Shooting Characters and Nearest Target

Simplified, would you class a unit locked in combat as the nearest target?


To expand, you can shoot a character only if its the closest target. To quote:

Quote :

A CHARACTER can only be chosen as a target in the Shooting phase if the closest vsible enemy unit to the model that is shooting.

The question I'm seeing if how this relates to:

Quote :

Models cannot target enemy units that are within 1" of friendly models - the risk of hitting your own troops is too great.

So, lets say you have a unit, lets call them some Kabalite Warriors.
They wish to fire, and a Characters WOULD be the closest visible target, if not for another unit. Lets call them a Tactical Squad. But said Tactical Squad is within 1" of a friendly unit.

So if I can not traget the tactical Squad, does this mean they don't count for nearest enemy unit? Meaning I can shoot the Character (Which to complete the mental image, I'm going to call a Librarian)?

Yes. If you can't shoot at the closest model, it is not a legal target, thus you can pick another.

The 'visibility' of a unit and the 'targetability' of the unit are two separate things.

As long as a closer unit is visible, then you can't target the character, period. It makes sense, seeing as how a massive melee isn't going to make the character hiding behind it jump up and down and yell "Hey! You can shoot me now!"

It's a small favor, considering that (barring FAQ/errata to address the issue) intervening units apparently no longer provide cover (though they can block still LOS if they're big enough, because true-LOS).

Count Adhemar wrote:

40K Designers Commentary wrote:

Q: If a model cannot shoot at the closest visible enemy unit for some reason (e.g. it is within 1" of one of your units) but the next closest visible enemy unit is a Character, can that model then target the character?
A: No.

Well balls.

Fair enough. Curiousity satisfied. Thanks.