Are they in range???

Partly inspired by the Deployment in Action series over at Sons of Sanguinius I got thinking about potential set up for my Space Wolves, and that got me thinking about threat ranges, movement range, and weapon range.

So without further ado here is the product of a few quite hours at work, maths, and my mighty MSpaint skill!


This is a plain 6x4 table set up in Vassal with all 3 Deployment type templates set down on the board.

"Ok John but how does a load of lines and squares help us?"

Well we all normally play on 6 feet by 4 feet tables, so thus we know the outer size of the board. Secondary the deployment variants in the rulebook give us their size and shape too. So a bit a reading and some quick maths can give you a lot of information that applies in every battle.

Lets start with the basics - 6x4 table and what the rulebook gives us:

So the Blue line is 6 feet - or 72 inches
The Red line is 4 feet - 48 inches
The Green line is 3 feet - 36 inches
The White line is 2 feet - 24 inches
The Yellow line is 1 foot - 12 inches
The Brown line is 2 feet - 24 inches

These are all the basic ranges we get from deployment in the rulebook.

But do these numbers look familiar? (12, 24, 36, 48, 72)

They should do as they are all the staple ranges of every main weapon type in the game (except Tau Fire Warrior Pulse Rifles which are 30 inches but they are silly cow people).

Now this may seem like pretty simple stuff to older or veteran players but this kind of information is always good for new players or those looking to step up to the next level or for revision.


Now let use the power of maths - or more specifically the power of the triangle - Pythagorean Theorem!


First off lets look at its possible to pull of a 1st turn assault in Spearhead deployment for beasts, cavalry, open topped transports, assault vehicles or a lucky 6 inch fleet roll:

So we have here is the direct gap between two opposite table quarters labelled C in red.

Now we know from spearhead deployment that each side must be at least 12 inches away from the middle and with the set up shown we know we have a triangle with these two table quarter edges and now we have the third side of the triangle which is our C line in red.

We know now that A and B are both 12 inches so we can find out that distance of C:

a² + b² = c²

12² + 12² = c²

144 + 144 = c²

288 = c²

 

c² =288

c = √288

c = 16.97 inches

So.......

........ this is how a first turn charge is possible for some units, as nipping down the 16.97 inch 'side' of the middle circle is quicker than going straight though the middle of it which is 24 inches!

But it doesn't end there! Using Pythagorean therome again we can get the opposite corner ranges of the table and corner to middle of table range too:

So first corner to corner (red line):

black² + white² = red²

72² + 48² = c²

5184 + 2304 = 7488²

7488 = red²

 

red² = 7488

red²= √7488

red² = 86.53 inches

And the blue line (any corner to middle of board):

green² + yellow² = blue²

36² + 24² = blue²

1296 + 576 = blue²

1872 = blue²

 

blue² =1872

blue² = √1872

blue² = 43.27 inches

Or simply blue is equal to half the red line :p
 
So bring all this maths and MS paint skills together and we get this:

.... pretty much every possible range you could need.

On a side note I have been told by those in the know" that GW want to move towards having every gaming table in all their stores and battle bunkers to be made from the Citadel Realm of Battle Gameboard which is in 2 feet / 24 inch square sections, and these pretty much give you a ruler on the table (without the numbers)!

They say "knowledge if power - guard it well" - so er you didn't read this ok ;p

Till next time!