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Breton wrote:
The general principles section even allows these blasts don't just target a single model or unit. (emphasis mine) However the general principles doesn't tell us what it DOES target. It just says count the hits under the template. It doesn't say what to do with those hits. The Blast USR does.

"Some weapons are so powerful that they don’t just target a single model or unit, but have an ‘area effect’ which might encompass (and often utterly devastate!) several different units. To better represent these circumstances, Warhammer 40,000 uses a series of different blast markers and templates:"

What is your actual objection or difficulty with this sentence? It seems to me you're trying to make the claim that not targeting a single unit but "encompassing" several units means something other than targeting several units, which to me is ignoring the context of the sentence as a whole.

So you think the first unit of bikers is going to jink the frag missile that's going to miss them by 30 meters to the right but the one watching the smoke trail headed straight for them is too dumb to do so?

Who says a frag missile makes a beeline for the unit that it scattered onto rather than where it was initially pointed before going off-course for whatever imagined reason? That's precisely why imagining a scenario from a rules abstraction is stupid; I'm possibly correctly imagining one thing while you're possibly correctly imagining another.

What is your actual objection or difficulty with this sentence? It seems to me you're trying to make the claim that not targeting a single unit but "encompassing" several units means something other than targeting several units, which to me is ignoring the context of the sentence as a whole.

No, I'm making the claim that it doesn't say it's targetting any units, single or multiple. Just like scatter doesn't select a target. You've read these rules pretty strictly for concepts like "selected" and refuting my attempt to differentiate the "official target" (as opposed to say an eventual target just to keep them seperate) and "selected target" which also doesn't have a glossary entry. I'm just applying that same level of strict reading to "target" period.

Breton wrote:
No, I'm making the claim that it doesn't say it's targetting any units, single or multiple. Just like scatter doesn't select a target. You've read these rules pretty strictly for concepts like "selected" and refuting my attempt to differentiate the "official target" (as opposed to say an eventual target just to keep them seperate) and "selected target" which also doesn't have a glossary entry. I'm just applying that same level of strict reading to "target" period.

So when the rule effectively says it represents attacks which don't necessarily target just one unit unit but potentially target several units and that we use the marker to represent that targeting, you're saying it... doesn't say that?

"Effectively says", in your opinion, is not says. I could say the rule effectively says scatter selects a new target, but that doesn't mean it says that. Doesn't mean it doesn't. Depends on how strictly you want to RAW the rules.

I have a unit of Guardian Defenders, equipped with a Eldar Missile Launcher platform. Please tell me where in the following steps your bikes can choose to Jink.

Step 1: Nominate a unit to shoot. (I choose my Guardians)
Step 2: Declare a target. (I choose your Tactical Marines next to a Bike squad)
Step 3: Choose a weapon. (I choose the Eldar Missile Launcher, Plasma Missile (Blast weapon)
Step 4: Roll To Hit (Instead of rolling to hit, I roll scatter)
Step 5: Roll To Wound
Step 6: Allocate Wounds & Remove Casualties
Step 7: Choose another weapon. (I repeat steps 4-6 with any remaining weapons)

Well that depends on you and how flexible you are.

Also one of the technical points is that blast weapons never roll to hit.

That aside, most people in here have agreed if you pick the tactical marine, and cover the biker next to him, the biker can declare. Some go so far as to say he can declare because he was covered initially but can wait to declare until he's (possibly) wounded, which I'm also not too fond of, and think it goes too far the other way.

Breton wrote:
"Effectively says", in your opinion, is not says. I could say the rule effectively says scatter selects a new target, but that doesn't mean it says that. Doesn't mean it doesn't. Depends on how strictly you want to RAW the rules.

When I wrote, "effectively says" I was using the phrase in the context of rewording the sentence while retaining its meaning, so yes, says. Reading the rules as they are written is not the same as taking an obtuse reading, expecting the rules to be written in an unnecessarily explicit manner and considering them to not work otherwise.

It also seems apparent to me that you agree with the reading and are simply insisting that selection be inserted into the interpretation. From where, I'm unsure.

From the same place you get effectively says. the ordinary common usage of the words. You're willing to use similar meanings to establish your target argument, but draw a line in the sand on "selected" when the definition of target has the word selected in it. https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=target%20definition

As far as I'm concerned it can go either way. If you want to strictly read selected target, then you don't get to paraphrase what it "essentially says" at other times. I'll play as strict or as flexible as you want to for the most part. But the WHOLE game plays that way.

I think that's a very... erm, selective definition, but I suppose we agree to disagree.

It's also Oxford's dictionary. http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/target


It's the same in the UK definition where the rules are written http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/target?q=Target

And again, all I'm saying is it goes both ways. If you want to tell me all that Blast rules means the new unit(s) covered after scatter are the target without actually saying it's the target, then by the same "words mean" logic, target by definition includes selection, so any and every target is selected.

You can play it however you want, but if you want to play it honest, you have to play it the same way for both sides.

If selected has to be there, then the same strict reading says target has to be there. If "all of that" means target, then "target" means selected.

And yet that's not the only definition for the word. If target as a noun necessarily included selection we wouldn't have phrases like, "select a target" or "selected as a target" throughout the rules.

But anyway...

 Mr. Shine wrote:
And yet that's not the only definition for the word. If target as a noun necessarily included selection we wouldn't have phrases like, "select a target" or "selected as a target" throughout the rules.

But anyway...

So your objection to MY using the meaning of words after you did, is you think they meant a tiny shied, and not a person, place or thing selected for an attack? Well rather, you think they mean that when I want to use the definition, and you want to use the OTHER meaning when you're using the "meaning of words" apparently and the new unit covered is selected but not selected for an attack as opposed to becoming a small round shield on someone's forearm. OK then.

Don't be obtuse.

Obtuse? I cherry picked a less prestigious authority to appeal to that does not have a both US and UK definition version?


But hey, that works too. Because a scatter is missed, the final unit covered wasn't the one fired at. Can't be the target.

I can apply your logic to counter you for as long as you try and only apply it in one direction. How much longer do you want to do this?

You know. RAW here, I actually agree with Breton.

Well speaking for myself, RAW is a dog's breakfast. I think Mr. Shine thinks so too, but I can't speak for him. I think we're arguing more RAI than RAW, I just don't think he's applying the same level of I from RAI to both sides.

Breton wrote:
Well speaking for myself, RAW is a dog's breakfast. I think Mr. Shine thinks so too, but I can't speak for him. I think we're arguing more RAI than RAW.

Agreed