Clearly barrages are different from normal weapons because the area affects certain units and not others. i,e, the affect a specific set of units with the weapons range, fire arc and Los and not any as yet undetermined units within those parameters

Barrages could then be considered a specific case of the more general concept of area affect weapons (and disasters).
Deathwinds and Reactor explosions could be considered a part of this general class.
One could imagine a consolidated and consistent set of rules for dealing with area affects.

I know that when a titan goes up I say 'that unit is affected roll to see if it is hit, that unit is affected roll to see if is hit' etc etc. And if there's more than a few units I'll say 'ok lets group these together as they're all the same type roll for them together as doing so makes no substantial difference to the outcome.

Others might do it the same was as they do barrages, more losely.

Is a point of note, I'm actually more in favour of barrages not affecting specific set of units, but rather they are used to simply calculate the number of dice you get, (a bit like how it was done in 3rd ed) and these dice are simply added to the sets of dice you use in normal shooting. However, I really do think is not what is intended (for some reason the authors wanted to go back to something more specific, like 2nd ed) and that what I favour would constitute an actual rules change.

So what people believe the barrage rules negates the normal epic procedure of allocation of hits?

All other attacks separate this process into two stages. Generate a number of hits, then allocate these hits and make saves.

I have to say I don't read that one sentence to mean, ignore all the normal rules of hits and allocation and do both steps together, but that the process can only be applied to units under the template(s).

that's what the majority here seem to thing yes. As E&C points out it's perhaps more implied then really explicit (and most feel it's strongly implied I think).

Well, I did scatter "IMO" and "I think" throughout my post, so yes it's my opinion.


Yes, most people are treating them more like a Deathwind pod's attacks, except they speed-roll units that are identical.

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Personally my feelings on it are ambivilent.

If you use the "life is harsh!" interpretation then you can use careful positioning of units to mitigate vulnerability to artillery strikes (Which does add a tactical element to your force dispositions I think).

If you use the "front guys die first!" interpretation, then you can just put your important units at the back, so that again you have reduced your vulnerability to attack.

Either is fine to me as a game mechanic, but I do think that the former is the intention of the rule so that's the one I have always played with.

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How do you play Drop Pods?
And critical hit explosions?

Do you total up number of hits and then apply front-to-back, or do you apply to individual units?

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well the reason i like it is for the sheer simplicity - but I think it was perhaps deemed a bit too abstract by Jervis.

With drop pods I pool my dice and hits are allocated as per normal hits. Most of the time with WE its one unit from multiple formations which have to be rolled separately, so in my experience it's not an issue.

If you are all happy with barrage sniping then fine, but why Jervis thought it necessary for barrages to work differently and not use the standard hit allocation rules I find strange.

But I am plainly in the minority so will agree to play what the majority do and enjoy the pseudo sniping ability of my barrages from now on.

I don't think you're in the minority Meph. All the flame on lads play it your way too (As it seems to be the fairest and easiest way-all fancy rules lawering and semantics aside.) and i would personally frown on barrage sniping in extremis. Since neither side of the argument can be proved to within an accepted certainty level and hangs on the semantic use of 1 word, the only way to decide which is right IMO is to go with the fairest, most gentlemanly option. I wouldn't feel good about sniping someone's SC with a barrage (In much the same way as aircraft sniping). It just feels cheap and dirty and not in the spirit of friendly competetiveness.

As usual on the internet though, the more vocal the point is made, the more likely you are to feel that you're in the minority if you're not on the side that shouts the loudest.

SHADDAP!


Is he in the majority or minority?
I just know that I've been playing Epic for a while and had never encountered someone playing it the "pool *all* hits" way until this weekend, which is why I started the thread.

So I just think a FAQ should be done to settle it (Contacting JJ if nessesary), as it's clearly a point of contention.


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As an aside, I've always understood the barrage sniping line in the rule to be a prohibition against placing the template so that it hits a non-optimum ammount of units, just so that you can hit the SC (or whatever).

Thus you have to place the template where it will hit the greatest ammount of units, and if your opponent has left his SC clustered up in that optimum barrage zone, well then that was his tactical mistake!

Otherwise the "sniping" line makes no sense to me, as you'd place it only over the SC, and then the hit would be assigned to the front of the formation anyway. To me, the "sniping" line only makes sense if "you hit what you roll to hit on an individual basis (Whilst speed-rolling identical units to speed up the game)".

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Similarly I don't ever recall playing barrages your way. Of course 6 years down the line my memory is going.... its still July right?

It's also Shaban, and also Av.

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The sniping is a small stretch but I'll explain.

Lets say I have 6 normal shots. If I place my SC at the back of the formation all 6 attacks would have to hit for the SC to have a hit allocated.

Under your barrage rules if, after ensuring I've maximized my template, there are 6 units under the template it makes no difference as to were they are, each unit is hit by a single dice roll. I'd also argue that as every roll is a separate event that cover would be assessed on a unit by unit case, not overall, as we are already ignoring all the normal hit and allocation process.

This, IMHO, feels like sniping.

Yes but the "sniping" prohibition is about the placement of the template, not about hit allocation.

In my opinion, that's not even opinion; It clearly says you can't place the template so as to only hit important units.


Play it your way and it doesn't matter where you place the template in an attempt to "snipe", as whatever hits you generate go on the front of the formation, right?


So the line about sniping makes no sense to me unless you're rolling to hit units on an individual basis (speed-rolling for identical units).

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That's how I understand it and feel too.