Hi,

I am unsure how to correctly play immobile transport WE with self-planetfall, especially the Ork Drop-Rok.

With war engines, troops can typically only disembark at the end of the WE's move, and then shoot or attack with the WE, counting as one formation until the action is concluded.
For "normal" Planatfall, any transported units may disembark directly after landing (during the spacecraft's activation), and later that turn take their own action. As I understand, the formations can take independent actions, e.g. the landa flies off and the ork mob does something else.
For Self-Planetfall you follow the same rules (e.g. "free" disembarking after landing), just that it all happens in the WE's activation.

First the Drop-Rok declares e.g. an engage action, and passes its 1+ activation (I guess the Ork bonus applies, as the Drop-Rok is technically a ground unit). It is placed on the board and scatter is determined.

Now, which of the following is correct?
A) Before the engage move, the transported ork warband has the choice to disembark up to 5cm away or stay on board, and they disembark. They can then make their engage move of 15cm, but have to remain in coherency with the immobile Drop-Rok as they still count as one formation until the assault is concluded.
B) as above, but without the need to remain in coherency as that rule is only valid if the formation moves with the WE.
C) The transport WE rules supersede the planetfall rules, and the warband can only disembark after the engage move (of 0cm, as the Drop-Rok is immobile). Hence, the assault fails if the Drop-Rok scatters more than 5cm from the next enemy unit.

Greetings, Pepper

Hi Pepper

As I understand it, "Self-Planetfall" combines the arrival on table with a standard action. As a consequence the troops being transported do not have a separate activation, so behave much like troops in an air-transport.

So, the Ork Drop-Rock declares the action, scatters from the pre-determined landing position, makes its "move" (0cm) and the contents disembark within 5cm of the Drop-Rock. If the activation was an "engage move", this automatically fails if none of the units are within range of the enemy.

Thanks for the answer. That is what I also first thought how it is supposed to be, but I am not yet convinced it is correct.
From the Self-Planetfall rule:
"If the activation is successful, place the formation at the plotted landing zone and determine scatter according to Core Rules 4.4 as if it were a normal Planetfall, including loaded units disembarking up to 5cm. The formation’s action proceeds as normal in all respects from that point. In other words, the formation gets the “free move” from Planetfall placement at the beginning of its action but in all other ways activates as normal."
From that I read that case A in my post above should be correct, that is the warband gets the 15 cm engage move, as they would just be a "normal" formation including infantry (not embarked) and a WE. Basically, as I understand it, when the engage action is declared the warband is mounted, but when the action starts they are already dismounted.

Hmm - the point is that it is the Ork Drop-Rock that activates, not the troops being carried. So if it declares an assault, I am presuming that the normal WE transport rules apply (see 3.1.3) and the transported troops may only disembark 5cm as part of the assault.

Now, if the Drop-Rock declared a different activation, I believe that the transported formation(s) then behave according to the "planetfall" rules. If you check the Planetfall rules, the option is either to disembark immediately after the planetfall, or to stay onboard while the Drop-Rock carries out its activation.

A more reasonable example is the Dark Eldar "Executor Landing Module", which has both weaponry and mobility. Using this, the Dark-Eldar player may declare a 'double' allowing the module to arrive, drop off its troops and then double (and fire) like any other normal formation. The troops dropped off can activate later on in the turn.

Note that the action is declared before the player knows the result of the scattering dice, so if an assault is declared there is a good chance that scattering will place the self-planetfalling transport out of assault range. If this is obviously going to happen, the onboard troops may be disembarked before the transport moves, (and activate later in the turn) or they may be kept onboard to disembark after the transport's next activation.

Does that make better sense?

Ok, that makes it more clear.
So my mistake was that I thought the drop-rok and the transported formation count as one formation for the whole action, even if the units disembark at the beginning.

Thanks again,
Pepper

They would count as a single formation if the troops stay on-board during the WE activation otherwise they are separate formations.

Indeed, on thinking further about this, there seems to be two options:-

• Disembark immediately after the planetfalling scattering is completed. At this point the transport and troops become separate formations. The transport then finishes it's declared activation in isolation, while the troops may activate later in the turn.
• Stay on-board at the end of planetfalling and disembark after the transport finishes its movement. The transported troops are considered to be part of the WE formation until the end of the assault or activation, so may shoot or assault etc - and are deemed to have activated.

I hope that makes things even clearer

Here's a relevant FAQ:

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Unfortunately when first reading the FAQ I thought it doesn't apply in this case, as neither the thunderhawk nor the marines in the example have taken an action yet. In the case of self-planetfall, however, the WE transport has already declared its action and passed its activation roll. It's a bit wonky how that interacts with the free disembarkation.

I get it now and fully agree with Ginger's reasoning, I'm just saying that it is not self-explanatory

Onyx, that FAQ applies to the 'standard' version of planetfall, where the spaceship activates to get the other formations onto the battlefield as part of its activation.

IFAIK there is no FAQ for "Self-planetfall", and it looks like there should be one to explain the options.

I might add that I have always opposed the notion of self-planetfall as being unnecessary and indeed somewhat 'gamey', and I thought we were withdrawing it . . . .

I almost added to my post that it was for the standard planetfall situation but I really thought it wasn't necessary as it is obvious.

I included the FAQ to clarify the situation about disembarking transported units for which the FAQ is entirely appropriate.

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