Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Mannahnin wrote:Not the case.

Look at Time Wizard's diagram again. Imagine that first model is 2" away from the assaulting unit, the wall is right behind it, and the rest of the unit is less than 4" from the assaulting unit.

You can see perfectly well that your assaulting models are capable of making base contact with the rear models if they take the difficult terrain test and score a 4+. Page 36 requires you to try.

That is all fine and dandy when the models are set up in such an obvious way. What about a horde of 30 Orks assaulting a line of Necrons. Can you be sure they will have to take a difficult terrain test with that many models? Can you visualize the space each Ork takes up after his move making the next move require a slightly different path?

Do the rules expect us to be able to do this? What happens when 20 of the boyz move before realizing the 21st forces a test causing them all to be moved back to their original spots?

Actually I think that actually solves this rule issue, there is no way to take back a move in 40k. You either can make the move or you can not. How can you be sure you put them all back in the same spots they started in?

scarab5 wrote:That is all fine and dandy when the models are set up in such an obvious way. What about a horde of 30 Orks assaulting a line of Necrons. Can you be sure they will have to take a difficult terrain test with that many models? Can you visualize the space each Ork takes up after his move making the next move require a slightly different path?

Funny thing is.. that actually makes it easier to tell. The rules tell us a couple things:

1. You cannot hold back. If a model can possibly make base to base, it must try.
2. If just one model in the unit will have to take a difficult test to get into B2B then the unit tests as a whole.

It's pretty safe to say with a mob of 30 boys that at least one of them will have to cross difficult in that scenario thus forcing the test.

The Green Git wrote:

scarab5 wrote:That is all fine and dandy when the models are set up in such an obvious way. What about a horde of 30 Orks assaulting a line of Necrons. Can you be sure they will have to take a difficult terrain test with that many models? Can you visualize the space each Ork takes up after his move making the next move require a slightly different path?

Funny thing is.. that actually makes it easier to tell. The rules tell us a couple things:

1. You cannot hold back. If a model can possibly make base to base, it must try.
2. If just one model in the unit will have to take a difficult test to get into B2B then the unit tests as a whole.

It's pretty safe to say with a mob of 30 boys that at least one of them will have to cross difficult in that scenario thus forcing the test.

Ah sorry, I meant to say the difficult terrain is off to the sides, and would only be hit if an Ork had to run around another Ork that assaulted just before him. So unless you know how far to the sides your blob of Orks will get, you don't know until you have placed several of them.

Are your suggesting to eyeball it and make the call based on that? Not all difficult terrain tests are forced because you are assaulting units behind the terrain, it could be off to the sides that you bump into avoiding your already placed models.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also just thought about the nightmare of trying to determine form the blob of Orks which will go to which Necron base? The first move is not very hard, second is pretty straight forward, 15th get a bit more complicated...

*Chants* Wizard, wizard, wizard!! *chants*

There are many bounties to using cover. And one of them has been detailed above. The rules explain it, and they have been quoted over and over again... well.

If you do not wish to use these rules... then don't. All the power to you. It does not change what is written in the rulebook. We can all agree it is written there... as there are letters that have been arranged together to form sentences, and paragraphs...

Grrr, this has gone on for too long.

Iago wrote:Grrr, this has gone on for too long.

QFT!

I'm going with Wizard on this one; and I don't quite understand the other side's argument.

See, here's the key. FIRST, you declare the assault. THEN, you GET TO MEASURE.

That isn't pre-measuring, it's measuring the assault distance to see if you're in range, and you can do it for all your models. That makes it perfectly easy to tell if anyone has to go through DT. Then, at that point, BEFORE you actually move anybody, you take the DT test if you have to, based not on where the first model goes but on where everybody goes.

BeRzErKeR wrote:I'm going with Wizard on this one; and I don't quite understand the other side's argument.

See, here's the key. FIRST, you declare the assault. THEN, you GET TO MEASURE.

That isn't pre-measuring, it's measuring the assault distance to see if you're in range, and you can do it for all your models. That makes it perfectly easy to tell if anyone has to go through DT. Then, at that point, BEFORE you actually move anybody, you take the DT test if you have to, based not on where the first model goes but on where everybody goes.

And how exactly are you supposed to know how your models are going to be moving in the future? There are many different ways to make the assault move, and the rules do not even suggest that you are supposed to "look ahead" and see if you have to test before moving even 1 model.

thebetter1 wrote:And how exactly are you supposed to know how your models are going to be moving in the future? There are many different ways to make the assault move, and the rules do not even suggest that you are supposed to "look ahead" and see if you have to test before moving even 1 model.

How is this any different than having special deployment rules and requiring players to figure out a sequence of events in which all of the rules work?

solkan wrote:

thebetter1 wrote:And how exactly are you supposed to know how your models are going to be moving in the future? There are many different ways to make the assault move, and the rules do not even suggest that you are supposed to "look ahead" and see if you have to test before moving even 1 model.

How is this any different than having special deployment rules and requiring players to figure out a sequence of events in which all of the rules work?

Such as...

IMO:

The rules on Pg 34 seem to indicate that only the first model must take the shortest route, and only this model MUST test for difficult terrain if taking this shortest route.

There are obviously possibilities where some assaulting models must move through difficult terrain even though the first is not required to (for example, if the first model is out of terrain and the rest of the assaulting squad is inside) which could explain pg36.

Still, following the rules on pg34 and pg14, I feel that if a player does not declare that a model is moving through difficult terrain, it may not move through difficult terrain. As declaring movement through difficult terrain is not a compulsory part of the movement for any model other than the first, you are not forced to do it. So, it is thus not possible to move into base contact with an enemy that may be within 6 inches (or even within 1 inch) if you don't declare; and so, you can move all your models into assault with enemy units not in terrain and it still be a legal move.

IMO.
(Tau player, i don't do assault, thats just my reading of the rules)

Trasvi wrote: IMO:

The rules on Pg 34 seem to indicate that only the first model must take the shortest route, and only this model MUST test for difficult terrain if taking this shortest route.

Partially correct. Only the first model must take the shortest route, but any model moving through difficult terrain must take the test.

Trasvi wrote:There are obviously possibilities where some assaulting models must move through difficult terrain even though the first is not required to (for example, if the first model is out of terrain and the rest of the assaulting squad is inside) which could explain pg36.

Yes, true.

Trasvi wrote:Still, following the rules on pg34 and pg14, I feel that if a player does not declare that a model is moving through difficult terrain, it may not move through difficult terrain. As declaring movement through difficult terrain is not a compulsory part of the movement for any model other than the first, you are not forced to do it. So, it is thus not possible to move into base contact with an enemy that may be within 6 inches (or even within 1 inch) if you don't declare; and so, you can move all your models into assault with enemy units not in terrain and it still be a legal move.

IMO.
(Tau player, i don't do assault, thats just my reading of the rules)

The compulsory part is that after moving the first model into base contact, subsequent models must move into base contact with unengaged models if possible and if in so doing move through difficult or dangerous terrain, the entire unit must take the relevant test.

time wizard wrote:
The compulsory part is that after moving the first model into base contact, subsequent models must move into base contact with unengaged models if possible and if in so doing move through difficult or dangerous terrain, the entire unit must take the relevant test.

and hence the disagreement.
I believe the rules indicate that, unless you have chosen to (or been forced to) roll a difficult terrain test, you may not move into difficult terrain (pg14).
Thus "and if in so doing move through difficult or dangerous terrain," is a situation that can never happen. It is not possible for the assaulters to move into base contact with unengaged models if they cannot enter difficult terrain.

Pg 34 even gives an importance order of the assault movement conditions, and getting all models into btb with an unengaged model is the LEAST important. seeing as we can't fulfill the least important rule, we move to a more important one and every model just attempts to make it into Btb with an already engaged model / engaged member of their squad.

In time wizards brilliant diagram, if with the models that may have to go over the wall, you can make a 6 inch assault move that gets you into an unengaged enemy by going around the wall, then yes, because you don't need to take the shortest route, you could go around it, however, if there is no such go around the wall, you still need to assault the part of the unit behind the wall that is unengaged, and hence would have to make a difficult terrain test.
EX: Y ----- Y Y X X X X
Lets say its 6 inches for the right most member of unit X to the member of unit Y behind the wall , then after the shortest to shortest, you could choose to move the right most member around the wall to engage the enemy behind the wall, then the rest of the unit could engage around the enemy in front of the wall as long as you can keep coherency and don't need to take a test. however, if the wall is longer, or if there are other members of the unit behind the wall that you cannot reach, you will have to go over the wall to engage the most enemy models and hence, force a difficult terrain test.

Assault moves are not movement moves, and hence, you do not 'declare' you are moving through cover, either you are forced to move through cover or you are not, if you are forced to move through cover you must make a roll. it doesn't matter which member of the unit is forced to move though cover as part of the assault, if any member is so forced, you must make the roll for the whole unit. those are the rules, disregard them if you like, but know you are disregarding the rules.

Before this goes any further, it may be useful to note the previous two threads about assaulting into difficult terrain, and where those threads ended up.
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/244474.page "How do you play it: assaulting a unit partially in cover", and
http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/205011.page "Assaulting through difficult terrain, or not!".

There's one camp which says that after the assault has been declared, before the first model has moved the assaulting player may have a choice whether or not to make a difficult terrain test if the first model doesn't have to move through difficult terrain. If no difficult terrain test is made, then the unit cannot move through difficult terrain for that assault movement.

There's another camp which says that after the assault is declared, the player has to measure out all of the assault moves to determine whether a difficult terrain test is necessary, and then the assault moves are subject to that roll if needed. Measurement in this case would be done to avoid the messy situation of conducting some of the assault moves and discovering that the assault had been made in error and trying to figure out where the models originated.

There are some variations in the middle, but that's pretty much what the conclusions were. It comes down to whether or not you interpret the secondary assault movements as compelling the movement through difficult terrain or not.

Fizzywig wrote:
Assault moves are not movement moves, and hence, you do not 'declare' you are moving through cover, either you are forced to move through cover or you are not, if you are forced to move through cover you must make a roll. it doesn't matter which member of the unit is forced to move though cover as part of the assault, if any member is so forced, you must make the roll for the whole unit. those are the rules, disregard them if you like, but know you are disregarding the rules.

As you have not supplied any rules reference to support this, I will not consider it valid. Models do not make difficult terrain tests. The unit does before any models are moved.

solkan wrote:
There's another camp which says that after the assault is declared, the player has to measure out all of the assault moves to determine whether a difficult terrain test is necessary, and then the assault moves are subject to that roll if needed. Measurement in this case would be done to avoid the messy situation of conducting some of the assault moves and discovering that the assault had been made in error and trying to figure out where the models originated.

I see two major problems with this camp. Firstly, it requires predicting the future. You would have to look ahead and see which decisions you are going to make before you are required to make them.

Secondly, the rules do not require planning on getting as many models as possible into combat before the charge begins. They lay out a very specific set of rules about how to move each individual model, and then says that the sequence should have resulted in as many models as possible being in contact. This leads me to believe that it really is impossible to move through difficult terrain unless you tested first, as the unit would have ended up with more models in contact otherwise. Also, if you really were required to plan ahead to get as many models as possible in, wouldn't this also force you to move closer in the movement phase if you are able? What about being forced to run if you have fleet?

What happens if you try to assault a squad that's in area terrain if a model's only like an inch inside it? Do you still need for difficult terrain if you're within 6"?

you can move your models in any way you want them to...there's no restrictions and anyone who thinks I'm wrong plays spayz puppiez


Automatically Appended Next Post:
how fukn hot is it today zoot...i'm like melting here in me room


Automatically Appended Next Post:
how fukn hot is it today zoot...i'm like melting here in me room

Yes.

thebetter1 wrote:

Fizzywig wrote:
Assault moves are not movement moves, and hence, you do not 'declare' you are moving through cover, either you are forced to move through cover or you are not, if you are forced to move through cover you must make a roll. it doesn't matter which member of the unit is forced to move though cover as part of the assault, if any member is so forced, you must make the roll for the whole unit. those are the rules, disregard them if you like, but know you are disregarding the rules.

As you have not supplied any rules reference to support this, I will not consider it valid. Models do not make difficult terrain tests. The unit does before any models are moved.

Well, I have provided the rules in a few previous posts. BRB, page 36, right hand column under "ASSAULTING THROUGH COVER". I'm not going to quote the rule again, I've done that a few times also. Just look at the rule, it tells you who test, when they test and even why they test.
It really doesn't get any clearer than this.

solkan wrote:

thebetter1 wrote:And how exactly are you supposed to know how your models are going to be moving in the future? There are many different ways to make the assault move, and the rules do not even suggest that you are supposed to "look ahead" and see if you have to test before moving even 1 model.

How is this any different than having special deployment rules and requiring players to figure out a sequence of events in which all of the rules work?

Quite easy actually, you use that thinking machine atop your neck. If you're grasp of spatial mechanics is insufficient to do so, well, I dunno what to say.

time wizard wrote:

thebetter1 wrote:

Fizzywig wrote:
Assault moves are not movement moves, and hence, you do not 'declare' you are moving through cover, either you are forced to move through cover or you are not, if you are forced to move through cover you must make a roll. it doesn't matter which member of the unit is forced to move though cover as part of the assault, if any member is so forced, you must make the roll for the whole unit. those are the rules, disregard them if you like, but know you are disregarding the rules.

As you have not supplied any rules reference to support this, I will not consider it valid. Models do not make difficult terrain tests. The unit does before any models are moved.

Well, I have provided the rules in a few previous posts. BRB, page 36, right hand column under "ASSAULTING THROUGH COVER". I'm not going to quote the rule again, I've done that a few times also. Just look at the rule, it tells you who test, when they test and even why they test.
It really doesn't get any clearer than this.

And I have provided the rules from page 34, which say that an assault move is done like a normal move with extra rules, the rules on page 14 that tells the player to choose whether or not he wants to go through difficult terrain, and the fact that many of the assault rules use the language "as possible" or "if possible" meaning that just because there are times where it might not be possible to follow that rule does not mean that the assault move is invalidated.

willydstyle wrote:And I have provided the rules from page 34, which say that an assault move is done like a normal move with extra rules, the rules on page 14 that tells the player to choose whether or not he wants to go through difficult terrain, and the fact that many of the assault rules use the language "as possible" or "if possible" meaning that just because there are times where it might not be possible to follow that rule does not mean that the assault move is invalidated.

The rules on page 34 start by saying that you move like a normal move except that you may move within 1" of an enemy unit. The next sentence lists all of the conditions that would make an assault move impossible.

The next paragraph starts with, "Assaulting units must attempt to engage as many opposing models as possible with as many of their models as possible - no holding back!" This means that if it is possible for a model to get into base contact with an unengaged enemy model, it must do so! If this means that the model has to move through difficult terrain it must do so! This means the unit must take a difficult terrain test.

You don't have the option of saying that you are not going to move a model into base contact with an unengaged enemy model because to do so it has to move through difficult terrain. The rules for moving assaulting models are very clear on this. If you follow the rules bullet point by bullet point you see that this is the way you conduct an assault move.

Page 34 starts by saying to move the first closest friendly model into contact with the closest enemy model by the shortest distance. Page 36 gives the rules for assaulting through cover, which the rules on page 34 do not address. You could no more follow the rules on moving assaulting models on page 34, while ignoring those about assaulting through cover on page 36 as you could follow the rules for shooting while ignoring the rules for cover saves.

You can't say that moving an assaulting model through cover is optional when the rules on page 34 clearly spell out when it is mandatory.

And it is still not possible to move a unit into cover if no terrain check is made.

That check is optional - other than the first model.

The part that says "if possible" allows for it not being possible.

/shrug

It seems this will never be resolved. Oh well.

I thought we figured that out two threads ago?

That said, the OP question was answered on page 1 and I think we all agree on that answer.

kirsanth wrote:I thought we figured that out two threads ago?

That said, the OP question was answered on page 1 and I think we all agree on that answer.

As did GW, in a previous FAQ:

Q. If a unit charges an enemy unit that is partially in
cover (i.e. some of its models are in cover whilst others
aren’t), does it have to make a difficult terrain test, or can
it choose to just engage the models outside the cover?
A. The assault move should be resolved following the
normal rules for moving charging models, against all of
the models in the enemy unit (the chargers cannot
decide to assault only the enemies outside the cover). If
this means that any of the charging models has to enter
difficult terrain to engage an enemy, the entire unit must
take a difficult terrain test before the first charging model
is moved (so the entire unit could fail to reach
altogether!).

don_mondo wrote:

kirsanth wrote:I thought we figured that out two threads ago?

That said, the OP question was answered on page 1 and I think we all agree on that answer.

As did GW, in a previous FAQ:

Q. If a unit charges an enemy unit that is partially in
cover (i.e. some of its models are in cover whilst others
aren’t), does it have to make a difficult terrain test, or can
it choose to just engage the models outside the cover?
A. The assault move should be resolved following the
normal rules for moving charging models, against all of
the models in the enemy unit (the chargers cannot
decide to assault only the enemies outside the cover). If
this means that any of the charging models has to enter
difficult terrain to engage an enemy, the entire unit must
take a difficult terrain test before the first charging model
is moved (so the entire unit could fail to reach
altogether!).

Wonderful . . . one problem this is no longer a current FAQ, and so is no long a valid house rule.

The argument that you must test for the possibility of moving through difficult terrain is very flawed. However, I will accept it if somebody is able to write a specific set of rules listing the exact conditions required for a test to be mandatory. If you can do this in a way that the rules support, without saying anything vague like "just eyeball it" or anything else like that, then that would be sufficient for your argument.

*beats dead horse*

thebetter1 wrote:The argument that you must test for the possibility of moving through difficult terrain is very flawed. However, I will accept it if somebody is able to write a specific set of rules listing the exact conditions required for a test to be mandatory. If you can do this in a way that the rules support, without saying anything vague like "just eyeball it" or anything else like that, then that would be sufficient for your argument.

*sigh* this;

I'm afraid you're not following the rules on page 34. I've listed them a few times.

X X X X X enemy unit
******** wall
X additional enemy model part of unit

Y Y friendly unit (assaulting and 3" away from red X, exactly 6" away from yellow Y)

Step 1 - Blue Y moves into base contact with red X (Page 34, 2nd paragraph under 'MOVING ASSAULTING MODELS')
Step 2 - Yellow Y has to move into base contact with X model, but not the red one. (page 34 bullet point 2)
To do so, it must move over the wall. To do that, it must make a difficult terrain test. Therefore the unit makes a difficult terrain test. (page 36 under 'ASSAULTING THROUGH COVER' )
If they roll a 3, then blue Y can still assult, but yellow Y will now have to assault red X because the yellow X models are no longer in reach. (page 34 2nd bullet point)
If they roll a 1, then blue Y can't reach red X so the assault does not take place. (page 36 under 'ASSAULTING THROUGH COVER', "...such test might cause the assault to fail altogether if the closest model cannot make it into contact with the enemy.")

....and this;

Look at page 36 under 'Assaulting Through Cover' - "If, following the rules for moving assaulting models (see page 34), any model in an assaulting unit will have to go through difficult or dangerous terrain as part of its assault move, the unit must take the relevant terrain test before moving." {emphasis mine}
You must follow the rules for assaulting models,
1-closest model must move in base contact with nearest enemy
2-each model must end in coherency with a model that already moved
3-if possible the model must move into base contact with an unengaged enemy model
4-if not, move into base contact with already engaged model
5-if not, move within 2" of a friendly engaged model
6-if not, stay in coherency

So following the assault rules, you must move all of your models into contact if possible. This is not an optional rule. That was why I said what I did about the earlier diagram. If I have 8 models assaulting your 8 models, the closest has to move into base contact with the closest. I can then move the rest in any order I wish. But I have to move into base contact with as many of your models as possible (remember, no holding back) and if any of the models would have to move into or over difficult terrain, a difficult terrain test must be taken for the entire unit.

You don't have an option of saying you aren't going to move a model into base contact because it would have to move through difficult terrain. If it is possible for the model to assault, even through the terrain, it has to.