Slitherine

As you can see I've been saving these up whilst on holiday.....

Can a Battle Line interpenetrate friends? (Assuming all other interception criteria are met)

Pete

petedalby wrote:As you can see I've been saving these up whilst on holiday.....

Can a Battle Line interpenetrate friends? (Assuming all other interception criteria are met)

I cannot see any reason why not.

I cannot see any reason why not.

I couldn't either but my concern is that it opens up another possible avenue of abuse on the interpenetration rules.

Imagine a 6 base LF BG deployed in 2 lines 14 MU from the base edge. A battle line of Cavalry BGs are deployed in a single rank at 10 MU from the base edge.

The LF advance 5 MU and contract by 2 bases so that they are now in a 1 base wide column, 6 deep. The Cavalry battleline advances 5 MU and reaches the rear most LF base. From my reading of the interpenetration rules, the Cavalry are now moved all the way through the LF BG? This gives the Battle line of Cav a move of over 10 MU in a single move. Put a Commander with them and they're over the half way line on turn one!

A good one to try with your Ghaznavids perhaps?

Wouldn't it make more sense to prohibit interpenetrations unless they can clear the unit being interpenetrated? It would cut out this kind of nonsense?

Pete

You have a point.

You have a point.

As a good ploy for the Ghaznavids?

Pete

petedalby wrote:

You have a point.

As a good ploy for the Ghaznavids?

Pete

Possible, although I am using Sassanids.

The diatribe that follows is not in any way directed at you Pete, we are grateful to you for pointing out the possible cheese. The diatribe is directed at those who might actually try to make use of the "loophole" you have spotted:

I don't see it as a particularly useful ploy. Although there is no reason why a BL should not interpentrate LF, as far as I can see, nothing in the rules would allow any BGs that did not pass through the LF to get any extra distance. So I guess you could use your LF column trick to get extra distance for a BL of 2 BGs of cavalry (by placing the join between the BGs behind the column of LF), but you could not use it for a BL of 3 or 4 BGs. And what self respecting Ghaznavid/Sassanid player would have only 2 BGs of cavalry in a battle line? And what a waste of the LF, which could be doing something more useful.

If my opponent wants to waste his mental energy setting up cheese like this, that gains (very) marginal advantage and wastes mental effort that could be better used thinking of a sensible plan, then let him. He will merely be showing the world what a pillock he is.

It reminds me of my last 7th edition foray to Derby, where one of my opponents was cheesily moving his heavy infantry further than their normal move (3" instead of 2") by expanding them in one turn and contracting them in the next. What annoyed me about this was that it clearly showed his lack of true skill, because with a bit of forethought he could have kept them a bit further away from my troops and moved them even faster (6") at march speed. As they said of King James I & VI; "The wisest fool in Christendom".

rbodleyscott wrote:I don't see it as a particularly useful ploy. Although there is no reason why a BL should not interpentrate LF, as far as I can see, nothing in the rules would allow any BGs that did not pass through the LF to get any extra distance. So I guess you could use your LF column trick to get extra distance for a BL of 2 BGs of cavalry (by placing the join between the BGs behind the column of LF), but you could not use it for a BL of 3 or 4 BGs. And what self respecting Ghaznavid/Sassanid player would have only 2 BGs of cavalry in a battle line? And what a waste of the LF, which could be doing something more useful.

I think the real concern is not with people doing things like this deliberately (although I can see how an army with only a few Cav BGs might want to get a slingshot effect into an opponent's rear) but with people exploiting a circumstance that arises during a game. Sort of like "bunging" in DBM: no one will admit to doing it deliberately, but lots of people will wind up--deliberately or otherwise--in those sort of situations during a game.

In this circumstance the fix is easy and requires only changing a sentence or two in the rules. It can be done prior to initial publishing. And it should be done. Not fixing it, and relying instead on a sort of generalized, Phil Barker-esque disdain for those who might use this cheese is bad policy.

Marc

PS. I honor Phil Barker for his real contributions to wargaming over the years, but his steadfast refusal to contemplate that his rules might have loopholes drives me crazy.

I forgot--in my previous post--to mention what I thought might be two ways to easily change the rules to minimize or eliminate this cheese:

1) simply state that an interpenetration move can only occur if the interpenetrator's front edge can clear the far edge of the interpenetrated BG; or,

2) as in the rules for evading, say that the interpentrating BG stops in the middle of the interpenetrated BG and one or both of them become disordered until the situation is resolved.

Any comments on that? Good ideas? Bad?

Marc

I don't see it as a particularly useful ploy.

Perhaps not - but what prompted me to reflect upon it was a similar string where some testers were exploring a similar abuse of the interpenetration rules to get interpenetrating BGs through slowing terrain more quickly. I think the example was Elephants interpenetrating LF in Difficult terrain.

You have a number of options on how to fix it. I prefer the first of Marc's suggestions - it avoids all of the messiness of intermingled BGs. Ignoring it now may prove unhelpful in the longer run.

Pete

ANother option would be to say no interpentraton can result in a unit moving more than two of its base depths further than its regular move in that terrain.

Because the idea is we don't mind at all about simple interpenetrations, but it is egregious ones that matter. I think that is a fair paraphrase of part of RBS' reaction.

All possibles and all worthy of consideration .... most cheese has gone but this one is a nice piece of Edam.

For after Britcon I would say, but we can beat a few of these to death over a few beers in Manchester.

As mentioned in the similar stream we are committed to providing official interps for such matters and will do so either by altering the rules of on the official FOG website.

Si