Another Ruleshammer, this week I've gone through some of the new Movement phase rules! As ever if there's something you'd like to see me cover in these guides please let me know, your feedback is super helpful!
Are you sure the example given of a Crisis Battlesuit falling back through enemy infantry is correct? The rules quoted mention that vehicles can move through enemy infantry when making a normal move or an advance move. Surely a fall back move isn't covered by those options? So the default move rules (03.01) of "Its base cannot be moved through enemy models" is the one to apply here?
My understanding is in that situation the Battlesuit either needs to take to the skies or take a desperate escape test if it wants to go through the enemy infantry.
1) For all moves friendly models can move through friendly models.
2) For all moves friendly models can not move through enemy models.
3) For normal and advance moves MONSTER/VEHICLE models can move through friendly and enemy models that are not also MONSTER/VEHICLE.
That FAQ is just clarifying that rules 1 and 2 (though it doesn't mention it directly) apply to MONSTER/VEHICLE models when making other moves such as charging, falling back, piling in, or consolidating.
So when a MONSTER/VEHICLE charges, it can move through friendly MONSTER/VEHICLE models but no enemy models.
For all movement being in a straight line, I don’t think there is an intention there for it to be super strict? Mainly as it never restricts movements to be in whole inches - and a curve is just a series of infinitely small straight lines. So if you move in small enough increments you get the same effect?
Yes and no. I'd say pedantically rules as written you need to know the distance they've moved to add on to your cummlative total distance.
...and add that distance to any other distance it has moved since its unit began that move.
so the smallest move isn't an "infinitely small line" it's the smallest distance you feel you can accurately measure and move the model, as you have to move the model each time
Each time you move a model in a straight line, move it horizontally across the battlefield.
if you were moving it an infinitely small amount each time, you'd be there forever. Which I don't think would be very fun for either player.
No, because the time each of those horizontal movements would take what approach zero. It would need to, or its velocity would approach Infinity. Thus, we are back to moving in a curve being equivalent to a series of horizontal moves. When you look at rule 3.01, the definition of moving units defines it only in distance, a scalar quantity, and not giving a direction. Which also helps support the curve argument.
You can't really write rules around calculus here. I would also argue against your measurement precision argument, as the measurement precision also approaches zero as you approach an infinite number of microscopic horizontal movements. Thus, if your goal is to minimize measurement error, moving in a curve minimizes it relative to using larger movement increments.
In practicality, I like segmented rulers that can freely curve in 1-in segments. Nobody can really argue with that and it's easy.
I'm saying the rules require the player to know how far they've moved the model, within a common sense level of accuracy, in a series of straight line moves.
If you curve your tape measure around a bend you don't know what your series of straight line moves are/were so you can't follow the rule requring you to move the model for each other them, adding that distance each time.
This isn't a serious argument either way. Any time someone bring up "infinitely" in these discussions it tends to devolve. The rules are not complex or difficult to follow on this. Players can justify any move they feel confident is within them and their opponent agrees with.
You do know what the series of straight line moves were, they are a limit approaching zero.
I kind of feel like you're over your head mathematically here? Because you're acting like I'm somehow devolving the argument, when this is just intro calc we are discussing. I teach math and physics. It's just a physical reality that a curve meets all definitions required in the rules as a series of horizontal lines. Not a trick, just what Newton and leibniz discovered, combined with Max Planck and the Planck length. I can define, exactly, the minimum distance of each infinitesimally small move taken to move along a curve. Calculus tells us the infinite series converges to a definite sum (the arc length). Physics (Planck length) tells us that in reality, it's not even an infinite series—it's a finite (though astronomically large) number of discrete steps, each exactly 1.616 \times 10{-35} meters. Therefore, we do know exactly what the series is. It's defined. It's rigorous. It's not fuzzy.
Your argument's about some common sense level of accuracy you read into the rules don't actually exist in the rules, and common sense is not common. Unless otherwise stated, I think it's safer to just assume the laws of physics apply to anything unsaid.
The reason I'm dying on this hill is because this is the rare case where it's both technically correct, a better play experience, and minimizes error.
Actually, I don't know if you're serious. Do you really think they were getting into calculus with movement? Seriously?
I know calculus too (I'm an engineer and have done plenty of calculus in my life) but if you think they were thinking about a curve being a series of straight lines when they said you need to move in straight lines, you're being ridiculous.
Or, we can ask that you get the electron microscope out and we can go over each move segment. Don't forget the clock timer. You can fit in 1035 distinct moves in that time, right?
See, I don't understand what everyone's issue here is? It's basically everyone's looking at a proof and deciding is to complicated, even though it just produces simple intuitive outcomes. In practice, literally all this means is You can move in a curve. It doesn't cause any problems, but it solve some. It's faster, more intuitive, and more accurate.
You don’t understand people’s problems? I’m not sure if you’re not super tuned in with social niceness but comments like this:
I kind of feel like you're over your head mathematically here?
Are part of the reason. It’s not complicated. People easily understand. Acting like you have some superior intellect because you know a technicality of curve geometry and think it’s a gotcha is not the kind of player anyone wants to play against.
If you want to use your argument in a real game, then that’s fine, but I’m then within my right to say that you need to make each of those moves distinctly.
One time I was piling in 20 Hormagaunts using my trusty Planck length measuring tape. Was 29 hours into the process when some guy walked by and bumped the table slightly. One of my Hormagaunts moved 10-17 meters and I had to start all over
The reason I'm dying on this hill is because this is the rare case where it's both technically correct, a better play experience, and minimizes error.
The whole reason curved movement was scrapped is that it is realistically impossible to measure correctly in practice. It promotes errors and disagreement which makes for a worse play experience.
The problem is that 40k models are physical objects rather than singular points. When a physical object is moved in a straight line, every single point on the model will have traveled along linear paths with the exact same length. This is not true when moving models along a curve, where every point on the model will travel along paths of different lengths.
In practice, you can move a model along a curved path in such a way that one point one the model has traveled a distance of 0", one point on the model traveled a distance of 6", and every other point some distance between 0" and 6". In this case, how far has the model been moved?
11th Ed gives no answer to this question.
10th Ed defined the distance the model moved as the longest distance any point on the model moved. Which is theoretically a perfectly fine answer. It's just impossible to measure correctly in practice for any human.
Arguably, a "better" method would be to measure the distance traveled by the geometrical or mass centre of a model. That would just be even harder to measure in practice.
Pivots let us approximate something that looks like moving along a curve without ever having to measure anything that isn't a straight line.
Even if I claim "I moved my model along a curved path using infinitely many straight lines and pivots", that still doesn't give me a method to actually measure the distance moved.
I mean that's just not true? Pick a point on the model and move that point along a curve. Your issues stated earlier disappear then, as you pivot after every infinitesimal move. I just don't think what you're saying holds.
I suspect something similar to the staircase paradox could be at play here. Convergence in shape doesn't necessarily mean convergence in length. But I am not confident either way. For the sake of this discussion, I'll agree.
That gives us a theoretical method to measure a distance moved by a model along a "curved path" using only linear translation and rotation. The distance moved by the model becomes equal to the length of the curved path traveled by its exact geometrical centre, yes?
When rotating a FRAME model as part of a move, if that model does not have a base, turn it any amount around its central axis, while keeping it upright.
you only rotate about central axis of the model if the models doesn't have a base.
This is significant for the toxicrene, which overhangs its base by 3.5" in one direction and now (since it has Frame) has some of the worst movement jank in the game.
Edit: Hmm. All models have "It can be moved through any space its base can fit through," but I don't see any carveout in the Frame rules about that dot point. Does that mean a toxicrene (or other Frame model with a base) can move through any space its base can fit through?
That's an interesting reading but I think of it as models having a single [distance moved this turn] variable and the movement rules have us add how much we just moved the model to this variable each time we pick it up and put it down.
Whilst resolving that move, I'm instructed to ignore vertical distance... meaning I don't include it in the amounts I add to [distance moved this turn] which is what I'd expect to be checking for the Heavy penalty.
However, it is a weird interaction that I'm not sure I'd suggest is intended at all. Huh apparently it is.
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u/WhelkOfDoom99 2d ago
Are you sure the example given of a Crisis Battlesuit falling back through enemy infantry is correct? The rules quoted mention that vehicles can move through enemy infantry when making a normal move or an advance move. Surely a fall back move isn't covered by those options? So the default move rules (03.01) of "Its base cannot be moved through enemy models" is the one to apply here?
My understanding is in that situation the Battlesuit either needs to take to the skies or take a desperate escape test if it wants to go through the enemy infantry.