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Tau Drones:Activate on a successful to wound roll. Transfer on a 2+. Converted into a single mortal wound on the bodyguard unit.

Grot Shields: Activate on a successful to hit roll. Transfer on a 2+. Converted into a slain model on the bodyguard unit.

Deathshroud Terminators: Activate on a successful to hit roll. Transfer on a 2+. Converted into a hit on the bodyguard unit.

Ogryn Bodyguard: Activate on each damage inflicted (Roll for each point of damage). Transfer on a 3+. Converted into a single mortal wound on the bodyguard unit.

Tyrant Guard: Activate on each damage inflicted (Roll for each point of damage). Transfer on a 2+. Converted into a single mortal wound on the bodyguard unit.

Space Marines Command Squads (and similar): Activate when the guarded model "would lose any wounds as a result of an attack made against that model" (Roll once per failed save). Transfer on a 2+. Converted into a mortal wounds equal to the amount of damage caused by the failed save.

Unquestioning Loyalty: Activate whenever you fail a save or suffer a mortal wound. Transfer on a 4+. Converted into a slain model on the bodyguard unit.

I am sure I must have missed one or two.

In short, why is there seemingly an active attempt to make bodyguard rules as unstandardised as possible? Yes, I know Hanlon's razor is a thing, but it's not like GW haven't retroactively errata'd books before.

Yup. Personally the deathshroud (which i think function the same as lychguard) is the correct best method. It makes you weigh your options and choose to risk the hit on the character or take it on the protector.

They should all work that way.

Celestians...

The first answer that comes to mind is they don't want all of them to be OP, but want some to work

 BaconCatBug wrote:
In short, why is there seemingly an active attempt to make bodyguard rules as unstandardised as possible?

Because you don't want to accept the answer, which is that the game is running largely as GW has intended it to?

Seriously this same discussion has come up regarding charging bonuses in AoS, shield stats in AoS, summoning rules, ect.
When GW designed AoS and 8e they made a very conscientious choice to remove the standardization (universal special rules) of previous editions/systems in favor of what they have repeatedly called "bespoke rules".

The idea it would seem is to give subtle differences which (in theory) better differentiate various units (or factions) with similar abilities and allow them to gain more distinct flavorful personalities.
This also has the added benefit of cutting down on the player needing to cross-reference rules text out of the BRB or GW having to make new USRs ever time they need to differentiate a rule for the purpose of balancing a single unit.

Whether GW has actually achieved these goals is very debatable (I'd argue they didn't go far enough in a lot of cases), but I'd argue this is absolutely as GW intend based on both consistent design trends in both AoS and 8e.

 Lance845 wrote:
Yup. Personally the deathshroud (which i think function the same as lychguard) is the correct best method. It makes you weigh your options and choose to risk the hit on the character or take it on the protector.

They should all work that way.

Yeah, and they make the defensive stats you are paying for the bodyguard unit matter and not only how many wounds they have and if they have a FNP.

I think Celestians are the same as Tyrant Guard IIRC.

Yeah, I can't understand any reason why it should work differently across these. The only way I can see it working differently would be if the bodyguard can do some kind of psychic bodyguard action, as intercepting mind bullets *should* work differently.

But otherwise, these are all the same thing. Something bad is going to hit something important, so something else jumps in the way at the last second to stop it. I could see a fluff justification for something not jumping in the way if they think the important thing can take the hit (only two I can really think would make that assessment would be T'au drones due to programming and Tyranid guards due to the Tyranids being more like 1 big organism rather so their reaction might be more akin to moving in a single individual trying to move in such a way as to deflect a hit or not moving because they already feel like they're in the best spot to take/deflect the hit), but that's a pretty big stretch. I'd much rather they all just work the 1 way, or a second way if they can actually stop mental attacks.

Because ones upon a time none of this mattered, as characters could join units, making the need for such rules moot.

Since GW did away with that (even with Guard, which was the entire point difference with their HQs), they don't know to implement it in a consistent and elegant way.

As it is, you got a real rich variety of ways to play it in different armies with different tactical implications. Only problem is one or two are a bit too useful, maybe, and could be trimmed back, like the iron hands when it could protect things that were also a levia-thingy.

Yeah, they should all use the same rule:

***
When (protected unit) is hit, roll a d6; on a 2+, the ((bodyguard unit)) is hit instead. Resolve the shot against the unit hit, then continue to fire.
***

You can group rolls to a point … if there are five models in the bodyguard unit, you could try to move 5 shots at once, resolve them, then continue for example, but it means that you always use an attempt to wound against the right toughness and the wounded unit handles saves as normal.

Simple, universal, clean.

The reason is because GW, uniquely among games designers, have ditched their old universal special rules in favour of a system that pretty much reproduces the same effect in a much more confusing way, with the added benefit that it's much more difficult to fix any errors in their system. I think the bodyguard rules specifically exacerbate the problem because they are by nature quite wordy and the text is often quite convoluted to convey the required mechanic.

At this point I feel it's about 50/50 whether GW were even aware those various bodyguard rules were different to other ones at the time of writing.

Same as Lance845.
Or maybe two different rules to represent both cheap expendable bodyguards that will just die and soak the wound, and good elite bodyguard that may tank the wound?
Elite bodyguards get the Deathshroud rules, and throwaway bodyguards get the Command Squad body guard rule, to avoid the throwaway bodyguard tanking a 6D hit to the face all by himself.
With all those rules except the Deathshroud, elite bodyguard sucks compared to cheap throwaway bodyguard, but that doesn't feel right...

Jack Flask wrote:

 BaconCatBug wrote:
In short, why is there seemingly an active attempt to make bodyguard rules as unstandardised as possible?

Because you don't want to accept the answer, which is that the game is running largely as GW has intended it to?

Seriously this same discussion has come up regarding charging bonuses in AoS, shield stats in AoS, summoning rules, ect.
When GW designed AoS and 8e they made a very conscientious choice to remove the standardization (universal special rules) of previous editions/systems in favor of what they have repeatedly called "bespoke rules".

The idea it would seem is to give subtle differences which (in theory) better differentiate various units (or factions) with similar abilities and allow them to gain more distinct flavorful personalities.
This also has the added benefit of cutting down on the player needing to cross-reference rules text out of the BRB or GW having to make new USRs ever time they need to differentiate a rule for the purpose of balancing a single unit.

Whether GW has actually achieved these goals is very debatable (I'd argue they didn't go far enough in a lot of cases), but I'd argue this is absolutely as GW intend based on both consistent design trends in both AoS and 8e.

I'd say 8th 40k and current AOS are actually par for the course. Most of GW's main gaming systems over the last couple of decades have had a core set of rules (move, shoot, magic/psychic, charge etc..) and then a series of rules that are consistent for weapon types (great weapons +Str in Fantasy, rapid fire, -1 to hit with powerfist equivalents, jink etc...) and then they create army-specific mishmashes of rules and abilities to individualise the different armies.

AOS in particular does the 'sleight-of-hand' trick of creating uniquely named weapons which are functionally the same to other weapons (long pointy spear weapon vs short pokey slash/crump weapon being the usual option for most basic troops types) and then passes them off as different.

Sometimes this is well-written and sometimes (often) it is not. I'm not a GW hater or fanboy, I'll give credit where credit is due (through a degree of personal judgement) and I'll criticise where I think it is due as well (assault weapon rules in 8th ).

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
I think Celestians are the same as Tyrant Guard IIRC.

I wish! It's same as command squads, aka the terribad version.

Jack Flask wrote:
The idea it would seem is to give subtle differences which (in theory) better differentiate various units (or factions) with similar abilities and allow them to gain more distinct flavorful personalities.

Ah, the very flavorful of needing 6 Celestians to die to tank a melta shot when a single grot or drone or genecultist could tank it, and a hive guard could only suffer one (1) hp! So flavorful and nice!

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:
Same as Lance845.
Or maybe two different rules to represent both cheap expendable bodyguards that will just die and soak the wound, and good elite bodyguard that may tank the wound?
Elite bodyguards get the Deathshroud rules, and throwaway bodyguards get the Command Squad body guard rule, to avoid the throwaway bodyguard tanking a 6D hit to the face all by himself.
With all those rules except the Deathshroud, elite bodyguard sucks compared to cheap throwaway bodyguard, but that doesn't feel right...

This is how it should be done!

Well yet another thread that's boynd to end up with people screaming about this and that rule being OP.

However if you mess with these rules you mess with the interfaction balance and generally not in a good way.

Your suggestions are lets make marines an even more powerful set of codex's. and you guys complain about GW and Balance.

Shields drones do nothing but this its their only reason for being on the table, nerf them they vanish the army tanks in ability to compete and would need even more points drops than they arguably already do for 50+% of their codex.

Grot shields again also critical for orks viability and needs CP placement yada yada.

Deathshroud nerfing a codex that many view as while having berb pretty powerful at release and not really competitive and currently awaiting a PA boost.

While I get you might find it frustrating to not have a USR but with the rules as they are GW have a small balance tool to keep some of the most OP factions bot runnibg away like a freight train.
If the downside is it hurts your head to keep them all in your head 100% of the time suck it up buttercup.

Or, you know, point the units correctly for the universal rule.

Ice_can wrote:
Your suggestions are lets make marines an even more powerful set of codex's. and you guys complain about GW and Balance.

Yes I totally think we should make this change without any other rule or point change, and also it's obvious that the ever so popular command squads would be even more popular if they could actually work at being bodyguards!

Different rules for different units because they want them to work differently.
That way there are many risk/reward profiles and degrees of usefulness.

I'm not going to argue that some units do wound interception poorly, and they might want to change those units, but universalizing the rule won't suddenly eliminate that kind of issue.

As an example, if all units had the saviour protocols wording the Deathshroud would be way worse (can't use their 2+/4++ against the hit anymore and being after the wound roll doesn't help much given who they intercept for), Grots would be way better, since they'd be intercepting after another round of failures.
You're just not going to figure out correct points values for Grots, Drones and Termies using the same rule that makes them all both usable in a bodyguard role and whatever else they're supposed to do. So now it's a bunch of different useless-bodyguard-rule issues to fix created by having a one-size-fits-all rule.
If you do the bodyguard rules for the specific unit you can mitigate that issue. To the extent that they do a good job of course. But GW doing a bad job is always a problem and not specific to this at all.

In the end it's all right there on the datasheet, which you should have when you're using the unit anyway.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:
Because ones upon a time none of this mattered, as characters could join units, making the need for such rules moot.

Since GW did away with that (even with Guard, which was the entire point difference with their HQs), they don't know to implement it in a consistent and elegant way.

This ^^

Just make it one or two "types", and junk the rest. It's very annoying. Same with re-rolls.

rbstr wrote:
As an example, if all units had the saviour protocols wording the Deathshroud would be way worse (can't use their 2+/4++ against the hit anymore and being after the wound roll doesn't help much given who they intercept for), Grots would be way better, since they'd be intercepting after another round of failures.
You're just not going to figure out correct points values for Grots, Drones and Termies using the same rule that makes them all both usable in a bodyguard role and whatever else they're supposed to do. So now it's a bunch of different useless-bodyguard-rule issues to fix created by having a one-size-fits-all rule.
If you do the bodyguard rules for the specific unit you can mitigate that issue. To the extent that they do a good job of course. But GW doing a bad job is always a problem and not specific to this at all.

Yeah that's why I wrote about two different rules. You really don't need any more than two though.

Not sure why people think a tiny robot made of hovering metal, a huge, muscular but unarmoured monster, and genetically engineered super-soldier wearing the toughest armour in the Galaxy should all guard their leaders in exactly the same way.

I mean, aside from making it easier for people who a) play multiple armies and confuse slightly similar rules or b) want to know all of the rules for every faction in order to better compete.

Gw already makes all kinds of abstractions to their rules, so clinging to any notion of realism is a fools errand. I'm just surprised there are people who want to play a game whose rules are so simple and streamlined that something that looks like a drone and something that looks like a terminator would follow the same body guard rule. I mean, they are very clearly different, right?

Like it's almost the punchline to a joke: an Ogryn, a Terminator and a Drone walk onto a battlefield, but they all have to roll 2+ on d6 to take a mortal wound for their commander.

I suspect there are differences because the writers don’t talk to each other that much. It might also have to do with the spread out codex releases and shifts of opinion over time.

The tau drone rule is the worst written imo. When 8th dropped, shield drones served no purpose because the mortals wounds ignored their invuln. GW had to errata their rule to grant an additional 5+ FNP just so that the drones would actually do their only job. Apparently no one on the tau codex team thought about going the deathshroud route, which would not have required the 5+ FNP in the first place.

PenitentJake wrote:
Not sure why people think a tiny robot made of hovering metal, a huge, muscular but unarmoured monster, and genetically engineered super-soldier wearing the toughest armour in the Galaxy should all guard their leaders in exactly the same way.

I mean, aside from making it easier for people who a) play multiple armies and confuse slightly similar rules or b) want to know all of the rules for every faction in order to better compete.

Gw already makes all kinds of abstractions to their rules, so clinging to any notion of realism is a fools errand. I'm just surprised there are people who want to play a game whose rules are so simple and streamlined that something that looks like a drone and something that looks like a terminator would follow the same body guard rule. I mean, they are very clearly different, right?

Like it's almost the punchline to a joke: an Ogryn, a Terminator and a Drone walk onto a battlefield, but they all have to roll 2+ on d6 to take a mortal wound for their commander.

I think the problem is that some of these iterations just aren't really functional, and some are far too functional, in a game that's typically played at a scale where there's really no good reason to get into that level of detail. That's adding unnecessary complexity for little value in depth, it's making them different for its own sake and as a result the ability of these mechanics to serve their intended purpose is highly variable. Likewise, for a game this scale, trying to squeeze "flavor" out of mechanics like this is a great way to get lots of confusion as people mix up different rules with different armies.

Whoever wrote the Tau savior protocol rules needs to be beaten with a dreadsock. They are absolutely infuriating to play against and there is no skill or counterplay to them. Can't make the drones run, can't kill the drones with high AP or damage weapons, can't use cheap crappy shooting to power through them efficiently, it's just a busted rule the whole way through. Converting the damage to a single mortal wound and getting their FNP is ridiculous. One or the other is understandable, but the two combined is too much. I understand my local Tau player is incredibly lucky (I'm talking 20 wounds on drones only killing one type lucky) but even with average dice they're insanely durable.

The others are annoying only in that they're all different, but I've yet to see another one I had an actual issue with like Tau.

Dandelion wrote:
I suspect there are differences because the writers don’t talk to each other that much. It might also have to do with the spread out codex releases and shifts of opinion over time.

The tau drone rule is the worst written imo. When 8th dropped, shield drones served no purpose because the mortals wounds ignored their invuln. GW had to errata their rule to grant an additional 5+ FNP just so that the drones would actually do their only job. Apparently no one on the tau codex team thought about going the deathshroud route, which would not have required the 5+ FNP in the first place.

The Tau index was clearly written by someone who either didn't understand 8th editions rules or set out to punish Tau players for 7th edition Taudar.
The codex atleast became vaguely functional, but it's still a codex while functional with a lot of pointless or downright broken rules in them, the dude leading a team of sniper drones who can't snipe.
Unit buffing drones being single model units and hence nonfunctional as they die when looked at.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
Whoever wrote the Tau savior protocol rules needs to be beaten with a dreadsock. They are absolutely infuriating to play against and there is no skill or counterplay to them. Can't make the drones run, can't kill the drones with high AP or damage weapons, can't use cheap crappy shooting to power through them efficiently, it's just a busted rule the whole way through. Converting the damage to a single mortal wound and getting their FNP is ridiculous. One or the other is understandable, but the two combined is too much. I understand my local Tau player is incredibly lucky (I'm talking 20 wounds on drones only killing one type lucky) but even with average dice they're insanely durable.

The others are annoying only in that they're all different, but I've yet to see another one I had an actual issue with like Tau.

Play Tau without drones and watch them get tabled in 2 turns.
Most of their units are pointed so ridiculously that they need to survive the 3 turns that saviour protocols allow to be worthwhile putting on the board.

Drones are subject to leadership and always have been, large units are a liability.

Marines tend to have no issue sweeping drones up on mass, Neither do Astramilicheese either, assulat armies tend to have issues but again they are in a rock paper game vrs tau often decided by terrain.
It sounds like your list is just hitting a hard counter matchup.

PenitentJake wrote:
Not sure why people think a tiny robot made of hovering metal, a huge, muscular but unarmoured monster, and genetically engineered super-soldier wearing the toughest armour in the Galaxy should all guard their leaders in exactly the same way.

Are the mechanical differences present in the rules any more unit-appropriate? Can you explain to me what they represent?

It seems to be like a lot of people use the 'it's so they can each have faction-specific flavor' excuse, but I can't see any rhyme or reason to how the rules are worded for different factions- why do Tyrant Guard behave differently from Shield Drones, for example, when they're both autonomous and fearless self-sacrificial units by design?

PenitentJake wrote:
Not sure why people think a tiny robot made of hovering metal, a huge, muscular but unarmoured monster, and genetically engineered super-soldier wearing the toughest armour in the Galaxy should all guard their leaders in exactly the same way.

We should also have different firing methods for each person in a squad, what they aim at, mechanics for deciding whether someone on a bike dies with their bike and whether they can keep doing things after the crash, rules for hiding in buildings and on and on and on. At a certain point you stop and say "that's enough for a game" and that point is when you have one bodyguarding method. Maybe 2 if you really need a different way of doing it for quality armour people and just chucking the nearest bloke at the incoming fire.

PenitentJake wrote:
Not sure why people think a tiny robot made of hovering metal, a huge, muscular but unarmoured monster, and genetically engineered super-soldier wearing the toughest armour in the Galaxy should all guard their leaders in exactly the same way.

Oh yeah, it makes perfect sense! Those difference are brilliantly illustrated by the different rules used! For instance, from a lore point of view....
Ahah just joking there is absolutely no way, no way at all to explain the rule difference from a lore standpoint! I dare you to try.
And seriously, you cannot imagine that someone may want to know the rules of other factions not just because they are over-competitive, just because... well, it's more pleasant to play the game when you know the rules?