How to assault like a pro

[DarkLink]

Part IA

With the advent of 6th ed and numerous tactically challenging rules such as Pile In, Challenges, and Random Charge Length, I’ve noticed that a lot of people have trouble with some of the more subtle aspects of assault. Playing with less experienced players, I’ve seen lots of little mistakes that cost them assaults and sometimes games.

I’ve been playing my Grey Knights since the old Daemonhunters codex, which for those who don’t know essentially required you to take multiple Land Raiders to be even close to competitive. Land Raiders were your only anti-tank and only transports, aside from Inquisitorial Storm Troopers in Rhinos (who were useful, but very overpriced). Additionally, old Grey Knights completely lacked Frag Grenades. Between the Land Raiders and lack of grenades, I spent most of 5th ed carefully coordinating assaults on nasty units while trying to avoid terrain. I like to think I got pretty good at it, so I figured I’d write a little tactica on the assault phase. Meet the kind gentlemen who will be modeling for us (excuse the photography, I'm working with a camera phone, with no lighting equipment and no terrain):

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There are a couple of items to consider when planning an assault, and the first is really straightforward:

When do you assault?
It seems like a dumb question, but assault is not always an automatic yes. If you have a tough assault unit in range of a weaker unit, the choice to assault is pretty obvious. But there are plenty of other situations in which you might want to assault at all. Here are some of the big ones:

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Target Priority: Some enemy units are more valuable than others. You can only assault what you shoot, and sometimes shooting is more important than getting into assault. Sometimes, you need to have your unit free to sit on an objective instead. Keep the mission in mind. Does the assault further your goals? Sometimes, in order to accomplish the mission, you need to decide that assaulting isn’t worth it.

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Shooting Protection: While you are in assault, you cannot be shot. You also can't move during your opponent's turn, or do anything else useful. Put two and two together, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out that it's often beneficial to get stuck in combat during your opponent's turn.

As a result, you usually want your assaults to last two player turns. Assault on your turn, kill some dudes, laugh while your opponent doesn't get to shoot you during their turn, then kill some more dudes, win combat, and be free to act in your next turn.

This is one reason to pull your punches sometimes. It can be tricky to pull off. A good example I have is a recent game in which I assaulted a unit of Chaos Space Marines with my Dreadknight. My Dreadknight was already wounded, and the nearby plasma would likely make short work of him. I Challenged (which we will cover later), and he had to accept because of the Champion of Chaos rule. I pasted his Champion, but the unit still passed their morale since I only won combat by 1. I then killed three or four Marines in his assault phase, broke the squad, and Sweeping Advanced them (or maybe they fell back off the table edge, I forget). I not only killed one of his units, but I just saved my Dreadknight for a turn by protecting him from all those nasty guns. A bunch of mere T4 Marines in assault is nothing compared to a whole array of plasma, melta, vindicators, and the other heavy firepower my opponent could bring to bear.

Funnily enough, I went for the same trick a second time, and the second Champion actually rolled a bunch of 6's and I failed all my armor saves. I killed the Champ, but the Champ killed my Dreadknight. These things happen, sometimes.



Slingshotting: Charge moves are a good way of getting some free movement. If you really need to get somewhere fast, pulling yourself forward with a convenient charge can net you a full turn’s movement. You’re moving 2D6 on the charge, 3” with some of your guys from Pile In, and another D6 from consolidation if you win. That could theoretically be almost 21”, though you would have to be in the absolutely perfect situation to get that. Either way, free movement is not insignificant. Just make sure that you’re not going to get bogged down in the assault. The slingshot doesn’t do you any good if you’re stuck in the assault for two or three game turns and lose your regular movement and shooting.

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Continued in Part IA...

[walrusman999]

Thanks man, This is good stuff!! I typically stay out of assaulting because i never really understood all the possibilities with it. I might consider playing some more assault moves with my SM now. Really helpful.

[DarkLink]

Not a problem. Assault has been nerfed a little bit, for whatever reason, but even still assault is an extremely effective way of breaking enemy units, clearing off objectives, etc.

[Aegwymourn]

Excellent write up and tactics for any assault. It is always good to go back and look at what one can do better to improve their gameplay.

I will agree that the largest grip I can muster about playing an assault oriented army in 6th is the random charge length. It can easily make or break whole games with either the lucky 12" charge or the 3" failed charge. The largest reason I took a break to play Tau.

[DarkLink]

Yeah, RCL messed that one up. You can still work to mitigate random chance, and it is cool pulling off 12" charges, but I think they needed protection from snake eyes when you're out in the open. The increased chance of killing stuff and screwing up your opponent's plan by getting a 12" charge is both fun and adds an element of gambling to the game if you also consider Overwatch. The chance of not doing anything due to a poor charge roll is just frustrating and disappointing.


Anyways, I'm going to be editing the article to insert some pictures. I'll likely have to break it up into several posts, since I think you're limited to a certain number of pictures per post.

[DarkLink]

Part IB

Continued from Part IA...

Slingshotting part 2
There’s also a trick you can pull with Independent Characters to buy charge range. If you have an IC in one unit close to the enemy, but your second unit is pretty far away, swap squads with your IC. Move the IC back to be just within Coherency of the back squad, and you just bought yourself an extra ~3” for when you go to charge. Just be careful of Overwatching Melta.

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I'll also note that swapping squads with an IC like this can catch your opponent off guard, especially if your ICs are big force multipliers like the GK HQs are. I played a game against an Ork player at the first Bay Area Open in which I let him advance with his Nob Bikerz on one of my Strike Squads, while the rest of my stuff lined up against the rest of his army. At the last second, I jumped my Grand Master with Rad/Psykotroke Grenades and Coteaz over into the Strike Squad unit, and assaulted his Bikerz. He didn't expect that, and went from facing an injured Strike Squad to facing a unit with so many Hammerhands/Force Weapons/nasty Grenades that I wiped the Bikerz on the charge. I ended up losing that game overall, but my opponent told me after the game he didn't see that coming and had convinced himself that he owned that half of the table. Non-linear thinking for the win. Incidentally, that guy was an awesome opponent, and that game was one of the closest and most engaging games of 40k I've ever played.


Enemy Deathstars/Tarpits/Bubblewrap: Sometimes you want to assault enemy assault units. Sometimes not. It depends a lot on the details. 30 Ork Boyz, for example, can bog down a THSS Terminator squad for several turns thanks to Fearless. The Boyz will probably only kill a few Terminators, but those Terminators won’t be killing more dangerous things. If you have a unit that can reasonably tie up an enemy deathstar, or even just a more moderately threatening enemy unit, go for it.

Alternatively, you can -not- assault, but instead use your unit as a blocker. A unit of Acolytes/Gretchin/Kroot/Cultists can literally just stand in front of an enemy unit and block their movement. This is often called bubblewrap. The bubblewrap unit will likely die, but it will take a turn or two to kill, and that’s a turn or two in which your opponent’s nasty assault unit isn’t doing its job. Net win for you, plus it buys you an extra turn or so to pour firepower into them.

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Multi-charges: Multi-charges are a tricky prospect, and one we’ll have to get back to later when we go over the basic set up (to be explained later). The first thing to keep in mind is that multi-charging costs you your bonus attack. You will do less damage overall in a multi-charge. There are reasons to do it, however. For one, you can sometimes guarantee the charge thanks to a multi-charge. If you’re close to one unit but 9-10” away from another, you can charge the close unit and guarantee success, while retaining the possibility of reaching the far unit if you roll well and position yourself properly.

Here’s where it gets tricky, however. A multi-charge has two types of targets. You have your Primary target, and Secondary targets. If you shot, the unit you shot must be your Primary. If you fail to reach the Primary target, the entire assault fails. Your first model must always go to the Primary target.

In addition, you may only engage the Secondary targets if your models cannot reach an unengaged model in the Primary target. If you get too close to the Primary target with all of your models, you’ll have wasted the multi-charge because you’ll be forced to put everyone into the Primary target. To top it off, you still suffer from Disordered Charge even if you don’t actually reach any of your Secondary targets.

This is something I see people play incorrectly all the time. And, I admit, I’ve played it wrong myself, handwaving the requirement to place priority on reaching the Primary target. How to get around this is a subject that will be covered a little later, as it also relates to other important topics.

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Overwatch: When you declare an assault, your opponent gets Overwatch once per unengaged unit that is the target of an assault. If your opponent has some nasty shooting, you might want to try to force them to waste it by first charging with a sacrificial unit. Get to know the Overwatch rules, and understand your opponent’s shooting abilities well, and remember that psychic powers can’t be used for Overwatch normally.

Note that Independent Characters, and other Characters to a lesser extent, are good against Overwatch in some cases. Look Out Sir means that your IC is likely to live, so your opponent’s Overwatch will not deny you the charge. Get your Character out front, so long as that Overwatch isn’t too deadly.

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If you do assault:
Now that we’ve covered when to assault, here’s the most fundamental thing about assaulting: don’t fail the charge. Especially with Random Charge Length now, you need to do everything you can to guarantee a successful charge. This is a two step process:

1. Get as close as physically possible. If you’re within 2”, even snake eyes while moving through terrain won’t matter. While out in the open, a 7” charge has a ~58% chance of success. Those aren't great odds. Charging through terrain is a little more complicated, but that kind-of reliable 7” becomes more like 4”. Assuming ‘no big deal, the average is 7 inches so I’m safe’ is lazy thinking. Protect yourself from that crappy over-randomness (I dislike Random Charge Length, for this reason and for reasons that I will mention later. RCL goes to great length to remove any and all tactical considerations you can put into assaulting, which makes for less than ideal gameplay).

2. Avoid Terrain. As I mentioned, when going through terrain even 4” is a long ways. So just avoid it. We’ll go over this later with the basic set up, where we’ll also cover how to move into multi-charges and a few other tricks we can pull. So, basically, you don’t want to have to enter terrain at all. This is particularly important for units that lack grenades.


With the basics covered, in Part II we'll look at a few of the more complex rules you'll have to worry about, Pile In and Challenges.

[DarkLink]

Part II
Now that we've decided to assault in Part I and gone over some of the basic considerations, let's look at some more complex issues.


Pile In
Once you’ve made your assault moves, you now wait until your Initiative step to pile in a mere 3”. This is important, because you can only attack if you are engaged, and if you’re not careful high Initiative models can be left out in the cold, while your low Initiative models get cut down before they strike.

First, you want higher I models near the front. That way they will be able to Pile In their 3” and reach base contact, or reach 2” of a friendly model in base contact. If your high Initiative models are in the rear of your unit, they’re less likely to get to hit since your low I models haven’t Piled In yet and may either get in the way or minimize how many guys you have in base contact and thus minimize the number of models you have engaged.

You want low Initiative models closer to the rear, so that they will live to get their attacks. Since you remove models closest to the enemy attackers, if a low Initiative model in the frontlines takes a higher Initiative attack, it dies before striking. This, in case you were wondering, is bad.

So in order to maximize your damage done, pay attention to model placement based on Initative, because Pile In can otherwise screw you over. Keep this in mind when assaulting as well, because you can sometimes deny your opponent attacks if you assault his low I guys and avoid his high Initiative models.

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Challenges
6th ed brings Challenges. This can be a loopy mechanic (seriously GW, what were you thinking with Mind Shackle Scarabs and Challenges?), and can regularly screw people over (poor Chaos Champions, you’re the new Devestator Sergeant, always the first to die), but it can be pretty fun sometimes so whatever.

Challenges are pretty simple (though in typical GW fashion it takes the rulebook a full page to explain what could be said in a paragraph or two):

Once per turn per assault, the player whose turn it is may issue a Challenge with one of his engaged Characters. If he doesn’t the other player may then issue one.

The other player may Accept the challenge with an engaged Character of his choice. Alternatively, he may Refuse the Challenge (except for those poor Chaos Champions). If he Refuses, the player that issued the Challenge may select one engaged enemy Character. That Character may not attack and the unit can’t use his Leadership, though the Character may still be killed.

Challenges may only be issued, and accepted/refused, by models that are engaged at the beginning of the Fight sub-phase, which means before any Pile In moves are made.

Once you’ve got your two Characters in the Challenge, they count as being in base contact with only each other, and “may only strike blows against each other”. You don’t actually necessarily physically move the models outside of your normal Pile In (you still try and reach base contact, and may even swap out other models in the same unit to get a Character into base contact with the other challenger, but you must maintain coherency with the unit and all that, so it is possible to be in a challenge and not in base contact), but those two Characters can only kill each other, and only be killed by each other.

The ‘Engaged Character” part is important. If there is not an engaged Character to Challenge, and there is not an engaged Character to Accept, then there is no Challenge. There’re also a few tricks you can pull.


Challenges are mostly about sizing up your opponent’s Characters. If you’re up against, say, Driago, your Librarian will want to run and hide. So you might want to sacrifice your squad Sergeant to both protect your Librarian and prevent Driago from bending over the squad itself. Driago killing your Sergeant alone is a lot better than him killing your Librarian and/or half your squad.

However, since only engaged Characters may get in on the Challenge (which gets played wrong a lot, people seem to miss the ‘engaged’ part), you can pull some tricks. If you arrange your assault so that your enemy’s Character(s) is unengaged before Pile In, they can’t Challenge. Even more importantly, if you can arrange the assault such that only one of your enemy’s Characters is engaged, then that engaged Character is the only eligible model to accept a Challenge, removing your opponent’s normal ability to accept with whomever they so desire.

So when you’re prepping an assault, keep in mind where your and your opponent’s Characters are. Play your cards right, and you can force your opponent’s Character into a bad match-up and swing the assault in your direction.

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The Grey Knight player may or may not want to Challenge the Warlock. On one hand, the squad isn't as likely to run if only the warlock dies, since Driago only won combat (presumably) by 1. That means Driago is stuck in assault during his opponent's next turn, and safe from Shooting. On the other, he might need to kill that squad right now, say to chase it off an objective in the bottom of the 5th, in which case he wants to avoid a Challenge and kill as many guys as possible to maximize their odds of running. Keep in mind that Driago cannot Sweeping Advance, so if the squad runs it will still be alive, and possibly have enough models to regroup next turn.

The Eldar player, on the other hand, wants the exact opposite to happen. Simply reverse the logic above. As a result, the Eldar player should have placed his Warlock somewhere that would allow him to Challenge Driago, if that option was favorable. Alternatively, if the Eldar player wants to run and regroup, he can spread the Guardians out so much that Driago cannot ever get close enough to issue a challenge.

These are all things to consider when placing Characters that you expect to either assault or be assaulted.


With Challenges and Pile In covered, we can now go over the basic set up for an assault in Part III, coming up next.

[DarkLink]

Part III: How to set up an Assault
So we have all these different factors to consider when setting up an assault. We need to determine that we actually want to assault in the first place. We need to avoid terrain. We need to position our high/low Initiative models and our Characters favorably, while trying to mess up our opponent’s positioning with their own high/low Initiative models and Characters. I’m going to break this up into a few simple items:



Assaulting Guidelines:
1. You only need one model to reach base contact. You can Pile In later. That one model should be as close as possible. Everyone else needs to back off so they don't spoil the charge.

2. Get your high Initiative models and all your Characters close to the front, though beware of Overwatch.

3. Aim to reach base contact with enemy models in the target unit that minimized your opponent’s return attacks, allows you to kill low Initiative models before they get to strike, and restricts his Challenge options in a way favorable to you.


If you get nothing else from this whole article, remember these three points. A good player can extrapolate from these three things to cover everything else I’ve talked about here. If you consider these three points, you are good to go, though you might still need a little practice getting everything to go smoothly.

Now, the first point is vital to avoiding terrain, pulling off multi-charges, and setting up point 3. Point 2 merely deals with the order in which you place the models in your squad. Point 3 is, to a certain degree, out of your control, but if your opponent leaves an opening that lets you take out his Power Klaw Nobz before they get to strike then take advantage of it. We’ve already covered points 2 and 3 above pretty well, though. Now for the implications of point 1.

The number one mistake I see new players make is bunching up their entire squad as close as possible in preparation for an assault. You don’t need the whole squad up there, just one model. Bunching up is a good way of being forced to go through terrain, preventing yourself from pulling off a multi-charge, or letting an opponent’s entire unit and Characters in on the action.

Select one or two models from your unit (two is probably a good idea, so Overwatch won’t kill the closest guy and cost you the charge on a poor roll for RCL). Then, string out your unit behind them as far as needed, and place the bulk of your squad ~10-12” away.

It seems counter intuitive to back away from a unit to pull off an assault, but the result gets you exactly what we’ve been discussing above. You have one or two guys close enough to ensure you’ll get the charge. They move closest to closest. You have two more guys strung out at the maximum 2” coherency, who may or may not make it into assault depending on your RCL roll, but if they do you can still probably fit them all on the initial model. By the time the rest of your squad moves in, they’re far enough away that they’re not actually in base contact, and your handful of strung-out assaulters are only in base contact with one or two enemy models. If you picked the target models well, then you can 1) control challenges, 2) avoid assaulting through terrain, and 3) minimize enemy attacks back, all while still getting your full attacks once you Pile In.

It’s obvious at this point that all of this preparation must be done in the Movement Phase. If you don’t move your unit correctly, you won’t be able to pull off any of these tricks. Move one guy in the wrong place, and you’ll be forced to assault through terrain, which could cost you the entire assault. Place your Character, or high Initiative models, in the wrong spot in the squad, and they might lose their attacks and not get to hit.


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You can see from the image, I've put two models as close as I could to the exposed Guardians. This gives me the best odds of a successful charge. The rest of the squad is then strung out as far back as I can get, so that I avoid terrain. They're still close enough that Pile In will get them their attacks, but so long as I don't roll super high for my charge, I don't have to worry about terrain. And if I do roll super high, then I'll have rolled highly enough that I'll make the charge even if I do have to enter terrain, so no problem there.


I call this the basic set up, because this is how most charges should look. One or two models get close to a target model of your choice, while the rest of your unit keeps its distance. Whether you're avoiding terrain, avoiding a challenge, seeking a particular challenge, or whatever, you simply pick the model in the enemy unit that will get you what you want, and orient your setup on that model. If you're multi-charging, set up multiple tendrils like this, and make sure you will have models that cannot reach your Primary target so that you can engage your Secondary targets.

As I noted in the picture above, I frequently don't shoot before a charge. All those Storm Bolter and Psycannon shots may go to waste, but my Grey Knights will kill more in assault, and shooting will probably cost me the assault in these cases.


This guide covers pretty much everything you need to know about assaulting in 6th, not counting actual unit statlines, wargear, and special rules. Make sure you know those as well. Don't let yourself get blindsided by Rad/Blind/Psykotroke Grenades, or get sucked into a Challenge with Mind Shackle Scarabs. Seriously, I've never seen a unit with Rad/Psykotroke Grenades lose combat ever, and I play Grey Knights. They're nasty. And the new Chaos Black Mace Daemon Weapon thingie... man, you'd better kill that stupid Chaos Lord before you lose half your squad to failed Toughness tests.

Anyways, I hope this helps some newer players pick up some tricks, or helps reinforce experienced player's knowledge If anyone has any tips or tricks to add, or if I've got an error hidden in here, let me know.





Just a side note, Random Charge Length bugs me. All of this that we just discussed? Random Charge Length removes control over this and places it in the dice. It removes a lot of the tacticality (is that even a word?) from the game by eliminating the effect player skill has on the game. In 5th ed, it was pretty impressive what a skilled player could pull off, regardless of the other issues with that edition. While 6th is an overall improvement on 5th, replacing tactical decision making and player skill with dumb randomness is annoying, even if player skill can still mitigate crappy dice to a certain degree. It's just frustrating to play everything right, and get screwed because the odds of failure on 2d6 are annoyingly high. It's one thing to get a laugh because you failed 5/6 of your 2+ armor saves. It's another to always have a ~30% chance of failing a charge at 6".

[Caitsidhe]

At issue is a proper defensive gun line, something you don't discuss much. Since combat will immediately end at the end of any phase wherein there are no longer any opposing models in base to base contact, it is possible for a shooting defender to maximize his/her chances of being free of combat after the first initiative pile in. Consider the following:

1. A defender get into a pattern shaped like a V with the point directed at the opponent's forces. The models are put at maximum distance from each other, just maintaining legal cohesion. This is to ensure the minimum number of troops will actually make it into combat via pile in. What is more, the absolute weakest models are put to the front.

2. With the new, generous shooting rules this formation will not lose many shots (probably not any) while it camps and fires.

3. The incoming assault troops will certainly think twice about shooting because any killed model increases their range by inches.

4. The incoming assault troops are likely to NOT be bunched up because that makes them vulnerable to pie plates and flame templates. Not being bunched up will play to the defender's benefit shortly.

5. The assault is declared and quite often it is the biggest, baddest fella or fellas up front. If they hit (and the defender has wisely put his or her chaff at the front and best in the way back) they are probably going to vaporize what they hit on their initiative round. Everything that could get into base to base did during the charge. If the assaulting troops also have the next highest Init for the pile in they have to HOPE that they can reach more models or combat immediately ends.

In short, assault troops are often victims of their own success. If they vaporize 3+ models the probability that pile in will result in more base to base contact is greatly reduced. Big gun lines of IG, Cultists, or any cheap shooting troop without decent saves or stats will literally vaporize on contact (and they want that to happens). So the Assault troops will choose not to shoot to improve their chances of arrival and miss out on possible wounds inflicted, suffer from additional Overwatch fire (which can be huge if the unit is large enough, and then proceed to fall right back out of combat after the first Initiative troops do their damage. Then they can get the crap shot out of them AGAIN.

It is almost imperative NOT to put your best guys in the front line. In short, the mid to long range assault attempts will always favor the defending gun line in proper dispersal. Only the short range assaults which are likely to bring most of your models into contact or 3" pile are likely to stick. Even those kinds of assaults can be mitigated by the defender in the right formation because they can still cut their losses by trying to make sure that what you reach dies freeing the rest of the blob to shoot again.

[DarkLink]

The focus of the article was specifically how to pull off an assault most effectively, so no, I didn't focus much on that.

However, your strategy of sacrificing weaker models and minimizing contact still leaves you locked in assault, and as I mentioned in the article it's actually beneficial for the assaulting player to be locked in assault for a full game turn. If he only kills a few guys the first round because you're spread out and wastes some attacks, no big deal, after two turns of Pile In you have to be extremely spread out to avoid casualties, and the defender is still losing combat a couple turns in a row. So it may or may not be beneficial to do this. Sometimes, such as in the case of a Stubborn Guardsmen blob squad, you can use this to tie up a deathstar unit for a long time. Other times, you'll still take casualties and break and it will just cost you attacks back.

However, in practice I've not seen many cases in which the assaulter has to worry about this. It's just as likely that you're assaulting a unit that just got blown out of a transport, and thus doesn't have much of an opportunity to take a spread-out formation.

But the point of your post is correct, that you can take the lessons from how to assault and apply them to defending against the assault. When you're moving and deploying your units, look at the enemy and see what might be in range to assault you. If you might see an assault, make sure to position your models such that you can disadvantage the assaulter. Think about the tricks that the assaulter can pull on you, and take measures to counter them. Move your Characters around, force the assaulters to move through cover, etc.

Edit:
I'll note that you have to be really, really spread out to fall back out of combat. Everyone gets a total of 6" of Pile In, 3 at their Initiative step and 3 at the end of assault, so that's 12" of Pile In guaranteed, plus the actual assault move itself. Most large units like Guardsmen blob squads simply run out of room to pull that off. While it's certainly theoretically possible to do this, in practice I've never actually seen it happen, or even seen a particular situation in which it was likely to happen.

[Caitsidhe]

The focus of the article was specifically how to pull off an assault most effectively, so no, I didn't focus much on that. However, your strategy of sacrificing weaker models and minimizing contact still leaves you locked in assault,

No, it doesn't. The moment there isn't base to base contact between two opposing unit and a pile cannot change this the assault is over. The combat is over. Nobody is locked in combat. Your opponent is free to move however he/she wants and shoot you again.



and as I mentioned in the article it's actually beneficial for the assaulting player to be locked in assault for a full game turn. If he only kills a few guys the first round because you're spread out and wastes some attacks, no big deal, after two turns of Pile In you have to be extremely spread out to avoid casualties, and the defender is still losing combat a couple turns in a row. So it may or may not be beneficial to do this. Sometimes, such as in the case of a Stubborn Guardsmen blob squad, you can use this to tie up a deathstar unit for a long time. Other times, you'll still take casualties and break and it will just cost you attacks back.

I don't think you understand what I'm getting at. The fighting for the round doesn't just end. The fight is over. There is no longer a close combat and nobody is locked into it. Your assault unit is hanging in the breeze to get shot at by everyone, not the least of which is the unit you just assaulted who might, after everyone and its cousin shoots the crap out of you, assault you themselves.


However, in practice I've not seen many cases in which the assaulter has to worry about this. It's just as likely that you're assaulting a unit that just got blown out of a transport, and thus doesn't have much of an opportunity to take a spread-out formation.

I see it. I use it. It is very effective. It forces assault troops to stay bunched up together to try and make contact with as many models as possible in base to base which means I can pie plate or template them. If they don't do it, my front line evaporates and they get stuck as the rear of my formation gets free to shoot them.


But the point of your post is correct, that you can take the lessons from how to assault and apply them to defending against the assault. When you're moving and deploying your units, look at the enemy and see what might be in range to assault you. If you might see an assault, make sure to position your models such that you can disadvantage the assaulter. Think about the tricks that the assaulter can pull on you, and take measures to counter them. Move your Characters around, force the assaulters to move through cover, etc.

I have found that on the assault the attacker should run in a weird REVERSE "V" pattern to minimize bunching and put flankers as far forward as possible so to hopefully still have the shortest distance from one side or the other to close ranks. Nobody but me does it so far though.


Edit:
I'll note that you have to be really, really spread out to fall back out of combat. Everyone gets a total of 6" of Pile In, 3 at their Initiative step and 3 at the end of assault, so that's 12" of Pile In guaranteed, plus the actual assault move itself. Most large units like Guardsmen blob squads simply run out of room to pull that off. While it's certainly theoretically possible to do this, in practice I've never actually seen it happen, or even seen a particular situation in which it was likely to happen.

I don't think you are doing this right, or I am way off as everyone in my Meta. You charge and get base to base with as many as you can and the ones that can't get to base to base have to move as close to your lead guys that are in base to base. There is no 6" pile in. There is no pile in until Initiative and if your fastest guys were in the front they GET NO PILE IN because they are already in base to base contact. Only those models not already in base to base will pile in on their Initiative. That is the problem with fastest to the front.

Look at it this way:

You are assaulting my big "V" pattern of Traitor Guard with your CMS and a Lord marked Slannesh. Your Lord goes at 6.... the rest go at 4... mine go last. Your Lord being up front makes contact and let's be nice and say that four more of your guys do to engaging directly all three of the point of my "V." Your Slannesh Lord goes first and being what he is inflicts 3+ AP-3 wounds easily and the front of the line vaporizes. We got to Initative-4 and the guys that managed to engage the two just behind my point can move forward far enough to engage the next to but that is IT. A total of five guys will be lost on the IG Squad and not only does the fight end, but nobody is locked into combat. You are just really close to them. *I forgot about the IG pile in. :) Yes the next two guys IF THEY ARE STILL ALIVE can pile forward and make contact. Chances are they won't be. They will have been lost as casualties... so correct my loss to (7) IG guys.

In return they will have been shooting at you as you go forward. Used overwatch when you charged, and will be shooting you AGAIN on their next turn.

*I see what you are talking about. You are getting the 6" at the end of the phase by adding the three inches from each side. In theory as long as you didn't do too much damage at the point of impact and cut back two more men to (9) on the Blob unit they would stay engaged. Fair point. I still think you risk a lot by hitting as hard as you can. I would suggest that you don't want your fastest up front but right in the middle to right behind the front so that the pile in itself engages more models. I suppose it depends on whether you want to vaporize or be certain of sticking. The issue against "melt like butter blobs" is that dedicated assault units now really will kill deep and if in the wrong configuration will end up out of combat.

[Caitsidhe]

You do have my apology though. I was jumping ahead to the end and ASSUMING that your Assault would hit hard and cut the tip off my arrow more than deep enough to ensure the fight end. Hell, I've had had a single Lord do it before, inflicting enough wounds that after his initiative the assault was over. :)

Another effective formation is a weird "T" with the vertical line pointing toward the opponent with maximum cohesion. This forces YOU to assault at the point man (closest model) that is most likely to ensure a loss of troops back in a way to maximize the distance between you and them.

[DarkLink]

You could also do that to force assaulters through terrain or away from other units in a multi-charge. Since they have to go for the closest model initially, positioning a model carefully could prevent careful positioning on behalf of the assaulters.

[Caitsidhe]

You could also do that to force assaulters through terrain or away from other units in a multi-charge. Since they have to go for the closest model initially, positioning a model carefully could prevent careful positioning on behalf of the assaulters.

Yep. You beat me to that. All in all it is a bad time to be a close combat kind of guy.

[GreySeerZ]

Yep. You beat me to that. All in all it is a bad time to be a close combat kind of guy.

Not necessarily. This assault guide, and discussing assaulting in general, forces one to take a keyhole view of the battle. While I agree that RCL really hurt the tactical side of assaulting, challenges opens up a whole lot of opportunities not available before, such as removing powerful characters from assaults, staying stuck in combat the next turn, etc. The effectiveness of assault armies is currently dependent on the local meta. Right now, my local meta consists of Cronair, Guardair, and things that shoot down Cronair and Guardair, haha. My footslogging CSM force focuses primarily on holding objectives (fearless cultists, plague marines, CSM blobs) and decimating gun-lines through sheer weight of bodies (cultists in the front, zerkers or slaaneshi/nurgle bikers in the back). The 2 airforce opponents I've faced, I've won purely through holding objectives (and it is also EXTREMELY boring :(), the anti-air armies I face, I've flattened through sheer weight of offensive might, and smart charges (I've actually used some of what Darklink provides here, I'm glad someone else has seen these things).

That said, this early in 6th, it is really hard to say how badly assaulty armies have been hit. All it takes is a Necron flier FAQ, or new toys in the next Codex, and the meta could shift dramatically. RCL is a big downer though...

[Caitsidhe]

Not necessarily. This assault guide, and discussing assaulting in general, forces one to take a keyhole view of the battle. While I agree that RCL really hurt the tactical side of assaulting, challenges opens up a whole lot of opportunities not available before, such as removing powerful characters from assaults, staying stuck in combat the next turn, etc. The effectiveness of assault armies is currently dependent on the local meta. Right now, my local meta consists of Cronair, Guardair, and things that shoot down Cronair and Guardair, haha. My footslogging CSM force focuses primarily on holding objectives (fearless cultists, plague marines, CSM blobs) and decimating gun-lines through sheer weight of bodies (cultists in the front, zerkers or slaaneshi/nurgle bikers in the back). The 2 airforce opponents I've faced, I've won purely through holding objectives (and it is also EXTREMELY boring :(), the anti-air armies I face, I've flattened through sheer weight of offensive might, and smart charges (I've actually used some of what Darklink provides here, I'm glad someone else has seen these things).

That said, this early in 6th, it is really hard to say how badly assaulty armies have been hit. All it takes is a Necron flier FAQ, or new toys in the next Codex, and the meta could shift dramatically. RCL is a big downer though...

Perhaps and perhaps not. The various local META are still in the process of sorting things out. More and more people are going to go with what works. Assault is hard NOW. Imagine how much tougher it is going to be as people get their stride. :)

[Amareis]

I know this thread is a little old, but I have to add this:
The fight is not over when you can't reach someone. As stated in the BRB, when the fight is over, you do another Pile In move. So, after your initiative step Pile In and the end combat Pile In you've moved an extra 6". This should be enough to get anyone into combat. If you count initiative steps on both sides it's a total of 12".

[scabsaw]

Shooting Protection: While you are in assault, you cannot be shot. You also can't move during your opponent's turn, or do anything else useful. Put two and two together, and it doesn't take a genius to figure out that it's often beneficial to get stuck in combat during your opponent's turn.

As a result, you usually want your assaults to last two player turns. Assault on your turn, kill some dudes, laugh while your opponent doesn't get to shoot you during their turn, then kill some more dudes, win combat, and be free to act in your next turn.


I haven't read all of the commentary here, but I don't think anyone actually brought it up. I don't think this is the way it works anymore. I'm going off of the miniature rule book here, so correct me if I am wrong, but on page 12 it begins discussing the shooting phase. Start by looking at the section Who Can Shoot?. You will see that it is referring to the player who's turn it is, and determining which of your models can actually shoot. It states that a model cannot shoot if "Their (meaning the model in question) unit is locked in combat."

This doesn't mean that your model, who's unit is locked in combat, can't be shot at. It means your model, who's unit is locked in combat, can't do any shooting itself. I am only clarifying this in advance because I have seen people quote this rule and attempt to state that this implies that you can't shoot at models who's units are locked in combat.

Now if we go a bit further to Choose A Target, we see nothing about choosing targets that are not locked in combat, or currently assaulting/being assaulted. It simply states that they must be within range and have line of sight. Then we determine which models in the unit firing can actually fire upon the unit we wish to fire at. Again, nothing about not being able to fire upon a unit locked in close combat. From here until page 16 it simply discusses how to resolve your die rolls, assigning wounds, and then goes into saves and the types of saves.

On page 18 we find rules for intervening models, directly under the Cover Chart section. It specifically states, and I quote "If a target is partially hidden from the firer's view by models from a third unit (models not from the firer's unit, or from the target unit), it receives a 5+ cover save."

Now the way I interpreted this was, if I want to shoot into a melee now, I can. If I have friendly units or other enemy units in my firing lane that partially hides an enemy unit that I wish to fire on, they get a cover save. I interpret this to mean whether they are locked in close combat or not mind you.

So if I assault with a unit of chaos terminators into a unit of space marines, and then follow that unit up next turn with a unit of shooty CSMs from directly behind the terminators, the terminators will essentially be providing cover for my opponents (assuming the terminators didn't mop them up in the first assault turn). If I where to bring those same shooty CSMs up from behind the SMs in a flanking maneuver, the odds of one of my termies being in the way is much less likely. I can fire into my opponents and they get no cover save.

Of course the space marines wouldn't need the 5+ cover save anyway because they have their armour saves. This was just for trying to illustrate my point. Of course even if I had a group of termies not in combat and I was trying to shoot an opponent through their unit, the termy models would still likely provide some kind of cover depending upon the size of the unit I was firing at, and whether or not I chose to focus fire.

In any case, I've rambled long enough. In summary, I don't think there are any rules forbidding you from firing into close combat any longer. I know it worked that way in 5th. I can find nothing that states this is the case in 6th now.