Interceptor Drones?

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**Sir Arun**

How far can the flyer move for the Interceptor Drones on the Tau Sun Shark Bomber to still be able to shoot?

**JinxDragon**

Page 33 of the Empire Tau Codex holds your answer:
Section Drones, subsection Attached Drones.

Within it informs us that Drones are treated as Embarked Passengers with a list of restrictions and exceptions that follow after that statement.

**Sir Arun**

It says they fire as passengers, and passengers can only fire if a vehicle moved upto combat speed, so if the tau flyer moves more than 18" (since that is the combat speed of flyers according to the BRB) the drones cannot fire, correct?

**JinxDragon**

Interesting, isn't it?
At least, with Interceptor Drones, they have permission to Disembark at any point during the Vehicles movement so they are not completely useless. It does it in such an unusual way as well, you move the Vehicle to the 'Landing Zone,' Disembark the Interceptor Drones using normal Disembarking rules and then resume moving the Vehicle to it's final location even though this wouldn't otherwise be allowed. The normal method for Deploying from these sort of Flyers tend to involve Deep Striking, without scatter, but I guess they wanted the Drones to be able to spread out a little bit further even though there is only 2 Drones and there won't be much spread between them.

**barnowl**

I suspect the idea is you will be firing them using Interceptor anyway. So won't be firing during your turn at all.

**JinxDragon**

Barnowl,

Before I continue allow me to point out that I do not like what I am about to post, but I am forced to agree with it from a Rule as Written perspective because it is technically correct. I personally believe, that such a problem even exists because certain Rules have secondary Line of Sight Requirements, is more then enough evidence that the whole concept needs to be reviewed and rewritten simply to function. Line of Sight ignoring Rules in particular, because they clearly are meant to have a purpose that is 'name on tin' but simply do not function in any way, shape or form. Line of Sight requirements from inside a Transport with Fire Points is another factor that needs to be heavily reconsidered in order to allow more function to the few vehicles that have them.

So with that in mind:
Interceptor can not use Fire Points to meet it's own Line of Sight requirements....

**Sir Arun**

barnowl wrote:
I suspect the idea is you will be firing them using Interceptor anyway. So won't be firing during your turn at all.

The drones are just called Interceptor Drones. They do not have the Interceptor USR

**JinxDragon**

Sir Arun,
You might want to look again as they do have Interceptor, very important to get around the restriction that Skyfire has against shooting ground units.
Also review Page 78 from the Basic Rule Book about fire points and when Embarked Units get to fire out of them, Cruising speed doesn't out-right forbid firing.

**Sir Arun**

huh, youre absolutely right. also yeah, only snapshots if it moves faster.

but anyways why cant interceptor use fire points to meet LoS requirement?

page 38 of the BRB doesnt say anything about the fire points of transports unable to be used during an interceptor shooting.

**JinxDragon**

The concept of Specific Permission being required to over-turn a general Restriction.

In short:
Evoking Interceptor requires Line of Sight
Units inside Transports do not have Line of Sight
Firepoints grant Line of Sight for two purposes: Firing a weapon or wychfire

While Interceptor will go on to allow a Weapon to be fired, evoking a Special Rule is not firing a weapon or wychfire so it can not be Evoked.

**coredump**

Isn't the drone firing a weapon...???

**Sir Arun**

you are trying to apply strict concepts of mathematical / programming logic to a 40k rulebook. if you do this, you'll find thousands of fallacies in the rulebook and probably wouldnt be able to play a full game

**DeathReaper**

coredump wrote:
Isn't the drone firing a weapon...???

Yes, but only after he uses the Interceptor rule.

The model that has arrived from reserve needs to be in line of sight of the weapon with interceptor.

It can not use a fire point for this purpose because FP's only allow drawing line of sight for shooting or witchfire attacks.

The Interceptor rule is not a shooting or witchfire attack so you can not draw line of sight through a vehicles Fire point to use the interceptor rule.

**Sir Arun**

The Interceptor rule *is* a shooting attack. It can't be a close combat attack...

**JinxDragon**

It is neither, it is a Special Rule and only a Special Rule.

No one here will ever go on record stating that reading the Rules exactly as Written create a game that is playable, it is one of the largest jokes on the internet how poor the Rules are Written. Keep in mind that we argue with the Rule as Written as a default baseline simply for the sake of debate itself, it is impossible to have sensible arguments if everyone is going to simply use their own House Rules as if they where the actual Rules. It also has the additional effect of allowing players to explain with their opponents just why Rule X or Rule Y needs to be modified for the course of the game.

We can't fix a Rule without first accepting it is broken.

**barnowl**

JinxDragon, just rereading the attached drone rules, interceptor and fire point rules. I am not seeing the issue, exactly. I can kinda see where you may be making it but not getting it.

Also from a HYWPI view would you allow interceptor shots? Just curious here. I don't use the Sunshark, but it does seem to really hinder the unit by RAW.

**Kommissar Kel**

If you move as close to 18" as possible(Since exactly 18" is technically impossible) and you and your opponent agree that that is combat speed you can fire with full BS(not that that is much better than snap shots).

I always make sure to discuss with my opponents that moving as close to 18" as we can is combat speed whenever flyers are going to be in play.

**rigeld2**

Sir Arun wrote:
The Interceptor rule *is* a shooting attack. It can't be a close combat attack...

It's the exact same situation as Coteaz's IBEY not working inside a vehicle.

**JinxDragon**

Personally:
As a Tau player, I am more then aware how poor the interaction between Line of Sight requirements, Rules that ignore Line of Sight and alternative methods to measure Line of Sight. I am more then willing to allow any Rule which modifies any Line of Sight requirement to be expended to include all other Line of Sight requirements within that situation and any situation of a similar nature. In this situation, the existence of a Fire Point on the transport would be enough to allow any Line of Sight requirement in secondary Rules to also be met. I will not make any plans based around this House Rule without first discussing it well ahead of time, but this is what I am more then willing to do for others.

Though I have encountered situations where I wish I wasn't so generous....