Slitherine

Page 72 says an evader whose path is blocked by an enemy BG stops 1 MU away. Page 116 says routers meeting obstructions are treated as evaders but, "If its path is obstructed by unbroken enemy that cannot be bypassed, the BG is destroyed at the end of the phase." We had this happen and played the routers halted 1 MU away from the blocking enemy BG, the pursuers made their pursuit move and then at the end of the phase the routers were removed from the table. Is this correct? It also seems possible the routers should have moved all the way to touch the blocking BG -or- that they should not have moved at all.

They move to an inch, if already at or closer they do not move, then they are taken off at the end of the phase so that the pursuers have something to chase I assume.

philqw78 wrote:They move to an inch, if already at or closer they do not move, then they are taken off at the end of the phase so that the pursuers have something to chase I assume.

Depending on the phase the owner would also have a chance to rally before they are taken off (correct?). Why he'd want to rally someone 1" from enemy to bring them back from Routed to Fragmented is anyone's guess...

Broken troops within 6 MUs of enemy cannot be rallied.

Which is something I was wondering about recently...does that have to be < 6MU, or does exactly at 6MU stop rallying?

If they get to 6MU by a second move its out, if by first and only move its in, would stop argument

"Within" would include exactly at 6mu, it's exactly the same wording as for Second Moves.

philqw78 wrote:If they get to 6MU by a second move its out, if by first and only move its in, would stop argument

You can't get to 6 MU by a second move, you can only get to a gnat's todger more than 6 MU.

rbodleyscott wrote:

philqw78 wrote:If they get to 6MU by a second move its out, if by first and only move its in, would stop argument

You can't get to 6 MU by a second move, you can only get to a gnat's todger more than 6 MU.

*cough* skirmishers 4MU + GT *cough*

grahambriggs wrote:

rbodleyscott wrote:

philqw78 wrote:If they get to 6MU by a second move its out, if by first and only move its in, would stop argument

You can't get to 6 MU by a second move, you can only get to a gnat's todger more than 6 MU.

*cough* skirmishers 4MU + GT *cough*

Well yes, but the point was the "more than".

This is a major flaw in the way the rules are written to avoid phrases used in previous rulesets.

A HF BG move to the proverbial 6MU by second move. Its opponent now moves towards it 3 MU. Are they now inside or outside charge reach?
More importantly how do you actually play it.

I can't believe anyone moves to a gnats todger apart with their HF

Good point Phil. That's why I always assumed you stopped *at* 6 MU.

I do think there's a problem with the wording around second moves...I looked at it quite carefully before, and decided that what the wording meant was that player A would move troops up as far as thery can go on their second move. But player B's troops would be free to make a second move becasue A's troops were not now "within" 6MU.

But then I discovered that is not how most people think it should work, and not how people seem to play it! Which is fine, but it does suggest that some fine-tuning/clarification of the rules could be helpful.

And as Richard describes it above, there still seems to be a problem, to me. If "within" is meant to include "exactly at", B would be able to make a second move because A has been forced to stop at 6MU plus a gnat's todger. So again that implies to me that A stops exactly at 6MU. Or that a gnat's todger is truly dimensionless. In which case expect lots of letters of complaint from angry gnats!

The fundamental difficulty I think is that the intention is that people shouldn't be able to second move and be able to shoot, but should be able to stop second moves by the enemy, thus different (and careful) wording is required in those two cases to produce the desired different results.

To be fair, I haven't looked closely at V2 wording in this area yet, so things may have improved!

I've always played it as 6+GT, HF move to 3+GT and are therefore out of charge reach. I wasn't aware that this view was in any way contraversial as I've never had anyone try to play it the other way.

Oh! Maybe it is one of those regional differences, which didn't become apparent because hardly anybody was using HF in tournaments

Oh! Maybe it is one of those regional differences, which didn't become apparent because hardly anybody was using HF in tournaments

This has perhaps been more relevant in Fog R where MF and HF both move 3MUs.

The Oxford dictionary offers for within:

"not further off than (used with distances): he lives within a few miles of Oxford"

Surely "not further" includes being at the exact distance.

Well I've never seen people second move to 6, then not (be able to) charge after their opponents 3 MU move, or their opponents complain about that charge.

The Shrubber wrote:The fundamental difficulty I think is that the intention is that people shouldn't be able to second move and be able to shoot, but should be able to stop second moves by the enemy,...........

Now that I play differently. If the enemy can second move so can you.

One occassion where this has made a significant difference to a game of mine.

I second move cavalry bow in line to 6 MU from cav lancers. Cav lancers move 5 MU forwards. I shoot them twice to no effect, his turn then mine. In his next turn he charges, I roll even VMD, he rolls up 1MU. The ruling was he caught me.

ShrubMiK wrote:The fundamental difficulty I think is that the intention is that people shouldn't be able to second move and be able to shoot, but should be able to stop second moves by the enemy, thus different (and careful) wording is required in those two cases to produce the desired different results!

There is no such intention. If enemy march up to (just over) 6", the approached troops can march away as long as they get no closer to the enemy.

philqw78 wrote:One occassion where this has made a significant difference to a game of mine.

I second move cavalry bow in line to 6 MU from cav lancers. Cav lancers move 5 MU forwards. I shoot them twice to no effect, his turn then mine. In his next turn he charges, I roll even VMD, he rolls up 1MU. The ruling was he caught me.

The ruling was wrong.

Within is defined in the glossary as "at or closer than". Therefore "Not within" 6 MUs = greater than 6 MUs. Therefore you could not second move to exactly 6 MUs from the enemy.

The lancers were thus > 1 MU of you before they charged, therefore they could not hit you by charging 1 MU more than your evade.