Can you have captains, lieutenants and ancients in the same unit?

[Adorondak]

Sorry if someone already posted an answer, my "search" skills are not great.

 

This came up recently in a game I played against a friends space marines. He had put a bladeguard captain, bladeguard lieutenant and a bladeguard ancient all in the same bladeguard unit. According to the rules (as stated in battlescribe, I'm at work) an ancient can be attached to a unit even if one captain, chapternaster or lieutenant has already been attached to it, and the lieutenant has very similar wording (can be attached even if one capitan or chapter master has already been attached). He took it to mean that he could put all three in the same unit but I read it as you could attach a lieutenant or an ancient to a unit with a captain or chapter master, but not both and I'm now curious as to what the consensus here is.

 

I let him play with all three because it was just a friendly game in my garage and I was curious how it would work, but other then the turn he did 37 lethal hit attacks with reroll 1s it really didn't do any better then a bladeguard unit with any two of those characters would have.

[Xenith]

Yea, you have it correctly - there is no rule that lets you attach the ancient to the unit if a Lt is in the unit. 

 

The general rule is that only one character can be a units LEADER. The Lt and Ancient permit a second attachment, but only for specific models. 

 

The ancient also specifically says that it can be attached  "even if ONE CHAPTER MASTER, CAPTAIN or LIEUTENANT MODEL as already been attached"

 

You have it right, they have it wrong. 

[Halandaar]

I would agree; 

• Captain [Leader] attaches to Bladeguard unit
• Lieutenant [Leader] attaches to the Bladeguard unit because he has a specific exception which allows him to join a unit with a Captain already in it
• Ancient [Leader] has the same exception but cannot join because there is a [Leader] in the unit that he doesn't have an exception for - the Lieutenant

 

Works the same the other way round.

 

The Ancient and Lieutenant can ignore the Captain for the purposes of joining the unit, but they can't ignore each other.

Edited December 5, 2023 by Halandaar

[DemonGSides]

It's in the rules commentary;