[lostsoul1783]

Howdy everyone, here's my question. If a squad of two models (Broadsides) are hit twice by lascannons from one heavy support squad causing instant death, do both models become casualties or does one model get both effective wounds? I was always under the assumption that both had to die since it says something along those lines in the rulebook.

 

[Galahad]

The rules in the book say you cannot spread wounds around and that when multiple wounds are inflicted on a unit of multi-wound models you have to assign them so as to remove whole models. Wounds are assigned before saves are made. Instant death takes place after the save is failed. So, I would think both lascannon wounds would be assigned to one model, then saved against and then the model is removed, as normal.

 

[DaemonsR'us]

huuzahwha :shock: i always played the other way where ID would kill the model outright and cannot be accountable for more then one ID hit... that would be very very interesting for obliterators if your right Gal

 

[The Wraithlord]

That is not quite right. In the above example, 2 wounds are caused with each one causing ID. There is no spreading of the wounds required as the first wound would ID one Broadside and the second would ID the other. You have to take whole models when removing casualties and the first ID wound would remove an entire model outright due to the ID rule. This would leave one more ID causing wound to resolve which would have to go on the other model.


I had to learn this to my deepest sadness when playing my Thousand Sons out of the previous codex when they had 2 wounds each. 4 wounds from 4 krak missiles would kill 4 models. Sucks but there it is.

 

[Galahad]

Humm, I could be wrong. I just thought that's how it went.

 

[anathema]

The Wraithlord is correct.

 

[maximus2467]

rule book page 26 refers to this question, top of the page right hand side, wraithlord is correct. in any case i'm sure that if the squad gets hit with as many shots as there are models in the squad they all get hit, don't they plus the shooting player decides which one model must make a save (or is that just wounding shots?) either way a squad of two gets hit twice by lascannons and both wound, the shooting player decides that one wound is against one broadside leaving the other shot to go against the only model left in the unit (rb page 26)

 

[Morgal]

Agreed, if not i could simply assign all shots to one model claiming that oh shots are assigned before rolls. then only remove one model despite taking 800 shots.

Think of the most absured case you could abuse a rule with...if the abuse does not make sence then it probably does not work that way.

 

[Slade]

I would have to concur with wraith here.

The section on Instant Death clearly states 'Even though a creature might have multiple wounds...they are killed outright...'. In other wounds, all wounds that a models has are irrelevant when hit by ID weapons.

Also, in this situation here, the Broadsides are hit twice. If this was a situation where there was a single hit that caused multiple wounds (as in 2ed) then galahad would be correct

 

[lostsoul1783]

Thanks for the responses, so all in all the instant death rule is applied before the second wound is assigned to the unit and then the second wound is assigned to the other broadside?

I'm still slightly confused because it also says that wounds cannot be all claimed against a single model, which sort of counters the multi-wound rule unless the multi-wound rule is only used to assign the first wound inflicted to that unit making sure it hits the wounded model first, and then all other wounds are spread amongst the unit until they wrap around.

Once again thanks or your time, and help answering this.

 

[Drax]

what it means is that ID cannot effect the same model twice. so ID overules multi wound in this case.

 

[The Son of Horus]

Simply put, you have to remove complete models where possible. It's possible that one model took both hits, but it's also possible that each model took one hit, so you assume that each model took one hit to remove complete models since the first wound causes instant death.

 

[Galahad]

For the record, I wasn't suggesting applying "800 wounds to one model"

I was merely suggesting allocating wounding hits as you would normally. If a squad of multiwound models takes two wounding hits, they would both go onto the same model, then armour saves are made, correct? Yes, of course. At no point did I ever suggest assigning more wounds to a model than it normally has.

The confusion lies in where the instant death rule actually comes in. Do you account for instant death as soon as the wound is scored (at which time it goes from being one wound to two, three or however many the model has), or do you do it after the armour save? I always treated wounds that cause instant death the same way you treat any other wound, *until* you fail your save, at which point it kills you. So if you treat an instant death would like any other wound until after you make your saves, then assigning them both to the same model makes perfect sense. Your squad has suffered two wounding hits. The rules say apply them both to the same model. The rules go on to say that if he fails his save even once, he dies.

I guess the question is, is the instant-death wound still only one wound (which now carries a special effect) or does it transmute itself into multiple wounds? Since you only get one save against an instant death wound, I assumed it was only one wound. Just a wound with a special effect attached for when you fail a save.

That's how I run the rule. I could be wrong, but I'm sure you can see it's not a terribly unreasonable or abusive reading. I wasn't able to find anywhere where the rules directly talk about assigning instant-death wounds in a multiwound squad. I simply assumed you assign wounds as normal and apply instant death at the first failed save.

As I said, I'm willing to accept that I was wrong. I just don;t want people to think I was attempting to be abusive or apply completely insane logic to the reading of the rules.

 

[lostsoul1783]

Aye Galahad, I can see how it can go either way and i'll prolly never convince my roommate that his broadsides are doomed, but after a day of searching the rulebook and website I found the closest official example to the problem. In the errata on the warhammer website, they give an example of a Ripper swarm squad getting hit by a plasma cannon. Since rippers are vunerable to blast templates the swarm takes 2 wounds but since both wounds are instant death, they state that you remove 2 bases from the unit even though the second base was no where near getting hit by the blast. Thanks for all the responses.

 

[Galahad]

Oh, well there you go. That's a pretty good answer, and it should convince him.

I'm certainly going to rethink how I handle it in the future. I've got Broadsides, but my brother has Obliterators so we'll have to come to an agreement on how to handle it.

 

[Engelus]

"you remove 2 bases from the unit even though the second base was no where near getting hit by the blast."

well, unless swarms don't have to be in coherency, its not possible to have less than 1 total and 1 partial unless there is only one member left in the unit., pretty sure thats why the blast is the size that it is.

 

[Galahad]

Eng, think about it.

Coherency is 2"

The blast template is 3" across.
BUT the hole in the center has to be *over* (not beteween) one of the bases. Which means, at best, it reaches 1.5" away from the edge of the targeted base.

Which means unless you crowd your models together, blast weapons are pretty much useless when it comes to hitting multiple models.

In 3rd ed you used to be able to position the blast template so as to touch as many as possible, but as of 4th ed, the rules state that you have to center the hole in the template over a model, making small blasts utter crap.

 

[Engelus]

I could be wrong but its 2 inches from center to center, not edge to edge (right) thus, if you minus the distance, .5 inch x2. you get the actual distance between the models which is 1 inch.

If not then I have been far too close to coherency and thats why I lose a lot.

 

[lostsoul1783]

The rulebook says to measure from the closet edge of the base for determining ranges since a model is considered to occupy the area of its base in the models section of the book.

 

[nightmarine]

yup im with lost soul. you can get up to 1.5 inches away fro ma model and still be easily within 2" coherancy. Small blasts r only usefull when shooting into a small fortified area where they would get cover saves anyway so ap is worthless. Quite usefull in cityfights on my heavily bunkered and very calaustrophobic board.