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yukishiro1 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Looks good so far, especially Obscuring (hello forests again!).

Well, except that it seems to say that if you're inside the forest, you can still be seen and shot at. It's only if you're completely outside the forest on the far side of it that you can't be seen. Set foot 1mm inside the forest and boom, you get evaporated. 1mm outside of the forest on the opposite side? Invisibility cloak!

Think of it like this. If a squad is occupying a house, it makes sense that they can shoot out of the house at the enemy, yes? If the enemy is being engaged by a unit from inside a house, it makes perfect sense that the enemy can shoot back at them. If a squad is behind a house, nobody can see anything, so nobody engages. That's how this terrain works.

The older rule (4th Edition) held that models were obscured in a forest if they were some distance into the forest from the attacker, (2" or 6" or something, I forget), which makes more sense logically, but is more of a pain in the butt on the tabletop, since it can involve careful measuring, especially when squads start flanking each other. The Obscuring rule is written as it is to avoid argument and keep things snappy.

I get what the rule says. It's just a massive, massive change from the standard in current 40k tournaments, and a massive DECREASE in the los-blocking of terrain.

It means the whole thing about not having to board up your ruins isn't actually true. If you want a LOS-blocking piece of terrain in the middle of the table, it has to actually be LOS-blocking, whether it has "obscure" or not, because otherwise you have to actually be on the far side of it to block LOS, which is a dramatic change from the current tournament rule that even one wall blocks LOS.

I suspect it will mean that ruins will simply not be used in tournaments at all, and will be totally replaced with walls, in order to avoid arguments about the precise dimensions of when you are "in" a ruin vs "on the far side of" a ruin.

I guarantee you that you are overthinking it.

 Insectum7 wrote:
They might rule that out, they might not, either way it's a vast fething improvement.

Not if you can still target antennae, banner tops, etc. That's the chief problem with LOS in 40K. Adding obscured rules doesn't make that problem go away any more than that useless MW melee stratagem solves the issues with Falling Back from combat.

 Insectum7 wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Looks good so far, especially Obscuring (hello forests again!).

Well, except that it seems to say that if you're inside the forest, you can still be seen and shot at. It's only if you're completely outside the forest on the far side of it that you can't be seen. Set foot 1mm inside the forest and boom, you get evaporated. 1mm outside of the forest on the opposite side? Invisibility cloak!

Think of it like this. If a squad is occupying a house, it makes sense that they can shoot out of the house at the enemy, yes? If the enemy is being engaged by a unit from inside a house, it makes perfect sense that the enemy can shoot back at them. If a squad is behind a house, nobody can see anything, so nobody engages. That's how this terrain works.

The older rule (4th Edition) held that models were obscured in a forest if they were some distance into the forest from the attacker, (2" or 6" or something, I forget), which makes more sense logically, but is more of a pain in the butt on the tabletop, since it can involve careful measuring, especially when squads start flanking each other. The Obscuring rule is written as it is to avoid argument and keep things snappy.

Remember that terrain can have multiple traits as well. Obscuring may not help you when you're inside a forest, but Soft Cover will.

yukishiro1 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Obscuration does what is meant by no TLOS. You might be able to see the model through the terrain, but you dont count as drawing LOS to it.

If you can still target units by seeing gun barrels, tops of banner poles, antennae, the tips of wings and so on, then the Obscure rule won't mean much.

I don't see why you are saying that. It doesn't matter if you can see the model by eye. If you are have to draw your LOS over any part of the Obscuring terrain to do it, it's hidden from view. You could have a banner pole that's 20" high and it wouldn't matter.

Yeah. But if you can draw a LOS to some spear hanging off the side, you could shoot at it just fine. It's only if the spear is directly above that it would be blocked.

Doesn't seem to work that way. In fact you could take a dread put it behind a wall, only with a dreadnought size hole in the middle, and if the wall is high enough you wouldn't be able to draw LoS to the dread as long as it doesn't touch the area terrain. Forests are like that too. Stand behind them and you are invisible, step 0,1" in to the forest and you are practicaly in the open.

Why?

Right now you have two big L-shaped ruins in the middle of a standard tournament board. These both totally block LOS - whether you're inside them or on the far side of them.

New GW rules: being inside doesn't block LOS any more. If you want to block LOS, you have to be on the far side of the terrain piece instead.

This is a massive change, unless we simply decide that all ruins have no dimensions and that being 1mm on the far side of the wall means you're on the far side of the terrain piece, not inside it.

Yeah I just realized that the wording of Heavy Cover is totally counterintuitive.

It's not saying 'you get +1 to your save by being in cover, unless you charged, then you don't benefit'.

It's saying 'you get +1 to your save by being in cover, unless you got charged, then you don't benefit'.

A horde of Orks swarming into a bunker will get the cover bonus for being in the bunker, while whatever they charged won't get the bonus in the first round of combat. In any subsequent rounds, both sides get cover.

That's just bizarre.

 catbarf wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 catbarf wrote:
Well, with cover remaining the current +1 to saves, I'm inclined to say that light infantry hordes are probably dead. Small units will have an easier time hiding, but big units of Boyz or Cultists are going to get nuked.

Still a lot to determine before that coffin is nailed shut.

I don't want to be all doom-and-gloom, but unless there's some new mechanic really out of left field I don't see how infantry will survive. For big units, it's basically the same as 8th, except now with Blast.

There is, I suppose, the slight change that it looks like a player will be allowed to take hits on individual models that are in cover, so the 'wholly within' requirement at least appears to be gone.

There isn't. 9th is killing light infantry just as gw planned.

Good news is obscured is even better than original itc rule.

Bad news terrain still favours elites more than hordes. No surprlse.

 Grimgold wrote:


I had a thought on the plight of light infantry, in a world with bolter discipline, hurricane bolters, and CC units rocking 40+ attacks are a few extra shots from blast weapons really going to matter? Against a unit of 10 the new blast rules work out to be an extra shot per attack on average, when you look at how bad light infantry have it now, perhaps we've been a little hyperbolic about a world with the blast rule.

Yes, I would agree. A 2D6 weapon goes from an average of 7 to about 8. There's just a lot less swing. What really gets people is depending on how they interpret the rule to apply to a 4D3 weapon or its likeness.

Karol wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:


Yeah. But if you can draw a LOS to some spear hanging off the side, you could shoot at it just fine. It's only if the spear is directly above that it would be blocked.

Doesn't seem to work that way.

No, that is what it says. Read it carefully: if you can draw a straight line from your model to any part of their model without hitting the building, you can shoot at it. So if there's a spear or a gun or something hanging off the side, you can fire at them even if 99% of their model is obscured by the sillhouette. It's only if the spear/rifle etc is pushing up over the top that obscuring blocks it.

yukishiro1 wrote:
Why?

Right now you have two big L-shaped ruins in the middle of a standard tournament board. These both totally block LOS - whether you're inside them or on the far side of them.

New GW rules: being inside doesn't block LOS any more. If you want to block LOS, you have to be on the far side of the terrain piece instead.

This is a massive change, unless we simply decide that all ruins have no dimensions and that being 1mm on the far side of the wall means you're on the far side of the terrain piece, not inside it.

An L-shaped ruins with no base can be a 'Obscuring, Light Cover, Obstacle' rather than 'Area Terrain'.

yukishiro1 wrote:
Why?

Right now you have two big L-shaped ruins in the middle of a standard tournament board. These both totally block LOS - whether you're inside them or on the far side of them.

New GW rules: being inside doesn't block LOS any more. If you want to block LOS, you have to be on the far side of the terrain piece instead.

This is a massive change, unless we simply decide that all ruins have no dimensions and that being 1mm on the far side of the wall means you're on the far side of the terrain piece, not inside it.

It matters because more than Ruins can completely block LOS. Ruins blocking LOS isn't even an official rule, but an ITC add-on.

It is a massive change, but it's a good one. More features being able to block LOS means it's easier to have terrain in your collection that will block LOS, as opposed to just ruins. There's more opportunities to channel fire, and therefore maneuvering becomes more important.

tneva82 wrote:


Good news is obscured is even better than original itc rule.

No, it blocks dramatically less, because now you need to be on the far side of a terrain piece to block LOS, not just on the far side of one wall.

If you've got a ruin, it's now open season on you if you're inside the ruin - you have to step backwards to be "on the far side of the ruin," whatever that means.

This is a big nerf to melee, because it means you're going to have to be a lot further behind a terrain piece to get LOS blocking, meaning your threat range coming out from that piece of terrain behind LOS protection is dramatically reduced.

scratch that

I mean, they haven't even revealed all the keywords. Terrain features can have more than one. People are freaking out for no reason (yet).

For all we know there could be another keyword called "concealed" or something that does for forests what the AoS rules do.

We just don't have all the rules to make real judgements yet. It's really not even worth conjecture at this point.

I hope that flying stuff is excluded from taking cover. Even if it would be funny to see a 5" wall would break LoS to an airplane.

 Insectum7 wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
Why?

Right now you have two big L-shaped ruins in the middle of a standard tournament board. These both totally block LOS - whether you're inside them or on the far side of them.

New GW rules: being inside doesn't block LOS any more. If you want to block LOS, you have to be on the far side of the terrain piece instead.

This is a massive change, unless we simply decide that all ruins have no dimensions and that being 1mm on the far side of the wall means you're on the far side of the terrain piece, not inside it.

It matters because more than Ruins can completely block LOS. Ruins blocking LOS isn't even an official rule, but an ITC add-on.

It is a massive change, but it's a good one. More features being able to block LOS means it's easier to have terrain in your collection that will block LOS, as opposed to just ruins. There's more opportunities to channel fire, and therefore maneuvering becomes more important.

But again: compared to the ITC rule, this emphatically does not result in more LOS blocking. ITC rule was that the first floor of ruins blocked LOS, period. Not just for stuff on the far side of the ruin, but for stuff inside the ruin too.

This is far less restrictive than that. It used to be in ITC you could stand right behind a wall of a ruin and be protected. Now you'll have to be 4 or 5 inches further back to get LOS protection if it's a ruin as opposed to just a wall, dramatically changing how much of the board you can threaten.

 catbarf wrote:
Yeah I just realized that the wording of Heavy Cover is totally counterintuitive.

It's not saying 'you get +1 to your save by being in cover, unless you charged, then you don't benefit'.

It's saying 'you get +1 to your save by being in cover, unless you got charged, then you don't benefit'.

A horde of Orks swarming into a bunker will get the cover bonus for being in the bunker, while whatever they charged won't get the bonus in the first round of combat. In any subsequent rounds, both sides get cover.

That's just bizarre.

I honestly don't see how you'r reading it that way. It says you get the save bonus unless you charged. Not the OPs post, which is worded weird, but the actual bit on WarCom.

Karol wrote:
I hope that flying stuff is excluded from taking cover. Even if it would be funny to see a 5" wall would break LoS to an airplane.

It's literally in the rule. Aircraft do not benefit.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Grimgold wrote:
Again no model eye view, break out your laser from x-wing and done. Given the parameters that are provided, can you think of a time where you would use a models eye view?

You're drawing a lot of conclusions from very little text.

Take a look at this image:

Spoiler:

This assumes the building has the Obscured rule. See that red circle? That's the tiniest bit of a spike on a wing from a Hive Tyrant. If we pretend that the building in front of it is a complete solid slab with no holes (ie. kinda like the new Obscured rule) the HT is still a valid target because of that tiny wing spike tip.

If the same applies to 9th, then all the "Obscured" rules in the world won't help it.

No need to check models eye view, just grab a laser pointer from a top down view, if you can draw a straight line between the two 1 MM thick (which is where I think this example will fail, but I'll go with the spirit of the example), you can shoot it. The only time you'd have to check LoS from a models eye view is for terrain less than 5" tall, like hills, and I assume TOs will do their round best to avoid using terrain like that because judges hate LoS arguments.

yukishiro1 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

yukishiro1 wrote:
Why?

Right now you have two big L-shaped ruins in the middle of a standard tournament board. These both totally block LOS - whether you're inside them or on the far side of them.

New GW rules: being inside doesn't block LOS any more. If you want to block LOS, you have to be on the far side of the terrain piece instead.

This is a massive change, unless we simply decide that all ruins have no dimensions and that being 1mm on the far side of the wall means you're on the far side of the terrain piece, not inside it.

It matters because more than Ruins can completely block LOS. Ruins blocking LOS isn't even an official rule, but an ITC add-on.

It is a massive change, but it's a good one. More features being able to block LOS means it's easier to have terrain in your collection that will block LOS, as opposed to just ruins. There's more opportunities to channel fire, and therefore maneuvering becomes more important.

But again: compared to the ITC rule, this emphatically does not result in more LOS blocking. ITC rule was that the first floor of ruins blocked LOS, period. Not just for stuff on the far side of the ruin, but for stuff inside the ruin too.

This is far less restrictive than that. It used to be in ITC you could stand right behind a wall of a ruin and be protected. Now you'll have to be 4 or 5 inches further back to get LOS protection if it's a ruin as opposed to just a wall, dramatically changing how much of the board you can threaten.

ONLY RUINS did the ITC style blocking. So unless your collection was all ruins, you often had just a couple LOS blockers, and even those were just the first floor.

So obscurred made my thirsters viable in terms of table deployment, and possebilitys to hide for incoming fire, THIS IS SO AWSOME. But besides that, i feel the the guys who said "wAiT fOR teH teRRain rUleZ" are eating their words now... yeah....wait for what? +1 armor AND nerf to melee if in heavy cover? Hah..hahahaha

tulun wrote:
Cover still seems to favour elite armies, and it appears to be even worse than 8th.

+1 save is a bad mechanic. There's too much AP for it to be relevant to light infantry, but Power armour or better becomes SO much stronger.

Absolutely agreed

 Insectum7 wrote:

I honestly don't see how you'r reading it that way. It says you get the save bonus unless you charged.

Yea - you're right. 2+ marines in heavy cover when they get charged. So, its intuitive and brutal for Orks currently.

EDIT: not correct - original interpretation applies

Karol wrote:
I hope that flying stuff is excluded from taking cover. Even if it would be funny to see a 5" wall would break LoS to an airplane.

That is literally in the example. Go read it.

 Grimgold wrote:


No need to check models eye view, just grab a laser pointer from a top down view, if you can draw a straight line between the two 1 MM thick (which is where I think this example will fail, but I'll go with the spirit of the example), you can shoot it. The only time you'd have to check LoS from a models eye view is for terrain less than 5" tall, like hills, and I assume TOs will do their round best to avoid using terrain like that because judges hate LoS arguments.

Yeah, this is a perfect explanation: obscuring means it isn't model's eye view, it's top down view. If you can use a ruler to get to some point on the model without touching the terrain - even an irrelevant overhanging spear or rifle or whatever - it's open season. If you gotta touch the terrain with the ruler, LOS is blocked.*


*But only if the model you'e drawing the line to is "on the far side of" the terrain, not "inside it."

Pretty much like X-wing for LOS (1st edition, anyway. I haven't played 2nd edition).

Makes it super easy and fast.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

I honestly don't see how you'r reading it that way. It says you get the save bonus unless you charged.

Yea - you're right. 2+ marines in heavy cover when they get charged. So, its intuitive and brutal for Orks currently.

Who knows, maybe "Assault Grenades" are back. We can't say how it shakes out yet.

 Insectum7 wrote:
ONLY RUINS did the ITC style blocking. So unless your collection was all ruins, you often had just a couple LOS blockers, and even those were just the first floor.

But basically everything counted as a ruin in ITC. Those L-shaped walls? Ruins. Buildings, as long as not totally enclosed? Ruins. Etc etc. ITC really didn't have any terrain that wasn't a ruin for rules purposes, except magic boxes, which were like ruins on steroids.

Ok, let's put it this way: this makes it a lot easier to shield your tanks and big models (which can't enter ruins anyway) from being shot at. It makes it much harder for melee infantry to hang out in a central ruin and threaten the board without being shot off it. And it makes it much easier for shooty infantry to draw LOS to a wide range of targets while getting the cover bonus.

This is another big buff to tanks and shooty infantry and another big nerf to melee infantry compared to how ITC used to work.

 Daedalus81 wrote:

Karol wrote:
I hope that flying stuff is excluded from taking cover. Even if it would be funny to see a 5" wall would break LoS to an airplane.

It's literally in the rule. Aircraft do not benefit.

thanks. I can't see any of the pictures on dakka, they don't load for me

Yea - you're right. 2+ marines in heavy cover when they get charged

from what people seem to be saying is that if you get charged you don't get the bonus save for heavy cover on the turn you got charged, only on the next turn, but then both units get it.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Daedalus81 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:

I honestly don't see how you'r reading it that way. It says you get the save bonus unless you charged.

Yea - you're right. 2+ marines in heavy cover when they get charged. So, its intuitive and brutal for Orks currently.

Who knows, maybe "Assault Grenades" are back. We can't say how it shakes out yet.

No, that's not what it says:

Orks charge space marines that are in cover:

Orks get +1 to their saving throws this combat round, space marines do not.

Next combat round, no falling back: everyone gets +1 to their saving throws.

When an attack made with a melee weapon wounds a model that is receiving the benefit of cover from this terrain feature, add 1 to the saving throw made against that attack unless the model making the attack made a charge move this turn (invulnerable saving throws are not affected).

It doesn't say "unless the model receiving the attack made a charge move this turn."

It gives chargers an advantage over people in cover for the first turn of combat.

yukishiro1 wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
ONLY RUINS did the ITC style blocking. So unless your collection was all ruins, you often had just a couple LOS blockers, and even those were just the first floor.

But basically everything counted as a ruin in ITC. Those L-shaped walls? Ruins. Buildings, as long as not totally enclosed? Ruins. Etc etc. ITC really didn't have any terrain that wasn't a ruin for rules purposes, except magic boxes, which were like ruins on steroids.

Ok, let's put it this way: this makes it a lot easier to shield your tanks and big models (which can't enter ruins anyway) from being shot at. It makes it much harder for melee infantry to hang out in a central ruin and threaten the board without being shot off it. And it makes it much easier for shooty infantry to draw LOS to a wide range of targets while getting the cover bonus.

This is another big buff to tanks and shooty infantry and another big nerf to melee infantry compared to how ITC used to work.

You really want invulnerable melee infantry sitting in the middle of the table? That's seems niche, weird and gamey. I know there's a really threatening unit in the building I can see with all my army but I can't shoot at it/them? That's goofy, man. I ought to be able to take my siege weaponry and start leveling that building on top of them.

We don't know all the rules yet. Maybe assaulting out of moving transports is a thing again.