[Grunt90]

Or that the cover save for units in the way is a really dumb thing. Not so much the fact that one unit can give another a cover save, but just the fact that if a wound is saved by cover from a unit, nothing happens to the first one.

I understand if I was shooting through a friendly unit that it would give a cover save, as you would not want to shoot at your own guys, but this is the part that is really dumb. Shooting through one enemy unit into another gives them a save, with no conequences. Now I really think it should be re worked into this.

If one enemy unit gives another enemy unit a cover save, for every cover save that is taken and saved, it confers a wound onto the unit that gave them the save, with the same restrictions that a normal shot would give.

for example if my Fire warriors fire onto imperial guard, and two squads are lined up infront of me and and I shoot at the second one, and the second one takes three cover, making two and losing one, the two cover saves should be turned into wounds onto the unit infront of it, with normal AP 5 and str 5 rules applying.

make sense?

[ForbiddenKnowledge]

Just imagine it means the guy taking the shot decided not to fire to avoid hitting his own men.

Its more logical that way

[Grunt90]

I understand that part, and I'm fine with that rule, but what about when an enemy unit gives another enemy unit a cover save? That part is the reallly screwed up rule.

[arandomshadow]

I understand why you think this should happen but not all aspects of Warhammer 40k are designed to be more like reality.
A similar rule will probably be issued in one of the next editions but as it is GW changed the 'line of sight' rules a fair amount in 5th Ed. I guess they thought that would be enough change to do with that particular topic.
Also, the current rule is simpler and easier to use.

However, you could try introducing this rule at your local GW to see how it works or just with a couple of friends in a relaxed game .

[khanaris]

I think it would be too easy to abuse. Imagine you have a unit with Pulse Carbines and you are facing two units of Ork Boyz, one behind the other. If you fired at the further unit, you would be dividing your fire 50/50 between the two units, possibly inflicting pinning hits on both. I don't think GW introduced this rule as a sneaky way to intentionally divide fire between two enemy units.

And then you have the case where there are two enemy units between you and your target. Which would have to take cover saved hits? If the further unit got them, would they get cover saves too?

The cover save rules probably represent the distraction of an enemy unit between you and the enemy more than the chance of actually hitting them instead.

[Grunt90]

The abuse part would suck pretty bad, I can see how that would happen. But I hope in the next edition they really change it up somehow. Maybe a 5+ cover save instead of a 4+ I mean you get a 4+ from a huge pile of rocks and destroyed buildings. A distraction I think should be 5+. Just 4+ seems a little to over powered to me.

[khanaris]

Better than it used to be, though, when they just blocked LOS altogether. You don't have to fire at the further unit. 5th Edition should be seen as something of a compromise between earlier editions of the game in this respect.

[Grunt90]

yeah, thats a bonus I guess. I mean I like 5th edition way better than 4th, it's just this one rule is the thing that gets my goat. But I'm sure everyone has some little pet peeve, ya know?

[khanaris]

I don't like it either. But I wanted them to go back to "to-hit" penalties for more difficult shots.

[Grunt90]

a to hit penalty would of been cool. Like fantasy and everything they have on penalties and such.