So this applies across most if not all of the 40krpgs, but because the question came up in a Rogue Trader game initially, I'll post it here.
When a PC has a force field of some sort, do they resolve the chance that it will block the attack on them before or after they roll their reaction?
The rules for fields that I've been able to find do not address this directly. The closest I've been able to come after some in-depth discussion with another RT GM friend of mine, points to the following language in both the field and the reaction text blocks:
Force fields activate, "when a character wearing an active field is attacked , roll 1d100, [...]", while the entry on Dodge says, " after a character is hit , but before Damage is rolled, the character can attempt to avoid the attack by [...]"
So the interpretation of reading those two rules in conjunction suggests that you resolve the field activation first, and then and only then if the attack is successful and damage should be rolled, does the dodge roll come into play.
However a couple of my players are arguing that logically from an in-character point of view, someone is going to dodge as soon as they realise they're being attacked - even with a force field, as the potential for that to activate is not a 100% certainty. So they're arguing that you should resolve a dodge action first, then if you don't manage to avoid the attack in the first place then you should see if the field activates, kind of a Hail Mary second chance situation. I have seen a wiki from another GM's RT campaign that says they houseruled this in as a rule.
I'm stuck between both viewpoints, because mechanically I can see how the language used in the system supports view a - fields come first. But from a fluff/storytelling/logical character actions perspective, I also can see the validity in my players' view b - resolve reactions, then see if the field triggers if you can't mitigate the attack in another fashion.
Thoughts? Suggestions? Ideally feedback from an official source would be great, but right now I'd just take logical arguments for either side - or a link to anywhere that this discussion has been held before if it's available.