ATSKNF question

When you fight an ATSKNF unit in assault phase and you manage to rout it, follow up an manage to roll higher on the initiative roll (for sweeping advance) what does really happen?

Do you:
A) fight in a second round of combat disregarding that the cowardly marines broke from combat and cannot use first round special rules like "furious charge" or "zealot" or,

B) start a new combat in which you can use first round special rules like "furious charge" or "zealot"?

Thanx for the answers in advance..

Continue fighting as if they had not failed the roll. (First assault turn rules will not apply.)

Sadly it is A).

This stuff is beyond my comprhension. It is incredibly powerful for no drawbacks.
In my mind ATSKNF and fearless should be unable to refuse challenges (what are you afraid of after all?) and if ATSKNF breaks and get captured the combat should start anew. Still powerful enough as normally the squad would be destroyed.

There is a misconception that ATSKNF, because it allows the possibility of flight, should be weaker than Fearless.

ATSKNF represents much of the resiliency of Fearless, without the suicidal stupidity it implies. (Most fearless units are either mindless drones or in the throes of a self-destructive frenzy.) Space Marines are capable of recognizing danger and making an organized withdrawal. However, they have the discipline not to succumb to the panic that would allow them to be cut down in flight (a Sweeping Advance). If such would be the case, the entire squad resigns themselves to making a final stand.

I started with SM, so I still feel a lot of sympathy for them. They don't have the cool weapons of the Tau, the mobility of the Eldar races (or superior wargear!). ATSKNF is really the best thing they have going for them. It's a huge advantage, I agree, but it's supposed to be. (And now that it makes you immune to Fear, like it rightly SHOULD do, it's even better.)

As to the challenge thing--ATSKNF units are smart enough to say 'no.' I wouldn't be that upset if Fearless units got that. Fearless = Brainless (usually), so a penalty of some type is in order. (Although their inability to go to ground is already a penalty of a fashion.)

Rather than make each combat start anew (which is insane for bookkeeping), I instead wish you could decline to pursue, to allow a unit one turn to flee, and THEN charge them again.

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As to the challenge thing--ATSKNF units are smart enough to say 'no.'

Which makes a wonderful narrative...
Space Marine Chapter Master: "Foul scum of Chaos! I challenge you to an honorable fight to death!"
Chaos Cultist Champion: "Yes, of course. Although there is nothing honorable in this fight and I would rather hide in the back to let my subordinates gun you down as you step in front of your men I totally accept your fair challenge!"

Chaos Lord: "Puny Servant of a false god. I am Kekarotnas, Slayer of Worlds, Ensaver of Billions and Doom of the Iron Hands. I was at Istvaan when your pitiful Primarch died. I enjoyed watching hundreds of your kin screaming in agony in their last hours renouncing their false beliefs in the rotting corpse you call your Emperor. Step forward Slave of a corrupt empire and face me!"

Space Marine Chapter Master: "Well... erm... I... I curse you foul spawn! Never should I fight with one of your taited kind in honerable combat. This would be... erm... oh yes... this would be a stain on my honor. I refuse your challenge!"

Chaos Lord: "Seriously? You just challenged a frak civillian with a rusty knife 2 minutes ago. His fould bllod is still on your Thunder Hammer. What the frak is up with you? Come on now and fight"

Space Marine Chapter Master: "No! There is nothing that forces me to defend my honor and the honor of my chapter. You can sit there and talk all day, I go and hide behind my boys now."

Totally like in the books....

Whoever said challenges should be realistic? This is GW!! I'm fairly sure a Tyranid doesn't give a crap about honour etc and yet Tyranid characters can still challenge and be challenged.

As far as I remember only Tyranid SC and the Tyrant are Characters and at least in some books the Swarmlord is known to issue challenges.

Aslo it doesn't matter for them anyways as they are always single models so a challenge doesn't change a thing for them.

Thanx for a prompt answers everyone..

Let's continue on the subject shall we?

My next question is:

Can "Hit & run" be used if the unit you assaulted gets routed?

i.e. marines fail their chk and flee 2d6, while reaverJB decide not to follow but use "H&R" instead moving 3d6 in whatever direction..

Following this post, I want to know the answer to that

While it is not mentioned directly, I would go with the last paragraph:

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If there are units with this rule on both sides who wish to disengage, roll-off to determine who goes first and then alternate disengaging them. If the last of these ends up no longer in combat, it Consolidates instead.

Seems reasonabel.

You can't Hit & Run if you're not locked in combat and if the unit has fallen back then you will not be locked in combat (unless it's a multiple combat situation).

Count Adhemar wrote:

You can't Hit & Run if you're not locked in combat and if the unit has fallen back then you will not be locked in combat (unless it's a multiple combat situation).

This is the correct answer.

H&R should give you a bonus to sweeping advance rolls, though.

Jimsolo wrote:

I started with SM, so I still feel a lot of sympathy for them.  They don't have the cool weapons of the Tau, the mobility of the Eldar races (or superior wargear!).  ATSKNF is really the best thing they have going for them.  It's a huge advantage, I agree, but it's supposed to be.  (And now that it makes you immune to Fear, like it rightly SHOULD do, it's even better.)  

I started with Chaos (and probably because of the treatment the dark eldar rules have gotten, they're still my favourite...) so I'd ask if ATSKNF is the best thign they have going because they lack the mobility and wargear of the eldar races, the guns of the tau, the numbers of the orks / nids, etc.... what does chaos get since they don't even get ATSKNF?

Its an age old rant & I certainly dont want to drudge it up here, especially on a forum dedicated to dark eldar, but ATSKNF is rightly recognized as the single most broken rule in 40K (since they've fixed serpent shields anyways )

I would hardly call it broken. I don't think it makes the top 10. (Jesus, with the new SM codex, it isn't even in the top 10 most broken rules in that codex.)

Chaos Marines get all kinds of goodies loyalists don't get. (Daemon Princes spring to mind.) Better psykers, the specialist troop choices (which are Fearless, a rule that is better than ATSKNF now that No Escape! no longer screws you over), autocannons on Devastators, hellturkeys, and walkers that don't suck.

Plus the ability to Battle Brother ally with daemons, which is tasty. I hear a lot of complaining about the random nature of the Boon table, but while I've occasionally seen it do nothing worthwhile, I've never seen it cost a Chaos player the game, and I've seen two games where the Chaos victory was DIRECTLY attributable to the Boon table.

Walkers that don't suck? A dreadnought has four attacks now! You still got auto canon dreadnought spam. Chaos cult troops aren't that great. Tzeentch ones suck. Slaanesh ones too. Only Khorne and Nurgle is okay. What if I play something like iron Warriors or Alpha Legion?
Dude, a chaos Marine is 13 points and he loses combat squads, ATSKNF and chapter tactics. For how many points? One? Two? I've not touched my iron Warriors since the new codex came out, because it sucks! Chaos space Marines in the chaos space Marines codex suck! If could be called codex demon machine and cultists...
Enough rant... Sorry

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Chaos Marines get all kinds of goodies loyalists don't get. (Daemon Princes spring to mind.) Better psykers, the specialist troop choices (which are Fearless, a rule that is better than ATSKNF now that No Escape! no longer screws you over), autocannons on Devastators, hellturkeys, and walkers that don't suck.

WHAAAAT? Are you serious here?
Better psykers? Really? Better?
The specialist troop choices? I see a TON more Sternguard than Noise Marines and Thousand Sons COMBINED.
Autocannons on Devastors are extremely useful. Im totally sure loyalsits would instantly want to have... nah they have grav cannons nevermind.

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Plus the ability to Battle Brother ally with daemons, which is tasty. I hear a lot of complaining about the random nature of the Boon table, but while I've occasionally seen it do nothing worthwhile, I've never seen it cost a Chaos player the game, and I've seen two games where the Chaos victory was DIRECTLY attributable to the Boon table.

Poor space marines are only able to be battlebrothers with 50% of ALL armies out there and summon daemons on 2+.
If you ever roll on the boon table as a chos player, your opponent is an idiot.
Chaos MUST challenge but you do not need to accept if it is unwinable. On the other hand your Psyker MUST accept the challenge from your S8 T5 2+ 3++ captain.

So they should, what, give Chaos all the same crap loyalists have plus all the heretical demon garbage on top of that?

lets not start a discussion about how to "fix" chaos... but ultimately the answer is simply to update an FAQ that brings:
- the stats of dreadnough.... err helbrutes and other daemon engines in line with what they've done to C:SM & C:DA (I'm sure C:BA, SW & GK would appreciate this too)
- fix chaos focus - make it a BONUS & not a hindrance, if chaos MUST take their pantheon powers, make those BONUS, in addition to those rolled from the BRB powers (thus making falling to chaos actually make sense!)
- adjust the points costs for a variety of chaos units to make them sort of competitive including all power armored units, defilers, land raiders (how much is POTMS worth on vehicle with two lascannons that's trying to deliver assault troops...)
- eternal warrior on daemon princes (how many times have I been stomped to death by a riptide....)
- do something (anything!) to make possessed, dark apostles, mutilators and warp talons effective.
- overhaul the mark system to better represent the fluff

ultimately I doubt anybody seriously wants chaos to simply be a carbon copy of C:SM plus daemons - hell if that's what someone wants to play they're actually free to use the chaos models & run them using the C:SM book and simply state (these guys are recent renegades who haven't lost all their tech & haven't become corrupted by the dark gods yet.  These guys simply decided to stop listening to the lords of terra, a'la the Astral Claws prior to fleeing to the eye of terror & becoming the Red Corsairs)

As a die hard chaos player I have tons of ideas on how to adjust things, but it doesn't matter.  GW will do as GW does.  And ultimately, despite its many flaws I have more fun building and using a variety of functional builds using C:CSM than I do with the current C:DE book.

The only thing I would want for my chaos Marines in actual useful Marines. Give them stubborn instead of ATSKNF and Legion tactics and combat squads. Why? Because they are still space Marines.

Do you have experience fighting chaos Marines?

Jimsolo wrote:

So they should, what, give Chaos all the same crap loyalists have plus all the heretical demon garbage on top of that?

How about "crap" that is on par instead just an inferior version of the original?

Guess what. chaos was the army with the old and forgotten tech. Not loyalists.
The reason why you had TL autocannons and were happy with them was that the assault cannon jammed a lot and even would blow up.
"Gets hot" was originally a rule for chaos plasma guns. The tradeoff was that they could fire every turn and not only every 2nd.

Hell, nowadays chaos doesnt even have access to a cheap drop pod

But the base discussion here is ATSKNF, and whether Chaos Marines should have it. And there is no reasonable argument that they should. It doesn't make sense from a rules stand point, and it doesn't make ANY sense from a fluff standpoint.

Because loyal space marines should be superior no matter what?

Why doesn't it make sense? They are Space Marines after all. They are highly skilled and trained killers that witness really bad stuff in the eye of terror. Why are they worse? They didn't know fear back in the days. Did they finally learn to feat after the heresy?

No, because the two armies should be different.  If they have all the same rules and equipment, why make them a separate army at all?  And call me crazy, but if we're making each army different, then the rule that represents supreme combat discipline should probably NOT go to the army which is consistently portrayed as a rampant mob of half-lucid cowards.  

Does Chaos need to be fixed to be on par with loyalists?  Sure!  Make the specialist troops better, give them Drop Pods fer cryin out loud, and make their point costs on par with other armies.  But ATSKNF makes as much sense as letting Imperial Fists take a Mark of Khorne upgrade.

CptMetal wrote:

Why are they worse? They didn't know fear back in the days. Did they finally learn to feat after the heresy?

Why does lacking ONE rule make them worse? Can't they have something else? They DID know fear back in the day. (All marines know fear, the rule title is poetic license. They just don't let it or other emotions break their discipline, which traitors do.)

And yes, following the heresy (which they joined because of their inherent lack of self control in the first place) most have become even less disciplined than they were.