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An enormous problem for me and the group I play with, (we all started together again with 6th after not having played since start of 4th, so we have no go-to rule-guy) have been mixed shooting. And not specifically mixed saves, but mixed visibility.

So I put it to you, resolve my shooting below, show me how it's done. These are firewarriors, they are all within 15" so they all rapid fire. Use your own die and show me
weapons are BS3 S5 AP5 pulse rifles, against T3 scrubs with 4+ Armour saves. The important scrub is T5 and is an IC, so his LoS is 2+. He has a 3+ AS, and will always use his LoS if he is targeted.

You are the firewarriors. The numbers above each firewarrior shows how many scrubs he individually can see. Use your own die, and resolve the shooting. GO!



Name of the scrubs are A - B* - C - D - E, left to right.

8 shots from the Fire Warriors, 4 hit, 3 Wpund, 2 armor saves and a cover save (far left guy) (none on the IC as he's not the closest to any of the shooters) 1 dead model, eyeballing it E has to die.

I'm in an airport so I don't have my book handy, but I'm pretty sure that's how it'd work out. If not, it would be 3 armor saves and no cover still meaning E would die.

OK

1. First we use LOS to determine which of the Firewarriors that can actually shot. Here we also determine that every single Scrub is within LOS of at least one Firewarrior (meaning every Scrub is eligible for wound alloction).
This eliminates one of the Firewarriors, leaving us with 4 Firewarriors.
Those 4 are determined to be within 12", so each fire 2 shots.

2. 8 shots, 4 hits (as BS3 hits on 4+) and 4 wounds (as Str5 wounds T3 on 2+...Majority Toughness is in effect).

Now we are standing with 4 Wounds that we have to allocate to the Scrubs.

The Scrubs have different saves, the Important Scrub can LoS....and crucially we have no way of determining which of the Scrubs are the closest target (and this is really the more important thing).

3. As no Scrub is closer to the Firewarriors than any other, we have to randomize.
Lets roll a d6. 1= Scrub A, 2= Important Scrub, 3=Scrub C, 4= Scrub D, 5= Scrub E, 6= Reroll.

3a. If A is hit he gets a 3+ Cover Save (he only needs to be in cover from the point of view of ONE firing model to receive the save, see page 18).

3b. If the Important Scrub is hit he can choose to either LoS or take the hit himself.
- If he takes the hit himself, he gets a 3+ Armour Save.
- If he chooses to LoS, you roll to see of that is successful. The poor Scrub that (might) take the hit for the boss gets either a 3+ Cover Save (if it is A that is closest to the Important Scrub) or a 4+ Armour Save (if C is closest).

3c. If C, D or E is hit they get a 4+ Armour Save.

4. Yes, The T5 of the Important Scrub never comes into play, Look Out, Sir rolls are taken before saves are taken, and while we worry about which Scrub is hit, we don't really care about which Firewarrior fired that specific shot.


Did I address all of your issues?

Steelmage99 wrote:

Did I address all of your issues?

Assuming no one contradicts your reading, I believe so. I think what can REALLY draw it out is the "no scrub is closer" part. It's so incredibly up for interpretation. Randomizing is all well, but then one might say that E is SLIGHTLY farther away, so he shouldn't be in the randomization since it's the others that are close, or maybe you could say that C is the one that is closest to the majority of the shooters.

And when it comes down to larger shootings, as this one is really a minimal situation, you might have 20vs20, and then how do you randomize it all? It's gonna take hours.

And if the firewarriors choose to shoot out of cover to avoid the 3+ cover save, does the shooter to the far left still get to shoot, and then the wound is just placed on the units he can't see?

You are absolutely right.
The big issue is the "no Scrub is closer"-part.

Luckily we most often find that it is rather easy to determine which model is closer.

Should one of the Scrubs happen to be closer (with the rest of the Scrubs be the same distance), we have to be able to see that situation happening before rolling Saves.

If Scrub E is slightly closer he will be allocated ALL the wounds (using his 4+ Armour Save) until he is dead. This means we have to roll his 4+ Armour Save one roll at a time until he is dead.
Once he dies we have to randomize the remaining wounds.

Steelmage99 seems to have it spot on.

Note that wounds are allocated to the closest model first. (steelmage99 assumed they were all equidistant I believe)
So that would have an effect on the order in which they take the wounds.

Steelmage99 wrote:
You are absolutely right.
The big issue is the "no Scrub is closer"-part.

Luckily we most often find that it is rather easy to determine which model is closer.

While my group incredibly often finds that hard to determine :( is it the model closest to the closest enemy model? Is it the model closest to the centre of gravity of the other unit? You are choosing the latter in my example.

 Purifier wrote:

Steelmage99 wrote:
You are absolutely right.
The big issue is the "no Scrub is closer"-part.

Luckily we most often find that it is rather easy to determine which model is closer.

While my group incredibly often finds that hard to determine :( is it the model closest to the closest enemy model? Is it the model closest to the centre of gravity of the other unit? You are choosing the latter in my example.

It is Target Model to Firing Unit.
If you see the Firing Unit as a big blob it sometimes gets easier.

If you desire a higher level of precision, I'm sorry to say that you are out of luck. The rules doesn't allow for that. Beer and pretzel-game, you know.

I believe the mindset of GW is to think; "It is hard to determine the closest model......so randomize"


...

Steelmage99 wrote:

 Purifier wrote:

Steelmage99 wrote:
You are absolutely right.
The big issue is the "no Scrub is closer"-part.

Luckily we most often find that it is rather easy to determine which model is closer.

While my group incredibly often finds that hard to determine :( is it the model closest to the closest enemy model? Is it the model closest to the centre of gravity of the other unit? You are choosing the latter in my example.

It is Target Model to Firing Unit.
If you see the Firing Unit as a big blob it sometimes gets easier.

If you desire a higher level of precision, I'm sorry to say that you are out of luck. The rules doesn't allow for that. Beer and pretzel-game, you know.

I believe the mindset of GW is to think; "It is hard to determine the closest model......so randomize"


...

I guess. In this case though, a contending person could easily say that C is the closest model to the centre of gravity for the shooting unit. How would you react to someone making this claim in your game?
Say C has a 2+ save. It's not a meaningless choice.

 Purifier wrote:


And if the firewarriors choose to shoot out of cover to avoid the 3+ cover save, does the shooter to the far left still get to shoot, and then the wound is just placed on the units he can't see?

Disclaimer. I am working on the assumption that you mean that the Firewarriors use the Focus Fire rule to avoid the 3+ Cover Save of Scrub A.

The rules are clear, but somewhat counter-intuitive.
When Focus Firing LOS is not taken into account, only range. So Firewarrior 1 would be able to shot, hit and wound with the added effect that Scrub A can never have any wounds (from ANY of the Firewarriors) allocated to him.

In my group we have house-ruled that LOS is an issue when using Focus Fire, and that Firewarrior 1 would not be able to fire at all. This is NOT the actual rule, and is simply made up by us after a nice a cozy talk over a beer about how we want to play.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Purifier wrote:


I guess. In this case though, a contending person could easily say that C is the closest model to the centre of gravity for the shooting unit. How would you react to someone making this claim in your game?
Say C has a 2+ save. It's not a meaningless choice.

Well, in my group we don't use Center of Gravity, but rather Leading Edge.

A contending player simply have to show (with a ruler) that Target Model X is closer to the Leading Edge of the Firing Unit than Target Model Y is.

I fully admit that in the example you made in the initial post, I assumed that part of the issue was "no Scrub is closer", and worked off of that assumption without worrying overly about the actual precise placement of the models in your example.

....

The rules fairly clearly state that the closest model in the target unit means the closest model in the target unit to ANY model in the firing unit. "Center of Gravity" doesn't matter here, you just measure the minimum distance you can between any model in one unit and any model in the other.

The rules for allocating wounds are not explicit here, it simply states to take the wound on the model closest to the unit. Clarification on what this means can be found on p4 under "Measuring Distances." The most relevant quote (but context is required) is:

Distances between units are always measured to and from
the closest models in each of the units (see diagram below).

Ok, follow up question.

If I understand what has been said correctly, then these two premises should be true:

1) Any Firewarrior that can see 1 or more models in the group it is firing at, can wound any model in the unit it is firing at (It's all placed into a wound pile and doesn't discriminate against who hit and wound.)

1) Any model in cover from ATLEAST ONE firer gains cover.

So in the situation below, even though a lot of firers can see a lot of targets perfectly clear, since atleast one of the firers can't see any of the opposing models completely clearly, the unit fired upon gains cover saves for everyone.

Is this correct?

 Purifier wrote:
1) Any Firewarrior that can see 1 or more models in the group it is firing at, can wound any model in the unit it is firing at (It's all placed into a wound pile and doesn't discriminate against who hit and wound.)

This is only true if all of he models in the target unit are in Line of sight and range from at least one model in the firing unit.

But otherwise you are correct.

 DeathReaper wrote:

 Purifier wrote:
1) Any Firewarrior that can see 1 or more models in the group it is firing at, can wound any model in the unit it is firing at (It's all placed into a wound pile and doesn't discriminate against who hit and wound.)

This is only true if all of he models in the target unit are in Line of sight and range from at least one model in the firing unit.

But otherwise you are correct.

Yeah I worded it poorly. That part was supposed to be in there too. We assume that no one in the victim group is completely out of LOS from everyone in the assailant group.

But this can create silly situations where a pillar gives a large unit a cover save.

But then again, what is W40k if not a cluster of silly situations.

 Purifier wrote:


1) Any model in cover from ATLEAST ONE firer gains cover.

So in the situation below, even though a lot of firers can see a lot of targets perfectly clear, since atleast one of the firers can't see any of the opposing models completely clearly, the unit fired upon gains cover saves for everyone.

Is this correct?

This is correct, I thought it was odd that if two 30 man blob squad met up with a single tree between them the entire squads gets cover. Got to love the New "Cinematic" Warhammer.

 Purifier wrote:
Ok, follow up question.

If I understand what has been said correctly, then these two premises should be true:

1) Any Firewarrior that can see 1 or more models in the group it is firing at, can wound any model in the unit it is firing at (It's all placed into a wound pile and doesn't discriminate against who hit and wound.)

1) Any model in cover from ATLEAST ONE firer gains cover.

So in the situation below, even though a lot of firers can see a lot of targets perfectly clear, since atleast one of the firers can't see any of the opposing models completely clearly, the unit fired upon gains cover saves for everyone.

Is this correct?

Spoiler:

Steelmage99 wrote:
Ok, follow up question.

If I understand what has been said correctly, then these two premises should be true:

1) Any Firewarrior that can see 1 or more models in the group it is firing at, can wound any model in the unit it is firing at (It's all placed into a wound pile and doesn't discriminate against who hit and wound.)

1) Any model in cover from ATLEAST ONE firer gains cover.

So in the situation below, even though a lot of firers can see a lot of targets perfectly clear, since atleast one of the firers can't see any of the opposing models completely clearly, the unit fired upon gains cover saves for everyone.

Is this correct?

Spoiler:

Yes, you are correct.

It is possible to dream up very specific scenarios where the rules seem broken or strange. I am surprised than you and your group seems to run into these so often.

I'm actually surprised you don't The only way for this not to be happen as far as I can tell is to have a perfectly flat playing field. Ours is full of nooks, crevices, pillars and half-cover. And we tend to use it as much as we can.

My images are incredibly simplified versions of situations that we have had to face.

I'd like to thank everyone in this thread. I believe I have a much better grasp on the shooting rules now.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
Actually, one more thing.

If we go back to the first picture.

The guy that can see 2 of the enemy models, does he confer a cover save to the other three? Because from his view, more than 25% is covered, right? (100% is after all more than 25%)

And does the guy that can opnly see 1 then confer the same save to the remaining 2?

The one that can see no one we can let go. he won't fire, so how much cover anyone is in from him has no meaning.

By using the logic above, all of them get cover saves in the first example too.

The question is really "Is 100% more than 25% or does it not count as in cover then, but rather as out of line of sight?"

And if this is correct, then all you need in that example to get cover saves for everyone is a short wall with a window in it. Surely that can't be a rare thing on a battlefield?

This should be handled by remembering that each model gets or does not get a cover save on its own. Cover saves are by model, not by unit. So yes, if a given model is hidden (25% or more covered, and 100% is certainly more than 25%) from the perspective of at least one firing model, then yes, he'll qualify for cover.

One impact of these rules is that units spreading out into skirmish lines, to cover a larger area of the field and to reduce their vulnerability to blasts, will tend to run into the situations you're describing more frequently, where at least one guys gets obscured fire to a given target. This is why it's sometimes beneficial to bunch up more, so all of your guys can get a clear LOS through a given gap in terrain. The formation in which you arrange and move your units has several tactical implications which may not be immediately obvious.

A rule you can potentially use to avoid this, though, is the one that you can always decide (before rolling to hit) NOT to fire with any models you want in a given firing unit. So if you've got a situation where most of your firing models have clear LOS, but one does not, you could choose not to fire with that guy, so he won't factor into the cover save determination.

 Mannahnin wrote:
This should be handled by remembering that each model gets or does not get a cover save on its own. Cover saves are by model, not by unit. So yes, if a given model is hidden (25% or more covered, and 100% is certainly more than 25%) from the perspective of at least one firing model, then yes, he'll qualify for cover.

One impact of these rules is that units spreading out into skirmish lines, to cover a larger area of the field and to reduce their vulnerability to blasts, will tend to run into the situations you're describing more frequently, where at least one guys gets obscured fire to a given target. This is why it's sometimes beneficial to bunch up more, so all of your guys can get a clear LOS through a given gap in terrain. The formation in which you arrange and move your units has several tactical implications which may not be immediately obvious.

A rule you can potentially use to avoid this, though, is the one that you can always decide (before rolling to hit) NOT to fire with any models you want in a given firing unit. So if you've got a situation where most of your firing models have clear LOS, but one does not, you could choose not to fire with that guy, so he won't factor into the cover save determination.

Thanks Manna, that pretty much covers the last of my ponderings. I was thinking about the opting not to shoot, but decided it should clearly be ruled exactly as you stated. Still, it's good that it gets mentioned as well.

Again, I'd like to thank everyone that contributed to this thread. I am that much wiser and I think my group can cut out a large amount of page-flipping and debating in the next battle.

Awesome! It's been a very good thread, and I'd like to express my appreciation of your clear and detailed questions and diagrams.

Where does it say you need Line of Sight to a model for a wound to be allocated to it?

Lets say in this scenario..

Model A has a heavy bolter and has not moved this turn

Model B has a plasma cannon, and has not moved this turn

Models C-F are all equipped with bolt guns.

Models G-J are all wearing 4+ armor and have 1 wound

Model I has a storm shield

The grey thing in the middle is debri that is taller then any of the models and does not allow any line of sight through it.

Resolve this shooting attack,

Which models can fire, page 13, states that each model which is in range of a visible enemy model in the targeted unit can fire. In your diagram, as you've noted, only model A (of the green models) can fire at all.

Page 16, Out of Sight, clearly states that if a given model cannot be seen by any of the firing models (I and J), it cannot have any wounds allocated to it.

ok, yeah I missed that.

As I am still currently familiarizing myself with 6th edition I'd like to thank the OP for creating this thread and everyone that has answered it as well. It's most informative in areas I was not exactly clear on.

I am happy to have been of assistance.

Purely for my own interest, what in the game has Tg3 and a 4+ armour save that can be joined by an independent character with tg5 and a 3+ armour save? It's really bothering me.

The only tg3 4+ armour saves I can think of are warrior acolytes in carapace, guard in carapace, dark eldar in ghost plate, eldar aspect warriors and fire warriors. But what on earth is the tg5 3+ armour save guy in there?

CHaplain on bike would be T5 with 3+ save, they can join servitors which, from memory, are T3 with carapace for a 4+ save

rossatdi wrote:
Purely for my own interest, what in the game has Tg3 and a 4+ armour save that can be joined by an independent character with tg5 and a 3+ armour save? It's really bothering me.

The only tg3 4+ armour saves I can think of are warrior acolytes in carapace, guard in carapace, dark eldar in ghost plate, eldar aspect warriors and fire warriors. But what on earth is the tg5 3+ armour save guy in there?

Could be something like Guard in carapace armour with a SM Captain on a bike.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

nosferatu1001 wrote:
CHaplain on bike would be T5 with 3+ save, they can join servitors which, from memory, are T3 with carapace for a 4+ save

Servitors do not have any armour wargear. They just have a straight 4+ save.

Fair enough, however I was right on the example at least

I discounted a bike as it wasn't shown on the otherwise very accurate diagram!