Do you know the rules?

I have a confession to make, I don't know the rules for 40k, do you?

Well, that isn't strictly true, I actually know loads of rules for 40k. They might not be the right ones, but I do know loads of them from numerous different editions and they've all sort of amalgamated in to one set of rules and so I suffer from MES, Multiple Edition Syndrome. As some of you are aware, this year I'm really trying to get some games in and I'm planning on going to the UKGT at the end of the year but over the past couple of weeks, I've had a couple of situations that have made realise that I really need to get my head in the rulebook and read it properly.

First off, I've started getting off my backside and getting down to the club to get some games in. Now, at the club, we've got a relatively new player Draz (who's actually a FTW blogger too - check this blog, give him some encouragement and tell him not to feel so bad when I hand him his arse on a plate - lol). Now Draz is quite different from all the other players at the club in that he's only played 5ed, and so the rules are clean and fresh in his mind, whereas the rest of us suffer fom multiple edition syndrome, and so I've found myself, and man of nearly two decades of gaming under his belt asking 'the new guy' for rule clarifications.

Secondly, I got into a brief discussion online regarding firing multiple plasma weapons and the allocation of get's hot wounds. Halfway through, I decided that I'd recheck the rule book and low and behold, there it was, perfectly clear in black and white. Now I've read that section numerous times and never really taken in the rule, perhaps it was selective reading, I don't know, but I do know is that it's not on if I want to go to the GT.

And finally, I played a game against Dunc and his new nasty nids at the club last night. We played CnC with a spearhead deployment. Dunc had his objective buried in cover surrounded by as sea of little nids and nid nasties, whereas my objective was right in the corner with no terrain with 18 inches of it on the far right of my long table edge. The plan was simple, I reserved everything and then deployed a large distraction force on the far left of the table to draw his nids away from the objectives and then bring a unit in from reserves to claim my objective whilst using my valk with the command squad to contest his and that's exactly how it happened - perfectly. At the end of the game, my valk sat on top of his objective surrounded by nid units and a vanquisher sat on top of mine. It was at that point that Dunc pointed out that tanks can't claim objectives and so it was a draw. If I'd just deployed one of the vet squads on the objective instead of part of the distraction force, the game would have mine. Not remembering that fact cost me the game - gutted!

So, that's when I came to the realisation that I really do need to get my head in the rulebook at learn the smegging rules, or I'm going to look at (insert insulting name here) at the GT at the end of the year.

So, am I the only one who suffers from multiple edition syndrome? Do you know the rules? Are you sure?