'Slingshotting'

[dswanick]

i dont buy the "move at the slowest speed of the unit he started with"

thats not what the rule says

its says "whilst they remain together", if an IC leaves a unit they arent together and his movement is no longer restricted

Except that that is an entirely seperate RAW debate which, I think, ends in a grey area.

i.e.: Is the "intent to detach" sufficient to affect the detachment, allowing full movement or is the unit and the IC ending their movement more than 2" apart the criteria that affects the detachment (at which time the IC has already moved his limited movement and may not move further)? I know there is a seperate thread on that debate.

[greatcrusade08]

very true, sorry didnt want to go off topic.

all that matters in this argument is the caveat that when the Ic remains with a unit he has to move at the slowest speed.. ive yet to see why this should be ignored

[Venemox]

I quoted the rule exactly as it appears in the rulebook (pg11).

 

DIFFERENT MOVEMENT DISTANCES IN A UNIT

All of the models in a unit move at the speed of the slowest model

 

And that maximum movement distance is clearly stated to be the speed of the slowest model. Nowhere in the rules does it state the the IC miraculously gains a higher movement speed at the instant that he leaves coherency. He still has a maximum move of 6" because that was his speed when he started his move.

 

Yes, and as Tual pointed out, once the IC is no longer within 2" or less of any other model in that unit, the IC is a separate unit of it's own. 1/10 of an inch, 1/100 of an inch, 1 micron, or 1 RCH; no matter how little, the IC is on his own. Why? Because that's measured during the Movement phase. With it's own movement rate, which may or may not be better or worse. It doesn't 'gain' movement, it was never gone. Nowhere does it state to determine movement speeds at the beginning of the movement phase. That's more assumptions to validate an argument.

 

Yes, you can move an IC and an attached unit at the same time, and there are valid reasons for doing so. Case in point: move a squad member, move the IC, move another squad member, so on and so forth. BAM! Locked into 'speed of the slowest model'. Why would you do this? Because we don't play in a vacuum, and there's a tabletop full of terrrain, allies, and enemies we have to move around, or over, to position for the most advantageous attack. I WANT Seth to get into base-to-base, and that may mean having to move him in the middle of the units move to ensure he's well placed to do so. I do NOT WANT my Sanguinary Priest in base-to-base; however, I also want my SP attached, so he's not a sitting duck of a fire magnet. So I mave have to use 'creative movement shennagins' and 'obstacles' to ensure this does not occur. This becomes even a bigger deal when bases start getting bigger, such a Terminators, since models can't move through each other.

 

So, there you have it, a clear situation in which the 'slowest model' rule definitively applies. It is not being diregarded, and has meaning outside of the vacuum of 'slingshotting'.

 

As far as beginning and ending with the same unit, I agree, the unit (IC included) SHOULD be limited to the slowest movement rate. I do not agree with that restriction when it comes to swapping an IC from one unit to another.

 

All said and done, my vote on 'slingshotting' with an IC already attached to the unit is 'Sleazy'. Not as intended, but works as written. Not something I'm going to do, but not something I'm going to argue over the table-top about either. 'Slingshotting' with an IC from outside the unit? Sound tactics, good generalship. You have to get multiple units in synchronization to effectively use it. Moving a leader where he can rally troops to take the fight to the enemy!

[Morollan]

I quoted the rule exactly as it appears in the rulebook (pg11).

 

DIFFERENT MOVEMENT DISTANCES IN A UNIT

All of the models in a unit move at the speed of the slowest model

 

And that maximum movement distance is clearly stated to be the speed of the slowest model. Nowhere in the rules does it state the the IC miraculously gains a higher movement speed at the instant that he leaves coherency. He still has a maximum move of 6" because that was his speed when he started his move.

 

Yes, and as Tual pointed out, once the IC is no longer within 2" or less of any other model in that unit, the IC is a separate unit of it's own. 1/10 of an inch, 1/100 of an inch, 1 micron, or 1 RCH; no matter how little, the IC is on his own. Why? Because that's measured during the Movement phase. With it's own movement rate, which may or may not be better or worse. It doesn't 'gain' movement, it was never gone. Nowhere does it state to determine movement speeds at the beginning of the movement phase. That's more assumptions to validate an argument.

 

And when do you determine coherency? At the end of the movement phase. So when has the IC moved out of coherency? At the end of the movement phase. Not, as you suggest above, as soon as he is >2" from the unit. So what is his movement rate? The speed of the slowest model in the unit.

[Gentlemanloser]

It doesnt matter what happens inbetween unless you are talking about IC's.

 

Being an IC doesn't change the movement or coherency rules.

[Brother Tual]

Being an IC doesn't change the movement or coherency rules.

 

No, but an IC can leave a unit DURING the movement phase. Hence where he is DURING the movement phase matters.

 

So when has the IC moved out of coherency? At the end of the movement phase. Not, as you suggest above, as soon as he is >2" from the unit.

 

An IC leaves the unit (no longer part of) DURING the movement phase. Not at the end. What is in coherency is considered at the end and this is when he JOINS a unit. This is why I have a problem applying the 'slowest move' because he is not part of a unit whne you move him.

[Gentlemanloser]

This is just going to go round the houses, with the rebuttal of;

 

"How do you know when the IC has left coherency, when you only measure coherency at the end of the phase"

 

Answered by;

 

"But the IC leaves the moment you move him over 2" away for the unit."

 

I disagree, but it's not worth bashing out another 2 pages of this. :tu:

[Marshal Wilhelm]

i dont buy the "move at the slowest speed of the unit he started with"

thats not what the rule says

its says "whilst they remain together", if an IC leaves a unit they arent together and his movement is no longer restricted

 

Exactly.

 

Maybe we should just play 40K together, GC08? ;)

[greatcrusade08]

Maybe we should just play 40K together, GC08? ;)

 

sounds great, im a big fan of templars :)

tbh im probably not suited for RAW rules discussions, i tend to look more realistically at the meaning of rules, rather than interpret each and every sentence trying to find easter eggs

[Brother Tual]

Gentle,

"How do you know when the IC has left coherency, when you only measure coherency at the end of the phase"

 

Because IC's have their own rule section. They leave once 2" away. This is done during the movement phase. Not the end. Your sig quote is golden. Seahawk is spot on. Read the rules.

[Grey Mage]

This topic is being considered for a grey area thread. Im however not yet convinced it needs one. I would appreciate summaries at this point.

[Marshal Wilhelm]

This topic is being considered for a grey area thread. Im however not yet convinced it needs one. I would appreciate summaries at this point.

 

Basically, we who are against Stelek's slingshot, are thinking something like this:

 

a] We know what GW means, and this is even acknowledged by the fors as well. So if anything is ambiguous and needs interpreting, we know which way to read the rules, if the rules themselves are not perfectly clear to someone.

 

b] We are fine with Tual's logic on the IC engage and disengage reading. It seems correct, and this would be why Stelek put this forward in an article - it seems to hold water.

 

c] But if what is written seems to support Stelek's hypothesis, it is blown out of the water by the "move at the slowest rate" section. Otherwise we are caught with this situation:

GW wrote a rule, but we want to be able to use Stelek's slingshot, and so ignore this "move at the slowest rate". Therefore GW has written a rule that speaks into this very situation, but never gets used, because we are being clever about how we read it.

We know this is not the case.

See my "well, a unit cannot assault passengers after blowing up the transport" catch 22 where the exception in the Vehicles section refers to the Assault section, which says you cannot assault two separate units, which the passengers and transport are.

We know this is also not the case.

 

+++

 

d] An IC can move at his full speed from the unit. That is to say, he actually leaves the unit and does NOT get re-engaged into coherency that turn, by his own impetus or said unit. Not the "leaves the unit" ball and cups as espoused by Stelek.

 

So if he has a mount, or bike, or jump pack, etc. he can move at full speed.

 

+++

 

Basically, this is guts of it:

The IC gets the benefit of not being targeted by shooting, due to being joined to the unit and wound allocation. The trade off is he moves at their speed, or vice versa, whatever is slowest.

 

Once the IC ceases to get that protection, he ceases to suffer the penalty. Therefore, full movement, and he scorches his former unit as he boosts away, or sprays rooster tails of dirt at them as he hoons away on his bike. Whilst giving a Colgate smile for the camera :D

:D

 

That is my summary, anyway.

[greatcrusade08]

id go along with tht.

there has been some discusion about whether or not an Ic gets his full move when he leave a unit, it may need its own topic, but i see that quie clearly, the movement limitation only affects the Ic if he remains with the unit, if he chooses to leave then he gets full movement

there is a great deal of intent with this rule.. simply put do you intend to leave the unit, or do you intend for him to stay attched at the end of movement, your itent decides the Ics movement.

a simple declaration in the movement phase will clarify any issues

[Gentlemanloser]

Because IC's have their own rule section. They leave once 2" away. This is done during the movement phase. Not the end. Your sig quote is golden. Seahawk is spot on. Read the rules.

 

That's it though. The IC rules *don't* change the usual Movement/Coherency rules. In the slightest.

 

The normal Coherency rules (and movement rules) are used.

 

And when do you check Coherency? At the end of the Phase.

 

But again, this is only going to ead to another 2 pages (plus! :D) of back and forthing on this point. :D So I really promise to try to leave it here! :D

[Brother Tual]

The IC rules *don't* change the usual Movement/Coherency rules

 

Fiddle sticks. Nothing else in the game can join and leave units. They have their own section to govern this. They didnt write this section for entertainment value, it is a rules section for IC's. Not story time. If the IC rules dont change the usual movement and/or coherency rules for ICs then what do they do? Are you saying the IC rules dont apply to ICs?

 

What you are suggesting, Gentle, if the IC section does not change the rules governing them - ie they still follow only the movement rules for units, an IC can never leave a unit and join a different unit in the same turn unless two units move to within 2" of the IC. Whats more, the IC would have to be within coherency distance at the end of the movement phase just like any other model in the unit because he cant leave it until the end of the phase.

 

Summary :

 

The rules, RAW, enable an IC to join and leave units freely and then move at full pace. This can be abused to allow for an IC or two to be placed in a certain way to 'sling shot' a slow/distant unit forward into assault range. This 'tactic' should not be used by a fair player but is legal as per RAW. You cant stop someone from doing it by getting out your rule book but you dont have to play against a player who uses this 'tactic'. As far as RAI goes, GW wanted players to be able move characters without restriction so they could be used easily and at every available chance. Exploiting this freedom is wrong. Its not GW's fault some people are clowns.

[Morollan]

You check coherency after movement - anyone disagree with this?

 

An IC leaves a unit by moving out of coherency distance with it. As he is part of that unit when his movement occurs he is still bound by the 'moves at the slowest speed' rule until coherency is checked, which is the end of the movement phase.

 

Until such time as someone can provide a rules quote that tells us that an IC benefits from increased movement once he is >2" from his unit then my summary of the argument is that he is bound by the very clear rule which states he moves at the speed of the unit.

[Gentlemanloser]

Fiddle sticks. Nothing else in the game can join and leave units. They have their own section to govern this. They didnt write this section for entertainment value, it is a rules section for IC's. Not story time. If the IC rules dont change the usual movement and/or coherency rules for ICs then what do they do? Are you saying the IC rules dont apply to ICs?

 

The IC rules explain how the join and leave units. That's needed as they're the only units that can.

 

But how they move, or how coherency works is in a separate section, and he IC rules for leaving/joining don't change that.

 

What you are suggesting, Gentle, if the IC section does not change the rules governing them - ie they still follow only the movement rules for units, an IC can never leave a unit and join a different unit in the same turn unless two units move to within 2" of the IC. Whats more, the IC would have to be within coherency distance at the end of the movement phase just like any other model in the unit because he cant leave it until the end of the phase.

 

Not at all.

[thade]

You check coherency after movement - anyone disagree with this?

Given an answer to this question, we can extrapolate an answer to the question at hand.

 

If the IC moves before his unit during a Movement phase and - at the end of the phase - the IC and that unit are attached again, they have - by any normal and mundane understanding of the phrase - stayed together. Since they offer no definition of this phrase while it is clearly important, we have only the normal and mundane understanding to go on.

 

Coherency is determined at the end of the Movement phase and this is really the issue people are hung up on. At the end of the phase, if the IC has moved his full speed unhindered by the slower unit, yet they are again attached, it really does seem to me that a rule has been broken. Others disagree: they feel that the Movement phase is implicitly split into segments and thus coherency is determined at the end of each segment. This is pretty heavy-handed RAI. It makes far fewer and simpler assumptions to assume coherency is determined only when the rules say it is: at the end of the Movement phase.

 

So, from my point of view, the two camps really boil down to this: only one of the following is true.

• All unit movement happens in parallel as far as the game is concerned: coherency is determined at the end of the Movement phase.
  
• All unit movement happens in sequence as far as the game is concerned: coherency is determined after each unit is moved.
  

The first interpretation makes the most sense to me. Why? For starters, because Shooting (morale checks are done at the end of the Shooting phase) and Assaults (all assault moves are performed before attack rolls start) both happen in parallel insofar as the game models timing of events. Also, if the second interpretation is correct, then there is a completely needless rule in the IC rules: namely that the IC is restricted by the slowest model in his/her unit. There are no examples of rules in the BRB that are in all cases superseded by some other rule, so I fail to see how this can be the grand exception.

 

Occam's razor. <3 Live it.

[Something Wycked]

Another +1 for Morollan- he has stated the case very clearly and simply. Thade also gets a +1 for his angle.

 

I have a need to fiddle with the nuts and bolts of the anti-Stelek Slingshot argument :)

 

1) IC's attached to units from the previous turn's movement are limited to that unit's speed this turn.

Page 48

While an independant character is part of a unit, he must obey the usual coherency rules. The combined unit moves and assaults at the speed of the slowest model while they stay together.

Simple enough.

 

2) A model/unit is declared to be moving and it begins and ends its movement at the allotted speed when the move was declared. Incremental moves are not part of the 40k RAW; a model's speed is not changed in the middle of the Movement Phase.

Page 11. Movement.

In his turn, a player may move any of his units - All of them if he wishes - upto their maximum movement distance. Once a unit has completed all of its movement, the player selects another unit and moves that one, and so on...

 

Once you have started moving a unit, you must finish its move before you start to move another unit. You may not go back and change the move already made by a previous unit.

A little more complex, with a tick for the pro-slingshot side if we don't read carefully. "Up to their maximum movement distance." Taken by itself, this would seem to support the pro-slingshotters, but every rule needs context which we thankfully find in the next line. At the beginning of the movement phase, the IC and the unit he is joined to are defined as a "combined unit" as in point 1. Therefore, you declare you are moving the combined unit as a whole and the whole unit must finish its move before any other units are moved. The combined unit moves at the speed of the slowest model as in point 1. There is no provision for a move out of coherency by the IC to "unlock" additional movement potential.

 

3) Coherency is checked at the end of the Movement Phase.

Page 48

An independant character can leave a unit during the movement phase by moving out of coherency distance with it.

 

In order to join a unit, an independant character simply has to move so that he is within the 2" coherency distance of a friendly unit at the end of their movement phase.

Again, more complex and can seem to support the pro-slingshotters if not read correctly. Of course the IC may leave a unit during the Movement Phase- there is no other phase the IC may leave the unit under his own power. But as we see in the second line, the check for coherency between ICs and units is at the end of the Movement Phase. There is no allowance during the Movement Phase to check for coherency, and particularly not in the middle of the IC's movement, as shown in point 2. This definitively opposes the idea that the IC magically recovers his lost movement speed and also opposes ignoring the "moves at the slowest" rule.

 

/end summation

 

Side point against the Stelek Slingshot: as quoted in point 3, the RAW is very clear that the IC must move into coherency distance with a unit to join it. There is no RAW provision for a unit moving to join an IC.

 

I still think it more realistic and gentlemanly (and fun) to allow an IC his full movement distance if he is honestly leaving coherency with the unit he was previously joined, but any abuse of this (ie, rejoining that unit to slingshot in the same phase) is not just ungentlemanly in the extreme but is also an illegal move due to the violation of the "moves at the slowest" rule.

[nurglez]

It mentions about ic's joining units and not the other way round, however it also states that in ic must join a unit or could join if within 2 inches. So if a unit moves towards one, it has to join it, or remain more then 2 inches from the unit, which it can't as the IC has already moved.

 

I'm against steleks form of slingshot. While with a unit an ic moves at the slowest speed. If he starts and ends with a unit, he has stayed with it, its all about intent.

 

Joining your char to a different squad to slingshot them is fine in my book. Though I would make the unit move first and join the ic to it after.

[Dan VK]

Side point against the Stelek Slingshot: as quoted in point 3, the RAW is very clear that the IC must move into coherency distance with a unit to join it. There is no RAW provision for a unit moving to join an IC.

That is incorrect; please see post #148.

[thade]

Side point against the Stelek Slingshot: as quoted in point 3, the RAW is very clear that the IC must move into coherency distance with a unit to join it. There is no RAW provision for a unit moving to join an IC.

That is incorrect; please see post #148.

Linked here for convenience.

[Something Wycked]

Yeah, I'm well aware of that post. "At the end of their movement phase" in my eyes only refers to the Movement Phase itself being a shared phase between all models owned by the same player. The end of the sentence has less bearing on the action than the beginning, which clearly states "an independant character simply has to move..."

[greatcrusade08]

i think after 9 pages we have proved that the rules can be interpreted to mean many things.

just like the spoon, there is no RAW.

 

therefore we must refer to common sense ruling which says if you being with a unit and end with a unit you havent truelly left..

[thade]

The rule is poorly worded, which allows this sort of loophole thinking (which, sadly, some people get very excited about).

 

A clear definition for "stays together with" (e.g. "if, at the end of the Movement phase, the IC is attached to the same unit he was attached to at the beginning of the Movement phase...") or clear delineation on when coherency for attachment is determined (at the end of the Movement phase only, any point after something has moved in the phase) will make this better. I'm not saying sling-shotting is in anyway possibly okay: it's not, and I'm convinced we've shown that here. However, some people don't see it that way; the only reasonable explanation for that is the lack of clarity.

 

Call me a dreamer, but I sincerely hope this kind of treatment of the rules comes up very seldom in your respective clubs. <3 This be dodgy, yo, and does not beget a gentlemen-like environment for your war games. <3