"I Like To Blast Off Of..."?

[Bazlord_Prime]

Howdy!

Okay - what am I missing? I keep hearing people talk about "good targets to blast off of", in reference to their own models that have some kind of pulse & blast immunity.

Is there a misconception out there that blast immunity means that they model will take zero damage even if it's the target of the attack? Cause that was cleared up in the Jan 2016 FAQ. 

So, that would mean that the only good models of your own to actually target and hit with a blast attack would be ones with Armour. 

I understand that blast immunity would come into play when you randomise off of your model and onto an enemy, but at that point you're facing a standard opposed duel to hit, and you might not need to put any resultant blast markers on top of your model anyway.

And surely the whole idea of using your own model to "blast off of", was to allow you to stack the duel result so as to get that Severe damage and maximise the blasts. At which point you're doing Severe damage to your own model. Unless you play that blast immunity grants immunity to ALL damage resulting from an attack containing blasts?

SO not getting it.

Thanks!

[Ludvig]

I don't think you are missing anything. Causing a single point of damage on my own armoured model to do 10+ damage spread out on a few enemy models is a good deal to me. Good blast targets usually have armour or as is the case with Sonnia you can use her totem since it has a high wp allowing you to cheat against it even in soft cover to put out burning on a bunch of enemy models. Now that they are burning you ignore Los and cover so can attack a fresh target and the totem can be resummoned with her upgrade so you didn't lose anything.

Sometimes the enemy targets are unfavourable like a model that is hard to wound or has the ability to use soulstones which means you might not get to a straight flip even if you focus. In that case it might be worth it to do at least a moderate 3 on your own model to do 2 damage to several enemies, one of which might die from that and that was what you were after. If the enemy has donr a good job og blocking LoS from ht2 models it might also be worth it to use a ht3 model to blast so you can do damage to models hiding behind other ht 2 models. Guild have a few models with defensive triggers to get armour +3 which protects you from most of the blast.

[Bazlord_Prime]

I completely understand blasting off of your own models (I am a Wong player ) - it's just I don't understand why people seem to specifically single out models with  immunity as being good targets to Blast off of, when that ability does nothing at all to help the model if it ends up being the target.

Case in point: in High Fauxdelity podcast  Episode 4, they mentioned Hannah as a good target to blast off, specifically referring to her Freikorps Suit ability (not her Armor).

Lightning Bugs are another one that gets mentioned a target to Blast off of. This I understand - partially - because if you Blast or Pulse onto them (after randomisation), you can get a free (1) Action out of it. But that doesn't make them good targets to Blast off of - if they end up being the target of the Attack, they wear the full damage and don't get to use their Ability 

I completely agree that high-Armor models make sense. And Stuffed Piglets. ALWAYS Stuffed Piglets... ;-)

[Ludvig]

There is no government podcast review that checks how well you know the rules before letting you podcast. I have nothing but admiration for the people putting their time into podcasts and they are a great resource to the community but they are not always right about rules and should not be seen as a source of rules interpretations if you ask me. The frequent posters on these rules forums are usually a much more reliable source for that and will happily quote rules in great detail to motivate why they back a certain way of playing. I'm pretty sure it's also easy to get carried away and talk up a combo that you then remember doesn't work for some reason or other but you might not take the time to go back and edit that.

What I'm saying is "I heard it in a podcast" will not convince me one bit during a rules argument, I'm going to need to see some text in the rulebook backing up your claim.

Some rules are also played differently between playgroups which accounts for at least some of the difference in how good people find some models. I remember some american playgroups saying Sidir could deny deliver a message so they found him quite OP while I was of the opinion that taking the action regardless of who ende up being the final target would net you the points. If you went by option one Sidir was an auto take in a lot of pools while I found him mediocre at best.

[Bazlord_Prime]

1 hour ago, Ludvig said:

There is no government podcast review that checks how well you know the rules before letting you podcast. I have nothing but admiration for the people putting their time into podcasts and they are a great resource to the community but they are not always right about rules and should not be seen as a source of rules interpretations if you ask me. 

Yeah, that's fair of course - I just wanted to know what I was apparently missing, as it's not just one source that was throwing around this "blasting off of things with Blast immunity" idea. You know, when you start getting something from multiple different sources, you start doubting yourself? It was that kind of thing.

[Ludvig]

I know the feeling. I've been out of the podcast loop for a while so I have missed it but you might want to leave a comment explaining how you think it works and why on the appropriate site when you hear misinterpretations so others don't get it wrong. Just don't forget to shower them in praise as well ao they keep up the hard work.

[Bazlord_Prime]

That's a good plan. Go to the source, and kindly ask them to expand their reasoning.

[Adran]

On 30/09/2017 at 6:55 AM, Bazlord_Prime said:

Howdy!

Okay - what am I missing? I keep hearing people talk about "good targets to blast off of", in reference to their own models that have some kind of pulse & blast immunity.

Is there a misconception out there that blast immunity means that they model will take zero damage even if it's the target of the attack? Cause that was cleared up in the Jan 2016 FAQ. 

So, that would mean that the only good models of your own to actually target and hit with a blast attack would be ones with Armour. 

I understand that blast immunity would come into play when you randomise off of your model and onto an enemy, but at that point you're facing a standard opposed duel to hit, and you might not need to put any resultant blast markers on top of your model anyway.

And surely the whole idea of using your own model to "blast off of", was to allow you to stack the duel result so as to get that Severe damage and maximise the blasts. At which point you're doing Severe damage to your own model. Unless you play that blast immunity grants immunity to ALL damage resulting from an attack containing blasts?

SO not getting it.

Thanks!

Its possible that they mean you are safe if you randomise onto the enemy, because then you don't do needless damage to yourself. So firng into an egnagement with a friekorpsman with LAzarus, if I hit my Friekorpsman, I can control the result, if I hit the otehr model I can still place the blast in the best place to hit otehr models without worrying about hurtign the friekorpsman. 

But I can't say for certain what they mean. 

[Sol_Sorrowsong]

What Adran says seemed like the reasonable assumption with blast/pulse immunity targets.  The unmentioned part was being in engagement, but perhaps the originators were assuming this as blasts are often best used when numerous models are grouped together.  

In all fairness, I think most people are in agreement that if you do end up attacking your own model it will do damage.  The importance then is how much damage will it do, and how much additional (or useful) damage will be done to the enemy model(s).

[Bazlord_Prime]

I agree, that's about the only way it makes sense, is to consider the randomisation factor. I mean, I would've thought that in that case, you would just place the  markers so as to avoid hitting your own model, but sure - there will be situations where you'll be unable to avoid it in order to hit a specific enemy.

Models with high Armour are definitely still looking better as targets though, as they still get to reduce the Blast damage, as well as the original damage. Hmmm... Now how do I get the (Armour +5) Pigapult up into engagement with my enemies... 

[Ludvig]

53 minutes ago, Bazlord_Prime said:

I agree, that's about the only way it makes sense, is to consider the randomisation factor. I mean, I would've thought that in that case, you would just place the  markers so as to avoid hitting your own model, but sure - there will be situations where you'll be unable to avoid it in order to hit a specific enemy.

Models with high Armour are definitely still looking better as targets though, as they still get to reduce the Blast damage, as well as the original damage. Hmmm... Now how do I get the (Armour +5) Pigapult up into engagement with my enemies... 

It's a gremlin so piglets can pull it with truffles.

You might be sad when the enemy ignores your armour though. 

[Bazlord_Prime]

2 hours ago, Ludvig said:

You might be sad when the enemy ignores your armour though. 

People I play with don't bring Armour-bypassing tech all that often. Most of those "current meta meta meta" things don't apply to us at the moment.

[Bazlord_Prime]

2 hours ago, Ludvig said:

It's a gremlin so piglets can pull it with truffles.

Actually, Gracie or Old Major + Saddle would be another legit way to move that Pigapult around. I love the mental image as well, of a giant pig being dwarfed by the huge, rickety war machine swaying ponderously on top of it as it walks upfield.

If only it could somehow fire at the same time...