Slitherine

We had several questions come up on legal formations last week and I would like to ask a what if question.
If a unit of 8 pike fight one file against each of two enemy Bgs drawing one and surviving a test but loosing a base that file looses the base but next round the same happens again, is the base removed from the file that looses it or is it reshuffled to 3 deep both files
My thoughts are that these are forced looses so they would come of the same file, but to keep legal formations we should try to keep them even?
Mike.

Base removal in close combat is:

close combat: Any front rank base facing the enemy battle group which inflicted most hits on the battle group.

Replacement of the missing base uses the following rule:

All vacated front rank close combat fighting positions (except overlaps) must be filled if the battle group has any bases available to do so. Non-front rank bases must be used if any are available, and can be from any part of the battle group.

There is no requirement to replace the front rank with another base from the same file.

somewhere it states that the bases must be removed that are in contact with the enemy that caused the base loss. So in this case the base would be removed from in front of the BG that caused the pikes to lose the base. In the next turn if the same BG forces the pikes to lose another base it would have to come from the same file. Now you can shift the 4th ranker over from the other file which leads to another question... when exactly does a pike block lose its 4th rank?

If they are only fighting a single bg and lose 1 base per turn for 2 turns do they remove one base from each file of the pike block still counting as having a 4th rank of pikes during the second melee before they lose a second stand or pikes? I can't believe that you could lose 2 bases of pikes in one file and have 4 in the next file to keep the PoA advantage, that would be silly and waaay too cheesy.

In the above example it is more clear since the combats are seperate and the POA's would be different for each combat. Just wondering since my own pikes will soon be ready for their trial run.

When a BG loses a front rank base any non-front rank base can be used to replace it. It does not have to come from the same file. As the BG continues to lose bases, the they will need to be replaced in a way that maintains a legal formation. You cannot lose two bases from one file and none from the other because only the rear rank can have fewer bases than the front rank. The only situation that I can think of where a base may need to come from a file other than the one containing the most bases is when you have to maintain battlegroup integrity with bases that are stepped forward.

you do have to remove bases from the file in contact with the enemy as per the rules of base removal and the only way you can shift bases from the other file is if they are not able to fight ie overlap.

Page 116 states " Non-front rank bases must be used if any are available, and can be from any part of the battle group". So you fill the gap with a base from the rear-most rank, and must use all the 4th rank before you can use any 3rd rank in order to maintain a valid formation.

It can be from the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th or 6th rank. Rear ranks then shuffle up to close forward.

Mike

deadtorius wrote:somewhere it states that the bases must be removed that are in contact with the enemy that caused the base loss. So in this case the base would be removed from in front of the BG that caused the pikes to lose the base. In the next turn if the same BG forces the pikes to lose another base it would have to come from the same file. Now you can shift the 4th ranker over from the other file which leads to another question... when exactly does a pike block lose its 4th rank?

If they are only fighting a single bg and lose 1 base per turn for 2 turns do they remove one base from each file of the pike block still counting as having a 4th rank of pikes during the second melee before they lose a second stand or pikes? I can't believe that you could lose 2 bases of pikes in one file and have 4 in the next file to keep the PoA advantage, that would be silly and waaay too cheesy.

In the above example it is more clear since the combats are seperate and the POA's would be different for each combat. Just wondering since my own pikes will soon be ready for their trial run.

When a battle group with two or three files of pike loses a base, the file with only three ranks does not get the fourth rank bonus while the files with four ranks do. You will need to use different dice for each file in this case as they will have different POAs.