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So, recently I played my first game in 40k (as a total newb who had no idea what the hell he was doing), and I was fighting Chaos.

So in my shooting phase, I had my Basilisk do a direct fire shot on a squad of Khorne Berzerkers charging my left flank, and I announced I was targetting them, but forgot to lay down the blast template. I rolled a direct hit, but my opponent argued that as I hadn't laid down the template before rolling I had to reroll. On the reroll, the Basilisk missed completely. Now, it didn't affect the game at all, as I would have got my ass handed to me with or without those Berzerkers, but in the end I have 2 questions about Basilisks and artillery in general.

1. If the Basilisk is firing direct fire does it still scatter the full 2d6?
2. Should not laying the template down first force a reroll?

Thanks!

1. no, if direct firing it'll scatter 2D6 minus your BS (3). Note that there is a pretty big minimum range for indirect fire on the basilisk so you will nearly always be firing direct.
2. there's no rules to say what happens when you don't follow the rules. In a friendly game I'd just let him place the template but I'm pretty easy about player error stuff.

Ok thanks! Yeah, I was getting pretty desperate in firing the Basilisk point blank like that....it should show how bad my situation was. Nearly all my Guardsmen proved to be horrible, horrible shots and extreme cowards.

Basilisk's are Awesome, but there's a little work that goes into firing them. Here's a checklist that I use to make sure everything is done correctly: (i'm also assuming you are within the firing ARC of the Basilisk):

1) visually look from your Basilisk gun turrets' persective and pick a model (I'll call it MODEL X) you can see in the unit you want to fire at that you feel will have the most models under the large blast marker ( you may need to go back and forth between the basilisk to the area your firing at a few times, but this is ok).
a) ANY part of the head, torso, legs, vehicle hull, vehicle turret will work
b) once all this is satisfied you've just estabilished Line of Sight (LOS) which means you can subtract your BS from the scatter roll ( this is important later)
2) Declare how you are firing the Basilisk: Ordnance Barrage or Ordnance* (Direct, see below)
3) declare you are firing at MODEL X
4) place large blast marker over MODEL X so that the center hole is over any part of the base (NOTE: you may need to look from the top down to get the best perspective)
5) measure range from the end of the gun barrel to MODEL X to make sure you are not under the minimum range, and also not over the maximum range
6) move the larger blast marker around until you find a spot where you can hit the most models while making sure that the center hold is still over the base of MODEL X
a) in the case of vehicles any part of the hull will work, even even a part you couldn't see from the Basilisk (loop hole... enjoy
7) roll scatter dice and if you have LOS you can subtract your BS

if you go in this order you won't have any problems.


*Direct fire means you fire as an Ordnance weapon, instead of Ordnance Barrage. Which means as an Ordnance weapon the Basilisk can move and fire in the same ture, can choose elevation, and can ignore minimum range... all things that Ordnance Barrage can't do, but you MUST HAVE LOS.

Cha.. Cha... Cha...

No to the first, possibly to the last.

It really depends on the person. Rolling a direct hit honestly wouldnt matter weather or not you forgot to place the marker or not, as it would land where ever the hell you wanted it too. Now if it was a scatter then it would depend, personally Id let you go ahead and do it, most people would, but some people are real jerky like, about things like that. Even getting your ass KICKED the guy wanted to pull something like that.

Since it was a direct hit, Id say screw you man, its a direct hit, its hitting where ever I wanted to hit. There really isnt much of an argument on that point. But again in the end it depends on the person. But I guarantee you wont forget to do that again now will ya


Automatically Appended Next Post:

mrfantastical wrote:Here's how you need to do it (i'm also assuming you are within the firing ARC of the Basilisk):

1) visually look from your Basilisk gun turrets' persective and pick a model (I'll call it MODEL X) you can see in the unit you want to fire at that you feel will have the most models under the large blast marker ( you may need to go back and forth between the basilisk to the area your firing at a few times, but this is ok).
a) ANY part of the head, torso, legs, vehicle hull, vehicle turret will work
b) once all this is satisfied you've just estabilished Line of Sight (LOS) which means you can subtract your BS from the scatter roll ( this is important later)
2) declare you are firing at MODEL X
3) place large blast marker over MODEL X so that the center hole is over any part of the base (NOTE: you may need to look from the top down to get the best perspective)
4) measure range from the end of the gun barrel to MODEL X to make sure you are not under the minimum range, and also not over the maximum range
5) move the larger blast marker around until you find a spot where you can hit the most models while making sure that the center hold is still over the base of MODEL X
a) in the case of vehicles any part of the hull will work, even even a part you can't see.... loop hole... enjoy
6) roll scatter dice and if you have LOS you can subtract your BS

if you go in this order you won't have any problems.


Direct fire means you fire as an Ordnance weapon, instead of Ordnance Barrage (can move and fire, can choose elevation, can ignore minimum range... all things that Ordnance Barrage can't do, but you MUST HAVE LOS).

Cha.. Cha... Cha...

Just wanted to add that a direct fire from a basilisk does NOT have a minimum range. That seems to confuse alot of people. But other then that, if you get into the habit of doing it that way, you wont forget stuff ever

Hmm, yeah, that was out of the order of play.... still seems kind of stingy though, I'd have just let that go, myself.

Ardensfax wrote:Hmm, yeah, that was out of the order of play.... still seems kind of stingy though, I'd have just let that go, myself.

Specially since he said he got his butt kicked still. I mean, I could see it if the game was REALLY close, or the guy was taking it, but beating the crap out of someone and STILL pulls that?sounds a bit TFG to me

mrfantastical wrote:Basilisk's are Awesome, but there's a little work that goes into firing them. Here's a checklist that I use to make sure everything is done correctly: (i'm also assuming you are within the firing ARC of the Basilisk):

1) visually look from your Basilisk gun turrets' persective and pick a model (I'll call it MODEL X) you can see in the unit you want to fire at that you feel will have the most models under the large blast marker ( you may need to go back and forth between the basilisk to the area your firing at a few times, but this is ok).
a) ANY part of the head, torso, legs, vehicle hull, vehicle turret will work
b) once all this is satisfied you've just estabilished Line of Sight (LOS) which means you can subtract your BS from the scatter roll ( this is important later)
2) Declare how you are firing the Basilisk: Ordnance Barrage or Ordnance* (Direct, see below)
3) declare you are firing at MODEL X
4) place large blast marker over MODEL X so that the center hole is over any part of the base (NOTE: you may need to look from the top down to get the best perspective)
5) measure range from the end of the gun barrel to MODEL X to make sure you are not under the minimum range, and also not over the maximum range
6) move the larger blast marker around until you find a spot where you can hit the most models while making sure that the center hold is still over the base of MODEL X
a) in the case of vehicles any part of the hull will work, even even a part you couldn't see from the Basilisk (loop hole... enjoy
7) roll scatter dice and if you have LOS you can subtract your BS

if you go in this order you won't have any problems.


*Direct fire means you fire as an Ordnance weapon, instead of Ordnance Barrage. Which means as an Ordnance weapon the Basilisk can move and fire in the same ture, can choose elevation, and can ignore minimum range... all things that Ordnance Barrage can't do, but you MUST HAVE LOS.

Cha.. Cha... Cha...

Also, in case this isn't complicated enough, note that you don't need LoS to model X if you are firing in barrage mode.

If you are firing indirectly (barrage) and you happen to have LoS to model X, then you can subtract your BS from the scatter. But even if you don't have LoS to model X, you can still shoot at it as long as it's outside your minimum range. But if you can't see it, you don't subtract your BS from the scatter.

Typically you want to fire indirectly whenever possible because the indirect shot counts as coming from the center of the *blast*, not from the gun, so it will often negate cover from intervening models & terrain. And it causes a pin test at -1, and can target a unit that it can't see even in night fight. That's what makes indirect fire worthwhile, and makes it worth learning the rules, even though they're a bit convoluted until you get the hang of them.

Alright. Thank you very much everyone, and I don't think the guy I was playing against was being TFG. I think he was trying to teach me a lesson in remembering to lay down blast templates and other things that would come naturally to a more experienced player. As for the Basilisk doing direct fire, I think both of us were just ignorant of the rules for the Basilisk. But thanks everyone. This has proven to be remarkably helpful.

I wouldn't have a problem with it, so maybe he was being a "borderline-TFG"

I was playing a two on two, and my partner proceeded to enter his shooting phase before I took my movement phase. Our opponents were being TFGs, so they said I didn't get my movement phase, which was total crap. We still won though.

Sort of thought I should vent there...

I was going to make a new thread, but I'll just ask this other q here just to save some time and space.

So in that same game, I had a Leman Russ shot scatter into some close combat between some Space Marine Terminators from my ally and some of his Berzerkers. I know you're not supposed to shoot into close combat, but what about scattering into? Should you resolve that against all models the template covers?

ChrisWWII wrote:I was going to make a new thread, but I'll just ask this other q here just to save some time and space.

So in that same game, I had a Leman Russ shot scatter into some close combat between some Space Marine Terminators from my ally and some of his Berzerkers. I know you're not supposed to shoot into close combat, but what about scattering into? Should you resolve that against all models the template covers?

Page 30, BRB.

While the actual rules issue has been answered, for the sake of clarity and avoiding misunderstandings down the track, it's probably worth pointing out that Basilisks are not artillery in the world of Warhammer 40K...

'Artillery' defines a specific type of unit in the game, consisting of 1 or more weapons carriages and a number of crew models to fire them. Vehicles are not artillery.