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All HFE genetic proteins aside, It IS too bad that the rule of cool has been lost in the shuffle over the years. That was one of the best things about the RT days, no tournaments and games had a "game master" to set everything up and make the calls without all the rules lawyering.

 BoomWolf wrote:

 TheCustomLime wrote:

 loki old fart wrote:

 TheCustomLime wrote:

 loki old fart wrote:

 Furyou Miko wrote:

 loki old fart wrote:
If people do this just to gain an advantage. Why do people put the sponsons at the rear position.
Meaning the tank sticks out over 50% to shoot to the side.?

One day we're going to see a land raider with both sponsons on the same side to make this tactic more powerful...

interesting. But it didn't answer my question

Could you rephrase your question? I can't understand it, I'm sorry.

If people will go to tricks to gain an advantage.

Why put the guns at the back? Exposing more of the tank to fire, surely they would want the best cover save.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, people do everything they can just to gain an advantage. Some people will model their Wraithknights/Riptides to be squatting/kneeling for LOS bonuses and whatnot. This is usually called MFA and is frowned on though not against the rules.

There is some debate whether putting the Land Raider guns on the front is okay or not. I don't really understand it myself since if GW didn't want us to they wouldn't make it so easy to model it that way. I suppose people just don't like it when you give yourself an advantage before the game even starts.

Just to make sure you are away, a kneeling riptide is far, FAR from modeling for advantage, heck-its one of the official poses on the GW site and in the box.
modeling it kneeling is no more MFA then modeling the scouts who came with kneeling legs as kneeling.

And Land Raiders with the guns on the front is in plenty of official GW pictures. Doesnt stop people from claiming MFA. I am not defending these people as I think MFA is a bunch of baloney but I am simply stating that some will take offense to it.

Then again, some people will take offense to you even bringing a Riptide so YMMV.

More on the main topic, how many inches are you actually getting by doing this? I would think one or two at the most depending on the tank.

DE boats can get ~3.5 iirc.

Hm. Well, that isnt nothing I suppose. I can see why people take offense to it then since that three inches really helps assault units.

I hope GW makes it so that your pivoting costs movement inches.

 TheCustomLime wrote:
I hope GW makes it so that your pivoting costs movement inches.

The vehicle movement rules have worked this way since the start of 3rd edition, so it seems unlikely that they have any intention of changing it.

 insaniak wrote:

 TheCustomLime wrote:
I hope GW makes it so that your pivoting costs movement inches.

The vehicle movement rules have worked this way since the start of 3rd edition, so it seems unlikely that they have any intention of changing it.

I agree, I think it would make it a little fiddly in terms of math. Eactly how many inches would what prcentage of a rotation cost and players trying to find ways to wring as much out of it as they can. I consider the free rotation as the prep "aiming" before the actual movement and the "sliding in sideways" at the end of the movement.

Easy. You have to measure the distance of the arc turned by the front of the tank.

Or you just say 2" for every 90 degrees it turns.

Would make the Walkers' Free Pivot actually worth a damn, too.

Thats where you would get the players saying "I didnt move a full 90degrees, I only went 89 degrees" Or vehicles of different lengths getting "cheated out of distance of given distance bonuses (however infinitesimal)and you end up with arguments than you have now.
What we have now actually works, and is only really affected by obvious MFA.
of course, thats just my opinion.

 EVIL INC wrote:
Thats where you would get the players saying "I didnt move a full 90degrees, I only went 89 degrees" Or vehicles of different lengths getting "cheated out of distance of given distance bonuses (however infinitesimal)and you end up with arguments than you have now.
What we have now actually works, and is only really affected by obvious MFA.
of course, thats just my opinion.

A subject where I fully agree with Evil? What has the world come to?

If you NEED shinanigans to win, how good are you...really?

I would take the high road here. No small advantage is worth the reputation it creates for you. Hell I do LEGITIMATe and TOTALLY beyond reporach things with deployment and get the evil eye. No one loves it when you redeploy using Eldrad...but its legit. No one likes the wierd Marbo rule where he can ACTUALLY (effectively) deep strike on a top of a ruin because its NOT a deep strike. And so on. Even though its legit... find me one person whose excited to see you do it.

And then you're going to do this? The sponsons are in fact pat of the tank. No part of ther model can cross the 12" mark. So sicne thats not unclear in any way, take the high road. Even IF no one would blink. they're blinking on the inside.

I've never done it, I don't like it, but would accept it if someone did it.

 EVIL INC wrote:
All HFE genetic proteins aside, It IS too bad that the rule of cool has been lost in the shuffle over the years. That was one of the best things about the RT days, no tournaments and games had a "game master" to set everything up and make the calls without all the rules lawyering.

The Rule of Cool has not been lost... but if you're extending the barrels to your tanks by 2", you're giving the vehicle an extra 2 inches of firing range. That *is* MFA.

 Psienesis wrote:

 EVIL INC wrote:
All HFE genetic proteins aside, It IS too bad that the rule of cool has been lost in the shuffle over the years. That was one of the best things about the RT days, no tournaments and games had a "game master" to set everything up and make the calls without all the rules lawyering.

The Rule of Cool has not been lost... but if you're extending the barrels to your tanks by 2", you're giving the vehicle an extra 2 inches of firing range. That *is* MFA.

How about if you explain it to your opponent beforehand? Or agree to lesson the range by 2 inches or set it 2 inches farther back so the end result is that there is no difference? Disallowing it's use even in those examples is a bit drastic yet we see in posts here where it would still not be allowed to be used.
To be honest, I am not that WAAC that I would even blink at it. Again, that is MY opinion. I play for fun and different people have different goals and agendas.

So you would give your opponent with a 48" range gun (by the book) the ability to shoot 50"? Since you measure from the barrel, that 2" can make a very, very big difference.

Obviously, if you've talked about it before the game and agreed to cut 2" off the range of the weapon, then you're golden, but that is certainly not the scenario I'm talking about, no more so than pivoting on the bumper should be allowed (as this grants the entire length of the vehicle in extra inches). I'm talking about showing up at the game with some scratch-built tanks that just so happen to be about 3/4" of an inch lower in profile with guns 2" longer than standard, and not saying a damn thing.

Later on, your opponent wonders why he can't see your tank behind that wall, cause he's dang sure when he played Bob the day before and Bob had his own Earthsmasher tank, he could see the turret sticking out, plain as day... and how the hell are you landing shots in his front line from behind that tree? Bob had to roll his tank half-way forward of it, bringing it into range of his PewPew Troops when he was trying to drop ordnance.

This is the kind of stuff people mean when they talk about MFA.

I'm shocked to see so many people opposed to pivoting.

I can't fathom what the problem with this is. I do this all the time with DE and to a lesser extent mech SM. Opponents do this routinely as well - as they should.

I'm so shocked because not only is this a perfectly legal maneuver, but it also makes a lot of sense from the forging a narrative point of view as well - your mechanized force got flanked by an enemy, or they are unwittingly driving past one.

I think most surprising, is the vitriol offered by some posters with respect to this. To the point of wanting to ostracize a players simply for pivoting. Seriously guys, how can a legal and even perfectly logical maneuver possibly deserve such ire?

yes, I would have no problem allowing an opponent to have a las cannon that fired 48" from a barrel that stuck 2 inches further than normal because of a really cool conversion and the intent and purpose was not to gain an advantage. I'm just not a WAAC player. Like I said, different players have different agendas going into games. Mine is that we both have fun playing a game.

However, the types of MFA that we would be seeing that are more relevent here are things like the land raiders and battlewagons that are 2 feet from front to back while maintaining the same width (yes, thats an exageration) as those would give the extra distance in terms of assaulting out of it.

I know you're exagerating but if I saw a 2 foot long battlewagon I'd be on the ground in a laughing fit. I'd also like to point out that if a BW did get modeled to be longer but kept it's width the same it would also be a huge disadvantage to them creating such a narrow front armour arc.

 EVIL INC wrote:
However, the types of MFA that we would be seeing that are more relevent here are things like the land raiders and battlewagons that are 2 feet from front to back while maintaining the same width (yes, thats an exageration) as those would give the extra distance in terms of assaulting out of it.

And yet after 15 years, the actual examples of this occuring are minimal, if not completely non-existant.

There are plenty of situations were MFA can be a legitimate concern. This isn't one of them.

I understand the actual 2 foot long tanks are minimal. However they CAN exist and it is possible to make them so they HAVE to be taken into account as possibilities. Much lesser exam,ples are FAR more likely to be seen and again, as shown when the "advantage" is smaller or even offset (or more than offset ) by disadvantages, you start to have to wonder was it intentionally done to MFA or was it just done for cool value? It can be a very fine line and advantages and disadvantages can be modeled unintentionally yet people will not always believe that to be the case. This is my point.
When you start lawyering every little tiny miniscule detail trying to say it was intentionally MFA, your taking the fun out of the game.
I know GW doesnt do it so much any more but as an old timer, I remember conversion workshops and how to's in white dwarf when GW advocated modeling and converting for cool. Who remembers the space marine daleck kitbashes? or the RTB01 laying on it's belly firing a missile launcher made from a piece of round sprue? Or the deoderent grav tank? I come from those days and simply do not assume the worst of people unless it is blatantly obvious. Others always assume the worst. Different people, different agendas when playing. Again, my agenda is that both players enjoy the gae.

 Jancoran wrote:
If you NEED shinanigans to win, how good are you...really?
...take the high road. Even IF no one would blink. they're blinking on the inside.

Sorry, but this kind of talk really bothers me. Check out the linked thread and look through the pages of arguments. There are plenty of arguments and rule citations supporting the pivot and move. It is a legitimate move in the game and really pivoting would be rendered entirely useless if it did not work in this way.

The rules don't support the side you're on. I don't mind that. House rule it if you want. But don't get on a moral high horse and start trying to guilt people because they aren't following your house rule.

 Psienesis wrote:

 EVIL INC wrote:
All HFE genetic proteins aside, It IS too bad that the rule of cool has been lost in the shuffle over the years. That was one of the best things about the RT days, no tournaments and games had a "game master" to set everything up and make the calls without all the rules lawyering.

The Rule of Cool has not been lost... but if you're extending the barrels to your tanks by 2", you're giving the vehicle an extra 2 inches of firing range. That *is* MFA.

Or mounting your Land Raider's Multi-Melta onto the front top-hatch instead of the back top-hatch as instructed in the manual?

I haven't owned a LR in... well... let's say that some posters here were not yet a gleam in their parent's eyes... but as I recall, the option was presented for affixing it on either end, as you could position the hatch/ring turret thing beside it.

Mind you, I'm going off memory here, which is only partially reliable at the best of times. I definitely don't recall anything from the instruction manual, but if you handed me a LR kit right now, and the manual said "it goes on the back", then I'd stick it on the back and measure from there.

 EVIL INC wrote:
I understand the actual 2 foot long tanks are minimal. However they CAN exist and it is possible to make them so they HAVE to be taken into account as possibilities. Much lesser exam,ples are FAR more likely to be seen and again, as shown when the "advantage" is smaller or even offset (or more than offset ) by disadvantages, you start to have to wonder was it intentionally done to MFA or was it just done for cool value? It can be a very fine line and advantages and disadvantages can be modeled unintentionally yet people will not always believe that to be the case. This is my point. .

What I'm apparently missing is why you think that point needed to be made.

For someone who claims to have a 'live and let live' attitude towards modelling, you seem to make an awful lot of posts complaining about hypothetical people engaging in hypothetical MFA.

the extreme examples HAVE to be taken into account. there is simply no other way to consider it. Because it is possible to be done, it is possible for someone to do it. In my gaming group of live and let live, we have that attitude BECAUSE none of us go to those obvious extremes. If someone were to want to join our group and pull that extreme sort of stunt, they would not be in our group.

To ignore the possibility and trivialize it is to deny the it exists. That is why it has to be taken into account. Its like going to a swimming pool in the summer. SUUUURELY no one would pee in the pool because that "just isnt done". That is an extreme that NEVER happens. However, you put the chemical in the pool that turns the water blue when someone pees in it, your gonna have at least one "blue situation" over the course of the summer. This is the same thing.

I've given up on 40k now, but I had players pull this thing all the time when I played in GW. Admittedly they also pulled other crap that wasn't breaking the rules, but wasn't in the spirit of the game. I'm out of GW games now, and try and play against just people that aren't WAAC types (though that's not to say that people that do this are). When calling people on this the usual response was "but its legal", which in return had me arguing for a time, but I wound up just not playing those guys any more (the same ones who'd give me all kinds of crap for using converted models, so I suppose my opinion of them was strained to start with). =P

Exactly, if it CAN be done, there will be someone who will do it or try to get away with it. Like I said, those are also usually the first to cry foul themselves. Thank you for vindicating me.

 EVIL INC wrote:
Thank you for vindicating me.

He wasn't. He was responding to the actual topic.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Wyrmalla wrote:
I've given up on 40k now, but I had players pull this thing all the time when I played in GW. Admittedly they also pulled other crap that wasn't breaking the rules, but wasn't in the spirit of the game.

The problem with this argument is that it the 'spirit of the game' is so very subjective.


Here's the thing to consider with the pivot 'shenanigans':
- Pivoting on the spot without moving is legal.
- Pivoting your tank at the start of your movement is legal.

So, if on turn one, I pivot my tank 90 degrees and then move 6", according to those who think that the 'shenanigans' here are not in the spirit of the game, I have just gained extra movement I shoudln't have, and shouldn't be moving the tank that far.

But how about if on turn one I pivot the tank 90 degrees with no further movement. On turn two, I want to move the tank straight forwards... how far should the tank move?


Yes, it can seem like the pivot 'trick' is gaining extra movement unfairly, but ultimately it's just a side effect of the way the movement rules work with models that aren't round. There are certainly ways that GW could tighten up the rules here to prevent this sort of thing if it was that big a problem (and again, they've had 4 editions now in which to do so, and haven't). But it ultimately isn't that big a deal... You just need to consider with long vehicles that if they turn at the start of their movement, that the length of the vehicle will add to their movement in that direction. It's not really any different to a tank being able to turn side-on to give a turret weapon that little bit more range in a specific direction.

 Wyrmalla wrote:
I've given up on 40k now, but I had players pull this thing all the time when I played in GW. Admittedly they also pulled other crap that wasn't breaking the rules, but wasn't in the spirit of the game. I'm out of GW games now, and try and play against just people that aren't WAAC types (though that's not to say that people that do this are). When calling people on this the usual response was "but its legal", which in return had me arguing for a time, but I wound up just not playing those guys any more (the same ones who'd give me all kinds of crap for using converted models, so I suppose my opinion of them was strained to start with). =P

thank you for vindicating my views on this as what you posted supports everything I have said throughout this entire thread.
of course, the ONLY way I could have been wrong is if there is never even a single player past , present or future living or dead who would not take advantage of an elongated model to wring extra distance through pivoting. it would also require it to be physically impossible to model or convert a model to be elongated in any way shape or form longer than the stock model. BOTH of those would have to be true statements.

Pivoting isnt REALLY shenanigans. It is making effective legal use of game mechanics.

 EVIL INC wrote:
thank you for vindicating my views on this as what you posted supports everything I have said throughout this entire thread.
of course, the ONLY way I could have been wrong is if there is never even a single player past , present or future living or dead who would not take advantage of an elongated model to wring extra distance through pivoting. it would also require it to be physically impossible to model or convert a model to be elongated in any way shape or form longer than the stock model. BOTH of those would have to be true statements.

Pivoting isnt REALLY shenanigans. It is making effective legal use of game mechanics.

Did this really need two posts? You already responded to him.

And, again, he wasn't responding to your claim that people build extra-long vehicles. At least that's not how I read his post. But if you want to feel 'vindicated' because some random person on the internet may have agreed with you, by all means feel free. The rest of us will carry on playing games against people who haven't modelled their land raiders to be 2' long, secure in the knowledge that this isn't actually something that is likely to come up at the table.

 Dracos wrote:
I'm shocked to see so many people opposed to pivoting.

I can't fathom what the problem with this is. I do this all the time with DE and to a lesser extent mech SM. Opponents do this routinely as well - as they should.

I'm so shocked because not only is this a perfectly legal maneuver, but it also makes a lot of sense from the forging a narrative point of view as well - your mechanized force got flanked by an enemy, or they are unwittingly driving past one.

I think most surprising, is the vitriol offered by some posters with respect to this. To the point of wanting to ostracize a players simply for pivoting. Seriously guys, how can a legal and even perfectly logical

maneuver possibly deserve such ire?

theyre not against pivoting. they are against you ignoring the sponsons, which are in fact part of the model... a large part really.