Actions

Actions are battlefield tasks (raising a ritual, retrieving archeotech, planting a device) that units perform instead of fighting, usually to score a mission. This page explains which units are eligible to start an Action, the cost it imposes for the rest of the turn, and what causes an Action to fail or complete.

How Actions are written

Where a rule lets units perform an Action, that Action is defined by five labelled parts. STARTS gives the moment the Action begins; UNITS states which friendly units can perform it; USE LIMIT caps how many times your units may start it; COMPLETES names the moment it finishes; and EFFECT describes what completing it does. An Action may also list extra restrictions of its own. The core Actions are open to all players. Others, found in mission packs and similar publications, can be limited by army faction or some other criterion.

Starting an Action

A unit may begin an Action unless one or more of the statements below apply to it:

• It is currently off the battlefield.
• It carries the AIRCRAFT or FORTIFICATION keyword.
• It is currently battle-shocked.
• Its OC characteristic is 0 or '-'.
• It is engaged. A TITANIC unit is the lone exception, since it can act while engaged.
• It performed an Advance or Fall Back move earlier this turn.
• It has already begun another Action this turn.

The last pair matters for sequencing. A unit that has already Advanced or Fallen Back is locked out, and no unit can begin two Actions in the same turn.

The cost of acting

Committing to an Action ties a unit down. From the moment it starts until the end of the turn, that unit is not eligible to shoot and not eligible to declare a charge. The shooting restriction is waived only for TITANIC units, which can act and still bring their firepower to bear. Most units performing an Action are therefore spending their turn on the task rather than on the enemy, so weigh the mission value of the Action against the offence you give up.

Completing an Action

An Action completes at the moment named in its COMPLETES section, often the end of your turn, and its EFFECT is triggered then. Completion is not guaranteed. If a unit that is performing an Action makes a move before the Action completes, or leaves the battlefield, the Action fails and produces no effect.

What counts as a move here needs care. Pile-in and consolidation moves are excluded, so a unit does not blow its Action merely by piling in or consolidating during a fight. Any other move breaks the Action, including being compelled to move by an enemy rule. Because Actions typically run until the turn ends, a unit acting near the enemy stays vulnerable to effects that would shove it, and losing the unit to destruction likewise takes it off the battlefield and denies the effect.

A worked example

Consider a device-planting Action. It might read: STARTS in your Shooting phase; UNITS one INFANTRY unit within a terrain area that is not inside your own deployment zone; USE LIMIT once per turn; COMPLETES at the end of the turn; EFFECT set up one marker within 1" of your unit and inside that terrain area. Reading it against the rules above, the unit forgoes shooting and charging from the Shooting phase onward, must survive and stay put until the turn ends, and only then places the marker. If it is forced to move, is destroyed, or leaves the table before then, the marker is never placed. Eligibility at the start, a turn-long commitment and a payoff on completion is the shape shared by nearly every Action you will meet.

Frequently asked questions

What is an Action in Warhammer 40,000 11th edition?

A scored task rather than an attack: the unit spends its turn doing something the mission asks for, and the mission pays out when the COMPLETES moment arrives. Read the five labelled parts in order before you commit, because USE LIMIT is the one players forget and it stops a second squad starting the same job.

Which units can start an Action in 40k?

Any unit on the table with a real OC value that has not Advanced, Fallen Back, been battle-shocked or begun another Action this turn, provided it is not engaged and is not an AIRCRAFT or FORTIFICATION. The OC test is the one that catches people: models with a '-' for OC, such as some support vehicles, cannot act even though they can do everything else.

Can a unit shoot or charge while performing an Action in Warhammer 40,000?

Not unless it is TITANIC, and even then only the shooting comes back; a TITANIC unit still cannot declare a charge while acting. Note the timing runs both ways: an Action that STARTS in your Shooting phase can be begun by a unit that has already fired earlier in the phase, since the restriction only bites from the moment the Action starts.

Does moving cause a 40k Action to fail?

Almost any move does, but the acting unit is allowed to fight. If it is charged it can pile in and consolidate without losing the Action, and it can make its melee attacks too, since fighting is never barred. The moves to fear are ones your opponent imposes on you, and a Transport's ingress move if the unit is aboard.

When does an Action complete in Warhammer 40,000 11th edition?

At whatever moment the COMPLETES line names, and not before. A unit that dies in your opponent's Fight phase before an end-of-turn COMPLETES has done nothing, so an acting unit is usually parked out of sight or screened by something you do not mind losing.