"All is Dust" and Tsons question

[Trollbeard]

Hey guys, was just reading the thousand suns faction focus, and I saw the bit about the "All is Dust" special rule, says it adds +1 to the save roll against weapons with D1 characteristics. Does this make Tsons terminators ignore, say, a bolt gun?? Or am I missing something?

[Sonoftherubric21]

how it functions on terminators is that it adds +1 to the saving throw, making it a 1+ armor save, except that a 1 is ALWAYS a failure, what this does is it helps against thing that are 1 damage, and effectively mean terminators ignore the first -1 ap to their armor a gun does.

So if you hit them with a D1 Ap-1 weapon they become 2+ armor saves when all is said and done. meaning they effectively ignore -1 ap on a D1 weapon. 

[Trollbeard]

Sweet, thanks for the response. It all makes sense now,pretty sweet bonus also!

[RapatoR]

Adding to the comment above, it should by noted, that the rule, as written on the datasheet, should also improve invuln save, however the faction focus specifically mentions it improves only armor saves, so there is a bit of confusion in the air right nie.

[Sonoftherubric21]

Yeah; at the moment VIA RAW It does work on invulnerable saves.  (plasma and power weapons being the big examples of high armor pen D1 weapons. 

[Archaeinox]

Yes theres no debate for that one RAW.

[Prot]

Yes I think we have to remember GW wrote the rules. The faction articles are written by two capable but fairly goofy individuals. They also played a lot of different armies so the odd wording is going to slip. The rules as written are clearly 'saving throws '.

 

I had the Bolter question myself, and since 1s always fail I look at it as insurance against larger modifiers on Damage 1 weapons.

 

Combine that with cover and these guys can be crazy hard to get rid of.

[Blood Shadow]

It also means standard Rubrics get a 2+ armour save against weapons with no AP

[Zeratil]

We also don't know when the Faction Focuses were written, so it could be that they were written before the final draft of the rules. I'd go with the RAW for now, it seems pretty plain unless GW corrects it later.

 

All is Dust is a very nice rule, D1 is by far the largest category of weapons and there's plenty of AP0, -1 and -2 weapons that have D1. In addition given that both Rubricae and Scarab Occult are very shooty units there are good reasons to put them in cover, giving you an additional +1. Taking normal plasma gun shots on a 3+ is very nice for the termies! Moreso given how brutal overcharging is.

[Ashe Darke]

T'sons on the Warhammer Live game today. No mention of it not affecting invun when they brought it up.

[Raven1]

@Ashe Darke, RAW is very clear though a save a save, what makes me think it's also RAI is for cover the verbage is almost the same but then explicitly exempts invulnerable saves from the bonus.

[Ashe Darke]

@Ashe Darke, RAW is very clear though a save a save, what makes me think it's also RAI is for cover the verbage is almost the same but then explicitly exempts invulnerable saves from the bonus.

I'm not questioning it, just saying that for those who doesn't think it affects invuns then that helps prove the point it does, although it's by inference rather than an explicit statement.