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In the Blood Angels codex it states that a vanguard veteran squad consists of 1 space marine sergeant and 4 veterans. The sergeant has his own statline but it's actually identical to the veterans' statline. If I give the sergeant identical equipment to one of the veterans (say I leave his gear alone and give one of them a power sword) do those two models count as identical for the purposes of wound allocation (since they are functionally identical) or different (since the codex says they're different things)?

Thanks in advance for any insights.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/357825.page

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/352524.page

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/347421.page

Read these threads, come to a consensus with your gaming group, hope for an FAQ to finally solve the issue.

What Lehnsherr said. No need to go there again!

Short version:
They're different because they have different names and names are part of the profile.
They're the same because the have the same stats and equipment.

There's no consensus.

Scott-S6 wrote:Short version:
They're different because they have different names and names are part of the profile. This also means that options such as "Any Terminator may..." do not apply to "Terminator Sergeants," since they are technically different. This becomes an important distinction between "Any <blank> may..." and "Any model may..."
They're the same because the have the same stats and equipment. This allows for Sergeants and "nonidentical" models with identical gear and rules to take options such as above.

There's no consensus.

Added a couple of caveats to your post. Just some things to think about when considering how to play it.

If their stats are same they are threaded as same kind of units.

...except that several rules (for example, The Sanguinor's blessing) distinguish Sgts as being different, even if they have the same statline.

As Scott-S6 said. There is no consensus.

Xca|iber wrote:This also means that options such as "Any Terminator may..." do not apply to "Terminator Sergeants," since they are technically different. This becomes an important distinction between "Any <blank> may..." and "Any model may..."

I don't see that as being related at all. Those options define the model types by name. The rules for wound allocation offer a different definition - that the models have "the same profile of characteristics, the same special rules and the same weapons and wargear".

Whether we consider the name to be part of the profile for purposes of having "the same profile of characteristics" determines the result of this question relating to allocation - it has no effect on equipment upgrades which refer to profile names explicitly.