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Spite Revenants Unbridled Malice Any Good?


T10

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I can't seem to find anything in the core rules that distinguishes between "rolls" and "tests" as two different classes of determining results and that elaborates on the difference between them. I believe you have invented this. 

-T10

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1 hour ago, T10 said:

I can't seem to find anything in the core rules that distinguishes between "rolls" and "tests" as two different classes of determining results and that elaborates on the difference between them. I believe you have invented this. 

-T10

Ehem. Here is the key differences as in the core rules:

 

MAKING ATTACKS

Attacks are resolved one at a time using the following attack sequence. In some cases, you can resolve all of the attacks made by the same type of weapon at the same time (see Multiple Attacks, below).

1. Hit Roll: Roll a dice. If the roll equals or beats the attacking weapon’s To Hit characteristic, then it scores a hit and you must make a wound roll. If not, the attack fails and the attack sequence ends. A hit roll of 1 before modification always fails to hit the target, and a hit roll of 6 before modification always hits the target.

2. Wound Roll: Roll a dice. If the roll equals or beats the attacking weapon’s To Wound characteristic, then it is successful and the opposing player must make a save roll. If not, then the attack fails and the attack sequence ends. A wound roll of 1 before modification always fails, and a wound roll of 6 before modification is always successful.

3. Save Roll: The opposing player rolls a dice, modifying the roll by the attacking weapon’s Rend characteristic. For example, if a weapon has a -1 Rend characteristic, then 1 is subtracted from the save roll. If the result equals or beats the Save characteristic of the models in the target unit, the save succeeds and the attack sequence ends without causing any damage. If not, the save fails and the attack is successful, and you must determine damage on the target unit. A save roll of 1 before modification always fails.

4. Determine Damage: Each successful attack inflicts damage on the target unit equal to the Damage characteristic of the weapon making the attack. Most weapons have a Damage characteristic of 1, but some have a Damage characteristic of 2 or more.

BATTLE SHOCK PHASE:

In the battleshock phase, both players must take battleshock tests for units from their army that have had models slain during the turn. The player whose turn it is tests first. You must make a battleshock roll for each unit that has to take a battleshock test. To make a battleshock roll, roll a dice. Add the number of models from the unit that have been slain this turn to the dice roll, and add 1 to the unit’s Bravery characteristic for every 10 models that are in the unit when the test is taken. If the modified battleshock roll is greater than the unit’s modified Bravery characteristic, the battleshock test has been failed. If the test is failed, for each point by which the modified roll exceeds the unit’s modified Bravery characteristic, one model in that unit must flee. You decide which of the models from your units flee – remove them from play and count them as having been slain.

 

They spell it out quite plainly.

Note that the Battleshock Phase is the only one that specifically calls for a modified roll.

Edited by King Taloren
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Two thousand words is not "spelling it out plainly". And nothing indicates that there is such a thing as a "roll" or a "test" and that those two are subject to inherently different rules.

It is also not relevant.

The ruling from the commentary only deals with re-rolls and modifiers, and the context of the dice being rolled is not limited to any special subset of dice. It thus applies to EVERYTHING.

-T10

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35 minutes ago, Ryan Taylor said:

It's impossible to say if a Battleshock roll is successful without the modified roll. 

It is possible to get the faux result simply by not applying ANY modifiers, which is what the designer's commentary instructs. 

As with a modified hit, wound or save roll, the ACTUAL result can only be determined by applying the modifiers, at which point reasonable people would expect to be allowed use their re-roll fail or re-roll success abilities.

I guess the inherent stupidity is just so much more obvious when the Designers Comments removes the value of a re-roll for the full range of the dice roll and not just one or two out of six.

-T10

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Welp the obvious thing to do here is send the designers an email to aosfaq@gwplc.com and you can inform them of their sad mistake and they can issue a fix in the next FAQ release.

Meanwhile the rest of us will play the game as it’s intended. You can’t always go by the read as written when it is obviously not what the intent of the rule is.

On the other side of this the reroll without modifiers is very explicit in saying what it does. Have fun.

Edited by King Taloren
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33 minutes ago, King Taloren said:

Ok so unless it fits within your set of expectations for rules anything I tell you is invalid. Good to know.

You seem to believe you are in the right here, so I want to set you straight.

The issue here is that the Designers Commentary introduces a ruling that affects how Players are allowed to apply re-rolls that have the condition of success/fail, and that ruling is that 1) no post-modifier re-rolls, and 2) the success/fail condition is checked pre-modifiers to determine if the re-roll is allowed, and 3) the ruling is non-specific as to which re-rolls it applies to. Finally, 4) no dice rolls covered by the rules have a their own specific rules for re-rolls.

The point 3) being the contested one, I submit that it must apply to all re-rolls. The reasoning behind this is that the ruling is pointless if it applies to no re-rolls, and since it does not specify any re-rolls we cannot simply decide to apply it to only some re-rolls, like having it count for hit re-rolls but not charge re-rolls. So more than zero, none excluded leaves us with all.

You have gone out of your way to defend 1) and 2) as being applicable to Abilities that read "re-roll failed hit rolls".

You object to 3) when this is applied to the battleshock tests.

We see it being argued that battleshock test does not involve "modifiers", but the rules text directly deals with "modified battleshock rolls" and "modified Bravey".  We can infer from the phrase "modified battleshock roll" that the process by which we determine that value involves a roll and modifiers, and the only thing mentioned by the rules at this point is the number of slain models added to the roll. Notice that this is even more explicit in dealing with modifiers than even the rules for hit rolls or wound rolls which do not even mention the word.

We see it argued that battleshock tests should be treated differently because it is a "test" and not a "roll", a distinction that does not exist in the rules text. This argument is insidious and serves to derail the conversation. It is true that the dice roll result is used differently from a hit roll or wound roll to determine success or fail, and indeed the consequence of failure. But it conveniently skips the point that to get that initial dice roll result you roll and re-roll dice just as with any other roll  the game.

I could take offense at having it implied that I am arguing rules without listening to valid counter-arguments, but what I am hearing here is opinions not rules.

-T10

 

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15 minutes ago, King Taloren said:

Meanwhile the rest of us will play the game as it’s intended. You can’t always go by the read as written when it is obviously not what the intent of the rule is.

I take this to mean that you concede that the points I have raised are correct in the literal interpretation, but you reject them as being contrary to the intent of the rules.

That suits me fine. I love being technically correct.

-T10

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Oh, just one thing:

The following commentary is intended to complement the Warhammer Age of Sigmar core rules. It is presented as a series of questions and answers; the questions are based on ones that have been asked by players, and the answers are provided by the rules writing team explain and how the rules are intended to be used. The commentaries help provide a default setting for your games, but players should always feel free to discuss the rules before a game, and change things as they see fit if they both want to do so (changes like this are usually referred to as ‘house rules’).

-T10

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I’m not conceding anything I’m just done with someone who decides that unless it’s blatantly spelled out word for word in minute detail it’s an opinion.

Also you are free to play as you wish just understand that is your way to play and not how the TOs and tournaments run the rules. 

 

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"If the modified battleshock roll is greater than the unit’s modified Bravery characteristic, the battleshock test has been failed."

Unlike any other example, modifiers are included in the test itself, and therefor need to be considered when deciding if the test has been passed or failed. This is important because at no point are you asked to consider the dice roll unmodified, meaning you do not have a complete morale test before you have added the slain models. The ability only checks the last part and you can not know if the test passed or failed until the modifiers have been included. It does not ask you to check the roll, only the test itself. 

You seem to insist that there is no distinction between a battleshock roll and a battleshock test, but it is pretty clear that the battleshock roll is the roll of a dice and the battleshock test is the ultimate result with all modifiers, with which the dice roll is merely part of the process. 

 

Edited by Mcprowlington
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@stroke: That seems to sum up the Designers Commentary: you can  substitute  "BS dice" for hit dice, wound dice, charge dice, casting dice, unbinding  dice, prayer dice, invocation dice, and so on... Any dice roll when subject to a re-roll allowed for failed or successful rolls.

Not sure what you mean with step 5, though. That should probably just read

5. Apply modifiers and continue.

 

Edited by T10
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7 minutes ago, Mcprowlington said:

"If the modified battleshock roll is greater than the unit’s modified Bravery characteristic, the battleshock test has been failed."

Unlike any other example, modifiers are included in the test itself, and therefor need to be considered when deciding if the test has been passed or failed. 

ALL rolls with modifiers involved must have them applied in order to determine the result.

When the designers commentary reads "before modifiers", that is literally what it means.

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13 hours ago, T10 said:

And the distinction between "roll" and "test" is a construct of your imagination, not something declared in the rules.

🤣🤣🤣🤣

You know what else is not declared in the rules? 

The natural meaning of words. 

Are you expecting each word to be defined and that if it doesn't, it's imaginary? 

8 hours ago, T10 said:

I take this to mean that you concede that the points I have raised are correct in the literal interpretation, but you reject them as being contrary to the intent of the rules.

That suits me fine. I love being technically correct.

-T10

The mind boggles. 

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1 hour ago, Carnelian said:

🤣🤣🤣🤣

You know what else is not declared in the rules? 

The natural meaning of words. 

Are you expecting each word to be defined and that if it doesn't, it's imaginary? 

I think you miss the point. KT argues that the battleshock test is exempt from the designers commentary ruling because it is a "test" and not a "roll", then leaves it at that.

In this context the challenge of definition missing is not the definition of the words "test" and "rolls" as one would find in a dictionary, but the definition of these as basic game mechanics, how they each function, and how the designers commentary ruling applies specifically to one and exempts the other.

The rules do not group the various dice rolls into distinct sets, they define the function of each as needed, be they hit rolls, casting rolls or battleshock tests. The Designers commentary ruling does not introduce any such distinction either.

When a person says that the text reads differently from the print, I assume he is imagining things.

-T10

Edited by T10
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Right and when a person refuses to see a plain difference I call them someone trying to push the narrative that they hate the re-roll before modifiers, because it messes up their WAAC game play, and desperately trying to prove that it is useless by trying to point out anything they can that makes the mechanic screwed up even if it isn't an actual problem with the rule so everyone can agree that something needs to be fixed because he knows the rules better than everyone else here in spite just now starting to play the game versus all the people on this forum who've been playing Game Workshop games for years who disagree with him. (which in case you haven't noticed not a single comment here has agreed with you) Just cause you rule out people because they can't show you a explicit commentary explaining the difference doesn't mean it's not good or accurate, I've seen this stuff before in 40k and WHFB, this is nothing new.

 

Every Ability that deals with Battleshock calls it a test. Every ability that deals with Hit Wound and saves call it a roll. How do you determine a failure of a hit wound or save? Look at the Roll it doesn't say modified roll. does it? Battleshock on the other hand very explicitly states the determination is from a modified totals. The Abilities to not say reroll the Battleshock roll but the battleshock test. I'm sorry the rules don't get any clearer than that. this is how Games Workshop does things because they think their audience is smart enough to distinguish the minute differences between certain actions.

 

Q: Some abilities allow me to re-roll a successful (or unsuccessful) roll. When this is the case, is the success or failure based on the roll before or after any modifiers are applied?
A: Re-rolls happen before any modifiers are applied,
so the success or failure will always be based on the unmodified roll. Note that, when an ability says you can re-roll a failed roll, you may want to consider the effect that modifiers may have before deciding to re-roll the dice. For example, if a roll succeeds on a 4+ and you have a +1 modifier, you probably don’t want to re-roll ‘failed’ rolls of 3, because they will become successful after the modifier is applied!

 

could it be that the context of the designer commentary says successful or failed rolls instead of successful or failed tests?!?!?

Edited by King Taloren
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This thread... 😂

Its a game guys

To answer the original question. It’s an Ok ability that is situational as a lot of armies have a way to ignore battle shock tests entirely, and everyone can use a command point to avoid battle shocks.

Edited by ppetford
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@King Taloren

Well yes, it is true that I hate the designers commentary ruling that insists on applying re-rolls before modifiers. I do not  have a negative opinion about the core rule itself, just the ruling. It is poor craftsmanship, as evidenced by the fact that people avoid applying it when they think they can get away with it.

I cannot say that this makes me a "win at all costs" player- I am not pushing an agenda to gain an in-game benefit for myself. Attributing that mentality to people who are pointing out the flaws of this ruling seems to me to be a cheap shot aimed at discrediting people who disagree by baselessly associating them with a negative trait. I hope you will refrain from such behavior.

I will entertain your line of thinking for a while. You quoted the ruling in your post so I will not repeat it here. The question that is addressed is that of "re-rolling a successful (or unsuccessful) roll". In their answer the designers refer to the core rule for re-rolls and they base their ruling on that.

From your line of argument I gather that you are of the opinion that the use of the word "roll" in the question (which, to be fair, sets the context to which the answer must apply) means it is relevant only for rules and abilities that also use the word "roll". For the sake of argument, let us say that holds true: This means that the issue of "tests" is as of yet unaddressed, not explicitly exempt.

If you will entertain my line of thinking for a moment, if the question was: 

Some abilities allow me to re-roll a successful (or unsuccessful) test. When this is the case, is the success or failure based on the roll before or after any modifiers are applied?

What do you think the designers would answer?

-T10

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40 minutes ago, ppetford said:

This thread... 😂

Its a game guys

To answer the original question. It’s an Ok ability that is situational as a lot of armies have a way to ignore battle shock tests entirely, and everyone can use a command point to avoid battle shocks.

Yeah, it's a dumb thread. It's arguing fine points.

But the correct application of battleshock rules can be difference of having all the remaining models in a unit flee, or keeping some around to score an objective that decides the game, and not all games are as friendly and relaxed as one might hope. In a competitive scene, surely you would want the players to  follow the rules honestly and correctly?

-T10

Edited by T10
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@T10 

I think that you are the one imagining stuff.

The Battleshock test is a roll + modifiers

An Unbridled Malice refers to a "test" and not "roll"

Yes, in warhammer if something has a different name it is a different thing - think about spells and endless spells - they are not the same and mods, abilities and all that does NOT apply to endless spells unless it specifically says that it does. There is no such thing as hit test or save test, there are rolls. 

 This is how things have been in GW wargames for those 8 years I'm playing them and simply by RAW the roll is different to test.

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