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Sir_Prometheus wrote:
Well, I forget the exact current state of it, but the hive guard no-cover rule has gone through a lot iterations. At one time, you could get cover if you were in cover, but not behind it, you could get smoke/jink saves at one point, then you couldn't, etc.

Is it really just no cover, never? That's fine, and simplicity is best, but the thing is it certainly didn't used to be simple.

The wording of the rule itself has never changed; we just had a hard time believing GW meant exactly what they said in the rule. I know that I, as a Tyranid player, would never have claimed that Smoke Launchers/KFF/etc. didn't work against the Impaler Cannon without the FAQ.

(For reference: you still get cover if you are a) in it; or b) touching cover between you and the Hive Guard; those are the only two cases listed in the codex.)

Sir_Prometheus wrote:
Is it really just no cover, never? That's fine, and simplicity is best, but the thing is it certainly didn't used to be simple.

It really is simple.
Q: Can a unit take cover saves from any source other than the terrain
they are in, or touching, against Wounds caused by an impaler
cannon? (p47)
A: No.
Which is exactly what the codex says.
Is Jink terrain that you're in or touching?
Is a KFF or smoke screen (nob bikers) terrain that you're in or touching?
Is whatever Psyker power you're casting terrain that you're in or touching?

It's really not that convoluted or difficult.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Janthkin wrote:
(I know that I, as a Tyranid player, would never have claimed that Smoke Launchers/KFF/etc. didn't work against the Impaler Cannon without the FAQ.)

Again - interesting.
I did claim that, and that's the way my area played as well before the FAQ.

rigeld2 wrote:

 Janthkin wrote:
(I know that I, as a Tyranid player, would never have claimed that Smoke Launchers/KFF/etc. didn't work against the Impaler Cannon without the FAQ.)

Again - interesting.
I did claim that, and that's the way my area played as well before the FAQ.

It was a "which rule is actually more specific?" problem. Both Impaler Cannons and Smoke Launchers/KFFs/Skimmers moving fast were exceptions to the basic cover rules, after all. Given any ambiguity, I default to the least-advantageous interpretation; in my experience, it was also the common interpretation for the West-coast tournament crowd.

Same here for the hive guard. Both tyranid players I know always told their opponents(including me) to take smoke/KFF/exhaust cloud saves against impaler cannons.

/me feels like a dirty cheater...
And it's not a "more specific" problem. Impaler cannon states what you can claim cover from. KFF/Jink, etc. is neither of those things.

rigeld2 wrote:
/me feels like a dirty cheater...
And it's not a "more specific" problem. Impaler cannon states what you can claim cover from. KFF/Jink, etc. is neither of those things.

We don't need to reopen that conversation; suffice it to say, I never even considered that the Impaler cannon would negate Smoke Launchers on first reading.

Which brings us back around to the original point of the thread, I guess - it's hard to know how other people are interpreting rules, which helps explain where FAQ answers that are apparently out-of-left-field come from.

 Janthkin wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:
/me feels like a dirty cheater...
And it's not a "more specific" problem. Impaler cannon states what you can claim cover from. KFF/Jink, etc. is neither of those things.

We don't need to reopen that conversation; suffice it to say, I never even considered that the Impaler cannon would negate Smoke Launchers on first reading.

Which brings us back around to the original point of the thread, I guess - it's hard to know how other people are interpreting rules, which helps explain where FAQ answers that are apparently out-of-left-field come from.

Heh, maybe, but I still prefer the "GW never play-tests, can't construct proper grammatically unambiguous sentences, and has their FAQs written by interns" explanation. If nothing else, it's just more fun.

In my area we also played that KFF/Smoke/Storm Caller/Shield of Sanguinius worked against the Impaler Cannon, until GW FAQ'd it otherwise.

I agree with Janthkin that this kind of thing points out why "common sense" is often a silly thing to reference in regards to FAQs. Many people legitimately and honestly read the same rule two very different ways, especially in different geographic regions, based on a lot of different elements. Such as how common a given army is or whether it's seen as abusive. Or how the same area has read and ruled other similar rules. Or whether they commonly rely on one or two guys to do most of their rules interpretation, and if those guys have a slightly idiosyncratic read. Etc, etc.

A lot of folks throw stones at GW or at other FAQ writers (like the INAT crew, or the NOVA FAQ crew) and claim that certain rulings are silly, contrary to common sense, or changing a clear rule. But when you get a little more perspective on the variety of interpretations out there in the real world in different places, these rulings often start to look less silly and unnecessary.

So does that mean that Stealth and Shrouded won't give a cover save against an Impaler Cannon? If that's true then it'll apply to Tau SMS (as it seems the rule wording concerning cover is pretty much the same) and them losing the sentence of ignoring the effects of night fighting is no actual loss.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
So does that mean that Stealth and Shrouded won't give a cover save against an Impaler Cannon? If that's true then it'll apply to Tau SMS (as it seems the rule wording concerning cover is pretty much the same) and them losing the sentence of ignoring the effects of night fighting is no actual loss.

Yes and no. If ALL you have is Stealth & Shrouding, then Impaler cannons deny cover saves. But as best I can determine, nothing stops Stealth & Shrouding from improving your cover save, if you're getting one from an allowable source.

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
So does that mean that Stealth and Shrouded won't give a cover save against an Impaler Cannon? If that's true then it'll apply to Tau SMS (as it seems the rule wording concerning cover is pretty much the same) and them losing the sentence of ignoring the effects of night fighting is no actual loss.

A related question -- do Impaler weapons ignore night fight? It sounds like they might. Tau SMS, I know does not (because the removed that sentence in the FAQ) -- though it hardly matters since most things firing an SMS would have Blacksun filters.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Janthkin wrote:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:
So does that mean that Stealth and Shrouded won't give a cover save against an Impaler Cannon? If that's true then it'll apply to Tau SMS (as it seems the rule wording concerning cover is pretty much the same) and them losing the sentence of ignoring the effects of night fighting is no actual loss.

Yes and no. If ALL you have is Stealth & Shrouding, then Impaler cannons deny cover saves. But as best I can determine, nothing stops Stealth & Shrouding from improving your cover save, if you're getting one from an allowable source.

Uh yes, unintuitive, but that makes sense--I think I would go with that.


Anyone else realize right away that a Hammerhead has a better save at the 12"-24" range during night fight than it does at 24"-36"?

Sir_Prometheus wrote:

Anyone else realize right away that a Hammerhead has a better save at the 12"-24" range during night fight than it does at 24"-36"?

I hadn't but now, wow. Best to stick close to the 24" end of the distance, of course. So 5+ Jink, Stealth from Nightfighting, Shrouded from Disruption Pods = 2+ Cover in the open and no loss of firepower if you've got SMS and multi-tracker.

That's really cheesy

I can say as a Tau player, I think the +2 is too much.

I agree with the Harrier comment. The guns/missiles on a harrier don't stop working against an airplane because it goes in to hover mode. In fact, maybe they work better??? Anyway, it's good that they cleared it up, even though I don't agree.

The bastion thing, that's just silly. I never would have thought that. The only time it would have come is when I played against a Fortress of Redemption, but I blew up the parts with emplaced guns the first turn.

Oh, does that missile launcher require a unit to be in base contact with... the hatch to use it's BS?

bb

Sir_Prometheus wrote:
I can say as a Tau player, I think the +2 is too much.

Probably but I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts.

We've been bottom of the pile for long enough that we should have our little bits of cheese.

 beerbeard wrote:
I agree with the Harrier comment. The guns/missiles on a harrier don't stop working against an airplane because it goes in to hover mode. In fact, maybe they work better??? Anyway, it's good that they cleared it up, even though I don't agree.

The bastion thing, that's just silly. I never would have thought that. The only time it would have come is when I played against a Fortress of Redemption, but I blew up the parts with emplaced guns the first turn.

Oh, does that missile launcher require a unit to be in base contact with... the hatch to use it's BS?

bb

Wait, which missile launcer?

So that makes it:

Flyers: 5-0 (including me)

Bastion gun: 3-2

And, btw, why didn't they say anything about the Fortress? Wouldn't it have the same problem?

 Janthkin wrote:

rigeld2 wrote:
/me feels like a dirty cheater...
And it's not a "more specific" problem. Impaler cannon states what you can claim cover from. KFF/Jink, etc. is neither of those things.

We don't need to reopen that conversation; suffice it to say, I never even considered that the Impaler cannon would negate Smoke Launchers on first reading.

Fair enough.

Which brings us back around to the original point of the thread, I guess - it's hard to know how other people are interpreting rules, which helps explain where FAQ answers that are apparently out-of-left-field come from.

Yeah. I started playing in a vacuum with me reading the rules and a friend helping me learn. When I first went to my FLGS to play some of the rules I thought I knew by heart were challenged and I was forced to look at them in a different light.
Anyone who moves from one FLGS to another would likely experience the same "eye-opening" when playing. It's kind of cool.

Same thing happens when you attend big tournaments in other states. When a crew of 8 or 10 of my local league guys drove down to Baltimore in 2001 for the GT, we had our eyes opened on a couple of rules we had been playing wrong.

Everywhere I've traveled, I usually wind up meeting at least one or two guys who play a couple of things differently. Or who play the same because the event has a FAQ, but disagree with different parts of the FAQ than I do.

Sir_Prometheus wrote:

 beerbeard wrote:
I agree with the Harrier comment. The guns/missiles on a harrier don't stop working against an airplane because it goes in to hover mode. In fact, maybe they work better??? Anyway, it's good that they cleared it up, even though I don't agree.

The bastion thing, that's just silly. I never would have thought that. The only time it would have come is when I played against a Fortress of Redemption, but I blew up the parts with emplaced guns the first turn.

Oh, does that missile launcher require a unit to be in base contact with... the hatch to use it's BS?

bb

Wait, which missile launcer?

So that makes it:

Flyers: 5-0 (including me)

Bastion gun: 3-2

And, btw, why didn't they say anything about the Fortress? Wouldn't it have the same problem?

The Fortress has that Missile Launcher that you can upgrade to a Krakstorm. It looks to be inside the building, like the Heavy Bolters on a Bastion or the Fortress. So which is it, I wonder.

Just re-read the building rules, and it's pretty clear that emplaced weapons of any kind need to be manned to be much use. Otherwise they are BS2 and fire only at the nearest enemy. Where I play we have been playing the Quad Gun behind the Aegis Line as a regular BS2 weapon if not manned. That is clearly wrong, and really makes the usefulness of the gun a lot less. You basically have to keep a unit back there to use it against flyers.

Might have been obvious to all you WAAC neckbeards out there, but it wasn't to me. (That was me, kidding. Don't ban me!)



bb

Sir_Prometheus wrote:

Second one, Pg 7:

Q: Can a unit occupying a Bastion manually fire a gun
emplacement (eg. quad gun) on the Bastion’s roof? (p116)
A: No – a model must be in base contact to manually fire a
gun emplacement, therefore the unit must be on the
Bastion’s roof.



No one I know ever assumed either of those two things was true. I wondered if you could fire the gun from the roof (but I assumed you could not), but I would not have in a million years assumed you had to be up there to fire it.

I've never heard of anyone playing it any other way - I was surprised the FAQ needed to comment on it at all! The rules for emplaced weapons are pretty clear that you have to be in base to base to use it, after all... I've been standing on the roof from day one.

I'm still waiting on a clarification for the vindicare deadaim/shield breaker rule as well as what the heck the purgation squad's astral aim is supposed to do with units with better cover saves and or night fighting nonsense it's got going on as well as how the heck are we supposed to use regular blast templates that scatter. The FAQ's that they have released on it so far has seemed to make no sense in any case for me. *rant over*

Astral aim is easy - if they have better than a 4+ they can use it. There's nothing removing their current cover save, they just add a 4+ one to their list.

rigeld2 wrote:
Astral aim is easy - if they have better than a 4+ they can use it. There's nothing removing their current cover save, they just add a 4+ one to their list.

It's just confusing due to the GK FAQ

Page 29 – Purgation Squads, Astral Aim.
Change the fourth sentence to read: “If the Psychic test is
passed, the unit (and any accompanying character chosen from
Codex: Grey Knights) can shoot at any enemy unit within range,
even if they do not have line of sight to it. If the Night Fighting
rules are in effect at the time their targets do not benefit from
the Stealth or Shrouded special rules”.

seems to do completely different things at night time for no clear or apparent rhyme or reason fluff wise or any such thing. Really wish they make up their mind on how to interperate what they want this thing to do.

I'm sorry, I don't get you. You can use astral aim to shoot the gun, it's pretty much going to get a flat 4+, but not better. I still don't believe you could target something outside 36", though, since that aspect of night fight is ignored.

Vindicare shieldbreaker and such wouldn't work, that's a property of the weapon, not the vindicare. However, the vindicare could select specific targets to hit.

The issue with purgation squads is that INAT basically clarified that if you have say a 2+ cover save from like stealth/shrouding, then you get a 4+ cover, it doesn't replace your 2+ cover. You can still use your 2+ cover save against the attack unless of course somehow night time was happening.

Purgation squads don't have anything out of 36' so I'm not even really sure what the point of this FAQ was for. Seems to be more confusing now. I suppose it would affect any IC's attached though who may have better weapons i.e. conversion beamer as that's the only one I can think up.

The dead aim rule I feel needs some sort of FAQ due to Look out Sir's. I personally feel though without any exact rules backing me, it's just my 5th edition ideas back again since all snipers get to assign wounds now, I just feel like the rule should do something like trumph LoS. (just personal opinion but currently it is not played this way)

If you want to add 1 to your hover = no skyfire side thats the way me and my incredibly small gaming group play it. We have an understanding of any argument over rules that can't be settled quickly with a rule check = logic wins.

For the flyer thing we determined jimmy the flyer stops flying and hovers. Jimmy is then no more accurate at hitting jeff the flyer zooming past him than frank the krak missile guy on the ground right below him.

Also the building thing we ruled the same way via logic. How can you fire a gun unless you are on the same floor right next to it?

That being said those are just our quick fixes. A couple of us like to check forums on a regular basis and when a better consensus/argument is presented on a forum (or obviously FAQ) we tend to adopt it instead.

Also I have a beard. Does that make me beardy? =O (couldnt resist)

Only if it covers your neck

 Jidmah wrote:
Only if it covers your neck

What if it's a full Gandalf?

Then, you shall not pass.

 Jidmah wrote:
Then, you shall not pass.

Actually, Gandalf said said "You cannot pass!", not "You shall not pass!"
Not that it matters.