To be precise, it's specifically player's choice. It's assumed he will chose "the most advantageous" option, but he is under no pressure to do so. When a BTS weapon hits an ARM 4 / BTS 0 Devil Dog, he can choose to defend with either ARM or BTS, does not have to always choose ARM. There's no reason not to that I know of, but if a reason comes up, he's not forced to use the better option of ARM.
Sometimes in Highly Classified it's better to be entirely dead than be an unconscious model that can give away easy objectives. If your suicide trooper like a Dog Warrior has completed the objective it was chasing you might well decide to try and make it die if it takes a bunch of hits.
Speaking of which, are you obliged to roll all saves at once, or can do so one-by-one, say, to make more informed decisions on whether to reduce chance of survival since you've already failed a save, or whether it's worth going Dogged on Unidrons...
You can decide per-hit, but there's nothing in the rules that would let you make the rolls sequentially - it's a single step in the Order Expenditure Sequence where you make all the ARM and BTS Rolls.
I don't think mechanical simplicity was the main goal. I think bringing it in line with the way the dice usually work for attacks was, while maintaining the one time bump in survivability concept.
you guys are confusing me so if sun tze takes a hit from an e/m grenade he takes a normal bts save and a possible wound but not other effects and if he eats an hmg shot he can not use his bts 6 but must use his arm 4
No, he has the choice to use ARM or BTS against the HMG. Against the E/M, he can choose to use TI and risk a wound rolling against BTS, or he can *not* use TI and risk the halved BTS and Isolation/Immobilization.
Any word on the interaction between TI and Sepsitor? Does it cause physical damage like E/M unless they opt to drop TI? Relevance for Chimera, Valkyrie, Metachem, etc
Since Sepsitor doesn't have the non-lethal label, nor special ammo, and isn't a comms attack nor a hacking attack, but is an attack that forces an ARM or BTS roll, all effect Total Immunity would do is allow you to select the best stat: ARM or BTS (which, I tihnk, for all potential targets is still BTS)
If a model with Total Immunity shoots at an enemy who shoots back with a Flashpulse is it still a Face to Face roll? or do they ignore the Flashpulse entirely, making it a normal roll?
If the flash pulse would be completely negated, it sounds like a normal roll. The requirement is that the skills would affect each other, and if there's no effect from the flash pulse, it fails that test.
I believe IJW confirmed elsewhere that it would still be a face to face roll, but I'm having a hard time sourcing the exact post.
I posted this in the rules thread but I'll add it here as well. I read Total Immunity very much the same as @Dr. Nik. Total Immunity has 4 bullet points. They refer to 3 different types of attacks. Non Lethal, Hacking/Comms, and Special Ammo. The second bullet point stating "in addition" doesn't specify what it's in addition to, because it doesn't need to. There is only one logical conclusion. We must assume it's in addition to the last point made. Luckily, there is only one point to choose from. Which is to treat those Special ammo attacks that qualify, as normal ammo. So in addition to treating those cases as normal ammo, a TI trooper can also treat them as either an ARM or BTS save. If anyone disagrees, what else is happening in the first bullet that we can add to? @ijw said, "Your argument would make Normal Ammo more powerful against TI than Special Ammo that's been reduced to Normal Ammo." Yes, this isn't bad or strange either. TI Troopers are not treating Special ammo attacks exactly the same as normal ammo attacks in all respects. Players are treating special ammo effects, as normal ammo effects. Which means they just cause 1 wound, nothing special. The difference is subtle, but important. This doesn't mean both attacks use the same ammo but a loophole now makes normal ammo stronger. DA ammo still uses light caliber, viral still uses soft-shell, and normal still uses whatever. The TI trooper has a better defense to special ammo types for whatever reason. It's those special effects that pack a punch. Normal ammo doesn't rely on that special effect to cause damage. So to sum up, Karakuri get one save on BTS 6 vs DA ammo. But one save on ARM 3 vs a combi.
Eh? They suffered an attack causing an ARM or BTS roll, so they get to choose whichever value from ARM/BTS is more advantageous for them, per the second bullet point.