Act of Faith and Shooting Characters

[graysparrow]

Hi!  

 

My question for you all is this.  Can I use a successful 'Divine Guidance' Act of Faith to make a shooting attack against a Character with less than 10 wounds, even if the <10 wound Character is not the closest unit to the shooting unit that succeeded on the 'Divine Guidance' Act of Faith?  

 

From what I can read of the Index Rules and in the FAQ's (copied below), since the Act of Faith is at the beginning of the turn (i.e. the Movement Phase), and not during the actual Shooting Phase, then it would be allowed.  Meaning I could use a 4 Heavy Bolter armed Retributor Squad of Sisters to turn a Cheese Character into Swiss Cheese Character from 36" away.    Am I wrong?  

 

From Index: Imperium 2.  

<Mod-snip>

Divine Guidance: The unit can immediately shoot as if it were the Shooting phase.

 

 

 

From Stepping Into A New Edition Of Warhammer 40k FAQ:

https://whc-cdn.games-workshop.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Warhammer_40000_Stepping_into_a_New_Edition_of_Warhammer_40000.pdf

Q: When can I target an enemy Character that has a Wounds characteristic of less than 10?

    A: Such a Character can only be targeted in the Shooting phase if it is the nearest visible model to the firing model. You can target enemy Characters without restriction in the Psychic phase*, Charge phase, Fight phase, etc. You may also make shooting attacks at enemy Characters which occur outside the Shooting phase (i.e. when resolving Overwatch in the Charge phase).

 

    *Note, however, that some psychic powers, such as Smite, do not target units but instead affect the nearest enemy unit.

Edited September 29, 2017 by Eddie Orlock
Redacted large rules quote block per OR rule 5

[Eddie Orlock]

... Am I wrong? ...

At this point I'll opine that you probably are, but that there's likely room for contention and further study as the codicies come out and they allow more out of sequence shooting attacks.

 

The troublesome clause is the '... as if it were the shooting phase.' If we compare this to the wording of other out of sequence shooting attacks we might glean some more insight. Overwatch, which is specifically called up in the migration document as able to target characters, does not tell you to conduct it as if it was the shooting phase, but rather to resolve it like a normal shooting attack.

 

Curiously, the Dominate power from the telethesia discipline might be able to make one enemy character shoot another as it contains no reference to the phase and is done in the psychic phase.

 

So, that troublesome clause begs the question of what's particularly special about shooting in the shooting phase as opposed to at other times beyond that in step one of the phase we get to pick each eligible unit in the army to so shoot as part of the phase. The only other thing is not being able to pick off characters lurking in the backfield.

[graysparrow]

Well, shoot.  (Or no shoot, in this case!)

 

Oh well, there's always Vindicare Assassins.  Thanks for clearing that up!  :D

 

(Oh, and sorry about the quote messed up!)

[Ciler]

I'm with Eddie on that one. The "stepping into a new edition" note is there to highlight that there are some exceptions to the rule about not targetting characters (notably for overwatch). But the fact that the shooting here occurs in a different phase does not overrule the fact that it says specifically "as if in the shooting phase". Ergo, you cannot snipe a character using Divine Guidance.