So, I've been brainstorming ways to use Snowtroopers, and a while back a variation of the classic "Jump-shoot-Jump" occurred to me.

First, a brief background as to the where the term Jump-Shoot-Jump (or JSJ) came from. See, when Tau were introduced to 40k, they broke conventional rules by using Jetpacks instead of the settings more common "Jump packs." The jump pack was intended to allow rapid advances and ascents, and let a unit move at twice the normal speed, after which they would often move even further by running or charging. Jump Pack units were different. They didn't move faster during the movement phase, but at the end of their turn, if they weren't in a melee, jump pack units got a second move. The application of this was pretty straightforward- You could jump in and out of cover, or even dart out from behind a wall and then be back before an enemy could shoot you.

When snowtroopers were first previewed, people immediately compared the steady keyword to the Tau's jetpacks. However, JSJ tactics work a bit differently in Legion. Due to units ignoring a source of cover if the unit leader is in base contact with it, popping in and out of cover doesn't really work unless someone has put two different pieces of cover very close together. And while popping out from behind a wall can work, the speed one move limits your ability to get the most out of this, especially since most units are faster than a units of snowtroopers dancing back and forth. But it occured to me that there's another movement type that moves you the same distance regardless of your speed; Clambering.

There hasn't been much vertical movement in my legion games so far because frankly, the game does little to incentivize it until we know whether or not it provides any benefit in bypassing cover like barricades. It's also not very efficient; Clambering and Climbing move the unit leader from base contact with the surface they wish to climb up to the edge of that piece of terrain, which is about an inch of horizontal movement. The rest of the squad can get a little further, but not much. And since climbing costs you two actions while clambering without expert climber has a 1/6 chance of inflicting a wound on each model in the unit, it's not generally worth the hassle. But snowtroopers with grappling hooks can clamber up a building, shoot something on the other side of the building, and then be back down behind the building where they can't be shot, all in one activation. That has the potential to be incredibly annoying.

Now, there's a couple caveats here; First off, the snow trooper officer has to start in base contact with the building, which means you have to get to the building first (Depending on the setup, this could be anything from trivial to a colossal waste of time). Sufficiently large buildings such as replicas of the bunker from Empire might be sufficiently wide that a snow trooper unit on one edge of the bunkers roof might not be able to see a squad of troopers on the other side of the bunker even if those troopers are not huddled up against the building. And of course, without an aim token, snowtroopers don't actually do much damage.

So, as you can see, I'm on the fence with regards to this strategy. Is it worth trying, or is it going to be too much effort for a squad of 4 snowtroopers to get an average of 1.5 hits while being largely immune to reprisal?

I made a post the other day about how frustrating I found the climbing rules, precisely because maneuvers like you're describing should be something you want to do, but most units will have to spend a turn getting into position, then another turn attacking and clambering away, leaving a turn in between for their target to shoot them or simply move away. I think this can be a really viable use for the Snowtroopers. Its also probably why they weren't given a better long range special weapon.

22 minutes ago, Jake the Hutt said:

I made a post the other day about how frustrating I found the climbing rules, precisely because maneuvers like you're describing should be something you want to do, but most units will have to spend a turn getting into position, then another turn attacking and clambering away, leaving a turn in between for their target to shoot them or simply move away. I think this can be a really viable use for the Snowtroopers. Its also probably why they weren't given a better long range special weapon.

i suppose that is a very good possibility. if they could perform this jsj trick and have a DLT which is pretty much a sniper rifle they would be pretty scary popping up out of walls on the other side of the board.

Clamber has a 1/6 chance of inflicting a wound, not 1/3.

Leave the hooks at home.

If the terrain is high enough to completely hide the unit out of site (like a building)... what's stopping a snowtrooper unit from simply starting behind a building... moving into open space around the buildings corner, get your free attack, and then move back out of site around the building again? No hooks needed.

1 hour ago, Tvayumat said:

Clamber has a 1/6 chance of inflicting a wound, not 1/3.

Leave the hooks at home.

That's true, my mistake. Still, Snowtroopers are 12 points apiece. A unit of four has over a 50% chance of losing at least one model to clambering. Paying 25% the cost of one model to eliminate that chance is a good deal in my opinion, especially since in this scenario we're planning to go back down, which raises the odds of clambering-based casualties even further.

1 hour ago, Sephlar said:

If the terrain is high enough to completely hide the unit out of site (like a building)... what's stopping a snowtrooper unit from simply starting behind a building... moving into open space around the buildings corner, get your free attack, and then move back out of site around the building again? No hooks needed.

Speed one leaves you with bad sightlines when dashing back and forth. It's an option, but at least when I visualize it in my head, it seems easier to avoid enemy fire when you're squarely behind a wall.

4 minutes ago, Squark said:

Speed one leaves you with bad sightlines when dashing back and forth. It's an option, but at least when I visualize it in my head, it seems easier to avoid.

It's less bad that you might think based on experience with other games because only one model in the unit is Speed 1. The rest get to magically teleport past him to where they can see the target and then bamf back where they were when he moves back.

15 minutes ago, Squark said:

Speed one leaves you with bad sightlines when dashing back and forth. It's an option, but at least when I visualize it in my head, it seems easier to avoid.

Not as bad as the sightlines imposed by the far side of the building roof you just climbed on top of.

10 minutes ago, LunarSol said:

It's less bad that you might think based on experience with other games because only one model in the unit is Speed 1. The rest get to magically teleport past him to where they can see the target and then bamf back where they were when he moves back.

Very much this.

If you have a corner, a speed 1 move gets the entire squad into the open / in LOS, and another one gets the entire squad back out of LOS.

It is hugely frustrating to play against.

19 minutes ago, Squark said:

That's true, my mistake. Still, Snowtroopers are 12 points apiece. A unit of four has over a 50% chance of losing at least one model to clambering. Paying 25% the cost of one model to eliminate that chance is a good deal in my opinion, especially since in this scenario we're planning to go back down, which raises the odds of clambering-based casualties even further.

Speed one leaves you with bad sightlines when dashing back and forth. It's an option, but at least when I visualize it in my head, it seems easier to avoid.

The problem, for me, is that you're assuming the board will have a location suitable for this maneuver, that you'll be able to get to it, and that there will be an enemy in range to use this against, and you're betting 3 pts + the opportunity cost of not taking an upgrade like Targeting Scopes which is guaranteed to be useful in every game.

Personally, even for 3 pts, that's not a bet I'm interested in taking. I'd just take the scopes and risk the 1/6 IF it even came up, at all. Alternatively, if you're sitting at like 797... just take the bid and get a little more choice when it comes to the scenario picks. Either of these things is more useful.

That's really the problem for me with upgrades like Grappling Hooks and Environmental Gear. Sure, they're good. Maybe. Assuming the stars align. Or maybe they're a total waste. I'd rather invest those points in something that is guaranteed to return its value.

4 minutes ago, Tvayumat said:

The problem, for me, is that you're assuming the board will have a location suitable for this maneuver, that you'll be able to get to it, and that there will be an enemy in range to use this against, and you're betting 3 pts + the opportunity cost of not taking an upgrade like Targeting Scopes which is guaranteed to be useful in every game.

Personally, even for 3 pts, that's not a bet I'm interested in taking. I'd just take the scopes and risk the 1/6 IF it even came up, at all. Alternatively, if you're sitting at like 797... just take the bid and get a little more choice when it comes to the scenario picks. Either of these things is more useful.

That's really the problem for me with upgrades like Grappling Hooks and Environmental Gear. Sure, they're good. Maybe. Assuming the stars align. Or maybe they're a total waste. I'd rather invest those points in something that is guaranteed to return its value.

Let's break down the calculation here.

a) A suitable location: If you don't have line of sight blocking terrain, you really need to get some. Most line of sight blocking terrain will work for this.

b) With several pieces of line of sight blocking terrain, this is still something of a gamble since you do need to be in base to base contact before attempting to clamber up and down. Not an insurmountable one, but your metagames' supply of terrain makes/breaks grappling hooks, period.

c) Kind of tied to b), but range 3 is pretty substantial. It shouldn't be hard to get something in range unless the only pieces of line of sight blocking terrain are deliberately places away from the action, defeating their purpose entirely.

So, yeah, it is a calculation you have to make, but I think you're underestimating how easy it will be to find a location to make it work.

As for environmental gear... Most players are using the barricades from the core set. That's some difficult terrain right away. Easier DIY terrain like forests, craters, and fences are also difficult terrain. Again, kind of metagame dependant if you're using a lot of buildings, but a lot of map setups ought to have some difficult terrain.

9 minutes ago, kaffis said:

Not as bad as the sightlines imposed by the far side of the building roof you just climbed on top of.

On a large building, yes. On a lot of GW Ruins or terrain based off them (Or the little Tattoine huts used as example terrain in the rule book), with the advantage of coherency, I don't see an issue.

Both sides have a fair point. Pick what you think you'd use.

I'm more on the @Tvayumat side myself. I like to have stuff I'll use most games, and am happy to suck up the risk for the times I could have needed grapples.

Basically, unless there's a cliff or something cool like that, I reckon the problem with hopping up and down on a house is that there's also a pretty good chance that hopping back and forth around the corner of the building will work just as well - or even better, depending on how big the building is (and ours are pretty big). It's a shame a height advantage doesn't give you, like, a single dice reroll or something, or that you can't do a speed 1 or something after climbing, just to get to the edge of a roof to get LOS.

Note that, even putting LOS issues from the roof edge aside, most games I can think of, a speed 1 dogleg around a corner actually would give you a bit of a range advantage over popping up on the roof...

...but my *main* problem is just a me-thing. That is, I don't like my squads to have too-different gear, because I get them mixed up and then use them poorly. Unless all the squads had grapples, there's a 93.7% chance I'd put the unit without grapples at the good building, and curse myself out. Hahaha. And if they all had grapples, then that's 12+ points, and I'd rather get an extra trooper, or comms on something, or a couple of grenades, or an extra force power, or whatever.

18 minutes ago, Weatsop said:

...but my *main* problem is just a me-thing. That is, I don't like my squads to have too-different gear, because I get them mixed up and then use them poorly. Unless all the squads had grapples, there's a 93.7% chance I'd put the unit without grapples at the good building, and curse myself out. Hahaha. And if they all had grapples, then that's 12+ points, and I'd rather get an extra trooper, or comms on something, or a couple of grenades, or an extra force power, or whatever.

True, but I don't see people taking more than 1-2 squads of snowtroopers anyway since DLT Stormtroopers are just that good, so that's less of an issue.

1 minute ago, Squark said:

True, but I don't see people taking more than 1-2 squads of snowtroopers anyway since DLT Stormtroopers are just that good, so that's less of an issue.

Yeah, good point. I could actually do that!

Hmmmm....

6 hours ago, Weatsop said:

Basically, unless there's a cliff or something cool like that, I reckon the problem with hopping up and down on a house is that there's also a pretty good chance that hopping back and forth around the corner of the building will work just as well - or even better

I've had situations in each of my games where I could have clambered my troops onto a hill or building in order to gain line of sight to an enemy that was at range 2 or 3 that i would not have been able to see at all if I had just walked around the building. I suspect that will be fairly common for most players who use a fair amount of line of sight blocking terrain.

Whether or not it will be worth it to climb up on something to gain line of sight is another matter. I think in most situations for most troops it won't, since it'll take at least a full turn to get up on something, and they'll have to wait for another turn to shoot, giving their target plenty of time to respond my moving out of sight/to cover, shooting them or dodging. The Snowtroopers are in a unique place of being able to move up onto high ground to gain line of sight AND shoot in a single turn. That seems pretty good. It may be situational, but i suspect in most games it'll be a situation you can set up.

Yeah, and they have the same climb speed (despite speed 1) as anyone else. So it's pure bonus.

I can see me getting grapples for my snowies. If I can see me buying snowies. But it'll come down to where the tables end up. Right now, we've got sort of cube buildings.

Is clamber and move the same thing or is clamber it's own action. Otherwise, they wouldn't work.

5 hours ago, Mep said:

Is clamber and move the same thing or is clamber it's own action. Otherwise, they wouldn't work.

climbing/clambering are considered move actions (RRG p10)