Impact Grenades and stacking keywords.

[KalEl814 1,510]

Not for nothing... if a whole squad of mooks carrying a bucket of frags manages to get in range of an armored unit... shouldn’t they be rewarded for that?

Edited February 27, 2018 by KalEl814

[NukeMaster 248]

You're not going to get impact 6 for less than 77 points. I doubt we see it as regular strategy. Impact 5 at 55 points maybe but not 6.

[RhymerNation 37]

Right - the more effective use of it is area denial.

Without them, AT-STs and AT-RTs can effectively move wherever they want - unhindered by engagement, and some pretty nasty melee combat attacks.

Throwing 5 points of Impact Grenades means those armored units aren't going to risk walking all over you because they'll get slammed by a high Impact attack.

 

The best corollary I can think of are Panzerknackers or Panzerfausts in most WWII mini games - great for defending an area against tanks/vehicles - awful for running out and trying to attack something. 

[OldSchoolEmpire 80]

Overall it's been a great and civil discussion. But I'm really glad we have an official ruling! The more I think about it, the less overpowered it seems.

[werdnaegni 1,563]

Apparently we can't even trust a screenshot of an email. They clearly doctored theirs. I asked and got this response.

 

[Orcdruid 500]

1 hour ago, RhymerNation said:

The best corollary I can think of are Panzerknackers or Panzerfausts in most WWII mini games - great for defending an area against tanks/vehicles - awful for running out and trying to attack something. 

Tell that to Beasts of War they did that exact thing in their bolt action 2.0 playthrough.

Edited February 27, 2018 by Orcdruid

[DarkJello 43]

2 hours ago, Big Easy said:

"Prepare for Impact 6" should be the name of the next FFG article posted

And the Internet has just been won!  

[Caimheul1313 2,990]

3 hours ago, OldSchoolEmpire said:

Overall it's been a great and civil discussion. But I'm really glad we have an official ruling! The more I think about it, the less overpowered it seems.

A screenshot of an email is hardly an official ruling in my opinion. Most TOs would not accept such a ruling without it being visible in say twitter or facebook or some other official, publicly viewable and verifiable location. I'm not trying to claim that the text we have been shown is doctored or any way or incorrect, just that as FFG is getting asked about the stacking of Impact on weapons they should make it more clear in the rules or an article. 

[KalEl814 1,510]

2 minutes ago, Caimheul1313 said:

A screenshot of an email is hardly an official ruling in my opinion. Most TOs would not accept such a ruling without it being visible in say twitter or facebook or some other official, publicly viewable and verifiable location. I'm not trying to claim that the text we have been shown is doctored or any way or incorrect, just that as FFG is getting asked about the stacking of Impact on weapons they should make it more clear in the rules or an article. 

For whatever it’s worth... I’ve seen this stuff referenced successfully by TOs at Regional FFG events.

[Caimheul1313 2,990]

7 minutes ago, KalEl814 said:

For whatever it’s worth... I’ve seen this stuff referenced successfully by TOs at Regional FFG events.

Ah, FFG TOs operate a bit differently than I'm used to then :-P. Still, I prefer my FAQ to be on say Twitter like some of the DnD creator FAQ, or Facebook. Especially as then everyone will be playing with the same ruling everywhere, not just at Tournaments that have access to these emails.

[LunarSol 1,369]

I'm not sure what more needs to be presented.  The rules are quite clear on how both the Grenade upgrade works (each model has that weapon added as an option of the weapon they can fire) and how the Impact keyword stacks (aka, it does).  Not really a mystery.

Also worth remembering; you don't have to kill the unit to prevent Impact 6.  Kill half of it and it'll be Impact 3.

[iamaddj 5]

OK Guys, since this debate is still somehow going on, I went and asked Alex Davy in person today. Here is his response: 

We both hope this is settled now. (Yes that really is ALex in the yellow sweater, I did a whole wonderful interview with him and Luke today. I'll post more about it when its up and able to be watched.) 

[OMGBRICK 247]

I agree that the rules are written suboptimally - as I was one of the people in the beginning arguing that they don’t stack. With the release of the RRG my opinion shifted in the opposite direction a bit. But I think multiple emails from the game designer should probably suffice as an official ruling - at least for now - and I don’t know what else could be provided to make it any more concete. 

Do agree that seeing the rules reworded a bit or an FAQ released would be most preferable. As it stands, someone who doesn’t frequent the forums could see the current weapon keywords rules and play them incorrectly and be justified I think. 

[Caldias 2,210]

To their credit, this seems to be the only major confusion, which is pretty impressive given the breadth of rules.

 

I've also heard FAQs are slow from FFG for Star Wars games due to needing to go through Disney vetting before being released, so this might be as official as it gets for a time.

[UnitOmega 2,818]

The latest X-Wing FAQ was very lickety split after a bad interaction came up as swamping tournaments, but it was solved entirely by FAQ, not eratta (they just said "No the rules are that they don't interact" rather than change any cards) so I think running theory is that delay might be shorter if they're just clarifying something, not actually rewording a card (because the card is a physical product LFL has control over).  

[Derrault 1,091]

4 hours ago, LunarSol said:

I'm not sure what more needs to be presented.  The rules are quite clear on how both the Grenade upgrade works (each model has that weapon added as an option of the weapon they can fire) and how the Impact keyword stacks (aka, it does).  Not really a mystery.

Also worth remembering; you don't have to kill the unit to prevent Impact 6.  Kill half of it and it'll be Impact 3.

Yes, what’s not clear is how the claim that it didn’t work exactly as written surfaced in the first place.

Given that vehicles aren’t going to be scoring victory points, I would predict that impact grenades are likely to be less valuable than concussion grenades. (Blast being useful vs the infantry who win games)

[DarkTemplars 85]

I think the correct follow-up uestion to the email would be to ask about speeder bikes. Since according to this they would become impact 2. 

[GreatMazinkaiser 1,335]

13 hours ago, Caldias said:

To their credit, this seems to be the only major confusion, which is pretty impressive given the breadth of rules.

 

I've also heard FAQs are slow from FFG for Star Wars games due to needing to go through Disney vetting before being released, so this might be as official as it gets for a time.

Seems like idle speculation... I can't imagine Disney actually gives a **** about the nuances of the rules beyond named characters and ships; otherwise metas would be consistently tilted towards Rebels and the OT/Sequels. This hasn't happened (consistently).

[slasher956 546]

Erm... .the question is... what does impact actually do?

 

Its turns 1 result to another... it doesnt alter blanks or surges

2ndly you can read impact as - "if this die comes up as a hit you may change it to a crit" in which case why dont you get impact 6 if you use 6 grenades?

[DarkTemplars 85]

5 minutes ago, slasher956 said:

Erm... .the question is... what does impact actually do?

 

Its turns 1 result to another... it doesnt alter blanks or surges

2ndly you can read impact as - "if this die comes up as a hit you may change it to a crit" in which case why dont you get impact 6 if you use 6 grenades?

A lot is due to the various demos floating around. Speeder bikes have been treated as having Impact 1, even when both are still alive and attacking. Not saying that the demos are correct as we've seen, there have been many screwup. 

 

If this interpretation of impact grenades is correct, the speeder bikes should be Impact 2 when firing their cannon as a pair. 

[Undeadguy 5,749]

25 minutes ago, slasher956 said:

Erm... .the question is... what does impact actually do?

 

Its turns 1 result to another... it doesnt alter blanks or surges

2ndly you can read impact as - "if this die comes up as a hit you may change it to a crit" in which case why dont you get impact 6 if you use 6 grenades?

Impact converts hits to crits when attacking Armor. The conversion happens after Cover and other defensive modifiers occur, but before Armor is applied and defense dice are rolled. 

Example:

1. You have Impact 3 on the attack pool and roll 5 hits.
2. The defender has Cover 1, so 1 hit is removed, leaving 4 hits.
3. 4 hits remain, and Impact converts those 3 hits to crits.
4. Armor is applied and removes all hits from the attack pool, so 1 hit is removed.
5. 3 crits remain, so the defender rolls 3 defense dice.
6. 2 Blocks are rolled, so 2 crits are removed.
7. 1 crit remains, and deals 1 Wound to the defender.

[imlost19 55]

25 minutes ago, Undeadguy said:

Impact converts hits to crits when attacking Armor. The conversion happens after Cover and other defensive modifiers occur, but before Armor is applied and defense dice are rolled. 

Example:

1. You have Impact 3 on the attack pool and roll 5 hits.
2. The defender has Cover 1, so 1 hit is removed, leaving 4 hits.
3. 4 hits remain, and Impact converts those 3 hits to crits.
4. Armor is applied and removes all hits from the attack pool, so 1 hit is removed.
5. 3 crits remain, so the defender rolls 3 defense dice.
6. 2 Blocks are rolled, so 2 crits are removed.
7. 1 crit remains, and deals 1 Wound to the defender.

The cover/impact thing is really only relevant on the airspeeder which is the only vehicle that has armor and cover. But yes this is the correct order from what I can tell.

Edited February 28, 2018 by imlost19

[Caimheul1313 2,990]

30 minutes ago, imlost19 said:

The cover/impact thing is really only relevant on the airspeeder which is the only vehicle that has armor and cover. But yes this is the correct order from what I can tell.

So far anyway. Only FFG knows what units the future holds, so it's important to understand the interaction now for the one case we know of so we know how to apply it when they release say Dark Troopers as an infantry model with Armour, another type of armoured speeder, or something else to that effect. 

[OMGBRICK 247]

43 minutes ago, imlost19 said:

The cover/impact thing is really only relevant on the airspeeder which is the only vehicle that has armor and cover. But yes this is the correct order from what I can tell.

Or if the ATST or T47 are in cover...

[Undeadguy 5,749]

Well if you put an AT-RT behind terrain that grants a level of Cover, it would matter. Makes the Air Speeder quite hard to kill with it reducing hits before Impact.