"Bring it down!" Order

[HenricusTyranicus]

A lot of guardsmen are very enthusiastic about the "Take Aim" order. I agree, it's totally awesome. But in what circumstances will it be better to reroll ones to wound rather than to hit?

 

Let's get the obvious ones out of the way. A squad rocking loads of flamers should obviously reroll to wound rather than hit. Ditto for any squads chilling near Yarrick or Harker. But what about, say, a mortar team firing at GEQ? A roll of one is turned into a success on a 3+ when wounding, rather than a 4+ when shooting. But the shooting pool is twice as large as the wounding one. Let's see how it shakes out:

Take aim: 10.5 shots, 5.25 hit on initial bombardment, probably 2 ones, one gets converted for around 6 hits. 4 of those wound.

 

Bring it down: 10.5 shots, 5.25 hit, about 3.5 wound on initial wound rolls, and about 0.6 wounds added, for 4.1 wound. (Ish, this is obviously very rough.)

I'm inclined to say autocannons and possibly lascannons will make great candidates for bring it down. But I can't be sure.

 

 

 

Can anyone think of great uses for this order? Or least, fairly optimal ones?

[micahwc]

I'd assume off the top of my head that high strength weapons would benefit more from the to hit bonus than the to wound bonus, specifically lascannons.

 

Lascannons will generally be wounding on a 2 or 3 and melta guns will generally be wounding on a 3 or 4. It's better to augment the bs4+ with these. I'd say for anything st 8 or higher you probably want the bonus to hit.

[momerathe]

Statistically, it doesn't make any difference. :D

 

All re-rolling ones does is multiple the probability of success by 7/6*. As the hit prob and wound prob. get multiplied together anyway, it makes no odds where the multiplier goes.

 

For example, say you take 36 shots with 4+ to hit and 2+ to wound.

Re-rolling 1s to hit: 18 hits, with 6 ones; 3 re-rolled hits making 21 total; 17.5 wounds

Re-rolling 1s to wound: 18 hits; 15 wounds with 3 ones; 2.5 re-rolled wounds giving 17.5 wound total, again. 

 

Somewhat unsatisfying, I know.

 

 

* P(x) -> P(x) +1/6 P(x) = 7/6 P(x)

[micahwc]

So bring it down is essentially just for flamers then, as they will increase the odds of your flamers damaging something and they auto hit anyway.

[Brother Captain Ed]

The Cadian regimental keyword will likely have something to do with rerolling ones on lasgun hits. If it truly is mathematically no different then it must be included for a reason like that.

[Withershadow]

When you have another effect that allows you to re-roll 1s.  Sgt. Harker already gives this bonus to nearby Catachans, so with a commander in the mix, they effectively have preferred enemy.

 

Also, I disagree that you get the same increase whether you boost wounds or attacks.  The benefit to re-rolling 1s when needing 3+ is for example an 11% boost to your success chances with that roll (from 66% success rate to 77%), as opposed to when you are re-rolling 1s needing 4+ which is a 8.5% boost (from 50% to 58.5%).

[Plasmablasts]

It's counterintuitive, but Momerathe is correct. The re-roll of 1s effectively multiplies the chance of success by 7/6. The overall chance of successfully inflicting a wounding hit doesn't care whether that x7/6 modifier applies to the to hit roll or the to wound roll:

 

P(wounding hit) = 7/6*P(hit)*P(wound) = P(h)*7/6*P(w).

[NatBrannigan]

Surely it's better re-roll 1's to hit, since you'll probably be rolling more dice?

 

If we say 24 shots (for easy math!), 4+ to hit, 4+ to wound.

 

Re-roll 1's to hit

24 Shots =12 hits (with 4 1's), 14 hits after re-rolls. That then leads to 7 wounds.

 

Re-roll 1's to wound

24 Shots = 12 hits. That's 6 wounds (with 2 1's), 7 wounds after re-rolls...

 

Well! There we go then, surprised myself. Unless other rules come into play it makes zero difference!

[micahwc]

Rerolling to hits benefits more for overcharged plasma.

[NatBrannigan]

Ah yes indeed, that's a good point!

 

Can a squad benefit from more than one order at a time? I'm assuming no but I can't see it written anywhere...

[micahwc]

I thought it said under "voice of command" for the company commander that only 1 order could be used per squad.

 

Edit: Found it

 

Voice of Command "A unit may only be affected by one order per turn"

[Ficinus]

It's better to re-roll to hit because you have more dice. With a smaller dice pool, the odds of rolling no ones is higher than with a large pool since the odds of rolling no ones is (5/6)^n where n is the number of dice rolled. It is correct that given a large number of samples the two are identical, but the odds of failing to generate re-rolls at all, you should go with re-rolls to hit.

[momerathe]

It's better to re-roll to hit because you have more dice. With a smaller dice pool, the odds of rolling no ones is higher than with a large pool since the odds of rolling no ones is (5/6)^n where n is the number of dice rolled. It is correct that given a large number of samples the two are identical, but the odds of failing to generate re-rolls at all, you should go with re-rolls to hit.

 

It's less swingy, I'll give you that, and there's something to be said for consistency.