Quote Originally Posted by Anggul View Post
As previously stated, Drop Pods don't state that the squad must start in them (bizarrely), so there's nothing stopping you from deploying the squads and having the Drop Pods come in empty. Only the Drop Pods follow the rule for having to start in Reserve, not the squad inside, so I'm pretty sure you have to deploy half of said squads.


I would still let anyone have all of their squads in their pods, because it makes sense and I'm not a douche, but I'm pretty sure that by RAW you can't.

Anggul, the RAW are clear: the troops with Drop Pods disappear from the equation and therefore none of them have to start on the board. The poster known as "Maine" said it all perfectly a while ago. Here is the recap:

Originally Posted by Maine
1. A unit embarked in a dedicated transport counts as 1 unit. Since this can only happen by choice, the fact that it is a choice made by the player changes nothing about the rule - the rule only occurs because a choice is made. Thus, a squad in a Drop Pod is one unit.

2. Drop Pods must be held in Reserve.
2a. Units in Drop Pods must be held in Reserve. They are one unit, because the player chose to embark them.

3. Units that must be held in Reserve are not counted toward the maximum Reserve force.
3a. The Squad must be held in Reserve (with the Pod) because the player chose to embark the unit during deployment, which made it a single Unit, and thus does not count towards the maximum Reserve force.