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 Fleeing as a charge reaction

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FrostWolf
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PostSubject: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyWed Mar 18, 2009 8:22 pm

I heard back from GW on our rules disagreement from last Saturday. It turns out that the flee movement from a charge reaction is resolved completely in the compulsory movements phase. This would include making any extra movement due to ending your flee move on top of a friendly unit. After all compulsory movement is done (remember that the timing of the compulsory movement phase is there for the sole purpose of interfering with charges?), you move on to the move chargers phase and resolve your charge against the fleeing unit like you would a charge against any other unit, except that if you successfully make it into contact then the unit is immediately removed. Yes it is done completely backwards from the resolution of fleeing from a combat, but stick to the basic turn sequence and all is well. Declare charges, Rally fleeing troops, compulsory moves, move chargers.

A final note before posting GW's reply: The most important rule... I hate to harp on it, but I suggested a roll off on this rule that was turned down because I was "wrong." These are precisely the sort of arguments that the roll-off rule is there for and anybody (myself included) can be wrong about rules that they are "absolutely sure" about sometimes.



Hello,

The answer is C, with a small addition. The ‘Enemy in the Way’ rule on page 23 might change the outcome.



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From: Richard Franzen [mailto:(deleted out my email address)]
Sent: Tuesday, March 17, 2009 5:26 PM
To: Ask Your Question
Subject: Units fleeing through friendlies as a charge reaction



Hello,
My gaming group had a recent disagreement on the resolution of flee moves in reaction to chargers. What occurred was that the charger had a 12 inch charge range and was only 3 inches away from the unit being charged. The flee roll was only 8, which in normal circumstances would have obviously resulted in the unit being caught and removed. The fleeing unit, however, ended its 8 inch flee move directly on top of a friendly unit and per the normal fleeing rules was moved past this friendly unit putting it outside of the charger's charge range and putting a friendly unit between the charger and their target.

The question is what happens now and why? The interpretations we came to from the rule book were as follows, but nobody could agree on what was the correct ruling.

A:) Due to the fact that the distance between the units plus the fleeing unit's flee roll was less than the charging unit's charge range, the fleeing unit is removed immediately before resolving it's movement in the same fashion as a unit being pursued from combat.

B:) The flee movement is resolved completely in the compulsory moves phase and the charger does not measure distance (and would not have been allowed to measure the 3 inch distance before the flee move) until the move chargers phase, where the unit is measured to be just out of charge range due to the extra movement it gained by fleeing through a friendly unit. The fact that there is another unit in the way of the charge is ignored because the charger need only be in range of the fleeing unit to catch them. The charger fails to catch the fleeing unit.

C:) Similar to B, the flee movement is resolved completely in the compulsory moves phase and the charger does not measure distance (and would not have been allowed to measure the 3 inch distance before the flee move) until the move chargers phase. In the move chargers phase, the charge against the fleeing unit is resolved as a normal charge against the unit in its new position. The charge is failed due to both there being a unit in the way of the charge and the fleeing unit being out of range of the charge.

D:) None of the above. We all had it completely wrong and the charge/flee is resolved in an entirely different fashion.

Thanks for your help on this question!
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyWed Mar 18, 2009 8:50 pm

glad you rembered this because I had comeptly forgotten about it. Thanks for looking into it.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyWed Mar 18, 2009 9:38 pm

It does not come as a surprise to me that GW's rules contradict themselves yet again. Fleeing is not fleeing, it is fleeing from chargers or fleeing from combat and I am sure it is different in some other place as well. I agree that the roll-off should have been allowed even though I believed the way it was handled was correct, even if I was wrong based on GW's response. I instead backed off and let you and my partner argue it out. My real problem with how GW ruled it is that it opens up the rule to be exploited by those who play ruleshammer instead of warhammer. Which is a big part of why I seldom play tourneys Smile. But, that is part of the game as long as the disagreements don't get out of hand and everyone has fun anyway. Thank you for writing and getting an answer. I may not agree with it, but it is better to play it right so it stays consistant no matter who you play against or where you play the game.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyWed Mar 18, 2009 11:35 pm

Yeah c seems like the right answer to me also, they get to run like little children before you can even charge, It happens in just about every battle report I read, where a small fast unit is set up to flee and bait the charger into something nasty. On the bright side, that unit might fail it's test and flee.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyThu Mar 19, 2009 1:22 am

I almost went and forgot about it myself, you'll note I didn't send that email off until Tuesday evening. I usually go back over every game in my head at some point in the next day or two and do my best to look up anything that I think might have been handled incorrectly. I tend to be more than willing to roll off during a game if a dispute can't be settled quickly and easily by pointing out a single sentence in the rulebook, however I very much prefer to have the correct ruling available the next time we play so that we can all be playing by the same rules (the correct ones, preferably). This calling and the casting into combat were the ones that I know we handled incorrectly (a spell may not be cast into combat unless specifically mentioned in its description pg 107). The ones I'm still unsure about and would like to get a better answer on are :

1: Immune to psychology "automatically passing" terror tests and whether this requires a terror test later if ItP is lost. This use of this wording rather than "doesn't test for" seemed rather deliberate to me and I saw no other reason why it would be phrased like that then for situations like this. Further reading of Fear/Terror rules leaves me not so sure that this is the intended rule (I.E. I think I read too much into RAW over RAI on this one)

2: Deployment of Characters. How we handled this seemed wrong and different from the way I've always played it in several different groups. The most simple interpretation of deployment rules in the book seem to agree with me, but I can see where argument could be made to read it in the way it was played. I would like to get an official answer on that one, as the way we played it gives a bit much of an advantage to characters on powerful monsters leading a small army.

3: Monster handlers on the hydra. I remember there was confusion in how a flank charge should be handled against the hydra. Pg 67 (under Skirmishers instead of Monsters?! Wow GW, just wow) has the rules for this but I honestly don't remember how we ended up playing that one. Also, I found a thread saying that multiple wounds to one handler can carry over to the second handler on Druchii.net but have yet to find any sort of official answer to back this up. This would be in line with how any other mixed unit like lizardman monster handlers, squig herds, and war machine crews are handled, however.


Yes, I truly wonder if the writers even have a full understanding of how their rules work sometimes. Then I usually chuckle and say "Of course they don't. What was I thinking?" The best way to look at this one is more of the difference between a pursuit move than a charge move. It does leave an inconsistency between the two types of fleeing but this ruling leaves all types of charges being resolved in the same fashion and same order. So it's trading off one consistency to save another if you will. As for what sort of exploits this would leave the system open to, I'm afraid I'm drawing a blank. The only things I see that this really allows are these:

1. Friendly units can screen a retreat.
2. Unexpected compulsory moves can interfere with a charge against fleeing troops.
3. Troops fleeing through difficult ground can escape more easily thanks to fleeing units ignoring terrain penalties.

All of these are things that I would call tactics instead of exploits, but then one's definition of an exploit vs a tactic often depends on how it affects oneself, and I find bait and flee style tactics to be the best part of this game. I also play an army where the "elite" units can rarely stand up to the core units of more recent armies, so there you go... I'll call em tactics. Oddly enough all of these tactics (that only protect fleeing units from a charge) would realistically be quite useless for a unit beaten and broken in close combat with their attackers already on top of them, so there's some unexpected justification for the differences in rules.

Of course if you want to see some contradiction, then re-read the fear and terror rules in light of the timing of measuring charge range. I don't know about you but I'm more confused on that now and would probably allow my opponent to measure that one immediately after all charge reactions are declared.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyThu Mar 19, 2009 1:25 am

Just FYI GW rulings by the rulzboyz is not official. The validity of their responses will induce laughter in most seasoned players.
Having read what is posted here Yes it Seems John Spencer almost got one right.

In order of how it should go:

1. Declare all charges
2. Declare all charge reactions
3. Rally Troops....
4. Compulsory moves, the players whos turn it is decides in what order to resolve the compulsory moves, In the Order that Charges were declared the defender if not engaged in combat follows through with their charge responses if it is to Flee.
5. In the case stated the Fleeing unit rolled an 8 and landed on top of another unit Correct? Move the unit beyond the friendly unit.
6. Friendly Unit needs to take a Panic Test now. And move the Unit if it failed...
7. Finish remaining compulsory moves in order of the declared charges,
8. Stand 7 Shoot & Hold are carried out
9. Chargers Measure for charge distance in order of declaration 1 at a time
A. If they can reach the original target the target is destroyed...
B. If another unit is in the way the Charger MAY declare a new charge vs the new unit, or stop 1" away from them if they are in charge range.
C. If they are too short they move their normal movement rate forward towards the original target.

So I hope that helped...
Basically if the charging unit had enough charge to hit the unit in front of the fleeing unit the fleeing unit is safe (For now) and the charger declares a new charge vs. the new target and then the new target takes its reaction.

So in a sense none of the given answers were totally correct. but C was the closest, and yes if there is a disagreement please roll off if a compromise has not been made in a reasonable time frame.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyThu Mar 19, 2009 1:55 am

Good call on the panic there Makari, I forgot to include that in the write-up. The unit being fled through in our game was ITP but its still worth mentioning. True about roolzboyz too, though they can usually be relied on for core rules like these. If your question involves spells or magic items in any way, then yeah, make sure you don't drink anything while reading their response.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyThu Mar 19, 2009 3:59 am

I will try to answer some of these:

This calling and the casting into combat were the ones that I know we handled incorrectly (a spell may not be cast into combat unless specifically mentioned in its description pg 107).

I am not sure what "calling" means or which spells you are refering to so I can't help here.

1. you got me here. I assumed that automatically passing means just that and since you only have for terror once in a game, it stands to reason you don't have to test later if you lose your immunity.

2. This one I wouldn't mind clarification on myself. In 6th edition, it was spelled out: All troops where placed, all characters where placed, then scouts. The person who finished placing troops first got a +1 to choosing to go first. It reads like you have to place characters even if the other side still has troops to place, so I am not sure.

3. I could not find anything official either even after reading the Dark Elf FAQ. I went with the assumption that since you must hit the Hydra if you can if the breastmasters are split on either side you could only kill the one you can reach if the other is protected by the Hydra.

4. some examples of what I would considered an exploit vs good tactics:

exploit: place a unit of goblins 2 inchs in front of a unit of Savage orcs and choose to flee. The Orcs don't care if I understand the rules correctly and the goblins cannot be caught by any infantry due the the rule that you are placed behind friendly units if you land on them. even if you rolled a 2 to flee. A better example would be to do this with a character.

good tactics: high elf player sends an eagle out in front of an enemy unit that is frenzied in such a way that the frenzied units charge will angle away from another unit just out of charge range and leave them open to a side charge.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyThu Mar 19, 2009 4:17 am

If it gives you peace of mind, after reading the FAQ I discovered that I was playing the beastmasters wrong. Their scourge counts as an extra hand weapon giving them 3 attacks each that is armor piercing instead of the 2 attacks I was doing. Also, hydras and their beastmasters count as skirmished, I was not taking advantage of that. I make mistakes and try to call rules fairly for and against myself.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyThu Mar 19, 2009 1:21 pm

on the exploits vs good tatics it really depends on the person a number of people would call you useing a eagle to force a bunch of frenzied units to charge the way you want to eploiting rules, to me both your examples are simply good tatics that can backfire when you are able to use it(stupid undead are to stupid to run go figure). I dont recall during our game ever casting magic into combat except for maybe invocation(the rebuild spell for VC).

Funny but I figured haveing read the rule book I would have less qustions on the rules instead of more questions.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyThu Mar 19, 2009 5:23 pm

First off let me say that I don't think anybody was cheating or trying to abuse any rules in our game. Any rules issues we had were clear mistakes or honest disagreements. I just want to get the correct rules ironed out and be sure that they are known by both sides. Indeed it would be cheating to look up a rule and knowing that you did not know it, withhold that information until I can use it to my advantage.

Now as for the casting issue, I may have my facts wrong, but I'm fairly sure that Rob cast a damage spell into a combat, stating that he was able to do so because it was not a magic missile. I could be wrong and it might have been that he was casting the spell from a caster that was in combat at an unengaged unit. This would be ok as long as the spell is not a magic missile. Also, invocation may be cast into combat. I don't have the VC book but this is apparently something that is only hinted at in the spell description but is verified as acceptable in the VC FAQ.

It seems that my question on the timing of measuring charge range for Fear/Terror causers is also in the FAQ and they are measured in the Declare charges phase after all charge reactions. That is one mystery solved! Yay!

You seem to have found the skirmishing rule I was directing you to for Hydra's in my previous post. Nice stuff, huh? Oddly enough the FAQ verifies that your monster and handlers do benefit from ignoring terrain penalties but are still affected by terrain on a charge (Why? I honestly don't know). That's interesting on the scourge rules too. I don't have the Dark Elf book so didn't know how those worked. Another interesting tidbit that I just found in the FAQ to give your beasties some more punch is that hatred carries over to mounts just like Frenzy. This means that your Dragon does actually benefit from his Rider's hatred. Ouch!

Now, I'm going to have to disagree with you on your tactics versus exploits examples. The good tactics example is golden and is certainly an example of what tactics in Warhammer should be all about. The "exploit" however is what I'd call poor tactics and far from an exploit. In order to "exploit" something you really need to be gaining some sort of unfair advantage for doing it and I just don't see that here. You are taking a trash unit and putting it in front of a good unit thereby blocking most of the good unit's charging abilities and maneuverability (and in the case of a character exposing them to higher risk of shooting/magic). You then, in order to save this cheap trash unit are giving your opponent a free charge against your good unit. That might actually be useful if you WANTED your opponent to charge into, say, a nasty spearman unit, but your opponent doesn't even HAVE to redirect his charge into that unit. You really might as well have just left the front unit at home because the enemy's charge ends up working just like it wasn't there. All you get is a fleeing unit in your back lines. But wait, there's more! You say that this unit is safe? After just giving away a free charge to the opponent, what is most likely to happen? That good unit of yours is probably going to break from combat, and if the unit in the way had actually saved the fleeing unit at all, then that fleeing unit is right behind the combat and has already made its 1 flee move per turn. This doesn't sound like an exploit, it sounds like a disaster! Ok, maybe best-case scenario for this deployment: stick a unit of empire knights in front of a unit of flagellants. You give up most of the mobility of the knights by holding them back with the flagellants, but gain the security of tar-pitting anything that tries to charge them in the front. Of course you are taking a lot of points into a narrow frontage in this case and without good support, this formation is vulnerable to flanking. With good support your opponent can just bait and flee to draw your knights out of formation or charge into your support units to break past the knights. End result: even this plan is something that I would only call good tactics and is still far away from being an exploit.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyThu Mar 19, 2009 11:17 pm

let me clear up a few things, a standard unit of infantry is 4 to 5 inches long. if you are a character in front of a solid infantry unit, you are guaranted to be able to flee at least 7 inches do to the infantry unit behind you. at that point, if you did your math right, you have a choice, if it is a unit you want to take a charge, you take it, if not, you flee with that unit as well and unless you roll extremely poor, both units get away and the charging unit is left hanging with its flanks open for an attack. To me, that is exploiting the rules to get the extra 4 to 5 inches of flee move. It gets worse if you have a mage with a movement spell. The unit/character that fled has a good chance to recover in most cases and can be moved back into contact in the magic phase. There are several other ways that rule can be used to great advantage that I do not believe are in the spirit of the rules and therefore an exploit.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyThu Mar 19, 2009 11:41 pm

As for the spell Rob was using, it is called "Tree Singing" and the last paragraph states: "the spell can be used to inflict D6 strength 5 hits on a single enemy unit that is even partially within a wood or simular terrain feature." The FAQ also clearifies that the spell can be cast on any woods or simular terrain on the board, no line of sight needed. Hope that helps.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyFri Mar 20, 2009 1:26 am

Fleeing is the new big wave for 7th ed(not for me I play tomb kings). It's hardly an exploit and is something that is easy to counter. here is a tip or two.

Block retreat routes, use fliers or fast calvary, and now their Hard unit can charge your weak unit, thus turing the tables.

Just don't charge! A unit set up to flee is called a bait unit, don't take the bait, Leave it there to block his big unit from doing anything good.

Finally never charge when you might be left high and dry, and if you do have a unit to counter charge their counter charge.

An army fleeing can be a pain, but fleeing has it's down sides.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyFri Mar 20, 2009 2:01 am

first, if you can get fast cav in the backfield like that on a regular basis, you are either an amazing player, or playing some really poor ones. As for flyers...not all armies have flyers worth buying or they take up a slot better used for something else. Some examples that come to mind are Ogre Kingdoms, they have neither fast cav or flyers and Wood Elves, they can bring 50 point eagles, but they lose the option for a Treeman in that slot. Their Hawk riders are far too expensive to consider. Their cheapest fast cav are shooters at 24 points per model for a horse, spear, no armor and a longbow that loses the wood elf specials. I should point out that you can buy 2 archers that keep all the wood elf specials for the same price.
For some armies, it is viable. Dark Elves have cheap flyers and reasonable fast cav. Brets have arguably some of the best flyers in the game which could end up in the backfield due to over run and pursuit rules. Vampire Counts have some decent flyers for a good price, but have more opportunity to get units in the backfield in the magic phase. I am not familiar enough with most of the other armies to say for sure, but I am willing to bet that Dwarves would have a hard time fielding enough flyers or fast cav to mount a decent defense against the "fleeing as an exploit" maneuver.
Just my 2 cents of course. Everyone is entitled to an opinion and just because it doesn't agree with mine doesn't make it wrong. And now for the disclaimer because I have always wanted to say it Smile.

These opinions do not represent the opinions of these forums or their affiliates.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyFri Mar 20, 2009 2:55 am

I just read something in the FAQ part 2 that might shed some light on casting into combat. The question was about the spell from the colloge of metal called rule of burning iron and it states that it can be cast into combat even though the spell itself does not specifically state it can be cast into combat. This makes it fuzzy on rather or not tree singing can be.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyFri Mar 20, 2009 11:50 am

I just thought of a good reason to do flee and let them hit another unit. If I have one of the special characters with a unit of skinks right in front of him draw out someone and then let him stand there and take the charge. He gets to strike first when people assault him so it would work out. Plus he gets to make you reroll successfull to wound hits.
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PostSubject: Re: Fleeing as a charge reaction   Fleeing as a charge reaction EmptyFri Mar 20, 2009 10:43 pm

The casting into combat rules seem pretty crystal clear to me.

"Wizards cannot cast spells at units engaged in close combat unless the spell only affects the caster himself or the spell's description specifies otherwise." BRB pg 107.

Rule of Burning Iron is a spell that had been argued about for quite some time about the ability to cast it into combat (or even into games on the neighboring table). I'm actually rather relieved that they got around to answering this one finally. The reason that there is an exception on this spell is the spell specifically states "No targeting restrictions apply except that the wizard needs line of sight to the target." It seems clear that GW has ruled that a spell not being able to be cast into combat is a targeting restriction and would be included in the catch-all phrase of no targeting restrictions apply.

I don't believe that tree singing states anywhere that it ignores all targeting restrictions. Simply having no requirements for range or line of sight doesn't mean that it completely ignores any and all other restrictions altogether. Even a spell like, say, foot of Gork which states that it stomps "any one enemy unit on the table" may not be cast on units in close combat because it isn't specified in the spell description.
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