Hello, i have a question to the tremor special attack. I’m not sure if i need to directly hit the target or i just hit the ground to send everyone in 2" knockdown, because there is no text that says “on hit”. The old text in mk3 had “on hit” wording. Mk3 text:" Tremor - (★ Attack) - Before resolving damage from this attack, center a 4" AOE on the model directly hit. Models in the AOE become knocked down. This model is not affected by Tremor. "
I think i need a target in range to use the tremor attack, but there is no need to directly hit it, but i’m not sure. A friend of mine disagrees with me and say’s i need to land a hit, which is hard with MAT6.
I posted this on reddit aswell a few days ago, i’m in search of an official answer.
You don’t need to hit with Tremor to knock down everything within 2", simply because it doesn’t say that you need to hit.
You do need a valid target in range in order to make the attack, because Tremor says nothing special about targeting. But, assuming you have a valid target, you simply knock down everything.
You don’t need to hit anything. Tremor does exactly as it says. “Other models within 2” of this model (ie. Darius) become knocked down." There’s no attack roll involved. Abilities that trigger when a model is hit by an attack are not triggered.
It may be confusing since tremor is listed under the hammer’s special rules, but it’s how Tremor has worked since time immemorial. (Note that this is a different rule from Quake, which also knocks down models but which does require a direct hit first. It’s also not helping that the weapon’s name is Quake hammer but it has the Tremor rule and not the Quake rule.)
Weird that it’s an attack that doesn’t require an attack roll or anything. Feels like it should be a *action instead of a *attack (and then it can have special rules that a model can buy attacks after this action or something, if that was the reason why it’s listed as an attack).
It does not specify that models are hit, so models are not hit. Special attacks that don’t require an attack roll but count as hit are worded as “models within x” are automatically hit and suffer…" (see e.g. Storm Raptor’s Energy Pulse).
It’s a special attack on a melee weapon, so it can e.g. be used after charging. There’s a reason why Tremor works like it does. It’s actually pretty streamlined when one stops thinking too complicated thoughts and just takes it as written.
It just feels counter-intuitive that it’s an attack but it doesn’t hit anyone, do any damage, affects everyone in a radius equally, and you don’t make an attack roll (yet still need a single target even though it’s not in any way a targeted ability).
Sure, it works, I’m just saying it feels a bit weird.
But this one doesn’t specify that any models are automatically hit.
It should follow all the rules of a melee attack, which are then modified further by the ability text. The ability does specify that there’s no damage, but doesn’t say anything about not making an attack roll.
Now, whether the attack hits or misses has no impact on whether afected models are knocked down, but in the absence of text saying otherwise, it seems an attack roll and target are still required.
So you would need to make an attack roll against a target, and regardless of what you roll, models would be knocked down? And abilities on the original target triggering on a hit/miss would trigger? That would be counterintuitive in my opinion. I don’t recall any precedents of needing to make an attack roll just for the heck of it.
That’s why I submit that the attack does not hit, it simply affects the models within range. Compare with the Khador Devastator’s Rain of Death *Attack, which also does not specify hitting, it simply makes models suffer a damage roll.
There is a notable, and most likely intentional, difference to e.g. the Energy Pulse *Attack.
