Which I personally think is a silly reason to oppose a rule. Immediate disengagement makes a lot of sense to me.

the majority spoke and we are were we are.

So it seems just ending a move in an aircraft's AA arc isn't good enough, you also have to be directly intercepting that aircraft in order to trigger its AA?***


***Unless it's on the ground, when its flak works like a ground-based AA unit.

There has been some discussion recently about how exactly the barrage rules were intended to work with respect to determining hits and allocation. First, let me say that everyone agrees this is something that can be resolved among mature players fairly easily. Either interpretation is functional. However, we are all game geeks and would like to know "the right way" to play it.

One interpretation is that when the rule says "Roll to hit all units" that means you are rolling for each individual unit and a hit is allocated to that particular unit if the die roll succeeds. Basically, that combines the to-hit and the allocation steps into a single roll. Support for this interpretation includes reference to "sniping" with artillery and the restrictions on template placement in order to hinder sniping (which would be unnecessary if there weren't a side effect of the mechanics which could allow sniping).

The other interpretation is that the template is used for counting up the number of units and types of attacks but the attacks are simply aggregated, rolled and allocated as with the normal shooting process. Support for this interpretation includes the "speed rolling" suggestion implies aggregation and the fact that hit allocation is never mentioned in the barrage rules so there is no reason to think the process should be different than normal shooting.

I know you are largely out of the FAQ business, but if you could answer this it would be helpful.

I've read through the barrage rules, and as best I can remember, the intent of the rule is that you roll to hit the units under the template, rolling separately for each type of unit, and removing units of the appropriate type from those that were under the template, starting with the ones closest to the attacker. If players prefer they can roll to hit 'unit by unit' from those under the template, but we'd recommend they not do this.

The reference to 'sniping' is to stop players placing the template in such a way that only one valuable unit (a Leader, for example) is under the template, while the 'mass' of the unit is elsewhere. The rule forces you to place the template to catch as many units as possible, and while this may allow for a certain amount of sniping, it stops things getting too silly.

All of this with the caveat that the rules were written a long time ago, and my memories could be playing me false. This is how I would play it, though.

Unfortunately, I phrased the question poorly so your answer doesn't really resolve the dispute. It's the use of the word "type" that is the source of confusion, both in the rules and in your answer.

When you say "type" of unit, do you mean "unit type" as the term is used on the data sheets (infantry/light vehicle/armored vehicle/war engine) or do you literally mean each distinguishable type of unit so that, for example, Grotz, Boyz and Nobz would be rolled separately rather than as "infantry"? The issue surrounds valuable units, as you alluded to.

If you mean "unit type" all infantry are rolled together and assigned front to back, AVs, etc.. It's possible to protect a valuable unit from a barrage by putting a shield wall of cheap units in front, which seems a bit unrealistic.

On the other hand if you mean "type" in a generic sense, then a commander would be a distinguishable kind of unit and would be rolled for. They would stand a chance of dying from a lucky (or unlucky) artillery barrage regardless of where they are in the formation. There's a certain amount of "sniping" that can happen with this, obviously, but seems reasonable that a lucky (or unlucky) barrage could hit a commander or other valuable unit while bypassing others.

I meant 'type' in the generic sense, it's a way of speeding things up really. I'm pretty sure this is why it ended up as a suggestion rather than a hard and fast rule, as it takes a little bit of common sense to apply.

I also tried to keep my follow up neutral so as not to bias JJ's response but I'm not sure I succeeded.

I've changed the rules for barrage templates so that you roll to hit what's under the template, rather than just using the number of units under the template to determine the number of to hit dice rolled (which I the way it was before). The new method is slightly slower, but is much more intuitive.