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Defenders are sitting inside Skyshield Pad behing the walls without gap.
Enemy is trying to charge them.
But first initial charger can't be stop within contact, because he can put model only to ground beneath
does it means Skyshield defenders cannot be charged this case?

Moving onto the skyshield is done as a difficult terrain move. So as long as you roll sufficient movement distance to make it into base contact, Wobbly Model Syndrome lets you place the model as close as possible and count them as in contact.

Wobbly Model Syndrome is working only when model is able to stay somwhere, but can fall and be damaged. In Skyshield case, model is supposed to stop charge outside of walls, which are to high and model can't be hang on air

 insaniak wrote:
Moving onto the skyshield is done as a difficult terrain move. So as long as you roll sufficient movement distance to make it into base contact, Wobbly Model Syndrome lets you place the model as close as possible and count them as in contact.

This is a rather generous interpretation of WMS. The rule just gives you permission to count as being somewhere that you could place the model but don't want to place it because of the risk of getting knocked over, it doesn't give you permission to count it as being somewhere that you can't place it at all.

So in this case, no, you can't charge the unit on the platform. Try shooting them.

Well, by Peregrines interpretation: you are not allowed to fight a unit that is on the 2nd floor of a building because you cant place models there.

I will guess the skyshield acts like a building in the sense that under it is considered the "first floor" and the top being the 2nd floor, so use the same rules applied for assaulting a building, and i am sure there is nothing that says that the models within the shield is shielded in such a way they cant be assaulted.

Dracoknight wrote:
Well, by Peregrines interpretation: you are not allowed to fight a unit that is on the 2nd floor of a building because you cant place models there.

No, because ruins have a specific rule that allows you to be counted as being in "base contact" and fight across levels without actually touching the model.

I will guess the skyshield acts like a building in the sense that under it is considered the "first floor" and the top being the 2nd floor, so use the same rules applied for assaulting a building,

You will guess, but you will be wrong. The Skyshield is not a ruin or building, and does not use any of the rules for ruins and/or buildings.

and i am sure there is nothing that says that the models within the shield is shielded in such a way they cant be assaulted.

There doesn't need to be anything that says it, it's just a normal case of failing to get into base contact. It has nothing to do with the Skyshield specifically.

 Peregrine wrote:


This is a rather generous interpretation of WMS. The rule just gives you permission to count as being somewhere that you could place the model but don't want to place it because of the risk of getting knocked over, it doesn't give you permission to count it as being somewhere that you can't place it at all..

The rules also don't normally allow you to treat empty air as passable terrain. My 'generous interpretation' is the one that, IMO, makes the most sense within the ridiculous mess of rules that they have given the Schofield.

I dont have the book on me at the writing moment, but what does the skyshield class as?

I thought it was more in line with the bastion in terms of being a building.

Terrain Type - Unique (top is open terrain, to move on or off counts as moving as difficult terrain)

Since open air isnt the Skyshield you'd have to use the legs to get up?

You would think so, but no, there is no requirement to climb up the legs. Moving up onto the skyshield just requires a difficult terrain roll.

Presumably because a soldier's ability to levitate is variable...

Peregrine wrote:This is a rather generous interpretation of WMS. The rule just gives you permission to count as being somewhere that you could place the model but don't want to place it because of the risk of getting knocked over, it doesn't give you permission to count it as being somewhere that you can't place it at all.

Thanks, that's what I'm trying to say, but my English not so smart.

Although Peregrine is correct about WMS, Insaniak has nailed the heart of the problem. That being "ladders" aren't necessary and you can enter it from any point (with ANY model!). You can basically consider these models as having used ropes to climb up and are hanging onto the rope while trying to hit their enemies.. or even that tanks "jump" up onto the ramp like the old Dukes of Hazard car frequently did.

I wish they would just errata the skyshield rules to be closer to what they were in PlanetStrike which made a LOT more sense. The parts they left out between the "copy/paste" were kind of important.

clively wrote:
Although Peregrine is correct about WMS, Insaniak has nailed the heart of the problem. That being "ladders" aren't necessary and you can enter it from any point (with ANY model!). You can basically consider these models as having used ropes to climb up and are hanging onto the rope while trying to hit their enemies.. or even that tanks "jump" up onto the ramp like the old Dukes of Hazard car frequently did.

I wish they would just errata the skyshield rules to be closer to what they were in PlanetStrike which made a LOT more sense. The parts they left out between the "copy/paste" were kind of important.

Mhmm, the skyshield is a mess. Unless someone converted a Sky shield to have no open space at the base of it, I'd refuse to play them because it's too much of a headache to be worth the trouble.

In this case, you're going to have to come to an agreement with your opponent about how to get onto the sky shield or 4+ it because there is no real answer.

getting onto the skyshield is easy, you make a difficult terrain test, you move onto it as long as your rolled the distance required.

If you can't fit, you must acquit, If the top is full of models, then shoot some off from there til you can fit models up there.

People make to much of a fuss about the thing.

The only real issue that needs to be discussed is coherence for a unit. because basic models are to short to maintain 2" coherence if some of the unit is on top, and some are on the bottom.

If you call it close enough, then you open up for leaving a model on the skyshield, and the rest on the bottom, the whole unit gets its 4++. so go the other way and call it the whole unit is on top or the bottom. It makes assaulting a bit more tricky, but just keep shotting til there's room.

 insaniak wrote:
there is no requirement to climb up the legs. Moving up onto the skyshield just requires a difficult terrain roll.

This makes the most sense, I think. The model itself has room for marines to fit underneath (presumably the terrain underneath a Pad is not difficult). This would mean that you could move horizontally underneath the Skyshield until you can move vertically up onto the pad. Now you still need LoS to declare an assault, so you'd have to make it up in the move phase...but once one model is up there, he'd be the only model in LoS to get killed by OW (since the others are underneath), and then the rest of your unit could charge in!

sirlynchmob wrote:
The only real issue that needs to be discussed is coherence for a unit. because basic models are to short to maintain 2" coherence if some of the unit is on top, and some are on the bottom.

It doesn't matter how tall the models are. Coherency is measured from base to base, except in Ruins.

 insaniak wrote:
Coherency is measured from base to base

Could you give a quote for this? I've found two places where it says coherency is "the distance between one model and the next" (BRB p3, 11). I haven't been able to find anything about measuring coherency between bases, although I could've missed it.

Edit: the Ruins coherency, BRB 98, gives an extension to normal 2" coherency, making it 6" between levels. But again, it only mentions models, not bases.

I don't have my rulebook on me at work, but check out the section on measurement right at the front of the rulebook. It explains that measurements between models with bases are always base to base.

 insaniak wrote:
I don't have my rulebook on me at work, but check out the section on measurement right at the front of the rulebook. It explains that measurements between models with bases are always base to base.

pg 4, third paragraph under measuring distances.

 insaniak wrote:
The rules also don't normally allow you to treat empty air as passable terrain. My 'generous interpretation' is the one that, IMO, makes the most sense within the ridiculous mess of rules that they have given the Schofield.

Actually, mine is the one that makes the most sense. If you can't move into base contact you can't hit someone with a sword, you don't get to magically float in the air and fight just because it would be "unfair" if you couldn't charge. The difficult terrain roll represents the problem of getting up to the top using ropes/ladders/whatever, but to actually stay at the top you need to have a space for the model to stand.

The only drawback to my answer is that it makes it impossible to assault a unit on top of a Skyshield in certain circumstances, but I don't see any reason to assume that this is a problem, just like it isn't a problem if you can't shoot a unit that is behind LOS blocking terrain.

 Peregrine wrote:
Actually, mine is the one that makes the most sense. If you can't move into base contact you can't hit someone with a sword, you don't get to magically float in the air and fight just because it would be "unfair" if you couldn't charge.

I don't recall saying anything about fairness.

My point was simply that within a system that allows models to walk on empty air up to the skyshield, allowing them to stand on that empty air using WMS makes sense.

The difficult terrain roll represents the problem of getting up to the top using ropes/ladders/whatever, but to actually stay at the top you need to have a space for the model to stand.

Why can't they stand on the ladder that you just created for them out of nothing?

 insaniak wrote:
My point was simply that within a system that allows models to walk on empty air up to the skyshield, allowing them to stand on that empty air using WMS makes sense.

But they're not walking on empty air, they're moving up using the appropriate gear each model is assumed to have (for example, a demo charge to break down a locked door in a ruin) using the difficult terrain test to reflect the uncertain speed of such movement. That's something entirely different from WMS.

Why can't they stand on the ladder that you just created for them out of nothing?

Because, unlike difficult terrain tests for moving temporarily through space that the model couldn't permanently stand, there is nothing in the rules that gives you the option to pretend to be somewhere that the model can't actually be.

Fluff-wise it's easily explained by the unit having to use its hands to climb and not being able to fight from that position, so they wait until they have an opportunity to make a proper assault instead of climbing up to near-certain death.

 Peregrine wrote:
Because, unlike difficult terrain tests for moving temporarily through space that the model couldn't permanently stand, there is nothing in the rules that gives you the option to pretend to be somewhere that the model can't actually be.

Actually, that is what WMS is for...

 DeathReaper wrote:
Actually, that is what WMS is for...

No it isn't. Read the WMS rule again, it only allows you to move a model and count it as being somewhere else once you have placed it there successfully. It doesn't give you permission to just declare that a model is going to count as being somewhere regardless of whether or not you can put it there. It's a rule for keeping delicate models out of dangerous situations (for example, perched on the top of a tall ruin where one bump of the table will send it to certain destruction), not a rule for giving you access to locations you couldn't otherwise get to.

 Peregrine wrote:
But they're not walking on empty air, they're moving up using the appropriate gear each model is assumed to have (for example, a demo charge to break down a locked door in a ruin) using the difficult terrain test to reflect the uncertain speed of such movement. That's something entirely different from WMS.

I must have missed the part in the Space Marine Tactical Squad wargear where it mentioned scaling gear...

Because, unlike difficult terrain tests for moving temporarily through space that the model couldn't permanently stand, there is nothing in the rules that gives you the option to pretend to be somewhere that the model can't actually be.

We're not pretendting the model is somewhere that it can't actually be. We're pretending that the model is standing in difficult terrain that the rules for the skyshield give it permission to be in.

Fluff-wise it's easily explained by the unit having to use its hands to climb and not being able to fight from that position, so they wait until they have an opportunity to make a proper assault instead of climbing up to near-certain death.

If we're making up imaginary scaling gear that is never referenced in the rules, why can't we make up imaginary scaling gear that leaves their hands free?

 insaniak wrote:
I must have missed the part in the Space Marine Tactical Squad wargear where it mentioned scaling gear...

Page 99 under "walls, doors, ladders, and lateral thinking" explicitly says that the normal difficult terrain rules assume that every model carries appropriate gear for moving the permitted distance through terrain.

We're not pretendting the model is somewhere that it can't actually be. We're pretending that the model is standing in difficult terrain that the rules for the skyshield give it permission to be in.

Of course we're pretending the model is somewhere that it can't actually be. The Skyshield's rules just state that moving up or down counts as moving through difficult terrain, they don't in any way grant an exemption to the normal rule that you have to place a model at the end of its move and can't just declare that it's standing in empty space next to the unit you want to assault. You might have a point if the rules said "if you roll at least 3" on 2D6 you move onto the top level", but no such statement is given.

If we're making up imaginary scaling gear that is never referenced in the rules, why can't we make up imaginary scaling gear that leaves their hands free?

We could, but that's not the point. The rules say X, and X makes sense fluff-wise so you can't argue that it's so ridiculous and unrealistic that GW couldn't possibly have intended for it to work that way.

 Peregrine wrote:
The rules say X, and X makes sense fluff-wise so you can't argue that it's so ridiculous and unrealistic that GW couldn't possibly have intended for it to work that way.

Where did I argue that, exactly?

 insaniak wrote:

 Peregrine wrote:
The rules say X, and X makes sense fluff-wise so you can't argue that it's so ridiculous and unrealistic that GW couldn't possibly have intended for it to work that way.

Where did I argue that, exactly?

"Why can't they stand on the ladder that you just created for them out of nothing?"

That's clearly an appeal to the fluff of the situation, not the rules.

That was your fluff, not mine. I was just following it through top the logical conclusion.

Your Walls, Doors & lateral thinking quote applies to Area Terrain. It has absolutely nothing to do with the skyshield, which isn't a ruin.

But even if it does, if you're going to apply a fluff explanation as to why models can levitate to the platform, there is absolutely no reason to not also assume that this same method of ascension would allow the models to assault the platform.

That is, however, a far cry from saying that your interpretation is unrealistic and ridiculous. Neither interpretation is completely backed up by rules, and either one functions. I strongly suspect, though, that most players would go with the interpretation that doesn't turn the skyshield into an unassailable fortress.

 insaniak wrote:
That was your fluff, not mine. I was just following it through top the logical conclusion.

But it doesn't have a logical conclusion, and that's not the point. I only mention the fluff to point out that my interpretation CAN be justified fluff-wise, so it isn't some ridiculous obviously-wrong nonsense that GW couldn't possibly have intended. And therefore you play it by RAW.

Your Walls, Doors & lateral thinking quote applies to Area Terrain. It has absolutely nothing to do with the skyshield, which isn't a ruin.

Not true. It says "the normal rules for moving through difficult terrain allow you to do this", and the difficult terrain rules on page 90 make it clear that you always assume that you can move through obstacles unless explicitly stated otherwise. For purposes of the rules the height of the platform is just a generic difficult terrain roll, how you imagine your models crossing that difficult terrain is up to you.

Neither interpretation is completely backed up by rules

Actually mine is. If you can't get into base contact you fail the charge, and there is no rule that lets you pretend that models are in base contact when they aren't (WMS doesn't apply here).

I strongly suspect, though, that most players would go with the interpretation that doesn't turn the skyshield into an unassailable fortress.

But it isn't an unassailable fortress. Assault is only denied in the specific situation where you can't place even a single assaulting model on the platform. If you can get that single model up there you successfully charge (and note that even if no other model in the assaulting unit can immediately get within range to attack pile-in moves will force the defender to move off the platform and fight). If you can't kill even a single infantry model in your own shooting phase to clear a spot (especially with 6th's wound allocation system ensuring that casualties come from the edge of the platform first) then the problem is your poor list and/or strategy, not the Skyshield.