Kill Team: Octarius is almost upon us, as pre-orders go live on the 14th of August. With all the shiny new equipment to try out, you could be forgiven for rushing in gung-ho to give the vile xenos (or vile humans, if you’re so inclined) what for. That’s a good way to die in a hail of bullets, though, and experienced commanders know that you sometimes need a quieter touch to get the job done.
However, before we talk about stealth, we need to look at how you can order your operatives to sneak around or go loud.
When selecting a model to activate during the Firefight phase, you must first decide whether they have an Engage or Conceal order – either breaking cover to attack or doing their best to keep out of harm’s way, respectively.
Only operatives with an Engage order can take attack actions during their turn,* so you’ll need to put your soldiers in the line of fire if you want them to acquire targets. Meanwhile, a Conceal order lets operatives fully hide behind even rudimentary cover.
The Line of Sight (or LoS) rules are particularly important in Kill Team due to the smaller killzones and densely packed terrain, with eagle-eyed snipers catching mere glimpses of their prey as they flit between cover. They govern who and what a model can see, and therefore shoot at, starting with whether any part of the target operative is visible to the shooter.**
While all operatives receive some protection from being behind cover,*** those with a Conceal order are completely hidden and cannot appear in their foe’s Line of Sight, even if the models can physically see each other. Given the sheer amount of terrain covering your killzones, such as the ramshackle Ork settlement included in the Kill Team: Octarius box, this gives cunning commanders plenty of opportunities to get sneaky with their opponent.
A Conceal order gives a beleaguered Medic or surrounded Sniper a brief moment of safety to scoot out of a dangerous position. It could even allow an operative holding an Archeotech token more protection from those who would try to take it from them.
Alas, operatives concealing themselves behind Light cover (or one of their charitable squadmates) are not entirely safe, as the extra height afforded by a Vantage Point can give sharpshooters a clear shot regardless. You’ll really need to watch out for those Ork snipers. Luckily, they can’t take cover behind the floor of the Vantage Point they’re using, so at least the rest of your squad can take a few potshots back at them.
Make sure your operatives are fully trained in the art of stealth before the Kill Team: Octarius boxed set arrives for pre-order this Saturday. While you’re at it, stay tuned to Warhammer Community this week as we take a look into the future of Kill Team and find out how the game will be expanding in the coming months.
* Barring a few specific exceptions for particularly stealthy operatives or those with very quiet weapons.
** You actually measure visibility from your operative’s head, so while a shorter model might have an easier time hiding behind cover, they’ll also have a harder time seeing enemies themselves.
*** A defender behind cover gets one automatic success on their Defence roll, as seen in our look at how ranged combat plays out.