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1. Do a Tech Marine's servo arms strike at S10 with hammerhand? Gut reaction is "yes", but the rule reads that it is an attack "made seperately at strength 8"... which RAW doesn't say it *is* strength 8. As such I'm concerned someone might rule that it isn't effected.

2. Can a vehicle hit incidentally (but not the "targeted" unit) by a Warp Rift be penned, or models hit incidentally removed? The rule reads "The *target unit* must make an Initiative Test for each non-vehicle hit." and "Vehicles hit take a single penetrating hit." RAW this would mean (I think) that incidentally hit infantry do not take it, but incidentally hit vehicles do. What do you think?

3. This one goes back to the last GK book and was ruled against if memory serves, but this is a new codex. Are "Psyker"s in fact psykers? There was some conversation about this when the codex first came out too... but did it ever get resolved? I can take 8 psykers per henchmen squad usefully for 80 points. With Coteaz I can take several squads. The Culexus assassin likes that a lot. If I loaded, say, four chimera with psykers (making them interesting variants on a basilisk) and let the Culexus jack someone elses rhino and roll with them he would fire at least 34 S5A AP1 shots at BS8 from the protection of the vehicle. If it works then he is able to remove any unit in the game with an average turn of shooting (minus Armor 12+ vehicles or maybe the odd few models from a 32 model horde.) Not bad for 185 points (counting the rhino.)

If any of these don't have absolute answers, how have you seen it played? How would you rule as a TO?

Indiges wrote:1. Do a Tech Marine's servo arms strike at S10 with hammerhand? Gut reaction is "yes", but the rule reads that it is an attack "made seperately at strength 8"... which RAW doesn't say it *is* strength 8. As such I'm concerned someone might rule that it isn't effected.

The Servo Harness always strikes at strength 8, because it says so. Note the lack of other codecies' terminology involving "counts as a powerfist". Instead you get two bonus attacks that are not at all related to the Techmarine's profile, and are simply strength 8.

2) Yes, as it is a flamer template. Still works as normal there...
3) "Psykers" do not have the psyker rule, so no

While the psykers do not have the "Psyker" special rule,

HOWEVER

The rules for their spell [Psychic Barrage] state that "All psykers in the same unit are a single psyker for the purposes of Psychic Tests, Ect."

ALSO

Within the Main rule book entry for psykers, it simply says "Psykers" and not "Models with the Psyker Special rule"



I would play that a unit of Psyker henchmen count as a single psyker for all purposes.

OK, look can we not do the whole daemon prince, great daemon thing again, please?

GW doesn't write very technical rules, get over it. A psyker is a psyker, duh. If you tried to claim otherwise at a tournament, I would disagree with you. <Let's leave the internet tough guys bits out of the thread, m'kay? --Janthkin>

Exactly. Unfortunately the issue came up with the last version of the codex and I did end up with an assassin who's speculum only coughed out like 5 shots instead of 3 dozen thanks to a "Psykers do not count as Psykers" ruling. I hate to have to call several places that are running it, ask the TO's for a written ruling, and play at the one who's decision I like... But that seems to be where this is going without an official GW stance.

Indiges wrote:...... where this is going without an official GW stance.

GW's official stance is "If you have to ask someone besides your opponent, then you're obviously being hard-headed and playing wrong. Roll a D6." Or, in other words, "Tournament players who want concise rules are just power gamers, and we don't want them buying our stuff anyway, so there."

nosferatu1001 wrote:2) Yes, as it is a flamer template. Still works as normal there...

So we just disregard the "targeted unit" wording? I'd prefer to do so of course. Do you suppose it was just a wonky way to write the rule rather than actually meaningful? I know templates normally hit everything under them but the wording was both specific and unusual.

Indiges wrote:1. Do a Tech Marine's servo arms strike at S10 with hammerhand? Gut reaction is "yes", but the rule reads that it is an attack "made seperately at strength 8"... which RAW doesn't say it *is* strength 8. As such I'm concerned someone might rule that it isn't effected.

If you're playing that Hammerhand is considered part of the Techmarine's attacks to get the Hammerhand bonus then I'm not letting you use it along with any other special close combat weapon. Because technically a model can't use two different special close combat weapons in the same assault phase. People conveniently ignore this and allow the attack to be made anyway (which is likely what the authors intend anyway), but you have to use consistency in this case and then also not allow the Servo-arm attack to benefit from any bonuses the Techmarine gets to his actual attacks.

3. This one goes back to the last GK book and was ruled against if memory serves, but this is a new codex. Are "Psyker"s in fact psykers? There was some conversation about this when the codex first came out too... but did it ever get resolved? I can take 8 psykers per henchmen squad usefully for 80 points. With Coteaz I can take several squads. The Culexus assassin likes that a lot. If I loaded, say, four chimera with psykers (making them interesting variants on a basilisk) and let the Culexus jack someone elses rhino and roll with them he would fire at least 34 S5A AP1 shots at BS8 from the protection of the vehicle. If it works then he is able to remove any unit in the game with an average turn of shooting (minus Armor 12+ vehicles or maybe the odd few models from a 32 model horde.) Not bad for 185 points (counting the rhino.)

Yes, they are psykers because their special rule says they count as a single psyker...but that also means they count as a single psyker. So your Culexus would also only count them as a single psyker.

Indiges wrote:
2. Can a vehicle hit incidentally (but not the "targeted" unit) by a Warp Rift be penned, or models hit incidentally removed? The rule reads "The *target unit* must make an Initiative Test for each non-vehicle hit." and "Vehicles hit take a single penetrating hit." RAW this would mean (I think) that incidentally hit infantry do not take it, but incidentally hit vehicles do. What do you think?

nosferatu1001 wrote:2) Yes, as it is a flamer template. Still works as normal there...

So we just disregard the "targeted unit" wording? I'd prefer to do so of course. Do you suppose it was just a wonky way to write the rule rather than actually meaningful? I know templates normally hit everything under them but the wording was both specific and unusual.

Yes, you disregard it because it is the kind of imprecise wording that is almost certainly just something the author failed to catch just as the vast majority of gamers would never notice it as well, if for no other reason that it would make the way this template weapon 'hits' its targets (see how easy it is to use that word?) vastly different then any other template weapon.

But yes, you are technically correct by the 'RAW', but frankly there are several other basic issues with how templates work in regards to vehicles (such as some vehicles not being able to fire their template weapons because doing so would mean that the template has to be placed over a friendly model...aka themselves).

yakface wrote:
Yes, they are psykers because their special rule says they count as a single psyker...but that also means they count as a single psyker. So your Culexus would also only count them as a single psyker.

However, their test regarding Perils implies that they are all individual psykers, something about every psyker in the unit takes a perils................. Just because a unit counts as a single psyker for purposes of casting the power (IG PBS or GK henchmen) does not mean that they count as a single psyker for everything.

don_mondo wrote:

yakface wrote:
Yes, they are psykers because their special rule says they count as a single psyker...but that also means they count as a single psyker. So your Culexus would also only count them as a single psyker.

However, their test regarding Perils implies that they are all individual psykers, something about every psyker in the unit takes a perils................. Just because a unit counts as a single psyker for purposes of casting the power (IG PBS or GK henchmen) does not mean that they count as a single psyker for everything.

There rule actually says: 'All psykers in the same unit are treated as a single psyker for the purposes of psychic tests, etc...'

That 'etc' is absolutely key and means they absolutely do count as a single psyker in all cases.

This is NOT the same as the psychic battle squad in the IG codex which only counts as a single psyker for the purposes of using a psychic power.

They are differently worded rules.


So IMHO, Grey Knight units with the Brotherhood of Psykers special rule and 'Psykers' in a Henchmen squad only ever count as a single psyker for any rule that affects psykers (good or bad).

Therefore, if a Henchmen unit with 'Psykers' suffers a perils of the warp attack, then all 'psykers' in the unit would all suffer a perils of the warp attack, as they count as a single psyker for using their powers.

And the last line of that paragraph says this:

"If the squad suffers the Perils of the Warp, ALL PSYKERS in the squad suffer the effects." To me that says that all of them are psykers, ya know, the 'all psykers in the squad' bit.....................

don_mondo wrote:And the last line of that paragraph says this:

"If the squad suffers the Perils of the Warp, ALL PSYKERS in the squad suffer the effects." To me that says that all of them are psykers, ya know, the 'all psykers in the squad' bit.....................

Then problem is, that they stupidly called these models 'psykers' and they didn't even bother to use capitalization to differentiate when they are talking about 'psyker' in the general sense and when they are talking about 'psyker' as in 'Henchmen Psykers'.

As I pointed out, their rules do say that they count as being "a single psyker for the purposes of psychic tests, etc", which, because of the 'etc' on the end, would typically mean this rule applies to pretty much any situation. Although its certainly open to interpretation whether that this rule is talking about 'psykers' in the general sense, I think we can safely rules that out because it then goes on to say (emphasis mine): "...and use their own Leadership value, not that of any attached characters."

As you can see the rule references their leadership, which does not make any sense if the rule was talking about 'psykers' in the general sense (especially given that most characters in the GK codex are psykers).

Similarly, in the rule you quoted: "If the squad suffers the Perils of the Warp, all psykers in the squad suffer the effects", this can be interpreted as either 'psykers' in the general sense or 'psykers' in the sense of 'Henchmen Psykers'. If you want to go with the former interpretation, it leads to some bizarre situations where any joined IC to the unit who is a psyker (which is most of them in the GK book) will suffer a Perils attack if the Henchmen Psykers suffer one when casting their 'Psychic Barrage' and vice versa...which I think is fairly ludicrous, but again I certainly will say it is ambiguous.


So IMHO, the best/correct way to read their rules are as follows:

"Only one Psychic Barrage is 'fired', regardless of the number of [Henchmen] Psykers in the squad. All [Henchmen] Psykers in the same unit are treated as a single psyker for the purposes of Psychic tests, etc, and use their own Leadership value, not that of any attached characters. The controlling player can measure range and line of sight from any [Henchmen] Psyker model when resolving the Psychic Barrage. If the squad suffers the Perils of the Warp, all [Henchmen] Psykers in the squad suffer the effects."