Monday, September 10, 2012

The Biggest Changes in this Weekend's FAQ Update



Today I am going to go over some of the big things covered in Friday’s FAQ update as well as a very quick rundown of my performance in four RTT’s over the last month. The rest of this week I will be posting my list and strategy for the Midwest Massacre GT this weekend as well as the final three rounds of the Golden Throne GT (always best to finish writing about one big event before running off to another).

An update on my pre-ordered copy of the Limited Edition Dark Vengeance box; as of this posting it still is not here. I called GW customer service and was treated as though the idea that a preorder would arriving the day (or week for that matter) a product is released was an obscene request. In fact they informed that if I wished to buy something the day it came out I should just go buy it from my local GW store. Considering there are literally zero Games Workshop stores in the state of Minnesota that is super fantastic advice. I personally will be taking the small portion of my business that was with GW’s website and moving it fully into local stores.
 
In the FAQ department I must say that I found GW to be spot on. Many of the questions people had were answered and there seemed to be very few outlandish questions and answers listed. Here is the FAQ items that I found most important to the game…

First and foremost is that paladins, nobz, and wolf guard are no longer characters. This means no more ridiculous levels of precision strikes, as well as limiting look out sir games deathstar armies were playing. It is worth noting that nobz and wolf guard are characters if they are leading a unit.

Page 16 – Shooting Phase, Look Out, Sir
Change the second sentence of the second bullet point to:
“Determine which model in the unit is closest to the character, and resolve the Wound against that model instead.”

This is huge. Now when a character leads a multi-wound unit they can not hand out wounds until everyone has one, the nearest model will take them until they die.

Page 49 – Flying Monstrous Creatures, Grounded Tests.
Change the second sentence of the third paragraph to read “A Grounded Flying Monstrous Creature is treated as if it is in Glide mode with immediate effect, and can therefore be targeted normally and charged in the following Assault phase. Furthermore, the model automatically loses the Jink special rule (if it had it), but can otherwise revert to Swoop mode again in its next turn.”

We can say so long to the monstrous creature bouncy ball argument. Though in some senses this ruling weakens flying monsters, it does make logical sense and should help against things like the Daemon Circus.

Page 71 – Vehicles, Difficult and Dangerous Terrain.
Change the final sentence to “A vehicle that fails a Dangerous Terrain test immediately suffers an Immobilised result from the Vehicle Damage table, including losing one Hull Point”.

While mech is not dead, this is another nail in the coffin. I expect to see more dozer blades in the future.

Page 83 – Skimmers, Special Rules.
Change this sentence to “Skimmers that are not also Heavy Vehicles have the Jink special rule”.

Do not let your opponent jink with their monolith. And to think, I had dual monolith Necron army all ready to post up next week.

Q: Can the BS1 of a Snap Shot ever be modified by special rules that modify the BS of a model’s Shooting attack (such as Tau markerlights, Space Marine Signums or Sergeant Telion’s Voice of Experience)? (p13)
A: No.

Q: How do maelstroms, novas and beams – or indeed any weapon that doesn’t need to roll To Hit or hits automatically – interact with Zooming Flyers and Gliding Flying Monstrous Creatures? (p13)
A: Only Snap Shots can hit Zooming Flyers and Gliding Flying Monstrous Creatures. Therefore, any attacks that use blast markers, templates, create a line of/area of effect or
otherwise don’t roll to hit cannot target them. This includes weapons such as the Necron Doom Scythe’s death ray or the Deathstrike missile of the Imperial Guard, and psychic
powers that follow the rule for maelstroms, beams, and novas.

Q: If a Psyker uses a beam power on an Infantry unit in front of him and the beam proceeds to pass over the base of a Zooming Flyer or Swooping Flying Monstrous Creature, is it also hit by the attack? (p69)
A: No.

One of the things these FAQ’s did was stop people from being able to make silly arguments about how to not be effected by snapshots. Two examples of that are on display here.

Q: Can psychic shooting attacks be fired as Snap Shots (assuming that the Psyker has enough Warp Charge available and requires a roll to hit)? (p13)
A: Yes, but only in your own Shooting phase. This means that psychic shooting attacks cannot be made when firing Overwatch.

It seems like this was coming up at every event I played in. It is good to see it resolved.

Q: Do models that ignore difficult terrain when moving or charging still fight at Initiative step 1 if they charge through difficult terrain?
(p22)
A: Yes.

This clarifies how Necron wraiths interact with terrain. Ignoring the effects of terrain now clearly does not include striking at initiative.

Q: In a multiple barrage, do you determine all of the hits and all of the Wounds separately for each blast, or do you resolve all of blasts in one go? (p34)
A: Work out the total number of models hit by the multiple barrage, then proceed to allocate Wounds and remove casualties all in one go.

This is less of me posting a big change and more of me being confused. The barrage rules state wounds are allocated from under the hole of the blast marker. If there are multiple holes then how can I do both this and remove casualties in one go?

Q: Can the Feel No Pain special rule be used to resist a Wound suffered from the Perils of the Warp? (p35)
A: Yes.

The next question then is how this interacts with a psychic power which gives you FNP. For example, if I roll double ‘1’ when casting catalyst, can I use the FNP I receive from passing the psychic test on the wound from the test? I posted this on a local groups forum and received solid answers from both sides of the argument.

Q: If a model has the Eternal Warrior and Feel No Pain special rules, can it still make Feel No Pain rolls against Wounds that inflict Instant Death (Eternal Warrior states that the model is immune to the effects of Instant Death, after all)? (p35)
A: No.

This is a great example of GW being astute about what people were interested in finding out how to play their armies.

Q: When a model makes a Vector Strike or Hammer of Wrath, do these attacks benefit from any special rules (such as Furious Charge, Poisoned or Rending), or any weapons or other wargear it is equipped with? (p37/43)
A: No.

This makes unholy might a much less attractive upgrade for Daemon Princes.

Q: Flyers are entitled to choose whether or not to use the Skyfire special rule at the start of each Shooting phase. Can Swooping Flying Monstrous Creatures also do this? (p49)
A: Yes.

Yes. Yes. YES! The night before the FAQ’s were released I played against a four flyer Necron list. Oh, how that game would be different now. Each Tyrant would average downing an AV11 flyer each turn by itself with their shooting.

Q: Can a vehicle Tank Shock a Swooping Flying Monstrous Creature? (p49)
A: No. If a Swooping Flying Monstrous Creature would end up underneath the Tank Shocking vehicle when it reaches its final position, move it by shortest distance so that it is 1" away from the vehicle.

I do disagree with part of this call. While it makes sense that a swooping monster can’t be tank shocked, it is bad that you can essentially push FMC’s by tank shocking them. Because these models reply on their movement, a tank shock can be a powerful took against flyer lists.

Q: Does a Flying Monstrous Creature that arrives via Deep Strike count as arriving in Swoop mode? (p49)
A: Yes.

Notice here that there is no choice, the model must be swooping.

Q: If passengers disembark from a Transport that has suffered a Shaken or Stunned result, do they still suffer these effects in their next Shooting phase? (p80)
A: Yes.

This is self explanatory and continues the trend of negative changes in regard to transport vehicle mechanics.

Q: Can a character on a Chariot that is also a Skimmer make a Sweep Attack against a Zooming Flyer? (p82)
A: No.

This is a good start, but I would like this same restriction to be put on sweeping flying monstrous creatures.

Q: To score a Victory Point for achieving the Linebreaker Secondary Objective, you must have at least one model from one or more scoring or denial units within the enemy’s deployment zone. Does such a model have to be completely within the enemy’s deployment zone, or do they still count if they are only partially within? (p122)
A: The base of the model in question must be wholly within the enemy’s deployment zone.

This will require an intentional change to how I at least get line breaker. In many games I simply place part of an MC base in their zone for the point. This is not as much of an issue for infantry armies.

Q: Do units that are transported in a vehicle that MUST start in reserve count towards the number of units that can be placed in Reserves? For example, must I count the units in a Drop Pod or Valkyrie towards the 50% of units I can place in Reserves? (p124)
A: No.

There is some discussion over whether this includes all transports that must be put in reserve, such as storm ravens, or if it is just dedicated transports. I feel based on this working it is clear that it is all transports.



Lots of words and few images in this post…but fear not! You can look for tons of pictures this afternoon when I give a brief report of the four events I have played in since the Golden Throne GT.

What codex specific FAQ updates do you feel are the most game shifting?

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