Gimp said:

This is only the case for figuring out the enemy's level of cover, and is *not* used to determine whether your soldiers can fire at them. If the unit leader cannot see the enemy, that miniature still cannot fire at the enemy - the vehicle is not "invisible" for that purpose.

I'm surprised this rule bothers you, as it seems perfectly realistic that if I'm hiding behind a friendly walker, it's not going to provide my enemy cover.

Also, you can't have your unit leader in base contact with an enemy vehicle - that's against the rules.

The only thing I am confused on right now, is exactly what we are arguing over?

I think on threads with many pages we need to have the original argument reposted from time to time LOL.

So the question is, can a unit create its own cover? No, as the damage can come off the models in front first, leaving the models in back for the left over damage. Models that cannot be seen cannot be assigned damage, models that cannot see cannot attack.

Can I hade behind a walker and see through it and have the rest of my squad out in the open and get cover. No, as over half the squad has to be obscured or in cover to get obscurment or cover benefits.

I do wish the line of sight rules were simpler. I wish it was just "can or cannot see the enemy or be seen by the enemy" instead of the "use hte leader's POV" BS. Even if my squad leader can see a target, doesnt me I can get a shot of at it.

Also if they would have left the same cover rules from Dust Tactics.

Peacekeeper_b said:

That's how AT-43 does it so it makes sense why they use the Leaders. It could be worse though… The unit could give itself cover!!! xD

Peacekeeper_b said:

felkor said:

Its even simpler than that. You have a squad of 5 shooting at a squad of 5. If 5 shooters can see members of the target squad all 5 can fire. If only 3 can see, only 3 can fire. If only 3 can be seen (by any memeber of the shooters the other 2 are completely obscured) only 3 can be hurt. It doesnt matter if only 1 guy can see you, you can take a wound. Besides, troops block line of sight to other squads, not members of the same squad. At least that show I read it.

Peacekeeper_b said:

Well now you got me confused on what we're arguing about - it seems we both think it's simple. :-)

felkor said:

felkor said:

Its even simpler than that. You have a squad of 5 shooting at a squad of 5. If 5 shooters can see members of the target squad all 5 can fire. If only 3 can see, only 3 can fire. If only 3 can be seen (by any memeber of the shooters the other 2 are completely obscured) only 3 can be hurt. It doesnt matter if only 1 guy can see you, you can take a wound. Besides, troops block line of sight to other squads, not members of the same squad. At least thats how I read it.

Anyway, I also feel that if a unit is shielding another unit then that 1 cover save should be a attack roll against the covering unit and not just vanish into thin air.

The end point of this rule, however, is to motivate the attacking player to shoot closer squads. And to not hinder the attacking player by having his own troops get in the way.

There's a lot I mentioned in my original post, as well as many other things I was less than impressed with I didn't bother noting, but the whole idea was to put those ideas out for consideration. I'm not worried if the topic shifts, as long as it is focused on issues people are having with Warfare. I don't ask people to agree with my opinions, but without the full diversity of opinions, FFG has less to work with on fixing what is obviously at least partially broken.

On the Line of Sight issue:

I do not see any references in the first sentence regarding the lack of obscurment regarding any unit other than the unit itself. "A unit never obscures other miniatures in its own unit ." It only references the models within that unit, and not the effect they might have on other units . If it said, 'from any unit.' it would be referencing other units, but it doesn't. If someone says they can see everyone in a room, that says nothing about whether other people just outside the doorway can.

The next paragraph deals with obscurement with models from other units, and that is very specific. It's something that could be easily cleared up, but it needs to be addressed, because the wording is too open for multiple interpretations that are all justifiable.

On page 42; vehicles are specified as: 'Obscuring any unit (friend or foe), treating the base of the vehicle miniature as an area of terrain .' A vehicle base is large enough for a group of models to hide behind.

From page 41; 'A Unit Leader that has its base touching or within an area of terrain ignores that terrain for purposes of obscured line of sight, but not blocked line of sight. The unit treats the area as open terrain .'

I forgot to include the consideration of remaining 1" away from enemy models at all times, so an enemy leader could not come into base contact with a friendly vehicle, but a friendly leader certainly can. I'd been playing another game where you could move into contact with the enemy. Thanks for the catch, felkor.

As the rules are written, a friendly leader would consider the vehicle open terrain for purposes of obscurement, but not for blocked line of sight. The unit would not have to be in base contact, only the leader, and the unit's only stipulation is that the terrain becomes open terrain, with no specification that the vehicle might block line of sight.

Even for the leader, vehicles are described as being considered only an area of terrain, of indeterminate height, for purposes of line of sight. It can be assumed , but it is not written, that the vehicle is considered an area of terrain with a height equal to the model, as it is for infantry, but that is not actually specified. Vehicles are an area of terrain with no specified height for blocking Without the body of the vehicle being described as blocking line of sight, but rather only specifying the vehicle by its base, the unit leader would not have their line of sight blocked either, but the rest of the unit is clearly specified as counting the vehicle as clear terrain.

I have no problem with considering a vehicle as cover for the game. That's a tried and true tactic. My issue is with considering the vehicle as no impediment to the friendly unit. You can fire around a moving vehicle, or around and over a stationary vehicle, but the vehicle does tend to get in the friendly unit's way. Not always as badly as it does for the enemy, but enough to cause problems. We aren't talking about firing over the family car, we're talking about either tall fighting vehicles, or walkers with moving legs and bobbing bodies, and adding the probability that that massive multi-ton obstruction is moving.

Throwing back out another topic I forgot to follow up on: the Long Tom.

I acknowledged that I really dislike using the name as a veteran, and someone else (I don't feel like searching right now with how the forum is running) noted they, as another veteran, don't mind.

I'm an ex-artilleryman, so the Long Tom 155mm howitzer is an iconic piece of my service's history. Someone in another service, or even another artilleryman, may have far less attachment, but I'm also a military historian, so it drives home more.

Someone with interest in fighters might be equally incensed if they decided the P-51 should be called the Wombat and be armed with 20mm canon, or the Spitfire should be used for a twin engined night fighter. Imagine a B-17 that was a short ranged ground attack plane.

Someone with a love of tanks could be upset if they decided to make the Panther a heavy tank with a 120mm main gun, or the Sherman a super-heavy tank that first used the Punisher's 155mm howitzer.

There are iconic elements of WW2 that resonate for people. They should be treated with respect. I don't care if some people don't care about them,

but they certainly earned it.

Question: If the models in the unit are not obscureing the other minis in their own unit then what exactly is obscuring the models?


Answer: Nothing therefore they are not obscured. The rule says they never obscure models in their own unit. This means they never do it. Not when they are shooting and not when they are shot at.

It is very clear.

Gimp I think you would enjoy kampfgruppe Normandy rule set from wargammer historical.

Ten bucks says FFG is shaking their heads over this thread and wondering what dark road they've gone down by taking up a miniatures line.

paradiddlebob said:

GW got rid of their forums years ago and I suspect it was due to all the fighting online. Maybe miniatures games brings out the vitriole like no other.

I think I got it. If I am wrong correct me.

"A unit never obscures other miniatures in its own unit."

So the first sentence says: that one figure doesn't obscure LOS for another figure in the same squad, when they are shooting somebody so they can shoot throu their comrades.

"Enemy soldiers obscure line of sight to other Soldiers out to the edge of their base and up to the figures height as if they were an area of terrain."

but the second says that if you are shooting an enemy, figures obscure LOS and doesnt specify if they can obscure minis in their own unit, probably they meant they obscure LOS to a different unit, but they didn't add this leaving it open for interpretations.

Treating vehicles as a terrain for LOS purpose is wrong, because terrain has its own rules.

Treating vehicles as an area of terrain is correct:

Pg 42 third paragraph under Miniatures in the way "Vehicles obscure any unit (Friend or Foe), treating the base of the vehicle miniature as an area of terrain"

This effectively allows a player to move a squad up behind the vehicle and use its as cover without any degradation in performance as long as the unit leader is touching the base.

I meant it's wrong that they treat it as an area of terrain. Ohhhh, its all so confusing.

Galadhir said:

My bad internet conversations suck… We should all probably just get together over a few beers and hash it out as it would all make sense then

How is it that a thread that contributes nothing to the game has the most views and answers on page one? Doh! Now Im part of the problem…

I've played half a dozen games. It's a lot of fun. It's not perfect. It'll get better. I've never seen so much bitchin and whining about a pass time. Employ half that effort and half that passion and you'd have cured AIDS by now.

theguildllc said:

Ha, then you have never been to Warseer. XD

theguildllc said:

Thanks for adding to the problem…

An interesting thread to read, I must say. Yes, it tends to wander all over the road (and into the pastures beside the road, and sometimes over an occasional confused cow), but points of interest.

Gimp's opening salvo (sorry, Gimp old bean, couldn't resist the allusion to artillery) may have been long, and controversial, but was thus a rather good way to open the discussion. Certainly beats "so, whadda we talk about?"

I did not know that FFG rushed the final production. Hm. I've worked in the industry; such things are hardly unusual. And while I agree that it would be ducky to have the game book industry adhere to production standards of other industries, I also know this industry works on a shoestring budget for really tight margins, which might explain why there are so few editors for so many products, etc. And, yes, I would dearly love to see more comprehensive editing, fewer typos, and better pre-publishing problem identification and resolution. (Although said limited staff would tend to explain why a major revision of Dark Heresy, for sake of rules update and continuity, is nowhere on the horizon…)

As for nomenclarture, my objection to referring to the Allied artillery (honestly, why didn't they just say "American artillery?") as a "Long Tom" seems a bit flaccid. No insult to the 155mm rifle, but a 22cm howitzer deserves a name of its own. Perhaps an acronym; 'BFH' (Bloody Fat Howitzer), or some such?

Yes, I also forsee a second/revised edition coming. I haven't seen wargames that don't need major errata and revisions since the late 70s. Ah, Avalon Hill and SPI, I miss you. (Yes, I'm keenly aware of the irony there. SPI could've profited from swift release of game errata.)

Gimp said:

As I said earlier a fixed lowered movement for spending any time in difficult terrain is not unique to this game. Flames of War does it, for example, and that is a game which means to take the real WW2 as its inspiration. It is a simple but fairly effective way of dealing with it (unlike GW's irritating "roll distance traveled randomly" method).

As far as leaders leading from the front is concerned, the more I have thought about this the less it bothers me. As far as I can tell, this is a platoon/company level game. It's not like we are talking about colonels leading from the front line, more like Lieutenants or Captains (or even NCOs). Those kind of roles need to be very close to the front, especially if we are talking WW2, where at platoon scale you are really relying on orders sent by voice, hand signals or messenger.

"A unit never obscures other miniatures in its own unit."

Unless "obscures" is a rule term (which it may be) the that is written means it is talking about other units looking in at the unit (ie, it is indeed referring to how it deals with interactions with other units). Obscuring is the act of hiding the object of the sentence, not the act of hiding other things from the object of the sentence. Object B if it gets in the way of Object C looking at Object B, not if it gets in the way of Object B looking at Object C (though it also obscures Object C from Object B at the same time). If it was only referring to models not obscuring LoS for other models in its units it would have to be written something like "Models never obscure enemy models for other models in its unit".

Though truthfully, looking at it, unless it is clarified somewhere (or it is a specific game term… which i suspect from the rest of the content of this thread that it is), the strict wording of that sentence would mean that models actually do interfere with the LoS of models within its own unit (but not from others looking outside in).

As far as "Long Tom" goes: It is not just a name for the American 155 gun. I has also been used for at least 2 other artillery pieces (and possibly more), one from the American Civil War, and another from the Boer War (used by the Boers) built by the French.

borithan said:

Totally true. I think Gimp had commented earlier that this game comes across more like a B action movie than it does like a historical simulation. And that, of course, was the goal all along. It's based on the Dust comic books, not on real life.

Derp… realised that my explanation of the "obscure" matter is even less intelligible than intended, as I seem to have deleted half a sentence… It wasn't that clear in the first place.