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Hey, he does a good job. 

I tend to be lighter-handed with post deletions.  Many posts which could be deleted to a better job of themselves displaying what a stupid thing someone wrote.  I think of it as  the "giving someone enough rope to hang themselves" approach.

Posted By Drake_Marcus on 12/10/2006 10:32 AM

Posted By Mannahnin on 12/09/2006 8:01 PM
Cincisamurai, Hellfury, please make an effort to attack the argument, not the person. Ad hominem attacks just demonstrate that your better reasoning and communication skills have failed.

Whatever are you talking about Mannahnin?  I see no post from Cincisamurai... *grins impishly*

Umm.... How is one supposed to perceive that post you made, Drake?

On one hand (because I have been here awhile and know that posts get deleted on occassion) It seems a boyish glee to wield the ax or it seems read literally that now you have deleted the post, that Ragnar's remark is directed solely at me.

I will take the first option.

I agree; it's the glee.

Just wanted to add.. beardy but legal.

If "remove = movement" then I can never "remove" models that have died on the turn that I assaulted with the unit. That would be 2 movements. I am fairly confident that remove is not meant to be a movement.

ender502

Its been confirmed by a number of sources within GW as legal. I would expect this to be confirmed in the forthcoming FAQ along with things like Shining Spears having Eldar Jetbikes, Auratauch Jetbikes not being able to Fleet, and Warding/Witnessing conflicts. Whether you choose to accept that is your affair, but their are plenty of things that are much cheesier that people routinely play that work the rules a bit, like 10+ man Death Company lists, Psy Cannons killing turbo boosting bikes, Siren Daemon Princes, and so on.

From a practicality standpoint, speaking as someone who owns the models to play this tactic, its not worth it. You are basically talking about a unit that puts out a far inferior template than a Whirlwind for double the cost and can only be expected to drop it the last four turns. While it is certainly true that the Hawks are unkillable VP (asuming they dont splat on an unlucky DS roll) on an uncluttered table, you are talking about 160ish points to maybe kill 4 marines total over the course of a game per squad. Against horde armies, you are better off with las blasters and running the hawks conventionally, anyhow. The worst thing you are going to do is deprive your opponent of 500 points of non threatening units to kill, while your army is trying to fight 500 points down. Realistically, the biking seer council is far more reliable VP denial and it actually is a threat.

Yes, but what about the Aurataurauataurachs? And the Autranaunachs? I'm just glad it doesn't apply to the Autarch.

Sorry, but psycannons toasting turbo-boosting bikes isn't anywhere close to cheesy...

They cost more than a Whirlwind but a whirlwind can be shot at, these guys are invulnerable to everything except bad luck with reserves and scatters.

That said, if someone tried to use it against me, I'd be happy to, I'd just ignore them and wipe out the rest of his army with superior numbers.

Posted By fourganger88 on 12/12/2006 8:20 AM
They cost more than a Whirlwind but a whirlwind can be shot at, these guys are invulnerable to everything except bad luck with reserves and scatters.

And a whirlwind has the strength and AP a heavy bolter, while the grenade pack has the strength and AP of a bolter.  It's amazing how nasty this tactic is (assuming you never die on a scatter) on almost everything but MEQs

Anyone whoe is claiming that this is fair because the hawks can't kill much with their template drop either doesn't understand the way VPs are scored, or lacks the imagination to escalate this case to a maximum VP denial list.

People are calling shenanigans because this is a unique (to 40k) case where you can spend points, that are guaranteed to be scoring at the end of the game regardless of your opponents actions, that will also have a small chance to do damage over the course of the game. If you could put all of your points into such a ploy, you would be guaranteed a win every game vs. anything but exactly the same list. As it stands you can only squeeze about 800 points into it, so the remainder will have to go into Holofield Falcons (which prior to this Skyleap reading were the most resilient unit in the game). The falcons can reliably hide from and outlast most enemy attacks, preserving their VP, while the hawks automatically preserve theirs.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shenanigan
Making 40k into a single player game is fair and fun how?

With that out of the way, it is legal rulewise unless deepstrike can be convincingly be shown to be movement or somehow negate the units movement phase.  I'd start with the cross references between reserves and deepstrike, where reserves does mention being movement.  I'd then argue that a model that cannot move does not get a movement phase.  True the models cannot move when engaged in an assault, which explains why the exception is specifically made.  No exception is specifically mentioned for skyleaping on the turn you deepstrike.

If all of this were ruled against, I guess I'd chase 3 Falcons around the table for 6 turns while being pelted with some templates.  I'd inevitably lose 200+ points of models, check my loss, make a note to never play this guy again, and move on.

Stalling would be a viable alternative in a serious tournament setting.  Gosh we only made it to turn 2.  Guess it's a draw.

 

Posted By Moz on 12/12/2006 9:58 AM

...either doesn't understand the way VPs are scored...

...this is a unique... case where you can spend points, that are guaranteed to be scoring at the end of the game regardless of your opponents actions,

 

You're contradicting yourself here.

Ah good point, I should say they are guaranteed to be surviving.

If you can't kill off an eldar list that is operating essentially down 500 points (minimum investment for three squads of rubber hawks) then you have bigger problems. Yes, its VP denial, but then so is every single SM squad that lives with one survivor, thanks to "They shall know no fear", especially when they pod in safely and get their entire first trigger pull risk free. There is also the daemon bomb, ect. Also, not all games are decided by VPs.

One thing that has been irking me through this discussion is the assuption that the large str4 ap5 blast template will not accomplish much. True it isn't great against marines, but I mostly play IG. A weapon like this makes Ork, swarm Nids, and IG completely powerless. 12-15 large ap 5 blasts can wreck an IG army. So "this unit isn't really that good" argument isn't sound. This is a very powerful unit against certain targets. The fact that it is unkillable just throws it over the edge.

   Even against marines if three squads can account for 12 marines (2 six man las/plas for ex.) over the course of the game that still adds up to 230vp's that only the possibility of a bad reserve roll on the last turn can compensate against.

   This is all in addition to these troops being pretty good at taking out veicles if they decide to engage. Tau have reason to be afraid if three squads of these bastards can come onto the table and stick haywire grenades to their skimmers. My gripe is that these troops do have their own merits in combat, plus the option to dance around in the sky if they want to not ever be shot. This makes them excellent troops. In a VP denial army they will always preserve themselves and do some damage. I think there shouldn't be an ALWAYS in 40k.  Every unit should be able to be killed by the enemy in some way, shape or form.  If this goes uncorrected it will make 40k a more idiotic game.  I want to get victory points for killing the enemy, not because they decided not show up for roll call.

Oh and a couple of other things for Phazael.  Who from GW is saying that its confirmed?  Plus, you can fit three squads of min sized hawks for under 400pts

Just saw this from the latest Black Gobbo.  Can't tell what to make of it.

"Many players will take an Autarch purely for his ability to add +1 to your Reserves rolls, meaning that in any mission with Reserves, you will have a real edge over your opponent — your units have a far better chance of turning up on time and on target. This ability combines very nicely with the Swooping Hawk Exarch Power Skyleap. Skyleap allows you to remove your Swooping Hawks from play, and then Deep Strike them back into play as if they were held in Reserve all along, dropping a S4 Large Blast Marker anywhere on the board in the process. Late in the game, an Autarch can allow you to pull off this trick every turn and still shoot those lasblasters while you do it." - from Phil Kelly.

Huh?

In addition to not answering the damn question, he claims that the hawks can still shoot their lasblasters.  I feel like I'm taking crazy pills!

Yes, but are you a hot little potato right now?

Youre not taking crazy pills, GW is just silly.

Now if they didnt give that little quip about shooitng before they could skyleap in the movement phase, then it would be fair evidence that this may well be a bonafide intent of the designers to trampoline the hawks the turn they deepstrike. But....It seems GW wants this unit to break every known rule and convention by writing stuff like this. Becuase kids love kroot-berserker-lascannon-shadowfield-kroxigors.

They could have made a FAQ for the stuff, but instead they choose to write that tripe.

Screw rules, just throw your dollies on the table and make gun noises.

I mean, this is the porsche of wargaming, right? Its not like I could invite a group of friends over to the sandlot behind my house and do the same thing with some firecrackers and G.I.Joes or anything....

Posted By Hellfury on 12/12/2006 6:24 PM
Youre not taking crazy pills, GW is just silly.

Now if they didnt give that little quip about shooitng before they could skyleap in the movement phase, then it would be fair evidence that this may well be a bonafide intent of the designers to trampoline the hawks the turn they deepstrike. But....It seems GW wants this unit to break every known rule and convention by writing stuff like this. Becuase kids love kroot-berserker-lascannon-shadowfield-kroxigors.

They could have made a FAQ for the stuff, but instead they choose to write that tripe.

Screw rules, just throw your dollies on the table and make gun noises.

I mean, this is the porsche of wargaming, right? Its not like I could invite a group of friends over to the sandlot behind my house and do the same thing with some firecrackers and G.I.Joes or anything....

Well if those were GW GI Joes.... you'd not want to use firecrackers.... maybe saltine or club crackers because that'd be all you could afford after paying GW prices for GI Joe sized figures.....

What seems like a good fix, to keep the unit viable, but at the same time make it actually have to be on the table during the enemy shooting phase would be to make it so the Skyleap power was used to remove the unit at the start of the turn and then they had to make a reserve roll the same turn to see if they would deepstrike in again.

This goes against the wording of the rules, but the wording of the rules is stupid.  This way the hawks could still flit around the board dropping bombs, plus they could shoot, and also be vulnerable to counter-attack.

Posted By Samwise158 on 12/12/2006 10:53 AM
One thing that has been irking me through this discussion is the assuption that the large str4 ap5 blast template will not accomplish much. True it isn't great against marines, but I mostly play IG. A weapon like this makes Ork, swarm Nids, and IG completely powerless. 12-15 large ap 5 blasts can wreck an IG army. So "this unit isn't really that good" argument isn't sound. This is a very powerful unit against certain targets. The fact that it is unkillable just throws it over the edge.

   Even against marines if three squads can account for 12 marines (2 six man las/plas for ex.) over the course of the game that still adds up to 230vp's that only the possibility of a bad reserve roll on the last turn can compensate against.

   This is all in addition to these troops being pretty good at taking out veicles if they decide to engage. Tau have reason to be afraid if three squads of these bastards can come onto the table and stick haywire grenades to their skimmers. My gripe is that these troops do have their own merits in combat, plus the option to dance around in the sky if they want to not ever be shot. This makes them excellent troops. In a VP denial army they will always preserve themselves and do some damage. I think there shouldn't be an ALWAYS in 40k.  Every unit should be able to be killed by the enemy in some way, shape or form.  If this goes uncorrected it will make 40k a more idiotic game.  I want to get victory points for killing the enemy, not because they decided not show up for roll call.

Oh and a couple of other things for Phazael.  Who from GW is saying that its confirmed?  Plus, you can fit three squads of min sized hawks for under 400pts

Couple things:

1) 4 Hawks w Exharch and skyleap can be crammed into 400 points, which makes it roughly the same as a Fury Librarian and 60% more than a Whirly, which both do the same thing more effectively with more risk.  Anyone with any intention of using their hawks for something other than bouncing every turn will likely not use minimum unit size and the people who do run full on rubber will be taking an Autarch to maximize the tactic.  Thats where I get the 500 point figure from.

2)  On average, you will get ten blasts, in total, over the course of a game.  Many of these will deviate out of optimum placement.  Asuming you beat the odds and manage to hit four marines every time you drop a plate, you will do a total of 20 wounds and kill roughly six marines over the course of the entire game.  Against horde armies, the hawks do far more damage with Las blasters, anyhow.  In any case, CC based lists will largely not care about the grenades once turn four rolls around, anyhow, because anything not dead is probably in CC by then.

3) Landing all three units safely, placing them down one at a time and they can die landing on each other, is not exactly a sure thing, especially if you are playing anyone with numbers in their list.  In fact, you need three seperate areas of 12" diameter and not within a foot of the table edge to do it risk free.  If the table has that much free space on it, then you are either already locked up to your balls in CC with your army, using way too few tooled up models in your lists, or already getting your poop pushed in anyhow.  The only truely risk free training wheels deepstrike comes in the form of pods in this game.  Further, to be truely unkillable, the eldar player has to go second, as they have to stay on table to take objectives on the final turn.  A librarian hiding back and dropping Fury every turn is arguably as unkillable and deffinately more effective for less points than a rubber hawk squad (to say nothing of orbital melta strikes), so nigh unkillable units of doom are hardly unheard of.  Finally, Hawks have been the bane of Tau for years, so there is nothing new there.

4) Every known rules inquiry to GW has come back saying that rubber hawks are a go.  Why anyone would want to do this, baffles me, though.  Spiders are almost as hard to kill and far deadlier.

 

Who/where did you make your GW inquiry at? My inquiry came back as that you only get 1 movement action in the phase, so no, you can't deepstrike and skyleap in the same turn.

 

I feel compelled to respond to your posts because I think each one of your posts is bunk in some way or another.

1.  You point out that in order for the hawks to be useful for something other than bouncing they need to be better equipped.  If the player is using them for VP denial then he may pump them up to a lot of points or he may want to sink his points into making his Grav Tanks and their units better.  I know that if I wanted to cheese it out as much as possible, 3 min hawk units with skyleap and intercept only comes to 411pts.  The only non bouncy use for them in a VP denial army would be to make a suicide run against a monolith or a pimped out land raider.  They likely wouldn't survive this attack, so I wouldn't try and make them too expensive.  Its also worth noting that this is a job that a Whirlwind or Fury Librarian couldn't do, plus both of those choices either aren't scoring units or will likely not be useful when grabbing objectives.  As the Autarch goes, a jetbike autarch with reaper launcher would be a good accompaniment to the hawks and would likely be a pain to kill w/JSJ and his speed.  You're right that this comes to more than 500pts but if the Autarch was in the middle of the Falcons he couldn't be targeted.

2.  I calculate that you'll average 12 blasts a game.  If you have a 2/3 chance on turn 2 and a 5/6th chance every turn after that.  It adds up to twelve over the course of six turns.  It may not be terribly effective against marines, since there are less of them, but the large blasts will be much more effective against Imperial Guard, Orks, Foot Eldar, and Nids.  10 lasblaster shots will only kill about 2-3 guardsmen on average, and then the hawks will be exposed to a counterattack.  The template threat will not allow an armor save in the open, which will herd the guardsmen into cover, bunching them up.  It will at least kill a similar amount of soldiers, most liley more, and can really punish squads that venture into the open, plus there is no way to counter attack.  Close combat armies won't be any better off because they'll just be chasing Grav Tanks around getting picked off little by little.  The VP denial bouncy hawks army is made to hide, but have a few weapons that can take potshots with little risk and fierce units (3 falcons w/snakes) that can pounce on an isolated squad.  This combination makes it really risky for enemy squads to spread out across the board, which contributes to point 3...

3.  There will likely be enough room so that DS is possible with very minimal risk.  The Eldar Grav Tanks can work to keep several areas clear on thier side of the board without too much trouble.  Granted, this won't protect the Hawks from some abysmally unlucky rolls, but I doubt they will have much problem finding open space.  Yes, if the Eldar go first then the enemy will get a turn of shooting at the hawks, but in this case, the falcons could be put on the objective grabbing detail, and the hawks can try and land someplace cozy, or like I said, land on turn five and go on a suicide run turn 6, if the VP total needs a re-adjustment.  It isn't guaranteed, but its pretty close.
     A Fury Libby is nowhere near unkillable.  Any unit that can deep strike with some decent firepower could kill him, plus fast units like pirhanas, grav tanks, or speedy Daemon princes can run him down.  Orbital Bombardments aren't scoring units and are unkillable because they are bombs.  Not only that, but they are extremely hard to use effectively.  A large str4 ap 5 blast may not be as deadly but its more accurate, flexible and reliable.

4.  I can't really comment on this one.

Those who have stated that Hawks aren't broken if they are used in the context of a balanced Eldar army are correct.  One or two units of rubber banding hawks aren't going to make that great of an impact.  Where they become broken is in the context of a VP denial army for the reasons I explained above.  If the RAW skyleap ruling is confirmed, the players using it will probably be using it in the VP denail force, not the traditional one.  That is why it should be corrected in FAQ.

I play in the LA area. And neither Deepstriking, nor Skypleaping, are movement. They are simply things that occur during the movement phase (with DS occuring at the beginning, by rule). Honestly, I can't believe anyone is flipping out over this has actually sat down and played games with it. Its not a winning tactic, its a play not to lose tactic which gets you nowhere in competitive events. Honsetly, if I faced someone with three units of Swooping Dorks, I would rather they bounced them every turn because they damage they can inflict on the table (especially against mechanized) is a hell of a lot more serious.

I play at the Baltimore Bunker, where the national HQ is. They are forms of movement. Just because they do not say "movement", they take place in the movement phase, thus, they are movement. And because you can only make one form of movement in the phase, you can't Deepstrike and  Skyleap. It clearly says in the Deepstrike entry in the rules that models count as already having been moved. And in the Skyleap entry, it says you can "remove"  a unit. That is a form of movement.

Anyways, I digress. I was just wondering where you had inquired at, because all the ones I have done with GW have been the opposite of yours. I do know that GW is setting up a better way to officially and uniformly answer questions like these.

 

Hobbs, this form of logical fallacy is known as the Appeal to Authority. No matter WHO says a thing, that doesn't inherently make it true.

The rulebook states that a unit which Deep Strikes cannot move in the same turn. It also states that they count as having moved for purposes of shooting.

If you want to claim that Deep Strike counts as movement, you need to actually support that argument or disprove mine (posted previously in this thread). Repeating your opinion over and over isn't proof.

Right...

Although Im in the camp that re-move is a form of move-ment; I admit its only my opinion; although I like to think a perfectly valid one.

Posted By Mannahnin on 12/13/2006 4:05 PM
Hobbs, this form of logical fallacy is known as the Appeal to Authority. No matter WHO says a thing, that doesn't inherently make it true.

The rulebook states that a unit which Deep Strikes cannot move in the same turn. It also states that they count as having moved for purposes of shooting.

If you want to claim that Deep Strike counts as movement, you need to actually support that argument or disprove mine (posted previously in this thread). Repeating your opinion over and over isn't proof.

They count as having moved because Deep Strike is a form of movement. It takes place in the movement phase. LOL. How much plainer can it be?

Prove that deep strike is a form of movement...Prove that removing them is a form of movement...

The problem is, Hobbs, is that when you call GW for a ruling you can call 10 mins later and get a completly different answer for the same question.

Thats why people find asking any employees of GW (short of a games dev person)a question to be sporadic at best concerning consistency.

They are no more qaulified to answer rules questions than anyone else here just because they work at GW.

By RaW, skyleaping isnt movement, and if a GW employee tells you it is, they are simply very much mistaken.

Now if GW is setting up a better way to answer questions, thats great. It really is. Bbut they have to get over the reputation they have earned in the last decade for making inconsistent answers to questions asked.

Saying you play at the baltimore BB has no more merit than my saying that I am jes goodwin's daddy.

The point is: Who cares?

Fleet of foot must not be legal either, since its movement in the shooting phase.....

/sarcasm

Your argument is pointless, anyhow, as there are forms of movement that occur with Deep Strike, anyhow, such as Lictors, Marines disembarking from a pod (I can just imagine you at a RTT telling some SM player that he can't exit his pod because you can't move after deep striking), the fact that a Speeder counts as having moved 12", and the million teleport/DS combos Necrons have. You can also wind up fleeing from CC if Repentia or BTs assault you during your own turn. The very foundation of your argument is flawed.

But lets say for the sake of argument that no movment after deep striking is an absolute. Removing models from the table is never specifically cited as movement anywhere in the main rulebook, even in the section where they talk about re-embarking into a transport. Neither is Deep Strike. Further, the wording of skyleap only procludes actual movement if you wish to use the ability and states that it must happen in the movement phase. Reserve arrival happens at the start of the movement phase in all cases. You can't roll bikes up and then summon Daemons any more than you can drive up a rhino, kick out the teleport homer, and THEN call in the Termies. It MUST occur first, which means the option to skyleap always comes after deep striking occurs. However you want to rationalize the rules, that is how they are written.

All that said, I still think its a dumb tactic that will only serve to annoy people without improving your chances of winning. Hawks can do so much more on the table against hordes/skimmers and the templates are practically useless against MEQs.