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Can a blast marker (shot in the shooting phase) that scatters onto a two units locked in combat cause a status test?

No, never.

I assume you mean by using rules like Suppressive (X), which say this.

If a Shooting Attack made for a Weapon or Model with this Special Rule inflicts one or more Hits on a Target Unit, that Target Unit must make a Cool Check in the Morale Sub-Phase of the same Player Turn.[...]

You are not allowed to select a unit in melee as your Target Unit, so Suppressive (X) and similar rules will never affect them. Shots that scatter do not create a new Target Unit, that refers only to the original target.

Hits on Other Units
If any Models from Units other than the Target Unit are fully or partially covered by the Blast Marker, then a new Fire Group must be created for those Hits and set to one side. Continue resolving the Shooting Attack on the original Target Unit, and once that Shooting Attack has been completely resolved begin a new Shooting Attack to resolve those additional Fire Groups generated for Units other than the original Target Unit.

Contrast with templates, which do explicitly create an additional Target Unit, but since they still cannot select a Target Unit which is in melee and they never scatter, they can't status something in melee either.

 Ashiraya wrote:
No, never.

I assume you mean by using rules like Suppressive (X), which say this.

If a Shooting Attack made for a Weapon or Model with this Special Rule inflicts one or more Hits on a Target Unit, that Target Unit must make a Cool Check in the Morale Sub-Phase of the same Player Turn.[...]

You are not allowed to select a unit in melee as your Target Unit, so Suppressive (X) and similar rules will never affect them. Shots that scatter do not create a new Target Unit, that refers only to the original target.

Hits on Other Units
If any Models from Units other than the Target Unit are fully or partially covered by the Blast Marker, then a new Fire Group must be created for those Hits and set to one side. Continue resolving the Shooting Attack on the original Target Unit, and once that Shooting Attack has been completely resolved begin a new Shooting Attack to resolve those additional Fire Groups generated for Units other than the original Target Unit.

Contrast with templates, which do explicitly create an additional Target Unit, but since they still cannot select a Target Unit which is in melee and they never scatter, they can't status something in melee either.

Hello, I was wondering about havoc launcher (stun1 ) and my friend used a phosphex aquitar bombard (panic 3). both of which scattered into melee. Would that be a similar case? Thank you

The wording of Stun, Panic, Pinning and Suppressive are the same. Note that I said "and similar rules".

Blast statuses vs collateral damage is one of those slightly ambiguous situations that the community has different takes on.

Ashiraya has nicely explained one side of the argument. Blasts never explicitly say you generate a new 'target unit', and statuses key off the 'target unit', ergo no statuses!

However, I shall now present the counter argument(s);

The 'Target Unit' is an intrinsic part of the shooting sequence. You roll to-wound against the Target Unit, you allocate hits to models in the Target Unit, you remove casualties from the Target Unit, etc. If you argue that collateral units are not a Target Unit (or that a unit in combat cannot be a Target Unit) then the entire shooting sequence against them falls apart.

Secondly, just on vibes it makes sense for blasts to fully affect whatever unit they hit.
And there's nothing written about units in melee saying they're immune to status checks either.

Personally I, and most group's I'm aware of, play it that collateral units *do* take status checks, even if locked in melee. Don't miss!

This does, however, open up the slightly cheeky possibility of targeting a unit next to a melee (or other target) and 'accidently' hitting them with the blast/template.
Previous editions largely prevented this by stating you *had* to place the blast/template such that it covered the most of the target you could, but that wording is gone.
But I don't think this necessarily torpedos the whole idea. It's just a quirk of the ruleset and isn't a great issue in practice.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
The 'Target Unit' is an intrinsic part of the shooting sequence. You roll to-wound against the Target Unit, you allocate hits to models in the Target Unit, you remove casualties from the Target Unit, etc. If you argue that collateral units are not a Target Unit (or that a unit in combat cannot be a Target Unit) then the entire shooting sequence against them falls apart.

This is correct, RAW the shooting sequence does fall apart.

I don't fault people for patching up the rules a bit so it works the way they feel it should, not at all. I will admit I am a bit miffed though; we got a rulebook that is incredibly dense, wordy and legalese, needlessly excessive with definitions and Capitalised Terms and making every rule twice as long as it has to be, ostensibly to ensure perfect clarity - only for the ruleset to be a mess full of holes and unFAQed issues.

Issues ranging from "RAW the Saturnine Diffraction Field does nothing" to "what happens if your character is in coherency range of two friendly units at once" and countless more are ones that shouldn't exist. I can forgive them in a concise ruleset, if we're keeping rules very tight and short I am totally okay with some sensible inferring, but if you are going to painstakingly write out all the detail, then don't leave us with questions!

I completely agree

They're the Specialist Design Studio's own specialist brand of rules writing that's simultaneously excessively obtuse and hard to read due to all the legalese, yet still entirely ambiguous and holier than a basket full of bishops :(

 Ashiraya wrote:
The wording of Stun, Panic, Pinning and Suppressive are the same. Note that I said "and similar rules".

Hi ashiraya, I assume that also means that say a phosphex arquitar can only status the main target in the shooting phase even if the blast clips two different units that are not in combat but just two squads kinda close together? I hope so because large blast panic 3 has been brutal in our games, we just assumed you get a status for each unit that the dang thing touches.

Have you guys actually read the rulebook? No offence, I feel like I am saying the same thing again and again here.

Again, RAW, Panic and similar rules only apply to your Target Unit, which is your initial target.

Again, I think the other units hit must *also* be Target Units otherwise the shooting doesn't work!

Meaning the statuses apply to them too.

Yep! Just explained my side on it, since OP asked.

Your side stands.

Hmm I think Im leaning towards ashirayas way since it makes the boogie man phosphex less strong than it already is. panic 3 on 2-3 units from 1 unit is honestly kinda stupid powerful. Especially in bigger games with a lot of terrain, the boots on the ground are going to be pretty close together. I can see both of your points. I feel balance is better this way since havoc launchers and phosphex are everywhere it seems.

I think I prefer the simulationist POV on this one - it isn't like the unit you were aiming for is given a pennant saying "Target Unit", so they know they need to deal with panic or stun or whatever. Any unit getting hit by such weapons should be dealing with the side effects, regardless of whether they were intended to or not.