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I've been reading the rules for tank shock and I can't really see how it's good. Am I missing something? Ramming other vehicles seems like it can be a good choice but against troops all you do is maybe cause a fall back and risk a free hit against you.

Moving the enemy off an objective.

As for Ram...it really only happens when you're transports are spent and have nothing better to do...or you want a reason to get your tank within an inch of another tank.

Yeah, I think it's recieved a nerf in 6th.

It's been a while so I may be wrong, but I think tank shocking used to actually run over troops instead of make them run away.
You can still use it to chase troops away from objectives though which can (situationally) be useful.

Or if you have something with a Deffrolla

 SkavenLord wrote:
Yeah, I think it's recieved a nerf in 6th.

It's been a while so I may be wrong, but I think tank shocking used to actually run over troops instead of make them run away.
You can still use it to chase troops away from objectives though which can (situationally) be useful.

If they death or glory and don't immobilize, wreck, or blow the the tank...they die. Or if deffrolla'd they die a little either way.

You can use Tank Shock to eliminate an enemy unit, with a little bit of forethought and some preparation. If you partially surround an enemy unit with one or more of your infantry squads, leaving a Tank-size gap on one side, you can make a shallow Tank Shock into that gap to displace half or more of the enemy models (but not all). The displaced models are allowed to move through the Tank, but not your infantry surrounding them. The displaced models must maintain unit coherency, or are eliminated. Since they cannot be displaced closer than 1" from any of your models, and coherency is a max of 2", all of the displaced models will be out of coherency with the rest if the unit that did not get displaced, causing all of the displaced models to be removed from the board. The remaining models are then required to pass a break check, failure would cause them to fail back into your surrounding models, eliminating those models, too.

It takes a bit of planning as well as enough experience to know when to try, but is an excellent way to remove infantry wholesale if you are bored and up for some maneuvering.

SJ

 jeffersonian000 wrote:
You can use Tank Shock to eliminate an enemy unit, with a little bit of forethought and some preparation. If you partially surround an enemy unit with one or more of your infantry squads, leaving a Tank-size gap on one side, you can make a shallow Tank Shock into that gap to displace half or more of the enemy models (but not all). The displaced models are allowed to move through the Tank, but not your infantry surrounding them. The displaced models must maintain unit coherency, or are eliminated. Since they cannot be displaced closer than 1" from any of your models, and coherency is a max of 2", all of the displaced models will be out of coherency with the rest if the unit that did not get displaced, causing all of the displaced models to be removed from the board. The remaining models are then required to pass a break check, failure would cause them to fail back into your surrounding models, eliminating those models, too.

It takes a bit of planning as well as enough experience to know when to try, but is an excellent way to remove infantry wholesale if you are bored and up for some maneuvering.

SJ

You are setting yourself up for quite an argument with the crowd that says the models can move to the nearest point not occupied by a tank.

I read the rules the same way you do, but it's not the prevailing interpretation.

Tank shock is amazing, especially on cheap transports which survive long enough to disembark their occupants and are hardly worth shooting at any more (contrary to Dakka's belief, this happens to me all the time). In an Apocalyptic battle I one time tank shocked almost 500pts worth of Tau off the board in one go with a measly Rhino.

 techsoldaten wrote:

 jeffersonian000 wrote:
You can use Tank Shock to eliminate an enemy unit, with a little bit of forethought and some preparation. If you partially surround an enemy unit with one or more of your infantry squads, leaving a Tank-size gap on one side, you can make a shallow Tank Shock into that gap to displace half or more of the enemy models (but not all). The displaced models are allowed to move through the Tank, but not your infantry surrounding them. The displaced models must maintain unit coherency, or are eliminated. Since they cannot be displaced closer than 1" from any of your models, and coherency is a max of 2", all of the displaced models will be out of coherency with the rest if the unit that did not get displaced, causing all of the displaced models to be removed from the board. The remaining models are then required to pass a break check, failure would cause them to fail back into your surrounding models, eliminating those models, too.

It takes a bit of planning as well as enough experience to know when to try, but is an excellent way to remove infantry wholesale if you are bored and up for some maneuvering.

SJ

You are setting yourself up for quite an argument with the crowd that says the models can move to the nearest point not occupied by a tank.

I read the rules the same way you do, but it's not the prevailing interpretation.

I'm not sure what argument you are refering to. This tactic welcomes models that would be under the Tank to literally move a far as it takes to not be under the Tank. What the tactic is abusing are the coherency rules and how those rules interact with a unit split by a shallow Tank Shock that force some but not all of the models out of coherency.

I've even used a similar tactic to eliminate a unit that breaks in CC.

SJ

Tank shocking is much worse than it used to be. It's not even reliable for moving guys off of objectives thanks to their ability to fill back in, and that vehicles don't contest. It's not even that great for bunching up dudes to get hit by a flamer anymore.

Pretty much the only use is to force morale checks, and given that so many armies just sort of ignore that part of the game...

Remember that a unit falling back automatically fails a morale check as well. So if you tank shock and a unit falls back, you can tanks shock with another tank and so on.

Heard of an American tournament player getting rid of Screamerstar this way.

Except screamer stars are, for most intents and purposes, fearless, so I dont know how he managed that.

All tank shocking really lets you do is move the enemy around a bit during your turn. Push their guys a little closer for a charge, or a little farther for safety, make them need to move through difficult terrain to get somewhere, etc etc. It can be mildly useful for those purposes, but nothing game changing. If youve got a useless empty rhino, its just another way for it to get in the way.

 McGibs wrote:
Except screamer stars are, for most intents and purposes, fearless, so I dont know how he managed that.

All tank shocking really lets you do is move the enemy around a bit during your turn. Push their guys a little closer for a charge, or a little farther for safety, make them need to move through difficult terrain to get somewhere, etc etc. It can be mildly useful for those purposes, but nothing game changing. If youve got a useless empty rhino, its just another way for it to get in the way.

You could do it with Terrify.

McGibs wrote:All tank shocking really lets you do is move the enemy around a bit during your turn. Push their guys a little closer for a charge, or a little farther for safety, make them need to move through difficult terrain to get somewhere, etc etc.

But tank shocking has never really done this. Your opponent has always had a fair bit of latitude with regards to how to move their models away from a tank shock. Now that the unit only has to make way for where the tank ends, and not even need to clear the path it drove through anymore, it's particularly useless at moving models. The best you can really do is to cause things to bunch up a bit, but because your own unit is now in the middle of the bunching up, it's not even much better for blast or template weapons thanks to the new restrictions you added to the equation.

Until they give tank shocking some real teeth (like forcing all models that were moved to make a dangerous terrain check, for example), it's still going to be largely pointless.

Especially when you need to drive into melta/close combat range and risk free death or glory hits in the process.

 Ailaros wrote:
Tank shocking is much worse than it used to be. It's not even reliable for moving guys off of objectives thanks to their ability to fill back in, and that vehicles don't contest. It's not even that great for bunching up dudes to get hit by a flamer anymore.

Pretty much the only use is to force morale checks, and given that so many armies just sort of ignore that part of the game...

I agree, there are a lot more ways to "ignore" the effects of tank shock. I used to be able to shock marines in their own deployment zone of the board due to failed Ld. Doesn't happen much anymore.

Yeah, in 4th ed, that part of tank shock was actually useful. Before every unit and its mother gained some source of fearless, and back when a failed morale test meant the tank could escort the unit off the board.

Now it's less like an armored titan smashing into infantry and scattering them helplessly before the heavy grinding steel of might made manifest, and it's more like a tractor backing up slowly, making its beeping noise while nearby pedestrians slowly clear out of the way.

 Ailaros wrote:
Yeah, in 4th ed, that part of tank shock was actually useful. Before every unit and its mother gained some source of fearless, and back when a failed morale test meant the tank could escort the unit off the board.

Now it's less like an armored titan smashing into infantry and scattering them helplessly before the heavy grinding steel of might made manifest, and it's more like a tractor backing up slowly, making its beeping noise while nearby pedestrians slowly clear out of the way.

LOL I thought I was the only one to make the beep beep beep noises when backing up my Batlewagons.

Tank Shock: needs more Deffrollas.

Tank shocking might not do much to take them off objectives, but used earlier it can prevent them from getting there.

Also, against units that can't do damage in death or glory, it's a free moral check on top on any from shooting done lately.

Tank shocking is awesome. You have to remember that if they fail the leadership test they fall back and require a rallying morale check, which always means they only move 3" and fire snaps next turn should they rally. You can effectively neuter most units for a turn doing this, even if they didnt run that far.

I had a game last night against SoB/IG and he managed to get some IG with plasmas/meltas too close for comfort to my broadsides. Since i was busy clearing out sisters i spaced out that IG unit had things that could easily kill my broadsides. So my skyray tankshocked them and a nearby sister unit, both ran like 9-11 inches away. Both rallied, but that was a turn i didnt give two feths about two units out of 7 targets i had 1 turn left to wipe out (KP game). Didnt want to hit the IG unit at that point, it was larger than the remaining sisters, so i neutered their shooting lol.

I still find it odd that it doesnt cause any damage without a deffrolla. You would think there'd be a small chance models would get ran over and get their armor crushed. By small i mean on a 5+ cause D3 S4 hits at APX or something like that.
X would be determined by the vehicle the same way the Ramming rules are. +1 for Tank, +1 per 3" moved, +1 for every front AV higher than 10 (making getting tank shocked by an AV13/14 vehicle kinda deadly, which it should since you just got ran over BY A FREAKING TANK lol)

Also if you are going second it is pretty easy to just go for tank shocks at the end of the game and even marines count as destroyed if they dont get a chance to rally.

Also depending on how they are placed if you come in at the right angle you can get small units off of the objectives just by measuring your tank shock distance correctly.

I am not going to say it is a super powerful rule but it is another tool in the tool box

The problem with clearing off of objectives is that the vehicle doesn't contest, and unless you put the vehicle squarely on the objective, and the vehicle is also larger than 3" in every dimension, then you're still not pushing anybody out of the way far enough to stop them scoring.

I mean, maybe it works for land raiders...

I have to agree that tank shocking used to be better in fifth, but as Ailaros said, the bigger issue iscthat vehicle can't contest.

That change, more than anything else, is why my 5th edition Blood Angels army has never left the shelf since 6th. I relied on having 6 Predators and 5 Razorbacks that could flat out and deny an objective late in the game. Once that ability was lost, it was pretty pointless to continue.

Look at tank shock in 6th only and do not compare to 5th, it is situational option that relies on luck more than skill, but quantity makes luck viable. So a rhino rush list it will workjust because of sheer numbers, few models are outright fearless.

We all have stories of how it won a game. It is an option, and I won't shame away from using. Beyond a rhino rush list don't plan on it winning you games.

If the vehicle is directly on top of the objective (since it doesnt impair movement) there would be a very VERY tiny gap that is still claimable by your opponent. Dont forget, they cant be closer than 1" to your model and you have to be 3" from the objective to claim it. Most vehicles only the sides of it will be short enough to allow you to still be 3" from the objective, but like 1 maybe 2 models.

In most situations, it would be more of a last minute GTFO attempt. They flee, they will almost always run far enough to not be able to reclaim the objective with their 3" rally. Without running yea its pretty much not going to happen as they will just surround your vehicle, but what troop outside 11+ boyz squads or nid bugs in synapse range are fearless without IC intervention lol. I know Necron Warriors are LD10 but hey you can still fail that....after all i failed like 5 LD10 tests yesterday with my Ethereal bubble'd firewarriors lol

You can be closer than 1" though. Tank shock doesn't push you more than 1" away, and when you assault a tank the next turn, you can get and stay into contact with it.

Pg 85

"If some enemy models in the enemy unit would end up underneath the vehicle when it reaches its final position (it makes no difference whether the unit is falling back or not) these models must be moved out of the way by the shortest distance, leaving at least 1" between them and the vehicle whilst maintaining unit coherency and staying on the board...." and we know what happens if they dont.

While yes youre right on the Assault part you dont move away, even though vehicles are not locked in combat and can simply move away (weirrrrd....) when you have to get out of the way of a tankshock you do have to be 1" away. What if you cant assault before game ends? Bam, tankshock wins lol.

Barebones chaos rhinos with destroyer blades and dirge casters work great in a khorne foot horde for tank shocking. Rush them up the field giving cover saves to the blobs behind them then ram everything in sight. Herds the enemy units closer, takes away the ability to overwatch, and does d6 automatic hits. If something runs off the board that's just gravy.

I once completely ruined a t'au gunline with my orks. every trukk has a ram, so can tankshock. I got really lucky with my initial turn, only lost one trukk - yay for kustom forcefield and no markerlights.
my plan was to shoot the tau up a bit before the charge, what with their entire army overwatching and such, but I decided to tankshock every unit while i was at it. no-one ever death or glories nowadays, I find, but the best thing was that at least 2 of his units failed their morale check and ran away. next turn I did it again, and tankshocked his last squad (everything else was about to be charged) with the ethereal in it with no less than 3 trukks. the third test was failed and he ran off the board.

tankshock's a brilliant utility for shifting people off of objectives. it's useful for herding a unit closer to another that's about to charge, squashing them tight together so they can be flamed more effectively, getting someone to run out of your deployment zone to deny them a linebreaker point, and on the rarest of lucky occasions, you can use it to get linebreaker yourself;
last turn, you're too far from the opponents deployment zone to get there, so you decide to tankshock a unit with your trukk of boys. they death or glory, successfully destroy the trukk, the trukk proceeds to karreen 14" into their deployment zone, explodes and dumps the boys into linebreaker. only happened once, I won by a point!!!