Nova / Adepticon FAQ's ?

[andalucien]

I've held off on bringing this up for a while, but it might be that time again...

The Adepticon/BAO FAQ has now been used in many huge tournaments.  I haven't heard anything about it being a problem, so is there a reason we shouldn't use it at Battlegrounds?

If there's a distaste for that pretty widely adopted FAQ, Nova has also just launched their own FAQ.

http://www.novaopen.com/wp-content/uploads/2013-NOVA-Open-Short-Return-Draft-FAQ.pdf

Let me give a real example of why I think adopting an FAQ like this would be a good idea, from the last 1850 tournament.  Here's a snippet from the NOVA FAQ that I read when I saw it pop up in my RSS feed this morning:
"Units that may fire two weapons (i.e., Monstrous Creatures, Multi-tracker Suits) in the Shooting Phase
may also do so when firing Overwatch."

At the last tournament, since Multi-Tracker mentions "the shooting phase", I was only overwatching with 1 gun on my suits.  This might have actually made the difference between me winning and losing my 2nd game, since my opponent charged  Daemon Prince into my Tau, who all overwatched, and reduced it to 1 wound.  The Daemon Prince survived, and eventually ended up both contesting an objective (giving my opponent the primary) and claiming a table quarter (giving my opponent the secodary), and representing 355 victory points (tertiary).

I didn't ask Sam or anything because I knew it was kind of ambiguous, and I thought the eventual official FAQ would probably be that you couldn't overwatch with both weapons.   But that's not a universally held opinion (obviously).  For all I know, 2 tables down, someone else was overwatching with both weapons on their broadside.  This hypothetical person may also not have known that anyone else played it any other way.

Earlier, I had charged Jared's Tau with my wraiths+destroyer lord.  I don't remember whether he overwatched me with more than 1 weapon at a time, & didn't think about it at the time.

What bugs me isn't any specific outcome of any specific game (honestly, I have no real skin in the game anyway), it's that collectively, without a set of rulings like this, we aren't actually playing the same game, and we may not even realize it.   THAT bugs me. Since the FAQ's aren't in effect for these tourneys, there's really no motivation for anyone to even read them, so it all just comes down to individual beliefs/negotiations at tables.   Sometimes a judge gets called, but since everyone is really just wanting to avoid arguments, I bet that 95% of the time, it gets handled amongst the players, probably with inconsistent outcomes.  If we used an FAQ, people would probably read it, and more games would end up being played with the same rules.

[Grimwulfe]

We already do use them.  BG has used the INAT for a while now.

[Typhus]

"An Overwatch attack is resolved like a normal shooting attack (albeit one resolved in the enemy's Assault phase) and uses all the normal rules for range, line of sight, cover saves and so on."

What's your normal shooting attack (i.e., during the shooting phase)?  If you can fire two guns as a normal shooting attack, then you can fire two guns during Overwatch.

Earlier, I had charged Jared's Tau with my wraiths+destroyer lord.  I don't remember whether he overwatched me with more than 1 weapon at a time, & didn't think about it at the time.

I didn't with the riptides (as they had tried interceptors on your scythes), but I did with the missile team; Heavy Missiles and Smart Missiles.

RAW; Multi-Tracker says "each shooting phase" so if we look at the literal interpretation, then I could fire my guns in your shooting phase;  However this is not my normal shooting attack, hence we can fall back on my first sentence.  We can look to the restrictions placed on the CC and MSS systems that *specifically* state they cannot be used in Overwatch.  No such restriction exists on the Multi-Tracker.  I don't see any distinction anywhere in the rules between making a "shooting attack" and making a "normal shooting attack," i.e. the word "normal" is included merely for rhetorical effect and doesn't actually reference anything. The shooting attack from Overwatch is just like any other, minus the listed exceptions. Firing extra weapons because of Advanced rules (Monstrous Creature, Multi-Tracker, whatever) is not one of the listed exceptions.

As far as I interpret it (I mean, I could also be like SUPER WRONG, because I have the attention span God gave a shovel.)

[Typhus]

And to be even more stupid;

The Riptide is a MC with a Multi-tracker.  Technically, he can fire 3 guns a turn (MC 2, MT +1) so put him on a Quad-Gun and go to town.

[andalucien]

Haha, that is an interesting trick Typhus

Yes, I have always been overwatching with 2 weapons on my MC's.  THe reason I was holding off on my broadsides was that the Multi Tracker rule specifically mentions "during the shooting phase".  But, yeah, I could see how someone would think, "oh, that's just sloppy wording by whoever wrote that rule"...  probably true.

Grimwulfe, I know BG used to use the INAT back in 5th, but there is no 6th edition INAT, and whenever I have brought up adopting a new FAQ in the past there has been resistance.  The tournament summaries that CHase posts specifically mention only the GW FAQ's.

[Benjamin]

The resistance came from FAQs at the beginning of 6th being nothing more than monkeys blindly punching keyboards. The edition's been out for a year, and the direction of the game is clearer now. It's probably worth taking a look at FAQs again.

[andalucien]

OK, I'm not sure I know what you mean by "the direction of the game", these are really just rules that are unclear and require a good way to disseminate clarifications, so that people who are interested in consistency know which interpretation to follow at a given event.  But, if it helps push it along, I'm all for it      

[Typhus]

Haha, that is an interesting trick Typhus

Yes, I have always been overwatching with 2 weapons on my MC's.  THe reason I was holding off on my broadsides was that the Multi Tracker rule specifically mentions "during the shooting phase".  But, yeah, I could see how someone would think, "oh, that's just sloppy wording by whoever wrote that rule"...  probably true.

FYI, it's the exact same wording for MC's as it is for Multi-Tracker.  I do get what you are saying, Matt, tho.

[andalucien]

Hmm.... the phrasing is indeed the same.   They both say it's for "the shooting phase".  So the way I was playing it clearly didn't make any sense   Well, anyway... 

there's another thing that I personally would really like clarification on (I know we can just do this the old fashioned way and ask Sam in the buried 6th rulings thread, but it just seems like it would save a lot of time to pick an FAQ as a basis and go from there).   

Fiends.

I'm thinking of taking my daemons out for another drive, and I looove my Fiend models.   If we go by the adepticon FAQ (enemy psykers get -1ld per fiend), they're at least justifiable. 
If we go by Nova FAQ (it's only ever -1 no matter how many fiends there are), fiends really just are a waste of time.   Neither interpretation is "correct"; they are both reasonable given the phrasing in the codex.  Of course I'm rooting for a ruling in favor of fiends being decent, but really I'd be happy with a ruling either way so at least I can stop wondering about it. 

[Benjamin]

Well, what does the codex say exactly?

[andalucien]

It's an ability that each fiend has, "disruptive song".  The definition of Disruptive Song is:

-----------

Enemy psykers within 12" of a Fiend of Slaanesh have a -1 penalty to their leadership when taking psychic tests.

--------
So.... each individual Fiend has this ability.   Question is, do they stack with each other?  The codex wording is pretty much split right down the middle allowing it to be interpreted either way.   And the 2 major FAQ's I'm aware of have interpreted in opposite ways.  Here are some ways they could have phrased it to make it clear what was intended:

Enemy psykers within 12" of one or more Fiends of Slaanesh have a -1 penalty to their leadership when taking psychic tests.

Enemy psykers within 12" of a Fiend of Slaanesh have a -1 penalty to their leadership when taking psychic tests.  This penalty is cumulative if there is more than one Fiend within 12".

[bradpowers]

I think the wording on this is actually pretty clear.  If you are within range of a fiend of slaanesh.  If you're in range of one, you're in range of a fiend of slaanesh.  If you're in range of 2, you're in range of a fiend of slaanesh.  If you're in range of three and so on.  The power does not say: If a fiend of slaanesh is within 12" of an enemy psyker, that psyker takes a -1 penalty to their leadership check when taking psychic tests.  THAT would clearly indicate it stacks.  As it stands, the conditional half of that ability is binary, not integer, and thus is non-stacking.

[Benjamin]

Seems to me it wouldn't stack. But if I still had those two dozen Fiends, I'd argue it does.

[andalucien]

I think my 2nd "rephrase" above fell a bit short, since I added on a whole nother sentence.

If it said this:

Enemy psykers within 12" of this model have a -1 penalty to their leadership when taking psychic tests.

If that were how the rule were phrased, I think it would be pretty clear that it DOES stack.

I really do think that as phrased, it's ambiguous.  Imagine if I said, "If _a_ werewolf is attacking you, you're fine as long as you have a silver bullet."   This is true.   But, does it follow that if 6 werewolves are attacking you, you're fine as long as you have a silver bullet?  No, in that case you need 6 bullets (the rule stacks)...

Anyway.

Let's say that for the sake of argument, I agreed with you that the phrasing indicates that it DOESN'T stack.  And furthermore, Sam reads it and posts "this is how I'm going to rule it".  Great.  Now, everyone who has read this forum thread will know what to expect.

However, let's say that 90% (conservatively) of the people who attend the next tournament have NOT read this forum thread.   There's a game between where this rule comes up.  The guy with a full unit of  fiends next to the other guy's farseer says "So you're testing at -6".  The farseer guy says "Whaaa?"  The Fiends guy says "Trust me bro, this guy did that to me at Adepticon, and it really works that way.   That's why I bought these 18 fiends and have spent the last few months painting them up and am bringing them today".   Now, some people might say, "Hmm, well, let me just go get Sam and get a ruling over whether you've just wasted your money and time".  But really, we're all here to enjoy ourselves, and that wouldn't get the day off to a good start.  So I suspect that 95% of the time the opponent will say, "Oh, cool, I didn't know that!  Good trick!"

Thus the need for a widely disseminated FAQ was born.   If the tournament description contains a link to a FAQ with a couple hundred rulings like this, if the FIend guy didn't read it, that's on him.  And you have more confidence that more games will be played according to the same rules.

[Sir_Prometheus]

Almost nothing stacks (rad grenades, fortified aegis, etc) with the notable exception of the same psychic power (hammerhand, that thing that lowers your toughness) cast multiple times.