Wound Allocation in Combat

Hey all! Found a new one for you that I never before noticed, and has been...not really the way we have been playing (at least in the games I've been involved in)

Typically we've been grabbing models off the back and I've often heard it's because you remove 'any model in base contact' when wounds are taken in combat and taken that as gospel. Turns out it's actually supposed to be allocated to the closest model to the attack, just like in the shooting phase (pg. 51, BRB "wounds are allocated starting with the closest model, just like in the Shooting phase). By an large, this doesn't mean much until an Independent Character with a tanky save comes along who might be in the back of the unit for that safe shooting phase. Rules as written, our glorious ICs actually need to be front and centre (or at least equidistant with other models in the front) for his tanky save to come into play. Bearing in mind that you can't use a Pile In move to take you out of contact with an enemy for a more favourable position...this could make things a bit tricky at times for some unit choices.

Anyone have any thoughts on this? I was previously unaware that this was the case for wound allocation in combat and have often just said 'yeah, they're all in base contact with each other', and will likely maintain that attitude regardless, but as always I'm curious about the opinions of the people who I actually roll dice with.

Technically wounds in combat follow similar rules to shooting. In my experience this slows the game down to a crawl but is the correct way of doing it. Rolling dice one at a time for a save on a Independent character coupled with look out sir rolls is frustrating. I guess it depends on who you're playing and how closely they want to adhere to the RAW. I usually play the same way you do unless an opponent wishes to do it by the book

I hear ya on that one. I don't feel cheapened by playing it the way I do and I don't feel like nickle and dime-ing my way into a 10 minute combat, but at the same time there are instances when the amount of models you can fit into the combat make it (now, anyway) less than sportsmanlike to keep that character at the back for shooting but consider him at the front for tanky saves in combat. There are some pretty ridiculous units out there that can take seemingly 'all of the saves' and come out unscathed at the end of it. On the one hand you have the IC dying first, on the other hand you have him make 10-20 saves and then the whole unit gets to hit you back.

Is there any merit to the idea that you can make all the Look Out Sir rolls you have models available for until you fail one, and then the remaining wounds have to fall by proximity to the attack? Off the original topic, but tied in...somehow.