Grav weapon question

[wolflold]

How do you roll to wound against a unit with mixed saves? If a character with a 2+ save is in a unit that has 4+ saves, and he walks at the front of the unit, i shoot grav at this unit, what do i roll for to wound? 2's because the first thing i hit is the character (and roll per wound), or 4's because of the unit?

[Wolfshade]

There are two ways to deal with this, unfortunately this has not been FAQd.

1) Use the "majority toughness" rule, but in this case it is the majority armour save.
2) Work out each shot model by model starting with the closest to the shooter and working backwards.

There are pros and cons for each

1) Pros: There is presidence for this toughness replacing stat for example working out instant death for Necron Abyssal Staff. Though there is no guarantee of that continuation of thought.
Cons: It isn't explicity clear that you can just replace it


2) Pros: Circumvents the "majority of tougness" issue
Cons: It isn't how shooting works, i.e. calculating the number of wounds first then allocating them

I would lean towards 1 myself...

[This Dave]

How do you roll to wound against a unit with mixed saves? If a character with a 2+ save is in a unit that has 4+ saves, and he walks at the front of the unit, i shoot grav at this unit, what do i roll for to wound? 2's because the first thing i hit is the character (and roll per wound), or 4's because of the unit?

I don't have my rulebook here at work but I believe this is covered in the section on rolling to wound from shooting. You just have to roll model by model until the unit is down to a single toughness, or in this case armor type.

[Nabterayl]

If you can find a quote to that effect I'd be very interested to see it, Dave (I don't mean that sarcastically). I agree with Wolfshade that no rule explicitly tells us what to do in this case, but I would be inclined towards using the majority armor save rule just as we're told to use the majority Toughness when the to-wound roll is dependent upon Toughness.

[Tyrendian]

if only because it's much much faster...

[Nabterayl]

Also, I can't think of any situation where we go model-by-model in figuring out how many wounds an attack has caused. Wound the unit, kill the model is the trend that I see in the rules.

[Gleipnir]

Also, I can't think of any situation where we go model-by-model in figuring out how many wounds an attack has caused. Wound the unit, kill the model is the trend that I see in the rules.

It is handled model by model for vehicle squadrons in the rules so its not entirely without precedent.

The question of timing has more to do with when are special rules for weapons resolved, before the roll to wound/armor penetration rolls or after as they are being allocated. Here the rules are much less clear since in some cases the rules suggest you do so before and and some cases after. Since the rules "never" tell us to use majority armor values, I favor resolving special rules that can be resolved on a To Wound or Armor Penetration rules before allocating them when possible so the shooting player can arrange his attacks where they would have the best effect.

But since the rules don't tell us we are allowed to separate wounds pools by die rolls, only by STR, AP and Special Rules, in many cases you either have to permit the separation of effects by die rolls(which maintains the spirit of the rules of allowing the shooting player to arrange the order of shots where they will be most effective, or resolve special rules after they are allocated(which in many cases is model by model) All of this is made even more complicated when you start combining Special Rules such as Preferred Enemy and Graviton

It may be unpopular but the argument for using a majority armor value for rolling To Wound is non existent in the rules aside from suggesting we use the Toughness characteristic that way, to which I could say that other characteristics with multiple values you use the highest value for a test. Neither argument has any weight to it as it applies to the Armour characteristic though.

The method I use(and admittedly this works much easier when you have the dice for it) when rolling to hit, I separate all my dice by STR, AP, Armor Facing, Special Rules, I roll them all, then re-roll to hit as permitted. I remove the dice that did not hit and then using the dice still separated as appropriate roll to wound, armor penetration or on special rule tables that replace the roll to wound or armor penetration, re-roll as permitted, then I collect them into their individual pools(seperated by STR, AP, Special Rules) and assign them by pool to the unit, if the target has mixed saves or characters the wounds assigned from each wound pool are resolved one at a time model by model(save as appropriate) die by die till each pool is empty.

[This Dave]

If you can find a quote to that effect I'd be very interested to see it, Dave (I don't mean that sarcastically). I agree with Wolfshade that no rule explicitly tells us what to do in this case, but I would be inclined towards using the majority armor save rule just as we're told to use the majority Toughness when the to-wound roll is dependent upon Toughness.

Not a problem since I was thinking of the Mixed Armor Saves rules rather than the Mixed Toughness rules, where you just use the majority. Like I said, I really need to start keeping a rulebook at work. :)

[Wolfshade]

It may be unpopular but the argument for using a majority armor value for rolling To Wound is non existent in the rules aside from suggesting we use the Toughness characteristic that way, to which I could say that other characteristics with multiple values you use the highest value for a test. Neither argument has any weight to it as it applies to the Armour characteristic though.

I do agree with this. However, I would say that there are occasions where the Toughness stat is swapped for another one, like the Leadership value and rules like instant death still work the same way with this new value.

Certainly in the case of vehicle squadrons it is very explicitly handled, vehicle by vehicle as you say.

[RGilbert26]

Assuming the guy in front has an invulnerable save and is a HQ this is how I would do it:

1. Roll to hit,
2. Roll against the majority armour save,
3. Re-roll any failed to 'wound' rolls if you're firing Grav-cannons,
4. Opponent takes look out sir rolls one at a time,
5. After each failed or successful look out sir they either remove the closest 4+ save within 3" or take an invulnerable save,
6. If the HQ dies any remaining dice kill off same number of 4+ saves.

If the model in front does not have an invulnerable save then all that happens is X number of models are removed after to wound rolls are made (unless you go to ground in which case you have 6+ cover saves to make).

Hope this helps.