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Old 12-13-2018, 03:24 PM   #11
Dave Crowell
 
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Default Re: Vulcan Combat Drones

Considering that "disabled" units are able to return fire during overruns, and the bit of spot fiction, either in the GEV rules or the Ogre Book, where a disabled Heavy takes out a target on its own, I would not argue against Vulcan controlled units being unaffected by "D" results on the CRT.

I wasn't able to find anything solid on the range at which a Vulcan can treat an armor unit as a "combat drone". The Battle Box rules just say that a drone "operates normally". Heavy Drones require the controlling unit to be in the same or adjacent hex, as do ducklings. The duckling rules could be interpreted to mean that a Combat Drone unit must be within the same or adjacent hex to the Vulcan to operate at full efficiency, but this is not clearly explicitly stated. Since a Vucan drop control of most of its ducklings to take active control of up to four (one per channel?) . The rule states that ducklings fight at half strength, and if control is dropped they count as disabled. It is not clear to me if this means that a Vulcan could control up to 16 ducklings, each fighting at half strength, or 4 units serving as combat drone each fighting at full strength. All within the same or adjacent hex range limitation. Or how exactly it works.
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Old 12-13-2018, 04:08 PM   #12
GranitePenguin
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Default Re: Vulcan Combat Drones

[QUOTE=Dave Crowell;2228367
I wasn't able to find anything solid on the range at which a Vulcan can treat an armor unit as a "combat drone". The Battle Box rules just say that a drone "operates normally". [/QUOTE]
That's exactly my point why the range is unlimited. The rules do not state a range, therefore, there is none.

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Heavy Drones require the controlling unit to be in the same or adjacent hex, as do ducklings. The duckling rules could be interpreted to mean that a Combat Drone unit must be within the same or adjacent hex to the Vulcan to operate at full efficiency, but this is not clearly explicitly stated. Since a Vucan drop control of most of its ducklings to take active control of up to four (one per channel?) . The rule states that ducklings fight at half strength, and if control is dropped they count as disabled. It is not clear to me if this means that a Vulcan could control up to 16 ducklings, each fighting at half strength, or 4 units serving as combat drone each fighting at full strength. All within the same or adjacent hex range limitation. Or how exactly it works.
As I stated above, the 1-hex range for Heavy drones should apply only to Engineering activities because the heavy drone is an M3 unit. However, you could argue that is only so it can move from one side of the Vulcan to the other. Where that argument falls flat is the fact there's basically never a time where M3 would be necessary in that case (it's not like the drone can't drive through the Vulcan hex).

Regardless, what heavy drones and ducklings do ultimately doesn't have a lot to do with what a combat drone can do.
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Old 12-13-2018, 04:10 PM   #13
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Default Re: Vulcan Combat Drones

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Originally Posted by TheAmishStig View Post
I like that. Maybe even go as far as putting the marker on the unit no matter what its status is, that way it's completely unambiguous that it's being controlled (and if cleverly utilized what channel it's on).
That was kindof implied. You need a way to mark it at all times since that's kind the point; it's really just a bonus that it can be used for disabled or not units.
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Old 12-14-2018, 07:54 AM   #14
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Default Re: Vulcan Combat Drones

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Originally Posted by TheAmishStig View Post
"Crew Disabled" is where it gets into messy semantics. Most of the time, it could be treated as 'not disabled', because the crew is going to recover at the start of the next turn anyway, either before or simultaneous to the Vulcan choosing its control targets
Not quite - remember, a vehicle disabled by enemy fire recovers after the next enemy turn. So I can see the following sequence:
  1. Enemy turn: Friendly armor gets disabled by fire.
    Friendly turn: Vulcan takes control of disabled unit and either attacks with it or moves it out of enemy fire range.
    Enemy turn: Either units have to pursue the retreating "disabled" drone, or let it go, assuming they weren't destroyed the previous turn.
    Friendly turn: Assuming it survives, the disabled armor recovers and the Vulcan releases control, possibly taking control of a different unit instead. Recovered armor moves and attacks normally.

So the crew takes a full turn to recover, while the Vulcan takes over for that turn and either uses it to press the attack (possibly removing the threat, or possibly not caring about whether the crew survives as long as it gets in a shot), or moves the unit out of harm's way until it can recover. Which could well be a very good set of tactics, especially if you can kill whatever it was that was threatening the disabled unit(s) or otherwise force them into a tactical disadvantage...
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