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Three rules I have found seem to have contradictory statements in them. They say they can apply to many things, but then use "i.e." which suggests it only works on that specific thing.

Dark Eldar Combat Drugs: Serpentin: +1 Weapon Skill (i.e. WS 3+ becomes WS 2+)

Tau Early warning override: If an enemy unit is set up within 12" of a model equipped with an early warning override as the result of an ability that allows them to arrive mid-battle (i.e. teleporting to the battlefield), the model may immediately shoot at that unit as if it were your Shooting phase.

Space Marine Storm of Fire: Each time you roll a wound roll of 6 or more for a friendly <CHAPTER> unit within 6" of the Warlord in the Shooting phase, the Armour Penetration characteristic of that attack is increased by 1 (i.e. AP0 become AP-1, AP-1 becomes AP-2)

Am I reading too much into this or can it be argued that, for example, the Tau EWO can't be used to attack units who use Grav Chutes rather than teleport, or that an AP -3 weapon (Like a Plasma Pistol) won't benefit from Storm of Fire? Note that the Deathwatch special ammunition uses e.g., so they do make a distinction.

Think you're reading way too much into that.

It's really sloppy writing and demonstrates a lack of attention to English.

But yes, it can be argued that way since ie, or id est, technically means that is.

So as reading:

Tau Early warning override: If an enemy unit is set up within 12" of a model equipped with an early warning override as the result of an ability that allows them to arrive mid-battle (that is teleporting to the battlefield), the model may immediately shoot at that unit as if it were your Shooting phase.

Wouldn't recommend doing so though. That's borderline, if not flat out TFG behaviour. The rest of the clause clearly implies that using any sort of ability to arrive mid-battle triggers the respective ability (or increase AP in the case of Storm of Fire).

It seems obvious from the text that this is just a mistake, and they meant "e.g." instead. This strikes me as about as significant for how we should interpret the rules as (hypothetically) Guilliman's buffs affecting "ULTARMARINES" units instead of "ULTRAMARINES".

Common use has ie and eg meaning the same.

The way I was always taught is that i.e. is a stand in for "that is to say."

So you could then parse those sentences as "blah blah blah blah (that is to say, WS 3+ becomes WS 2+)."

In context that makes sense.

i.e. = it est = it is
e.g. = exempli gratia = for example

They meant e.g. and failed to understand the difference.

This is the kind of thing worth emailing GW about for future reprints, but not the stuff of a YMDC thread. There is no way to claw advantage from this.

Being a total pedant, the AP and WS examples read just fine with i.e., though e.g. would be preferable. But there's no advantage to be gained by trying to start an argument over this mid-battle, unless you don't like having opponents to play.

I.E. means E.G. just as codexs means codices just as.....

Half of GW rules writtin problems occur because of sloppy use of English.

I would like to remind people of the Tenets of YMDC, specifically #3, #5 and #6.

The last one specifically deals with GW's weird english.