8th Ed. Does the first rank count as a rank?

[themuffinman873]

Lets say my lone cowboy is in CC with a small unit of goblins. If the goblin unit was 5 wide, and there are 5 goblins in the unit left at the end of the combat phase, do the goblins get +1 for having 1 more rank than me? What if it was 4 goblins, or 8 goblins?
The answer to me seems like it should be only at 10+ goblins do you consider getting the +1 rank bonus for CR, however the rules dictator at our local shop seems to think otherwise.

 

[Dyvim Tvar]

They do count as a rank.

But you only get rank bonus for ranks after the first so no +1

Also:

A unit can get rank bonus for an incomplete rank of at least 5 models. 10-wide unit of 15 models gets +1 for example.

If the cowboy wins the Gobbos will be steadfast since they have more ranks (1) than he does (0)

 

[Stonecutter]

Ranks are as detailed by Dyvim Tyvar. The references are:

1) ranks toward rank bonus - pg. 52 Calculate combat results under the sub-heading Extra Ranks; and

2) steadfast - pg 54/55. This addresses the issue of 5 gobbos forming a "rank", which they do. The key here is to read the example in italics since it is easy to confuse this with part 1 above. The description of 12 bloodletters indicates two complete ranks and a third rank of 2 daemons.