Shooting into and out of terrain

[benjones1211]

As this seems to be played a number of ways I thought I would ask for some clarification. This is how I read them!

Lets start with the easy one!

Gully : Troops inside a gully can see outside: therefore if armed with Musket they can shoot 6MUs
Troops in a gully are only visible from outside within 1MU: therefore no one can shoot at them until they get to within 1MU of the gully

Enclosed Fields: Light Foot and Dragoons wholly inside are only visible within 4MUs: therefore Dragoons and Light Foot armed with Musket can shoot at troops at 6MU, troops can not shoot back at them until they are within 4MU.
The terrain affects the line of site (Pg108 see below) of the enemy, it doesn't affect the dragoon/LF line of sight. In effect they can ambush shoot.

Marsh, Vineyards, Brush as above but LF only.

Plantations, Villages, Forests, : Troops wholly inside are only visible within 4, 2, 2MUs respectively.
Now with this one there are two parts.
First is the visibility, which restricts people shooting at them, that one is obvious (I hope).

Second is the line on pg108
A file can shoot at a target base if it is possible to draw straight lines from both front corners of its front rank base to a single point on the target base without passing through
*Terrain that would block line of sight

Now if the Terrain is square, and a lot of people do use square terain, and the unit is lined up on the edge of the terrain then they are wholly within for visibility, but any straight lines drawn from the corners would not be going through any Terrain that would block line of sight therefore they should be able to shoot 6MU's using muskets. It would also mean anyone charging them need not enter the terrain to contact them or get any negative's for terrain although the BG in the terrain may get positives/negatives.

Ben

[kevinj]

I'm not sure if you're reading this that, for example, troops in a gully can shoot at anyone in their range, but only be shot back if the enemy are within visibility range, i.e. 1 MU?

This is covered on P170 "When they shoot, they become (and subsequently remain) visible to all bases of the battle group they are shooting at - these can immediately shoot back".

Your other point, about troops in terrain that can be contacted without entering it is correct, each calculates POAs based on their own circumstances.

[benjones1211]

Thanks for pointing that out, must have missed that section, although, on page 170 it does mention LF and Dragoons in all the possible circumstances it actually doesn't mention shooting from Gullies, so are they a seperate occurance, which can ambush shoot.

Also it does clarify who can shoot back and that is just the BG the LF and Dragoons are shooting at, and no others.

The rules state they must always shoot, so LF and Dragoons in terrain get very little benefit from the visibility, other than fire from artillery, or if there are multiple BG's within 6MUs but over 4MU's, only the one shot at can return fire.

This then raises another question, a Dragoon unit is on the edge of an enclosed field, some Horse are 4.5MU's away, the Dragoons fire at them, and thus become visible to them, therefore the Horse can charge them in the following Impact as "When they shoot, they become (and subsequently remain) visible to all bases of the battle group they are shooting at."

[kevinj]

The bit on LF and Dragoons only specifically mentions those terrain types that have limited visibility for LF/Dragoons as opposed to those that are general for all troops. It doesn't mention, for example, woods or plantations as well as gullies.

As for your dragoons on the edge of the field, I'd say they can be charged, although they would count as protected. Of course if they were a gnat's wotsit back from the edge they would be too far away.

[deadtorius]

Try to keep your base front back a bit from the edge of the terrain, that way your opponent has to enter it to fight you, and then they can possibly count as disordered etc. We players seem to have a tendency to wiggle up to the edge of our terrain pieces don't we?