A Question About Base Removal

[bddbrown]

Hi,

I've been looking at the Base Removal rules and they seem very complex because they try and cover every possible situation. This is both good and bad. Good that there is little scope for cheese, bad because it has taken five readings to really absorb the rules. I have a question regarding uber-picky edge case.

Take Side A with 6 bases (3x2) fighting against Side B with 4 bases (2x2) and all lined up. Say Side A loses a base due to a death roll. So Side A can choose any of the front 3 elements to lose.
p.67 "* Close combat: Any front rank base facing the enemy battle group which inflicted most hits on the battle group."
What happens if Side A chooses the overlapping front rank element?
p.68 "All vacated front rank close combat fighting positions (except overlaps) must be filled if the battle group has any bases available to do so."
This seems to indicate that Side A does not then shuffle any bases to fill the front rank and the BG remains in an illegal formation, with 2 bases in the front rank and 3 bases in the rear rank.

Cheers,

Bruce.

[rbodleyscott]

Hi,

I've been looking at the Base Removal rules and they seem very complex because they try and cover every possible situation. This is both good and bad. Good that there is little scope for cheese, bad because it has taken five readings to really absorb the rules. I have a question regarding uber-picky edge case.

Take Side A with 6 bases (3x2) fighting against Side B with 4 bases (2x2) and all lined up. Say Side A loses a base due to a death roll. So Side A can choose any of the front 3 elements to lose.
p.67 "* Close combat: Any front rank base facing the enemy battle group which inflicted most hits on the battle group."
What happens if Side A chooses the overlapping front rank element?

Leaving aside the probability that no player would want to do this as he would get less dice next round....

If you read the rule literally, the overlap isn't facing the enemy battle group, so isn't eligible to be removed anyway. This is not only the literal meaning of the above rule, but also captures the spirit as you are supposed to be taking a base from the place where the enemy did most damage.

I appreciate that this probably makes the mention of overlaps in the second sentence you quote

p.68 "All vacated front rank close combat fighting positions (except overlaps) must be filled if the battle group has any bases available to do so."

redundant, but its redundancy does not make the above interpretation incorrect. (Although it would give scope for Yahoo groups to debate the interpretation at length).

Moreover, despite that sentence, the previous sentence:

Other bases of the battle group immediately shuffle up to retain contiguity and fill vacated front rank positions.

allows BG integrity to be restored. (The second sentence you quoted enforces this for non-overlaps, but does not forbid it for overlaps).

And even if BG integrity could not be restored, the formation would not be illegal because it is the result of an compulsory move (yes, yes, I know the counter-argument) - the BG would only have to reform if it was going to make a voluntary move.

I appreciate that all my above points are arguable (barely) if someone is determined to make an issue of it, but , however you choose to interpret the rules, I don't see that it leads to any significant problem (nor cheese).

[shall]

I have always found this area a bugger in that it is one of those areas that seems pretty obvious when in front of you but not easy to put down in words.

I just never seem to have a problem if I follow the simple philiophy of

Take off base where most damage was received, and sort out BG thereafter.

But then all sorts of exception occur:

1. What if this make a hole - hence shifting to maintain integrity as rbs mentions
2. What is condererd to be bases that received most damage - hence facing ( but reading ti now it is a bit awkard if an impact is offset slightly so a base is overlapped by 1mm only)

Persoanally I am finding one of the lessons now is not to try to iron out the last 1% in the rules as the words needed to do so are +33% and ruin the document as a vehicle to grow the hobby.

To me now all such tweaks are best solved on a website where only those who are relly interested - serious comp players who we do indeed respect and want as part of our clientelle - can while away their time to the hearts content.

So the rulebook is the core that is enough for 95% of players and the website - which will be just as high a standard - will add the quality product support for the hardened pros.

This we get a great galme well supported for thre comps and an easy enough read for the newbie - we hope.

Si

[bddbrown]

Hi,

I agree with everything you have both said. I wish there was a much simpler way of wording the whole Base Removal section. It is far too complicated in my opinion for something that should be quite simple. Personally I would be happy with a little cheese potential in this area if it cleared up the wording significantly. I would hate to try and explain that section to a 12 year old playing his first game (well ok it would never happen like that, but my point is that it's quite complicated for what should be a simple operaiton).

Cheers,

Bruce.

[shall]

Open to all offers on how to do it - i think we are a bit snowlblind now on it if honest.

Si

[bddbrown]

I suppose this would be the advantage of a split layout, with simple (but accurate) rules up front and then detailed explainations later. For Base Removal you could literally say "Remove a front rank element where the most hits were dealt and fill in any gaps." - for club players this is more than enough. Then in the detailed explaination you can cover all of the edge cases.

[lawrenceg]

Open to all offers on how to do it - i think we are a bit snowlblind now on it if honest.

Si

How about:

If a base is removed from a front rank close combat fighting position, it must be replaced if possible by another base of the BG. The replacing base is selected according to the following priorities:

1. Any non front rank base.
2. Any front rank base not in close combat or only fighting as an overlap.
3. Any front rank base in close combat, provided another base of the battlegroup is fighting the same enemy battlegroup.
4. Any front rank base.

After replacing a base, or if it is impossible to do so, the battlegroup may no longer be contiguous. In that case, move bases to restore contiguity. Follow the same priority as above when selecting which base(s) to move.

On base removal priorities I make the following comments:

I think you can remove the the constraint that you must (if possible) leave at least one base in contact with each opposing enemy battlegroup ( as the base will always be replaced if possible).

I suggest changing the base removal priority for close combat from "facing" to "facing or overlapped by" in case the most hits were inflicted by an overlapping BG.

[bddbrown]

Breaking it out into steps / bullet points makes it easier to read and process.

[bddbrown]

A follow-up question to base removal. I've been thinking about this and reforming rules. Take a Pike BG 2 wide by 4 deep. It loses two bases and under the rules this could leave it with a a file of 2 deep and a file of 4 deep.

This leave the BG in an illegal formation, but I don't know when it reforms or if this is a legal way of removing bases in the first place?

[rbodleyscott]

A follow-up question to base removal. I've been thinking about this and reforming rules. Take a Pike BG 2 wide by 4 deep. It loses two bases and under the rules this could leave it with a a file of 2 deep and a file of 4 deep.

This leave the BG in an illegal formation, but I don't know when it reforms or if this is a legal way of removing bases in the first place?

There is no such thing as an "illegal formation", there are only "normal formations" and not-normal formations.

As far as I can see removing bases in this way is not illegal.

The BG can reform at the start of either player's manoeuvre phase, and must do so if it makes a voluntary move other than to feed more bases into a melee.