So say I don't wish to kill a target, but knock him unconscious or I have a flammenspear in a link and don't want to use all of the disposable rounds against a target. But for whatever reason, there is a tactical reason that I would want to reduce my burst to a lower number. Am I allowed to do so? In n3, I believe it was a nebulous answer where the it hung on the word in burst about shooting "up" to a number. In n4 is there a concrete answer for this situation?
Hello, right now in N4, you have to declare the full burst with the exception to the +1 burst comming from the "fireteam bonusses" which is described as optional. If others B+1 have the optional tag I can't remember, but a combi without bonusses it has to declare the full burst, for that I'am certain. Page 54 of the Rule book. "Burst (B) is the number of dice the Active Player must roll when declaring a BS Attack" , if I'm not wrong, "must" is "mandatory" in english gramma. Best regards.
Just as an addendum to the above: if strictly speaking you must declare your entire burst, is it illegal to distribute some of your burst to targets you can't see? For example, say you only wanted to risk doing one wound to an enemy, could you fire a combi rifle splitting your burst two have one shot at the target, and two shots at a model not in your LOF just to intentionally waste them?
@RobertShepherd No, because then you would be declaring a BS attack on those targets as well and you need to have LOF to something you declare BS attack against, as clarified by recent FAQ’s
The FAQ says that "LoF Requirements must be fulfilled when declaring Skills. ZoC Requirements must be fulfilled during the Resolution step." "Must be fulfilled" probably means that you can't choose not to fulfill the requirement by choosing a target outside LoF. Although, it says ZoC requirements "must be fulfilled" at resolution, even though we know that sometimes they will fail to be fulfilled at resolution, so I wouldn't say it's definitive.
It's a bit contrived, but I guess you could choose to split some of your burst to something that is in LoF but obviously out of range...
In all previous editions you could voluntarily reduce your burst, but it seems not in N4 unless it gets addressed in a FAQ/errata doc.
With the exception of disposable weapons, you shouldn't not want to go for max damage. I know I know, extreme prejudice, but Marksmanship L1 got changed into BS Attack Shock and is no longer voluntary, either. It does sort of in a sideways manner lend some credence to the reading that disposable weapons are per activation and not per burst (with Double Shot being the exception that confirm the rule)
Yes, you're right and Urubros did write it earlier in the thread. Both those burst bonuses are optional, I do note.
Why can't you just assign burst you want to waste in a way that doesn't meet the requirements of BS Attack? This doesn't prevent you from declaring a BS Attack without LOF, it just makes such an attack be checked and fail during declaration rather than be checked and fail at resolution. So you can assign Burst to a target to which you don't have LOF and the requirements of that Burst won't be met and that Burst will be wasted. Doesn't resolve issues around Disposable weapons, but does make not inadvertently killing targets you don't want Dead easier.
I am not confident that you can assign burst to models that you don't actively have lof to. Otherwise you could use first short skill to shoot 1 round at unconscious target and the rest at a target within ZoC but outside lof. Their aro would have to dodge and then second short skill is to move into lof, making it legal at resolution. This is something that the rules seems to avoid heavily.
You can't make it legal at Resolution. You check the requirements as part of Declaration. That's literally the point of the FAQ. So in your example what happens is this: Alice has LOF to Bob but not Charlie. 1. Alice is activated and declares BS Attack with a Combi Rifle splitting 1 Burst vs Bob and 2 Burst vs Charlie: checking if the Requirements are fulfilled, the Burst vs Bob meets the Requirements but the Burst vs Charlie does not. The bursts assigned to Charlie are wasted. 2. Charlie declares Dodge because Charlie's player thinks Alice is inside ZOC. 3. Alice Moves into LOF of Charlie. 4. No further AROs. 5. Validity of Charlie's ARO is checked: it was valid due to having LOF at Step 4. 6. The Requirements of Charlie's Dodge are checked, it meets it is valid. The Requirements of the BS Attack have already been checked so are not checked again. Etc
The wording is that LOF requirements must be fulfilled when you declare the skill, so when you declare Charlie as the target LOF requirement must be fulfilled. So splitting hairs here, the check doesn't happen after picking targets, the check has to happen before Alice splits burst, meaning the skill she declares versus Charlie is already invalid and Alice knows it.
Splitting burst is part of the declaration it's simultaneous with checking LOF. "All details and choices related to the execution of a Short Skill, Short Movement Skill, Entire Order Skill or ARO must be specified when it is declared." The timing is the same: the choices are specified when it is declared. Nothing in the rules makes a timing of what you do in what order during declaration explicit. So there's no reason in the rules that I can't declare a target and then check the requirements: both occur during declaration. So when I declare Charlie the target of a BS Attack I must check to see if the requirements are fulfilled, if they are not fulfilled then the declaration will not function and those Burst will be lost.
Okay, I think I see what you mean. The LOF requirement portion of the skill depends on a choice you make during declaration, however, I still maintain that the FAQ is unambiguous that in order to declare BS Attack at all you have to be able to draw LOF before making those choices because the FAQ specifies that LOF requirements have to be fulfilled in past tense when you declare the skill. However, keep in mind that in order for the details to matter, you need to be reading this as that the specific LOF you are declaring is the one you check at step 1 - that specific LOF doesn't exist until step 6 which is when you pick where you are drawing LOF to. The only way you can marry the whole process is that LOF are a constantly known quantity and that you are only allowed to use one of those known quantities that makes the requirement fulfilled - given how the FAQ is written.
Except the language for non-LOF requirements is the same and we know that it is possible for these not to be fulfilled and the declaration to be legal (but fail). The FAQ is silent on what happens when you fail to fulfil the requirements: but the rules themselves tell you what happens when you fail to fulfil the requirements. So the "must be fulfilled" actually means "must be fulfilled [or the skill doesn't function]". "If any Skill, Special Skill, or piece of Equipment does not meet its Requirements, the Trooper is considered to have declared an Idle. (See FAQs & Errata. LoF Requirements are checked when declaring the Skill.)" The requirements ARE CHECKED when declaring, ergo it is possible to fail to meet the LOF requirements. All the FAQ does is shift when you check Requirements: not meeting Requirements doesn't prevent you from declaring a skill or from assigning burst. Not meet Requirements just makes that skill/burst not function. Also, please explain how this requirement can be fulfilled prior to the target of a BS Attack being specified: "Be able to draw Line of Fire (LoF) to the target of the BS Attack, unless the BS Weapon, Skill or piece of Equipment used doesn't require LoF."
Interestingly, the word "checked" in this context is commentary, not rules. The FAQ says that LoF requirements must be "fulfilled" at declaration, and doesn't use the word "checked." The phrase "See FAQs & Errata. LoF Requirements are checked when declaring the Skill." isn't a line from either the rulebook or the FAQ. It was added to the wiki to provide a reference to and summary of the FAQ entry. The wiki edit was presumably written by ijw, but now that he's marking his official rulings as official, I'm not sure that a summary he wrote on the wiki carries a lot of weight. It's possible that he considered the implications of using the word "checked" in his summary, but I wouldn't assume so.
I think you're setting up a strawman here, whether you intend it or not. The FAQ states unambiguously that the LOF requirement has to be fulfilled at the time you declare your attack. The rules are technically incapable of handling a BS Attack declaration declared without fulfilled LOF requirements because there is no check involved and no resolution for what happens at this point if you have declared the skill in error. The only possible solution to this is that LOF is a known quantity at all times. There is nothing to check, the existence of LOF is known to all players (regardless of whether they are aware of it). (Not least because the game becomes basically unplayable if LOF is an unknown that may only be checked at specified times.)
