Assaulting - 5th vs 6th and Fleet

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**Quark**

Before the rulebook was out, I made a chart to compare charging success in 5th and 6th, with most of the emphasis on Fleet. It was based on the assumption that Fleet allowed you to reroll one die. Since then, I've seen it's player's choice for any amount of dice. Also, someone was wondering how the numbers would work out when dealing with Difficult Terrain, as that might lessen the nerf that Fleet felt.

The results are below, split into two charts - one without Fleet, and one with. In addition, I have attached the code if anyone wants to see my work for this. It's driven by SQL tally tables for calculations.

Here is a list of when you should reroll one or two dice, based on highest chance of success. Spoiler'd for length:

Spoiler:

**labmouse42**

Excellent analysis. Thank you for sharing.

Its proof that fleet has been nurfed for purposes of assault distances.

**Leth**

Indeed, however it does not factor in how many things are faster these days. Also could we see an analysis for fleet into difficult terrain in 6th? I would be interested in seeing how the 3d6 drop the highest with re-rolls would workout

**Quark**

Leth wrote:Also could we see an analysis for fleet into difficult terrain in 6th? I would be interested in seeing how the 3d6 drop the highest with re-rolls would workout

It's in there - purple line in the With Fleet chart. 6th Difficult w/ Fleet has a tiny buff over 5th Difficult w/ Fleet. In fact, Fleet loses so little through Difficult Terrain that it's probably better to go through it to mess with units shooting at you (or units that are not themselves Fleet).

**DrDuckman**

We should also probably consider the bonus of being able to shoot and then use Fleet now, which CAN be pretty big.

Granted, some units might not want to shoot to avoid runing the assault, but if you are facing, say, terminators or MCs or whatever, it's a pretty big boost. I know my shoota boys love it.

**Gangrel767**

Not to mention being able to re roll one d6 or more means you get to keep those high rolls, unlike jump packers who have to reroll the entire charge distance.

**Ailaros**

So, this misses two things. Firstly, by only looking at assault range AFTER movement, you're ignoring the fact that fleet used to only help you BEFORE the assault phase. Back in the day, a model used to move 6", fleet D6", and then charge for 6". Now they move 6" and then charge a rerollable 2D6" That's still fewer inches, on average. The only models with fleet that didn't net lose range are those models that got the old fleet rolled in (like cavalry, which can now just move 12" straight away).

Secondly, what this misses is the random element. Assaults are now much less predictable than they once were, and if you make it into close combat now has much more to do with how lucky you are, not how well you set up the charge in the movement phase. This further makes fleet worse than it was in was in 5th, as then you could still make a choice of whether to charge or not with a bad fleet role, but now once you've committed, you're in, and let the dice decide.

**Dracos**

Agreed Ailaros, that has been my analysis as well.

Pile in the removing casualties from the front with getting overwatch shots at you regardless of success or failure on the charge distance roll, and you have CC units that have a much higher risk when trying to assault with a lower chance of even making it to assault.

Fleet got nerfed big time this edition. Any unit that was good before because of fleet, is now essentially bad.

**Mannahnin**

The other part that you guys are missing is the one beneficial to Fleet units. Particularly to Tyranids and DE Beast armies.

Fleet lets you re-roll your Run distances, which helps you in the first few turns BEFORE you're close enough to charge. This results in a net gain of distance in the first few turns, before the decisive one when you want to charge, on which you've lost a couple of inches, on average.

Should be pretty simple math to work out the gain; Quark, your table is awesome; want to do this additional piece?

Something like, if I always re-roll a 1 or a 2 on a Run roll, what's my average gain? Or what if I always re-roll a 3 or less?

I know, from calculating Twin-Linked BS2 shooting in the past, that if you're looking for a 5+ and have two chances at it, you have a 54% chance of getting it. If you''re just looking for a 3 or better, and have a re-roll, you have an 89% chance of getting at least a 3.

I think the foot Fleet armies are going to make up the one-turn loss in the early turns' gains, in terms of closing with a shooty army.

**Jihallah**

Ailaros wrote:Assaults are now much less predictable than they once were, and if you make it into close combat now has much more to do with how lucky you are, not how well you set up the charge in the movement phase.

Right, because charging into a line of dudes with guns isn't the best way to start a fistfight, but does make for great "foolishly heroic" cinema

**Testify**

Fleet got nerfed. We know this.
Unfortunately, assaulting out of transports also got nerfed.
Eldar elite melee units definitely got hit hard in the new edition. Pretty much everything else, fleet or not, will probably be okay.

**Quark**

DrDuckman wrote:We should also probably consider the bonus of being able to shoot and then use Fleet now, which CAN be pretty big.

Granted, some units might not want to shoot to avoid runing the assault, but if you are facing, say, terminators or MCs or whatever, it's a pretty big boost. I know my shoota boys love it.

Treat it like this: if you shoot then assault, and your opponent overwatches in return, how many inches distance are you going to lose in a good/average/bad scenario? Look at the proper distances in the chart to see how that affects your charge success %, and decide based on your chances of ruining your assault if it's worth it or not. The change in chance of success starts to get very significant around 5".

Ailaros wrote:So, this misses two things. Firstly, by only looking at assault range AFTER movement, you're ignoring the fact that fleet used to only help you BEFORE the assault phase. Back in the day, a model used to move 6", fleet D6", and then charge for 6". Now they move 6" and then charge a rerollable 2D6" That's still fewer inches, on average. The only models with fleet that didn't net lose range are those models that got the old fleet rolled in (like cavalry, which can now just move 12" straight away).

Secondly, what this misses is the random element. Assaults are now much less predictable than they once were, and if you make it into close combat now has much more to do with how lucky you are, not how well you set up the charge in the movement phase. This further makes fleet worse than it was in was in 5th, as then you could still make a choice of whether to charge or not with a bad fleet role, but now once you've committed, you're in, and let the dice decide.

Both of these are shown, right in the chart. I'm not ignoring run, I'm ignoring movement. Movement is static and just clutters up the chart making it 6" longer than it needs to be. Fleet's 6th line being lower than Fleet's 5th line shows fewer inches on average. I'm simply showing, both for Fleet and not Fleet, the % chance of success under both editions. The random is quite obvious as well. Again, check out Fleet 5th vs Fleet 6th - 5th is at 100% chance up through 7", then decreases by 1/6th every other inch. 6th is already under 100% at 3", and the gap only gets worse from there.

Most of this wasn't to say "Fleet was nerfed', but to answer how much it was nerfed and to learn (based on % chance of success) when a good time to assault is. Beyond having a better idea of the assault cutoff, the only thing I saw that I hadn't noticed before is that Fleet units really should be using cover.

Mannahnin wrote: Fleet lets you re-roll your Run distances, which helps you in the first few turns BEFORE you're close enough to charge. This results in a net gain of distance in the first few turns, before the decisive one when you want to charge, on which you've lost a couple of inches, on average.

Should be pretty simple math to work out the gain; Quark, your table is awesome; want to do this additional piece?

This does introduce outside unknown variables, however. How many models are you losing per turn because you're running straight to a gun? Is the opponent also moving? The simplest answer is a Fleet reroll on a run (assuming rerolls for below average 1"-3") will change the average from 3.5" to 4" - so half an inch per turn. I don't really see a way to model it into the chart without also modeling many other variables.