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"Drain Life" says that an enemy unit cannot use any rules that ignore lost wounds.

Nork/Ogryn Bodyguard says that whenever a Guard character near them loses a wound, on a 2+/3+ the character keeps the wound and Nork/Bodyguard get a MW instead.

So when the Nightbringer wounds a Guard character near Nork/Bodyguard, can the character still transfer it to Nork/Bodyguard?

It all depends on whether you consider bodyguard style rules to be ignoring wounds, or simply transferring them. AFAIK this has never been clarified.

If your quote on the rules is correct, I would say that no it can't stop the wound being lost.

Exact quote:

Each time this model makes a melee attack that is allocated to an enemy model, that enemy model cannot use any rules to ignore the wounds it loses.

Roll a D6 each time a friendly ASTRA MILITARUM INFANTRY CHARACTER (excluding OGRYNS) loses a wound whilst they are within 3" of any models with this ability; on a 3+ the Astra Militarum character does not lose a wound but one model with this ability suffers a mortal wound.

I'd argue that since it's not "that model" using a rule, but the bodyguard doing something, it should work.

Thats a really good point. And quite possibly RAI even, as with a bodyguard its someone else taking that drain life hit anyway.

The wound is not ignored. The bodyguard rule works. If the bodyguards have a rule which allow them to ignore wounds they could use it, because they arent affected by the drain life rule.

This one hurts my head a little bit, because now I think we have to define 'ignored'. Does the Nightbringer rule only come into play when the rule specifically says "this wound is ignored" or in any circumstance where the end result is allocated wounds do not cause any damage to the target?

If the latter, then a Nightbringer can kill another C'tan or Ghaz in one phase, right?

Necrodermis: This model has a 4+ invulnerable save. In addition, this model cannot lose more than 3 wounds in the same phase. Any wounds that would be lost after that point are not lost.

Prophet of Gork and Mork: This model has a 4+ invulnerable save. In addition, this model can only lose a maximum of 4 wounds in each phase.

You can pile more attacks into a C'tan or Ghaz after they have reached that threshold, but those additional wounds would then, basically, be ignored.

Yeah Ghaz et. al. don't ignore wounds, the wounds just don't happen.

Edit: How about that, seems like Nightbringer counters Ghaz.

It actually seems that Nightbringer does chew through Ghaz and other C'tan after all:

Page 363 – Rare Rules
Add the following:
IGNORING WOUNDS VS. RULES THAT PREVENT MODELS FROM
IGNORING WOUNDS
Some models have a rule that says that they cannot lose more
than a specified number of wounds in the same phase/turn/
battle round, and that any wounds that would be lost after
that point are not lost. When such a model is attacked by a
weapon or model with a rule that says that enemy models
cannot use rules to ignore the wounds it loses, that rule takes
precedence over the previous rule, and if that attack inflicts
any damage on that model, it loses a number of wounds
equal to the Damage characteristic of that attack, even if it
has already lost the specified number of wounds already this
phase/turn/battle round.

There is also a case to be made that the Nightbringer would ignore any damage reduction rules "if that attack inflicts any damage on that model, it loses a number of wounds equal to the Damage characteristic of that attack".

So to answer the original question with the Ogryn bodyguard... I am going to say that the Nightbringer is intended to bypass any and every rule to reduce, transfer, or ignore wounds.

I agree with everything else above, but disagree only about the transfer rule, and only if is provided by a bodyguard (not the target itself).
Willful of not, it's embedded in the wording and also make sense in gameplay perspective.

So, the Ogryn would work, anything else won't.

The damage reduction is an interesting point, as I am inclined to say that yes, is ignored as well.

That is anyway GW bad game designing at its best... Create a rule to ignore wound, than a rule to ignore-ignore wound... It only need another ignore-ignore-ignore wound and we will be going in full circles

Since the bodyguard rule is coming from a model other than the target of the nightbringers attack, I say it would work.

A 6+++ save that comes from another model would surely be ignored, though, and that is how a lot of models get these FnP rolls. Take Dok's Tools for example,

'Roll a D6 each time a friendly Ork Infantry or Biker unit loses a wound while it is within 3" of Mad Dok Grotsnik. On a 6 the wound is not lost. This is not cumulative with other Dok's Tools.'

It's worded the same way as the bodyguard rules. A lot of these aura-type rules aren't giving the models an extra save, they are actually a separate activation undertaken by a different model. I think the Nightbringer bypasses all these rules.

 Oaka wrote:
A 6+++ save that comes from another model would surely be ignored, though, and that is how a lot of models get these FnP rolls. Take Dok's Tools for example,

'Roll a D6 each time a friendly Ork Infantry or Biker unit loses a wound while it is within 3" of Mad Dok Grotsnik. On a 6 the wound is not lost. This is not cumulative with other Dok's Tools.'

It's worded the same way as the bodyguard rules. A lot of these aura-type rules aren't giving the models an extra save, they are actually a separate activation undertaken by a different model. I think the Nightbringer bypasses all these rules.

Its not worded the same way as the ogryn bodyguard rule. This wouldnt work against the drain life rule, because its a rule to ignore the wounds a model would lose. The ogryn bodyguard rule is different. The wound happens, but not on the original model.

The way I'm reading it is; the wound happens no matter what - the Drain Life will cause a wound. What happens after that wound has been caused follows the Ogryn/Nork rules, and then transfers that wound to the aforementioned bodyguards. The rule doesn't prevent the wound, it merely allocates the wound to another target after it has been caused.

You aren't transferring a wound technically though. You are ignoring a wound on the target unit, and inflicting a mortal wound on the bodyguard unit.

So how are we leaning when the Nightbringer comes up against the new Disgustingly Resilient?

 Oaka wrote:
So how are we leaning when the Nightbringer comes up against the new Disgustingly Resilient?

The new DR doesn't ignore wounds. It reduces damage.

Yep, meaning it isn't affected by the nightbringers rule

People run Ogryn Bodyguards? News to me!

 BaconCatBug wrote:

 Oaka wrote:
So how are we leaning when the Nightbringer comes up against the new Disgustingly Resilient?

The new DR doesn't ignore wounds. It reduces damage.

nosferatu1001 wrote:
Yep, meaning it isn't affected by the nightbringers rule

Agreed. (For those who may be unclear about why this is, it's because the new DR rule affects the damage characteristic of the attack rather than ignoring wounds caused. It's a subtle distinction, but it's significant here.)

I'm still wondering how Drain Life works vs Transhuman?

v0iddrgn wrote:
I'm still wondering how Drain Life works vs Transhuman?

I believe transhuman works. Because it functions at the wound roll stage of the process. Drain life functions at the save role stage.

v0iddrgn wrote:
I'm still wondering how Drain Life works vs Transhuman?

Transhuman doesn't allow you to ignore wounds, simply means you can only be wounded on 4+. Don't see the issue here.

v0iddrgn wrote:
I'm still wondering how Drain Life works vs Transhuman?

The easy way to remember this is that drain life only affects things that happen after a damage roll has been made. Everything up to that point is unaffected.

Agreed.