"if any models from the unit are carrying..."

[opqdan]

I've run into a couple warscrolls now that say this.  Stormcast Eternals Liberators for example can re-roll any saves of 1 "if any models from this unit are carrying Sigmarite Shields."

As written, does this mean that as long as 1 model in the unit has a Sigmarite shield then all of my saves get rerolled on 1's?  So you could just equip the remainder with paired weapons to get +1 to their hit rolls and leave the guy with the shield to hang out in the back of the unit.  That doesn't seem to be the intention of this ability, but the text is explicit (and that line is used elsewhere where this is the intention), and as far as I can tell there are no rules requiring units be equipped the same.  It only breaks the rule of "does it make sense?" so I guess you'd just have to agree with your opponent that you can't do that.

 

EDIT: Hmm, upon reading the description section I'm wondering if there it implies that units must be equipped the same.  "units of Liberators are armed with...", units being the important word.

 

 

 

[mhsellwood]

In general units are equipped with one weapon, i.e. Blood Warriors for example as a UNIT are equipped either with a Goreaxe in each hand, or a Goreaxe and a Gorefist. The reason you will see the occasional reference in unit special rules to "if a model is equipped with..." is where you can choose to equip some models differently from the rest of the unit. Continuing the example of the Blood Warriors you can give one in ten a Goreglaive, so if you have Gorefists you get the reflect wound ability until there are no models with Gorefists.

From a game design point of view I would suggest the reason for this is the game is very much focussed on keeping things as consistent and low bookkeeping as possible, so you don't have the situation of a unit of liberators with shields and a grand hammer having to have special exceptions to wound allocation - wounds are normally allocated after saves, if you have a unit with different saves you would need to allocate wounds then make saves.This would also raise the question of, if you have taken a save with one model and the attack does multiple points of damage which flow over to the unit which has a different save how do you account for that?

Also  note that the FAQ makes clear that you should only have one 'wounded' model - i.e. if you have a unit of 3 varanguard and each model has a different weapon you can allocate wounds suffered to any model, but as soon as you have allocated a wound to a model you must keep doing so until that model is dead. This means that every 5 wounds would kill a Varanguard, but that you as the owning player decides who goes. Also remember that the FAQ has clarified that special weapons can be carried by the Champion of the unit. So continuing again the Blood Warriors example, the Chaos Champion can carry the Goreglaive and he will have 3 attacks with it.

[yarrickson]

My thought on this is that the part "as long as one model...' Is only there to cover the odd situation where say a unit has taken casualties and you have two models remaining, one with a shield say and one with a grand hammer? 

Cause yeah, 'units are armed with' is how the description reads.

[yarrickson]

Exception being Orruk Ardboyz. (Formerly Black Orcs) who can mix n match weapons freely. 

 

[opqdan]

14 minutes ago, yarrickson said:

Exception being Orruk Ardboyz. (Formerly Black Orcs) who can mix n match weapons freely. 

 

I just noticed the same thing.  The Ardboys are worded to explicitly allow multiple weapon choices.  The Liberators do not have that called out and therefore must be equipped the same (except for the special weapons as stated in the description).  That simplifies the issue, since it shouldn't happen except in the following case:

I guess it could happen if you had a large enough unit of liberators.  Say you had 20 liberators in a single unit, armed with sigmaraite shields.  4 are allowed to be armed with grandhammers (no shields).  If the unit took 15 damage over the course of the battle, you'd be left with 4 Liberators with grandhammers, and only one Liberator with a shield.  In this case, the unit will still get the shield ability even though the majority do not have shields (at least with RaW).

[Malakithe]

I've sent this come up before. It's RAW and I think in the FAQ that days just one model in the unit 

[Shane]

Some units are allowed a mix of weapons, others aren't.

The Unit Description is key here. If all models in a unit have to take the same load out (i.e. one option is shields), then they'll all have the same load out and abilities granted. If they're allowed a mix, then having at least one with a shield will grant the ability.

For some units this will make the player think who they are removing. Do you remove the bearer and lose the buff? Or lose the hero and miss an extra attack? Happens a lot with my Plague Monks as they die from tripping on rocks, a sudden gust of wind, or a glancing look from a passing tumbleweed.

[BaldoBeardo]

The other thing to bear in mind is there isn't a universal mechanic for this.

(I still cannot understand how people thought Wm & crew were a single unit when it required creating rules/steps to make it work)

So in the case of the Liberators, a single model with shield affects save rolls, and unit comp ensures that this will only ever create 'unrealistic' situations when you have large units that have already taken a lot of casualties as shown above.

The 'Ardboyz version comes into effect when allocating wounds.

[Malakithe]

I'm planning to do this with a unit of 6 Prosecutors. 2 with shields, 1 grandaxe, rest hammers

[BaldoBeardo]

You can't do that. Unit has to be armed identically, with the exception of the special weapons.

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[Veterannoob]

6 hours ago, Shane said:

Some units are allowed a mix of weapons, others aren't.

The Unit Description is key here. If all models in a unit have to take the same load out (i.e. one option is shields), then they'll all have the same load out and abilities granted. If they're allowed a mix, then having at least one with a shield will grant the ability.

For some units this will make the player think who they are removing. Do you remove the bearer and lose the buff? Or lose the hero and miss an extra attack? Happens a lot with my Plague Monks as they die from tripping on rocks, a sudden gust of wind, or a glancing look from a passing tumbleweed.

Yeah, this. It's still weird  for our conditioned brains .:) 

[Paul@DiceFiend.com]

I've just been wondering about this as well, I thought I'd seen the opportunity to get the re-rolls to save due to the one shield I was going to put in a unit and just remove him as a casualty last wjilst arming the rest of the unit with two blades or hammers to get the re-rolls to hit and extra attacks. I thought this was a bit off and was only written in the Sigmarite Shield section as it is due to the fact that 1 in 5 can have the special weapon option.

I've re-read the Description section of the Liberators (and some other units) as people have mentioned above and that makes sense now as it reads that the whole unit is armed the same way apart from the special weapon dude.

I can imagine some will equip units of Stormcast to maximise stuff like this so I'll have to keep an eye out for it and have a 'discussion' about it. My days as a 40k player having rules interpretation discussions have just come flooding back to me, yuck!

[BaldoBeardo]

No rules discussion needed - the unit descriptions are clear.

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[Shane]

The Unit Description is super important. Can be easy to infer it's just intro fluff but it often clarifies a few elements (like one model usually being the hero and getting an extra attack).