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So I'm playing SW vs Tau and it's about turn 2, I've got my Razorback parked with it's butt against a small wall, I know I've left my rear exposed to enemy fire but I'm thinking it will be fine becuase at least I'll get a 5+ (or was it 6+?) cover save from being behind the wall. Buddy jumps out with his Crisis Suits and proceeds to fire a couple shots at the Razorback. Boom, pen! I say okay, good shot, now for my cover save. My opponent says I don't get a cover save because he can clearly see the facing he is shooting at. I say that the Razorback is at least 25% covered by the wall and thus gets a cover save. We go to the rule book to make sure. Yup, anything over 25% lets you take a cover save. However the way it's worded makes me think it's dependent on the cover itself, in this case we agreed before hand that the walls were a 5+, so I say I should get a 5+. Still nothing, so I break out the ruler and PROVE that it's actually more like 1/3 covered. He grabs the ruler and pokes my tank and says that he can in fact see the facing thanks to TLoS. Not sure how he measured that other than getting his face as close as possible to the table and guessing, but whatever...

Whatever, let him blow up my Razorback...

I wouldn't care but this happens every bloody time we play! Help a bro out here. How can I avoid this baloney altogether or is there a better way to explain this rule? Do I need to make a template just to measure this?

Edit: misread.

Your opponent is correct. You need to have 25% of the facing the firing unit is shooting at covered, not 25% of the vehicle. So, the entire front of the vehicle might be behind a wall, but if a unit is shooting at from the side and the side facing is completely visible there is no cover save.

You get a cover save if 25% of the facing that is being shot at is obscured. The rest of the vehicle doesn't matter. (Page 74) That's assuming the firing unit is firing at only one facing. If they're firing at two facings, work it out by model.

I was talking about the rear facing of the tank, sorry. If he would have shot at the side of the tank, which he would have penned through anyway with how he rolled then yes he would have had a clear as day shot. As it stood however, the facing he was shooting at was obscured. The wall came right up to where the tracks disappear into the hull. Which to me looks like a fair chunk of the tank.

I would say it doesn't matter because I won, but that's just not true. This whole "tank facing" thing has caused a couple interruptions.

I am designing a template.

If he was shooting at your rear arc and it was next to a wall and was 33% covered you get the 5 up. It's all about the arc he is firing in and the relevant cover that arc has.

Watching this with interest as it comes up often where I play. my view is that the 25% should be from th arc you are firing at. We have a guy who will roll a row of chimeras up literally side by side and claim that they are all covering each other as at all times, 25% of them are covered. My opinion is that if it is coming at me and I can see 100% of the facing I am shooting at, it should not get cover. I usually just say the heck with it, not worth an argument and let them have it their way to avoid the hassle.

Did you show him the picture straight out of the BRB? I think that shows and explains it pretty well. It also references the facing situations, the one being oh I can see the side facing completely therefore there's no save. Specifically states that if the unit itself is in the Front arc facing and it's in cover completely obscured, but can see and shoot at the side arc you actually get a bonus +1 on that cover save. If he can see the vehicle's facing for the arc he is in, he does the shot from that facing, not a different facing.

 EVIL INC wrote:
Watching this with interest as it comes up often where I play. my view is that the 25% should be from th arc you are firing at. We have a guy who will roll a row of chimeras up literally side by side and claim that they are all covering each other as at all times, 25% of them are covered. My opinion is that if it is coming at me and I can see 100% of the facing I am shooting at, it should not get cover. I usually just say the heck with it, not worth an argument and let them have it their way to avoid the hassle.

It's a great tactic for protecting your side arcs from incoming fire, but dose jack for his front and back.

If you want to protect your front arc, you have to use your Imperial General Utility Armor, Replaceable, Dependable, Supplementing More Expensive Nonliving: Imperial Guardsmen.

Conversely, if the unit is in the rear arc, and you hid the side of the tank it doesn't matter, you only get the cover save for the side arc.

Vehicle cover rules are fun.

You guys appear to be talking about two completely different rules. The first one deals with whether the facing is obscured or not. If he is in the front arc of the tank and can only see the side, then the facing is obscured and you get a save for obscured facing.

If he is in the front arc and the facing is not completely hidden then he shoots at the front and you test for other cover. If something is in the way you check to see if the tank is at least 25% hidden. If it is, then you get that save.

Sounds like your rear facing was hidden by 33% and he was in the rear arc. In that case you get the save.

If he was not in the rear arc and the arc he was in did not have cover then you don't get the save.

Your terminology is slightly off, clively. "Obscured" is any time the facing the firer is in, is at least 25% covered. The "extremely angled" scenario (where you can see the vehicle, but not the facing you're in) doesn't really have a pithy descriptor.

Also, keep in mind that in the "extremely angled" scenario, the cover save is +1 to the cover obscuring the facing the firer is in - which is not necessarily covering the facing they're firing at. I.e., if you're firing from the front arc, but you can't see the front of the vehicle because of a 4+ cover wall, yet you can see 99% of the side arc, you can fire, but the vehicle gets a 3+ cover save.

Pyrian wrote:
Your terminology is slightly off, clively. "Obscured" is any time the facing the firer is in, is at least 25% covered. The "extremely angled" scenario (where you can see the vehicle, but not the facing you're in) doesn't really have a pithy descriptor.

Also, keep in mind that in the "extremely angled" scenario, the cover save is +1 to the cover obscuring the facing the firer is in - which is not necessarily covering the facing they're firing at. I.e., if you're firing from the front arc, but you can't see the front of the vehicle because of a 4+ cover wall, yet you can see 99% of the side arc, you can fire, but the vehicle gets a 3+ cover save.

Thanks for that! This comes up as well but I can't word it sufficiently to get myself a darned cover save!