40K: Re-Rolls & Modifiers: Rules Breakdown

Continuing our series on rules you might have missed, we’re diving into how how Re-rolls & Modifiers work in Warhammer 40,000 8th Edition!

With the rules on the way this weekend it’s been hard to explain to folks without the rulebook how things work. Thankfully, the book will be on shelves on Saturday so people can finally get a copy and read it for themselves! But, I wanted to try to help clear-up a point of contiention about how Re-rolls and modifiers work. We have a rulebook so you can either take my word for it or wait till Saturday to get your own and read it for yourself (but for future reference, I’m looking at BRB pages 178 & 181 with examples from the indexes mixed in).

The Basics

Let’s assume you’ve already picked a unit to shoot with, their target, ranged weapon, and determined the number of attacks. You’re ready to Resolve the attacks at this point. This is a pretty familiar situation for any veteran of the game:

1. Roll your dice
2. Compare with Ballistic Skill Characteristic
3. If equal or greater, it’s a hit
4. If less than the Ballistic Skill Characteristic value, it’s a miss
5. If the “natural” die roll is a 1, it is a miss
6. Go on to Wounding Steps

Then you move on to shooting and you’re ready to rock. Make sense? Good. Now it’s time to add some re-rolls to the mix and see if we can make it crystal clear.

Adding in Re-Rolls

Here we have Azrael back again with his cropped stats. His ability Chapter Master allows friendly Dark Angel units within 6″ to re-roll failed hit rolls (side note: that’s for both shooting and melee – always refer to the datasheet for clarification… Also, he’s considered a Friendly Dark Angels model with 6″ of himself, too so he also gets the benefit).

So going back up to our example steps above:

1. Roll your dice
2. Compare with Ballistic Skill Characteristic
3. If equal or greater, it’s a hit
4. If less than the Ballistic Skill Characteristic value, it’s a miss
5. If the “natural” die roll is a 1, it is a miss
6. Gather up all dice that are misses and re-roll them (Re-Roll Step)
7. Compare with Ballistic Skill Characteristic
8. If equal or greater, it’s a hit
9. If less than the Ballistic Skill Characteristic value, it’s a miss
10. If the “natural” die roll is a 1, it is a miss
11. Go on to Wounding steps

Example: A Dark Angels unit is shooting at a target. They have a BS of +3 and have 5 shots. They get a 1,1,2,3,5. That means they only hit with two shots. Fortunately they are within 6″ of Azrael so they get to re-roll those 3 misses. On the 3 dice, they get a 2,3,4. Now they have 4 hits total and Azrael is pleased with their shooting. Still with me? Please note, Re-rolls only happen once – you can’t re-roll a re-roll.

Adding in Modifiers

We’re going to now add Modifiers to the step without Re-rolls so you can see the order of operations FIRST. In the example we’re using a Tyranid Prime:

Let’s look at how that interacts with the steps above:

1. Roll your dice
2. Compare with Ballistic Skill Characteristic
3. If equal or greater, it’s a hit
4. If less than the Ballistic Skill Characteristic value, it’s a miss
5. Apply *Modifiers (Negative and Positive) – Modifier Step
6. Re-check all dice rolls for hits/misses
7. If equal or greater, it’s a hit
8. If less than the Ballistic Skill Characteristic value, it’s a miss
9. If the “natural” die roll is a 1, it is a miss
10. Go on to Wounding Steps

* Keep in mind that when you apply modifiers those are added (or subtracted) from all the dice. The exception is that a “natural” 1 is always a failure. Note there is nothing about natural 6 is always a success however.

Example: In this example our Tyranid Warriors are shooting at a target. They have a BS of 4+ normally. Lets say they are shooting with 3 shots and roll a 2, 3, and 5. Now, looking at the steps above we can tell that currently they only hit once. Let’s add in the +1 to the hit rolls from the Tyranid Prime:

• 2+1=3
• 3+1=4
• 5+1=6

Now we have 2 hits. Remember, the +1 is added to the hit ROLL not to the BS stat. It modifies the physical die roll number. That means if you rolled a 6 on the die, and you had a +1 on the roll you just rolled a 7! Also remember: 1’s always fail!

Mixing Re-Rolls with Modifiers

Let’s take’em both and get faded!

I’ve got two examples to lay out. First, let’s say we have those same Warriors with the Prime nearby and for some other reason they get a re-roll for their misses. That means they are re-roll misses and getting a +1 to their to hit rolls.

1. Roll your dice
2. Compare with Ballistic Skill Characteristic
3. If equal or greater, it’s a hit
4. If less than the Ballistic Skill Characteristic value, it’s a miss
5. If the “natural” die roll is a 1, it is a miss
6. Gather up all dice that are misses and re-roll them – (Re-Roll Step)
7. Compare with Ballistic Skill Characteristic
8. Apply *Modifiers (Negative and Positive) – Modifier Step
9. Re-check all dice rolls for hits/misses
   1. If equal or greater, it’s a hit
   2. If less than the Ballistic Skill Characteristic value, it’s a miss
10. If the “natural” die roll is a 1, it is a miss
11. Go on to Wounding Steps

Example: Our Tyranid Warriors are shooting at a target. They have a BS of 4+ normally. Lets say they are shooting with 3 shots and roll a 2, 3, and 5. Remember: Re-Rolls happen BEFORE modifiers. So they pick up the 2 and the 3 and re-roll. They get a 6,3.

• 6+1=7
• 3+1=4
• 5+1=6

If their guns had an ability that said “something happens when you roll a 6+ to hit” then that means the natural die roll of a 5 would become a 6 and trigger that ability. That also means the natural roll of a 6 would become a 7 and also trigger that ability.

When Things Get Weird

In our playing we came across an interesting thing that happens: What happens when you get a negative modifier, like when you are shooting a heavy weapon on the move?

Example: You have a Dark Angel with a Lascannon. His BS is +3. He moved this turn and has a -1 modifier. He rolls a 3 on the die. What happens?

• 3-1=2

Clearly a miss. Okay, now let’s mix in the re-roll from Azrael with that. What happens?

He misses.

“But you didn’t tell us what the re-roll was!? What did he roll?”

He doesn’t get a re-roll. Check the steps again: Re-Rolls happen BEFORE modifiers are applied. He rolled a 3 on the die which equals his BS of +3, which is a hit. At the Re-Roll step, it’s still a hit, so you don’t get a re-roll. However, at the modifier step it changes with a -1 modifier, converting it to a 2 which is a miss.

Welcome to Warhammer 40,000 8th Edition.

Hopefully that clears things up. If not, you’ll be able to read it all for yourself when the Rulebook drops tomorrow. And check your datasheets for any exceptions!

Author: Adam Harrison

Writer, Editor, Texas Native, and Austinite for 15+ years, Adam covers all things Tabletop Gaming. Which includes Warhammer 40,000, Age of Sigmar, D&D, Board Games and everything else that involves dice, boards, cards and a table. A hobbyist, player, and collector of miniatures and games, Adam's current obsession are his Death Armies for Age of Sigmar, his Blood Angels and Tyranids for 40k, and his ever growing Arkham Horror: The Card Game Collection.