Jump to content

Does a Slow-firing weapon suffer penalty when pinned down.


barca

Recommended Posts

Although this specific case is not called out in the LFTF or updates to the rule book, the LFTF does provide some clarity:

SITUATION: Bazooka Team is pinned down, but did not move.

QUESTION: Does it

  1. shoot with ROF 1 and its unmodified to-hit number, or
  2. does the Slow-Firing rule apply? And therefore, the score to hit = (to-hit number) plus 1 (for slow-firing).

ANSWER: Number 2. Here is why (emphasis is not in the original):

See page 2 in "LESSONS FROM THE FRONT: QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS ON FLAMES OF WAR, October 2019"
SHOOTING
Why does a heavy Gun team like an
8.8cm AA gun have a Moving ROF of
1 when it doesn’t have a Tactical speed?
When it is Pinned Down it shoots using
its Moving ROF rating,
getting only one
shot. Likewise, at the start of a Meeting
Engagement, if the 8.8cm gun belongs to
the first player, it will shoot as moving,
i.e. using its Moving ROF, so it will get
one shot in this case as well.

Since the Slow-firing rule affects a "moving" unit, and a pinned unit uses it moving ROF, then the bazooka team that is pinned uses its moving ROF, which includes the Slow-firing penalty.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Barca,

I don't think I agree that a pinned unit is a moving unit. I think this would be an excellent question to Phil to be answered in LFTF.

I think you inferring that because a pinned unit uses its moving rate of fire then it is a moving unit. But you can be pinned and not move and stay gone to ground. If being pinned meant that you were being treated as a moving unit then you could not stay gone to ground because you have to stay still and not move to be gone to ground.

I didn't see Phil's email that he takes these questions on but if anyone knows please chime in.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/14/2019 at 1:10 PM, Souldier3 said:

I didn't see Phil's email that he takes these questions on but if anyone knows please chime in.

1. I could be wrong. You are free to disagree. The logical reasoning is not as clear as it could be in either the rules or in the LFTF.

2. As for e-mail, I think that might not get a response. Battlefront has been pushing a lot of Gamer-staff interaction to their Facebook Page. If you can log in to facebook and tag the posting to notify you when there are comments to what you posted, then that might get some discussion or even an answer. If you cannot set a notification, then you might have to scroll through lots of other stuff to find your posting and its comments.

3. I don't yet have a FB page, otherwise I would ask the question myself. It seems to be murky and yet important.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

On 11/14/2019 at 1:10 PM, Souldier3 said:

Barca,

I don't think I agree that a pinned unit is a moving unit.

I am not trying to argue that Pinned = Moving. There are situations where they have different effects.

What I am trying to say is that the EFFECTS of pinned on shooting, and the EFFECTS of moving on shooting can have the same outcome.

To address this in a different way, I think that the effects (on shooting) of being pinned and the effects of moving have more to do with time and the focused attention of the shooter to line up a well-aimed shot.

 

In the case of movement, time is the primary factor. Part of your turn (time) is moving and the other part (time) is shooting. To show that LESS time is used to locate the target and setup a well-aimed shot, or to fire more than one shot, there are two ways to approach this:

  • a. Reduce ROF for moving
  • b. Penalty in the To-Hit score.

When the Stationary ROF is already 1, then your choices are:

  • Set the Moving ROF to zero, or
  • Set Moving ROF also to 1 AND add mechanism "b"

 

In the case of pinned, you could argue that either time or focus (or both) could affect the ability of the of the shooter to line up a well-aimed shot.

  • c. Time: part of the turn is taken up with dodging incoming enemy fire, or working up the nerve to stick your head up to shoot.
  • d. Focus: shooting at a target when you are NOT being shot at allows you better focus to find your target and perhaps waiting a bit to take your best shot (time and/or focus). Shooting at a target when you ARE being shot at rattles your nerves and/or makes you hurry to take a less-than-optimal shot

 

Additionally, going from version 3 to version 4, a lot of special rules were streamlined. So equating "Pinned ROF" to "Moving ROF" was taken as a simple way of applying a general rule to most cases, instead of writing PINNED ROF as a separate statement in many places.

 

Now, I am not on the staff at Battlefront, so I do not know if their discussions are anything like the one I described above.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I have been discussing with some people on the NDNG forum and I thought of another instance in which you use your moving RoF but have not moved.

Here is the scenario:

There are tanks less than 4 inches from your dug in infantry. Your infantry does not move in the movement step. Your bazookas/shreks fire using moving RoF so that the can assault with the rest of the infantry teams. Are you penalizing your bazooka/shrek shot +1 because your using your moving RoF to be eligible to assault?

I dont think I've seen anyone do that but it follows the same correlation of the pinned scenario.

I found where this is coming from in the version 3 rules. Adding a +1 to a RoF 1 weapon when it is pinned used to be in the rules but they took that out.

I think a ton of people have been still playing this way because old habits die hard.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

23 hours ago, Souldier3 said:

James that all makes logical sense but I just dont see anything in the rules to answer the question definitively. I sent a message to battlefront via Facebook. We will see if they answer. I'm not a big facebook user but I do have a account.

OK. Thx 4 taking that initiative.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

When I was looking at this last Thursday, the rule book was vague on the matter, but when I looked at the back of the us rifle platoon card the bazookas slow firing and pinned down is more defined. Battlefront always has the card over-rule the rulebook, but that doesn't mean it will be that way for all similar weapons. Nice to see someone got a response.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...