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I think I must be missing something but can't for the life of me work out if I am right in my assumptions, so some feedback is required!

If I am fighting two roughly similar close combats, one featuring a 'normal' unit and one with the Fearless rule, if the 'normal unit loses (lets say by two wounds for argument's sake) it takes a Ld test at -2 and depending on the result, either fights on or falls back.

Now if the Fearless unit loses the same combat, because it is Fearless it doesn't take a morale test but because it lost the combat it is subject to No Retreat and therefore could possibly take more wounds?

Basically, it looks to me like Fearlessness really has a major drawback in CC - ie you don't even get the chance to see if the unit may or may not fall back; simply because it is Fearless it takes further wounds. This seems to me like Fearless is at a disadvantage compared to 'normal' units in CC? Or am I reading the rule wrong somehow?

The difference is that the Fearless unit, while taking extra wounds, is never going to be wiped out in one fell swoop by a Sweeping Advance.

Fearless isn't supposed to make you invulnerable. It's just supposed to stop you from being routed.

insaniak wrote:The difference is that the Fearless unit, while taking extra wounds, is never going to be wiped out in one fell swoop by a Sweeping Advance.

Fearless isn't supposed to make you invulnerable. It's just supposed to stop you from being routed.

Yeah I get that bit but what I would have imagined was that the Fearless unit, upon losing the combat, still gets the opportunity to test morale; if it passes then so be it, if it fails then it is subject to the No Retreat extra wounds.

What I am trying to say (and struggling due to my poor grip of language, no doubt!) is that the Fearless unit is already at a disadvantage to the 'normal' unit because it doesn't even get the chance to see if it can fight on as per morale rules - straight away it takes extra wounds for losing the combat.

But you have answered the question with your response - I am reading the rules right!

filbert wrote:Basically, it looks to me like Fearlessness really has a major drawback in CC - ie you don't even get the chance to see if the unit may or may not fall back; simply because it is Fearless it takes further wounds. This seems to me like Fearless is at a disadvantage compared to 'normal' units in CC? Or am I reading the rule wrong somehow?

You've got it right but it's not as big a drawback as you seem to think.

Fearless is worse on very small units (where one or two wounds is significant) and units with high leadership and initiative (because they had a good chance of staying in the fight or running away without being caught).
So it's not great on marines because they don't often run away and don't get suffer sweeping advance when they do but very good on guard blobs who would otherwise be getting wiped out regularly.

Scott-S6 wrote:

filbert wrote:Basically, it looks to me like Fearlessness really has a major drawback in CC - ie you don't even get the chance to see if the unit may or may not fall back; simply because it is Fearless it takes further wounds. This seems to me like Fearless is at a disadvantage compared to 'normal' units in CC? Or am I reading the rule wrong somehow?

You've got it right but it's not as big a drawback as you seem to think.

Fearless is worse on very small units (where one or two wounds is significant) and units with high leadership and initiative (because they had a good chance of staying in the fight or running away without being caught).
So it's not great on marines because they don't often run away and don't get suffer sweeping advance when they do but very good on guard blobs who would otherwise be getting wiped out regularly.

It was one of those situations where it happened and I kind of did a double-take when I read and re-read the rule because I wasn't sure if I had interpreted it right but at least it seems I have.

filbert wrote:What I am trying to say (and struggling due to my poor grip of language, no doubt!) is that the Fearless unit is already at a disadvantage to the 'normal' unit because it doesn't even get the chance to see if it can fight on as per morale rules - straight away it takes extra wounds for losing the combat.

Except that 'disadvantage' balances out the fact that they will never, ever run away. So, again, will never suffer a Sweeping Advance, which is ultimately a much more devastating (and immediate) way of losing a high-value unit.

Fluff-wise, GW have explained it in the past as representing the fact that being fearless isn't always a good thing... the immediate wounds instead of a morale test can be considered to represent the unit fighting on despite being over-matched, due to being too stubborn/stupid to fall back.

insaniak wrote:

filbert wrote:What I am trying to say (and struggling due to my poor grip of language, no doubt!) is that the Fearless unit is already at a disadvantage to the 'normal' unit because it doesn't even get the chance to see if it can fight on as per morale rules - straight away it takes extra wounds for losing the combat.

Except that 'disadvantage' balances out the fact that they will never, ever run away. So, again, will never suffer a Sweeping Advance, which is ultimately a much more devastating (and immediate) way of losing a high-value unit.

Fluff-wise, GW have explained it in the past as representing the fact that being fearless isn't always a good thing... the immediate wounds instead of a morale test can be considered to represent the unit fighting on despite being over-matched, due to being too stubborn/stupid to fall back.

No I understand the rule and the fluff backing for it, I just wasn't sure if I was reading it properly because it seemed a little wrong to me.

I might not agree with it, but there you go!

You've got fearless wounds down pretty pat, but wait until you run into the next step of the adventure. Take a Hive Tyrant. Surround him with 20 Termagants. Charge them all into a combat. Sounds pretty cool right? I mean it's what Tyranids do.

Not so fast, bucko. You're going to get your ass handed to you FAST because of how slowed this rule is. Let's say ten Termagants died. They charged a whole squad of assault terminators or something I dunno. Just say they lost by ten because the opponent they charged into never took a single swing at the Hive Tyrant. He attacked absolutely nothing but Termagants with every singe last available attack. Never even glanced sideways at the Hive Tyrant. Sounds like they have to take ten armor saves right? Well they do. That's how fearless works, BUT WAIT, for the price of one assault the enemy gets to kill everything.

The Hive Tyrant is 'a unit' in the assault. He lost because the Termagants lost. Now he takes ten armor saves as well. So the total is twenty armor saves for the bugs, ten of them coming from literally nowhere, completely ignoring all of the Hive Tyrant's stats, rules, abilities and defenses, and just telling him to roll for armor until he's dead.

Enjoy.

I'm not sure what the problem is there... What it would seem to suggest is simply that charging Terminators with units that have little chance of hurting them leads to pain.


And for what it's worth, if the Hive Tyrant is the only bug in base contact with any of the Terminators, they would have had to direct their attacks at him.

insaniak wrote:I'm not sure what the problem is there... What it would seem to suggest is simply that charging Terminators with units that have little chance of hurting them leads to pain.


And for what it's worth, if the Hive Tyrant is the only bug in base contact with any of the Terminators, they would have had to direct their attacks at him.

Actually I've exploited this with different armies, but it is very easy to charge a weak unit but have one model make into contact with a nearby tough model/unit and have every other member attack the weak unit, thus ensuring that they both take any excess wounds. In the above you have one termie in contact with the tyrant and everyone else with the gants. Focus all available attacks at the gants and your almost guaranteed to send a bunch of extra wounds to the tyrant.

It's only "very easy" if your opponent doesn't know the rules or hasn't learned how to counter it. You can make it happen against an aware and skilled opponent, but it's not necessarily easy. This is why every battle report involving Tervigons written by a good player will mention gaunt screens, AKA "bubble wrap".

And if those assault termies were all fighting the Hive tyrant, it would *still* be dead. So I am not sure why this is considered a big deal.

It doesn't have to be terminators maybe it was a really lucky squad of guardsman. That has no bearing on the situation. If something is attacking the Hive Tyrant the Hive Tyrant would have the chance to use his stats, rules and abilities to defend himself from their attacks and all the Termagants in this scenario would still be left alive. Instead this incredibly broken rule makes it so that the most profitable course of action is to plow as many attacks as possible into the weakest models possible then get a 'free' dead Hive Tyrant when the assault resolution wounds are doubled in number.

Whether it's possible to avoid with bubble wrap or not the rule is still busted and makes absolutely no sense in multiple assaults. Defending it is just bewildering.

The rule is exactly the same as 4th ed. It is just 5th ed allows CR to go much higher than before.
The rule is not "busted", the 'nid player either messed up on the assault by not realising the consequences of the rules OR they didnt anticipate this on the defensive.

Its not difficult to avoid this situation occuring. It really isnt.

Let me add more fuel to the flame. I do not like the Fearless special rule as presented in 5th edition. I have read the fluff that GW gives for mandating the extra wounds equal to the number of lost units. To me it seems very arbitrary. I get the feeling they are trying to make the rule somehow less powerful for the sake of balance.
Brief review of combat; Higher initative models attack and resolve attacks, same initatives go at the same time and can counter even if they die as their blades were in mid flight. Lowest goes last because they fight with a hammer which is heavier to swing. To me when you fail leadership you are fleeing; a fleeing army would be pulling away while the other unit gaining a sweeping advance is their ability to absorb the hits they took, too successfully persue down you down. However, due to some oath, or pledge, or a commisar, or chaplain nearby, the group doesn't budge when they might have. They don't even stop too look at casaulties. How I can imagine them taking further damage because of this is beyond me, they are fearless. (Hence arbitrary) What are they doing that is allowing more hits? (arbitrary) More importantly who or what is causing the wounds? (ahem arbitrary) In the case of a sweeping advance I can imagine that turning your back invokes some kind of attack of opportunity, but this arbirary allocation of additional hits doesn't make any sense.
The easy fix to this imo is Fearless gives leadership 11, just don't roll box cars. If you aren't stubbron you take normal modifiers unless of course you are stubbron as well.

Can someone tell me how to use a Chaplain in a space marine army? I got one once upon a time, but his fearlessness makes him frustrating to use.

Except in combat you would be down to leadership 2 or 3 fairly quickly. And you would be needlessly breaking the "stats are capped at 10" rule.

With Fearless they are, beyond all reason, NOT running. This HAS to have a downside.

nosferatu1001 wrote:With Fearless they are, beyond all reason, NOT running. This HAS to have a downside.

Why does it need an arbitrary downside? Why can't you just say you don't have to run? Would that break the game? But more importantly, how can anyone not look at these additional wounds to take as anything but arbirtrary?

Because unlike you they understand what the rule is meant to represent.

Apparently it's meant to represent the poor state of cardiovascular health in every Hive Tyrant in existence since they all die of heart attacks when Termagants get killed at their feet.

Yay, hyperbole again.

It represents that staying in a fight you are losing is bad. If you are losing the fight really badly it is really bad for you to stay in the fight.

The trick is to not let yourself get into the situation in the first place, which is generally called "good tactics"

It is for 1 very good reason:

would you rather have a downside and cheap(er) fearless models?

-or-

Would you rather have less models on the field because any fearless models, and any models that grant fearless now cost between 15-30 more points per model(possibly even up to 60 more if the bubble is large enough)?

Personally i would rather have an "arbitrary" drawback

As far as hive tyrants go many complain they are too expensive right now(even prohibitively so); you take that same Fearless bubble of 12"(making a roughly 26" diameter circle centered on the tyrant) without a "no retreat" drawback, Fill the rest of the list with 6 units of hormagants and 3 units of Gargoyls and just assault the crud out of anything. You would be able to tarpit 9 units and never have to worry about fleeing nor losing any more models than what is naturally lost in combat. That Tyrant had better cost more than 170 pts base(likely 250-270).

In short the "arbitrary drawback" is done for game balance.

So balanced it makes Hive Tyrants have heart attacks because Termagants died. Nothing else. Never even had anyone swing at them, use any abilities on them, nothing. Just the sight of so many precious Termagants dying.

Truly I understand the heart break and anguish in such a horrible circumstance. Maybe they don't actually die. Maybe they break down crying and just can't go on with the fight. Too much suffering. It's shell shock that's what it is. Too much death, so they can't function.

If your Tyrant was involved in the Combat; He gets to swing.

Also; why was your tyrant involved in a combat with Gants where the gants were not, at least statistically, guaranteed to win?

Poor General-ing does not make a rule unfair.

You choose a ridiculous example for why the Hive Tyrant died, but you can easily make up plausible ones as well. The guardsmen blasted the gaunts into the tyrant, the tyrant was swarmed by guardsmen while pinned in place with dead gaunts, the impact of the charge pressed back the gaunts making the tyrant ineffective and unable to defend itself...

...or dont let your tyrant get multiassaulted with your T3 models...

No it totally makes more sense that the Hive Tyrant is just shell shocked at seeing his close buddies die. Do you have any idea that kind of bonds forged on the field of battle? Those were like brothers to him. More than brothers. Being brothers is an accident of birth. He lived with these Termagants, day in and day out, getting to know them, their families. What hive ship they were from. When all those lives are lost and he has to witness each and every one of their deaths mere feet away he just can't go on with the fight. Nobody needs to attack him even a single time, he just loses the will to fight.

Yay, SYG hyperbole again.

Seriously. Complaining that the rules are unfair in this case is like complaining that you basic gaunts cant win a combat against a wraithlord.

You let yourself get into a bad position, and you were punished for it.

I guess I would rather fearless models be more expensive than an arbitrary rule for balance. This probably was too difficult for game designers (which I never claim to be- my hat's off to them for the work they do) so they went with the rule as is.

I've read some good points, and I guess I should just look at it from a different persepective than being fearless. The models are more "reluctantly fearless." It's like the space marines are so much more scared of the Chaplain sending them to the 7th lavel of chaos hell than they are of the enemy so that confuses them when they know they should probably take evasive action.

That said, I agree with the OP that you should be allowed to take a leadership roll, and if THAT fails you take your wounds, roll your saves, and rumble on.

I always assumed that Fearless taking damage when failing an assault was part of natural melee momentum.
If you have ever been in a brawl, or even martial arts/kendo/LARP "boffer" or other melee simulation, you will be well aware of the fact that when someone gains the upper hand, they can often push forward: When men start to fall, the defense and offense they provide falters, and this can be capitalized upon with a renewed charge or countercharge. This applies to groups as well as to individuals: your guard is broken, you need to retreat or the enemy will use this opening. Whether that guard is a stance or a half-dozen guys doesn't really matter.
So a retreat is thus followed with a sweeping advance, in 40k terms and often in real life too.
And if you don't retreat, that enemy will do their sweeping advance right into your throat, and you'll be cut down.
So the rule isn't really BS, or stupid, or arbitrary, or any other of those nasty McMean words for rules that people who are inconvenienced by them like to throw around. (Somehow these words tend to be oddly absent when the shoe's on the other foot and the enemy is the one being run down, funny thing that)


As for why fearless units don't get a leadership check at 10-wounds lost to avoid taking these extra armor saves? This is a more valid question, but I personally figure the idea is that a fearless unit is too caught up in the fight to notice the fact that they're losing until they're dead: They can't adjust to their downed men in time to stop the sweeping advance because they don't care about it.

...oh, and hi everyone, this is my first post, I hope I haven't been unpleasant or irrational.

mynamelegend wrote:I always assumed that Fearless taking damage when failing an assault was part of natural melee momentum.
If you have ever been in a brawl, or even martial arts/kendo/LARP "boffer" or other melee simulation, you will be well aware of the fact that when someone gains the upper hand, they can often push forward: When men start to fall, the defense and offense they provide falters, and this can be capitalized upon with a renewed charge or countercharge. This applies to groups as well as to individuals: your guard is broken, you need to retreat or the enemy will use this opening. Whether that guard is a stance or a half-dozen guys doesn't really matter.
So a retreat is thus followed with a sweeping advance, in 40k terms and often in real life too.
And if you don't retreat, that enemy will do their sweeping advance right into your throat, and you'll be cut down.
So the rule isn't really BS, or stupid, or arbitrary, or any other of those nasty McMean words for rules that people who are inconvenienced by them like to throw around. (Somehow these words tend to be oddly absent when the shoe's on the other foot and the enemy is the one being run down, funny thing that)


As for why fearless units don't get a leadership check at 10-wounds lost to avoid taking these extra armor saves? This is a more valid question, but I personally figure the idea is that a fearless unit is too caught up in the fight to notice the fact that they're losing until they're dead: They can't adjust to their downed men in time to stop the sweeping advance because they don't care about it.

...oh, and hi everyone, this is my first post, I hope I haven't been unpleasant or irrational.

I try and refrain from McMean words as much as possible Good first post. Welcome to DD

This thread seems to be wandering into proposed rules territory, but I have to say upon further review I will agree that the rule can make fluffy sense in certain circumstances and makes more sense for speed of combat (GW's intent if I remember was to speed up CC resolution so the game would play faster). And honestly that’s fine, but armies who are almost always fearless in CC get hit especially hard with rules like this ('Nids, BT etc).

Of course sweeping advance (which has some of the same issues of expediency over believability) hits non fearless armies just as hard so I guess it's a bit of a wash.