A Target Rich Enviornment

rogerg · Post by **rogerg** » Wed Jul 14, 2010 12:05 pm

Oh no! I've gone and read the rules. I've changed my mind.
The bases in an overlap position, but in contact with the routers, do fight as an overlap. They are not contributing dice or a POA to fight the routers, hence they contribute as an overlap.
It was Graham's comment about feeding them into the melee that led me to read this. If I am correct and they are eligible to fight, they cannot therefore be fed into the melee elsewhere.

grahambriggs · Post by **grahambriggs** » Wed Jul 14, 2010 4:03 pm

rogerg wrote:Oh no! I've gone and read the rules. I've changed my mind.
The bases in an overlap position, but in contact with the routers, do fight as an overlap. They are not contributing dice or a POA to fight the routers, hence they contribute as an overlap.
It was Graham's comment about feeding them into the melee that led me to read this. If I am correct and they are eligible to fight, they cannot therefore be fed into the melee elsewhere.

you can feed in bases that fulfill these criteria:

- not able to contribute to combat prior to being moved (with dice or by creating a POA)
- no enemy bases in front edge contact with them, nor able to fight them as an overlap
- moving them must not result in contraction by one file

these bases fulfill all three criteria:

1. You don't contribute to combat vs. routers with dice or POAs. Different mechanism.
2. the routers have their rear in contact, not front.
3. there is only one file facing the routers, hence only one file needs to contract

grahambriggs · Post by **grahambriggs** » Wed Jul 14, 2010 4:13 pm

Oh I see what you mean Roger, P86, they are in a position to fight as an overlap on the Thracians as they are in an overlap position. If they had hit troops other than routers they could not fight as an overlap as 'a base that can contribute to close combat to its front (with dice or by creating a POA) cannot fight as an overlap'. You don't use dice or POAs against routers, so that doesn't apply. So they fight as an overlap against the Thracians. So they don't need to fill in bases (indeed they can't)

petedalby · Post by **petedalby** » Wed Jul 14, 2010 4:46 pm

Hurrah!!

kevinj · Post by **kevinj** » Thu Jul 15, 2010 7:44 am

If the Pursuers are 3x2, and it's their right hand base that's hit the Thracians, surely the left hand file could feed in (assuming there's room) as they would noly be in contact with the routers, and therefore not have any enemy fighting frontally, and not contributing as an overlap?

rogerg · Post by **rogerg** » Thu Jul 15, 2010 2:47 pm

Yes Kev, what we are saying is that the bases in the overlap position and contacting the routers will fight in overlap against the Thracians. Others not in the overlap position will be eligible to feed in as usual because they are not able to contribute to the fight.

The revelation from this thread is that contacting routers is not a contribution to fighting.

azrael86 · Post by **azrael86** » Mon Jul 19, 2010 4:31 pm

It seems that is how the mechanism works, but ..then the question has to be is that right? Pursuers are pursuing, and finishing off someone running away is going to be more appealing than fighting someone who isn't.

essentially this means that the pursuers suffer no penalty at all, wheras in practice surely they would be in a bit of a mess maybe even "disordered"?

If we revisit the idea of converted charges, I seem to recall that you could fight routers, and that the result then tended to be the pursuers thought they were winning but so did the new unit (since both invariably inflicted more than received). The routers would then head off and then the remaining troops turn on each other. It seems that this has been dropped, and in so doing the immediate effect is to reduce the chances of the unit who were charged (in this case the Thracians) standing.

rogerg · Post by **rogerg** » Tue Jul 20, 2010 3:47 pm

The combat result for a BG depends on the hits given versus those received. Allowing those fighting the routers to fight as an overlap to the other contact does this rather neatly without having to factor in the routers. The state of the pursuers usually depends on how tough the melee with those routers was before they ran. One might argue that any lack of order form the pursuit is balanced by the enthusiasm of having been in a pursuit.

There can be arguments both ways. The situation as it is gives a reasonable result with a minimum of complication, very much the spirit of FoG.

JacquesDeLalaing · Post by **JacquesDeLalaing** » Tue Jul 20, 2010 4:23 pm

TERRYFROMSPOKANE wrote: It is actually the Thracian's side's turn, so they can expand to their own right to go to a 3x2 formation to overlap the Roman left.

Just a quick question on this: Is it allowed to feed in bases in order to get an overlap? On p. 73, right hand side column, bullet point 1, it says "Bases cannot be "lapped round" the end of an enemy formation to get extra bases in front edge contact" and I don't really know what that means (maybe because my english is rather bad

). Obviously, overlaps are not front-edge-contacts, so what does this section refer to?

Jilu · Post by **Jilu** » Tue Jul 20, 2010 6:01 pm

JacquesDeLalaing wrote:
TERRYFROMSPOKANE wrote: It is actually the Thracian's side's turn, so they can expand to their own right to go to a 3x2 formation to overlap the Roman left.
Just a quick question on this: Is it allowed to feed in bases in order to get an overlap? On p. 73, right hand side column, bullet point 1, it says "Bases cannot be "lapped round" the end of an enemy formation to get extra bases in front edge contact" and I don't really know what that means (maybe because my english is rather bad ). Obviously, overlaps are not front-edge-contacts, so what does this section refer to?

ok a 2 x 2 Cav unit A is attacked by an 4x4 cav unit B. the bases of A touch the middle of unit B.
you can feed 1 base of B on each side of A.
you cannot feed bases in front of the bases that you put in overlap and especialy not feed more bases of B on the sides of A

philqw78 · Post by **philqw78** » Tue Jul 20, 2010 6:08 pm

rogerg wrote:There can be arguments both ways. The situation as it is gives a reasonable result with a minimum of complication, very much the spirit of FoG.

But since the enemy BG, the friend of the router, cannot match this overlap he is now unfairly disadvantaged.

rogerg · Post by **rogerg** » Tue Jul 20, 2010 8:42 pm

Indeed you have a point Phil. However, this is even less likely to happen than the original situation. Nice spot though.

azrael86 · Post by **azrael86** » Thu Jul 22, 2010 10:56 pm

rogerg wrote:Indeed you have a point Phil. However, this is even less likely to happen than the original situation. Nice spot though.

1. that was what I said, and Phil evidently understood it
2. how is it less likely?

and how does it match up with classic Roman doctrine of keeping your best troops behind the front line.