Play Sequence Q&A
by Jervis Johnson & Andy Chambers
Includes Strategy Rating, Movement, Firing Phase, and Assault Phase

Strategy Rating

Q:May an army's strategy rating change in mid-game, or is it fixed for the duration at the start of the game? For example, a marine force would have a strategy rating of 5, but this decreases to 4 if they inclued any Guard units or Titans in their army. Would the rating increase to 5 again if all Guard units and Titans were destroyed in the midst of a game?

a) The strategy rating is fixed for the duration of the game, regardless of casualties.
b) The strategy rating may change if casualties reduce a "mixed" force to a "pure" force. (Change the rating at the beginning of the next turn, or the beginning of the next phase?)

A: This is another question I can't honestly remember coming up during playtesting. This makes me think that if it did ever occur (and I think it must have), then we imply didn't notice and kept on playing with the same strategy rating we'd been using since the start of the battle. However, players that prefer to come up with their own house rules for such situations should feel free to do so, as I can see no good reason why the strategy rating should *not* change from turn to turn depending on the composition of the army.

Movement

Q: If a unit of infantry dismounts from its transport in the assault phase then it loses 5 cm. from its move when it charges into combat. Players are usure, however, if this 5 cm. is subtracted from the unit's move before or after it is doubled if such doubling will allow the infantry to get into Close Combat. Which case is correct?

a) The infantry may charge up to (10-5)*2=10 cm if this will place the infantry into base-to-base contact.
b) The infantry may charge up to 10*2-5=15 cm if this will place the infantry into base-to-base contact.

A: b)

Q: Page 15 of the rule book (SNAP-FIRE)
Second Paragraph:

"The unit can move no further - the sudden burst of enemy fire cause it to halt. In addition the attacker rolls a D6 to see whether they get a hit. Note, you always roll 1D6, no matter what the Firepower of the attacker. If the D6 roll equals or beats the moving unit's Armour value it takes a hit in addition to being halted. The effect of hits is explained in the Shooting Phase."

When a unit with an anti-tank weapon elects to snap-fire, does it:

a) Roll to beat the targets armour value
b) Roll to score a hit on a 4+.

A: a) is the correct answer.

Q: When the rules call for a value to be halved, eg. the firepower of units with assault orders during the shooting phase, do you:

a) Round up
b) Round down?

A: Up to you, but be consistent!

[Editor's Note: I would suggest following the standard mathematical convention of rounding 0.5 and higher up, and rounding 0.49 and lower down, in all cases when fractions come into play.]

Q: A detachment on Assault orders shoots with only 1/2 of its firepower in the firing phase. Should it's firepower be halved before or after you subtract for blast markers? (Eg.: A detachement with 12 Firepower has two blast markers. On assault orders, would it shoot with 5 or 4 firepower?)

A: After (that's 5 firepower in your example)

Firing Phase

Q: The EPIC 40K rules, on p. 16 of the Rules Book, now allow players to pass during the firing phase if they wish to wait for a better opportunity to shoot. [A change from the old rules that I like very much! -Ed.] What happens if both players want to pass in the shooting phase?

a) The phase ends.
b) The player who initially passed must fire a detatchment. Play then continues.
c) The player who initially passed must fire a detatchment or declare that a detatchment will not fire this turn. Play then continues.
d) Discuss it with your opponent. If you have reached a point where neither will fire unless the other fires first, then the firing phase ends.

A: a

Q: A detachment on Assault orders shoots with only 1/2 of its firepower in the firing phase. Should it's firepower be halved before or after you subtract for blast markers? (Eg.: A detachement with 12 Firepower has two blast markers. On assault orders, would it shoot with 5 or 4 firepower?)

A: After (that's 5 firepower in your example)

Assault Phase

Q: When one detatchment engages another in an assault or a firefight, it is quite possible for one of these two detatchments to have a toal assault or firepower value of zero. (Consider a detatchment that has nothing left but rhinos.) For the puposes of determining the die roll modifiers, should the superior side automatically be considered to have 4 or more times the assult/firepower of the side with zero (and thus get +4 to the die roll), or should some minimum value be assigned to the inferior side?

A: It automatically gets a +4 modifier. Theoretically (sp?) this can lead to some strange situations, i.e. one stand of Gretchin getting into a firefight with 25 Rhinos and ending up with a +4 modifier!, but in practice the rule works just fine. Players that have a problem with this should come up with their own house rules, for example assuming that a detachment always has a value of at least 1 for firefights or close assaults, even if all the units involved have a factor of '0'.

Q: During shooting, the rules specifically state thet a unit needs a line of sight to at least part of the target detachment in order to participate. There is no such statement in the rules for lending assistance in an assault or firefight.

a)Does a unit need to have LOS in order to participate in a firefight, or does it only need to be within 15cm of the enemy detatchement?
b)Does a unit need LOS in order to lend support to an assault, or just satisfy the 15cm criteria?

A: NO LOS is required in either case. For firefights and assaults we assume that there is considerable movement going on which is not represented on the tabletop, and that if a unit wants a shot, it will get one!

Q: If an infantry can get into CC but is not allowed to (ie the enemy unit in question is already being attacked by two units) can the infantry unit still double its movement to get into range to help with surporting fire?

A: No

Copyright 2000 by Doug Wolfe	Last Updated Monday, July 2, 2001
All games, books, and movie content on this site is copyright to the various companies that own them, and any reference is used without the permission of their owners and no challenge to their status is intended.