Heavy, blast, and melee combat interaction.

[Galron]

Question, can monster that is in combat and it has a heavy blast weapon, use it to shoot at a target outside of combat? I was always under the impression blast weapons could not be used if the owner was in melee combat.

 

To add to this, if the owner is able to shoot, how does the heavy interaction work. Shooting out of combat gives a -1. A unit in melee combat is not standing still, they are ducking and weaving, trying to hit and not be hit even if the base of the model is not actually moving. They certainly are not sitting there bracing and aiming which is what the Heavy key word entails they are doing. This came up today in a game, effectively a model with a heavy weapon shoots without penalty in combat? Thankfully in my game the model was also bracketed so there was an additional -1 but still thats pretty much BS that its better for a shooty monster to be safe in combat where it can shoot with impunity. Did we play that right?

Edited Sunday at 02:56 AM by Galron

[Lord_Ikka]

Blast weapons can not be shot at units that are in Engagement Range, either from an outside party or by a Monster/Vehicle in Engagement against the models that are engaged with it. They can be shot from a Monster/Vehicle at other targets that are not in Engagement, with the standard -1 to Hit for Big Guns Never Tire. 

 

Heavy just keys on whether the model/unit moved during the Movement phase. If a Monster/Vehicle with a Heavy weapon is in Engagement and doesn't Fall Back in the Movement phase, then the Heavy keyword triggers and applies a +1 to Hit when the weapon is shot (making the -1 for Big Guns go away). Basically, if a Monster/Vehicle fires a Heavy weapon while they are in Engagement range, they are firing without any +/- modifiers due to the two rules canceling each other out (unless there is another modifier such as Stealth or a bracketed damage mod). 

 

Generally, if a shooty Monster/Vehicle is in close combat, they are at a disadvantage, as even lowly grots/guardsmen can get some lucky wounds in on the basis of volume of attacks. Also, that shooty unit is now not able to reposition at all without giving up shooting. So tying up a shooty big guy unit can be quite useful as it allows the opposing side to maneuver the units it doesn't want shot by the enemy out of LoS, requiring the shooty unit to either Fall Back and give up a round of shooting (wasting its points value, as the shooting is why it costs what it does), or fire sub-optimal shots at available targets, which may not be the ones it is designed to kill (something like a volcano cannon shooting at a squad of marines for example). Engaging a shooty Monster/Vehicle in melee isn't always about trying to kill it off (as they usually don't have great melee prowess), it is about the ability to make your opponent use his units in a manner that negates their effectiveness.

Edited Sunday at 02:37 AM by Lord_Ikka

[Galron]

A monster with toughness 12, 2+ armor save, 1 reduction of damage to zero per game with 48" range and 16 wounds really doesnt care about the occasional stray wound getting through. It just likes that it doesnt have to worry about other big guns shooting it and it gets the nice bonus. That has to be a stupid mistake on GWs part they never corrected. 

[DemonGSides]

28 minutes ago, Galron said:

A monster with toughness 12, 2+ armor save, 1 reduction of damage to zero per game with 48" range and 16 wounds really doesnt care about the occasional stray wound getting through. It just likes that it doesnt have to worry about other big guns shooting it and it gets the nice bonus. That has to be a stupid mistake on GWs part they never corrected. 

 

Idk, my Rogal Dorn is basically that same exact stat line and I do not prefer it to be in combat.  Admittedly it doesn't have heavy, but I do not want the -1 to hit either way. 

 

They can't fire into the melee they are in and take the penalty to hit cancelling out the heavy. That seems relatively punishing and they can also still be targeted by other things as well; the monster you're talking about is still targetable, just not the infantry in combat with it.

[Lord_Ikka]

4 hours ago, Galron said:

A monster with toughness 12, 2+ armor save, 1 reduction of damage to zero per game with 48" range and 16 wounds really doesnt care about the occasional stray wound getting through. It just likes that it doesnt have to worry about other big guns shooting it and it gets the nice bonus. That has to be a stupid mistake on GWs part they never corrected. 

It can still be shot at while engaged- just not with Blast weapons from an enemy. Vehicles/Monsters can both shoot and be shot at while in engagement, unlike other units which can only shoot pistols in engagement and cannot be targeted for ranged attacks while engaged. Quite a few anti-tank weapons don't have Blast, like lascannons, thermal spears, or railguns. making them the premier weapons to shoot at Vehicles/Monsters that are in melee.

 

I assume you're talking about a Tyrannofex? This is a situation I've had before- Tyrannofex was in its deployment, covering a firelane that stopped me from advancing my Knights onto an objective without taking its fire. It has enough movement to move and get LoS from another firelane if it needs to. I sent a unit of ten subductors to tie up the Tyrannofex, while moving a couple of Warglaives through the second firelane (they are obscured from the first firelane by ruins). The subductors charge and get into melee with the Tyrannofex, do nothing. Now, even if it hits and wounds with all its melee attacks, it can't kill off them with only four attacks, so it will be in Engagement on its turn.

 

Three options for the Fex:

1- The Tyrannofex spends its turn shooting my subductors, that's a win for me- it isn't shooting anything more important. 

2- The Trannofex Falls Back, removing its shooting from that turn. Win again, my stuff isn't getting shot at.

3- The Trannofex ignores the crunchies in melee with it, shooting at any other stuff that it can see. Minor win, as it is only hitting on 3s rather than the 2s it would at that same spot if it wasn't engaged, and it isn't moving and shooting my Warglaives in the second firelane.

 

No matter what, next turn my Warglaives will get into melta range for their thermal spears and be able to blast at the Tyrannofex. Four S14 AP -4 d6 +melta 4 damage shots are coming in, plus another couple of regular meltas that may or may not wound on 5s. With Knight re-rolls, there is a very good chance that the Tyrannofex is looking at around 3 wounds and is only able to negate 1 via its ability. That is what getting something like a Tyrannofex or Dorn engaged in melee does- it narrows down their chances to fully employ their own deadly shooting to its fullest. 

 

Believe me, I don't like having my Knight Crusader tied up in melee, even if it is with stuff that has a statistically low chance of doing any damage. It limits the mobility of the unit and thus the options I have to use it the next turn. 

 

Terrain has a big impact on what happens in this sort of case; there should not be a lot, if any, 48" sightlines on a board. If you aren't playing with terrain that obscures, then that is an issue. I have my own issues with ITC/GW terrain, but those setups do make it so that there are not a lot of unimpeded shots if you maneuver well. There should be plenty of terrain that even obscures Knights.

[Galron]

It was off the Table top tactics app set up and had two huge fire lanes down the board length. Because of the terrain we were using we also had the two middle buildings that were on either side of the center objective as TLoS and in that case it worked out fine for both of us. His Norn and friends blasted things and my autocannon havocs in the only detachment they are good in were able to hit his odds and ends over them. The event with the severely under costed d6+6 damage super gun bug happened top of t5.

 

I still havent figured out how a well helmed nid zilla list isnt destroying the tournament scene, they have no weak points and are extremely under costed for what they can get away with. I ended up winning because my opponent was a newer player and forgot about the objectives.

 

Is this a change then or am I getting editions mixed up again? I thought early in the edition, Blast weapons could not be used into or out of melee.

[Lord_Ikka]

48 minutes ago, Galron said:

s this a change then or am I getting editions mixed up again? I thought early in the edition, Blast weapons could not be used into or out of melee.

That was last edition- in 9th you couldn't shoot Blast weapons at all when in Engagement range, nor could Vehicles/Monsters be targeted while they were engaged. Now you can shoot Blast weapons, just not at units in Engagement, and Monsters/Vehicles are valid targets while engaged.

 

48 minutes ago, Galron said:

I still havent figured out how a well helmed nid zilla list isnt destroying the tournament scene, they have no weak points and are extremely under costed for what they can get away with. I ended up winning because my opponent was a newer player and forgot about the objectives.

Last week a big bug Crusher Stampede did take a 4th place in a tournament and several other were 4/5 - 1 in wins/losses, but overall the tournament meta is pretty varied. Via Goonhammer, last week's top places were (14 tournaments w/29+ entrants)- 

Orks x 3 (all three different detachments)

Tau x 2 (different detachments)

CSM 

GSC x 2 (same detachment, very different lists)

Blood Angels

Dark Angels

Chaos Daemons

Astra Militarum

Ultramarines

Imperial Knights

 

That's a wide range of first place finishers (with the other top 4-10 being also pretty different). Nids showed up in the top tables a few times and have a decent win rate, but they aren't overpowered according to the stats.

 

My guess about why we aren't seeing them dominate the scene is due to OC and primary objective points. Every big bug for the Nids has an OC between 3-5, Aside from using a Norn's ability to gain OC 15 on a specific objective, the big bugs can be out-OC'd by ten-man squad of any OC 1 little guys, and even the Norns lose out against OC 2 stuff like a brick of Necron Immortals. So gaining and holding an objective means Nidzilla lists need to focus on killing off the little squads of enemy objective-campers while tanking the enemy's big shots. Depending on the enemy/board, it can definitely be done, but against something that can throw masses of low-cost chaff at them like Orks or IG, or have tougher units with equal/more OC than the big bugs like Knights/Necron C'tan they can have a struggle; means the nidzilla list isn't being spammed. 

Edited Monday at 11:26 AM by Lord_Ikka