3 hex charge pole weapon rule

[xane]

Originally Posted by hcobb

Bob declares a standing pole arm defense against the three hex charge of the dragon he has remained adjacent to.

The 3 hex requirement is only for the attacker, Bob would get the pole arm defense bonus regardless of how far the enemy moved.

[hcobb]

Gargyole: Literacy, Humanish, Pole Weapons, Staff, Magic Fist.

Stand with silver halberd staff. If the enemy moves next to you spin in place to face them declare standing response at DX 11+2, roll three dice of damage which knocks the intruder down.

Next turn take one step back as they stand up.

Rinse and repeat.

[larsdangly]

Originally Posted by xane

The 3 hex requirement is only for the attacker, Bob would get the pole arm defense bonus regardless of how far the enemy moved.

My reading is that the pole-arm defender against a short (1-2 hex) charge gets the +2 bonus to adjDX but not the 1d damage bonus. Do people agree with this or not?

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by larsdangly

My reading is that the pole-arm defender against a short (1-2 hex) charge gets the +2 bonus to adjDX but not the 1d damage bonus. Do people agree with this or not?

Disagree. The 3-hex straight line condition only applies to attackers getting a damange bonus. The defensive damage bonus is listed as applying to charge attacks, which the same section defines as someone moving from non-adjacent to adjacent.

Hcobb's "gargoyle" above is correct, as it did in original TFT, and applies to any halberdier with DX 11.

If it were otherwise, I doubt anyone would intentionally choose to move 3 hexes in a straight line towards a polearm unless they had some special reason they needed to do that.

[hcobb]

Octopus with a Reverse Missiles ring and three Pike Axes against a party that doesn't have any magic will force retreats and knock the humans down to force the humans to always have to make "charge attacks" every turn until they're all dead.

[Skarg]

Originally Posted by hcobb

Octopus with a Reverse Missiles ring and three Pike Axes against a party that doesn't have any magic will force retreats and knock the humans down to force the humans to always have to make "charge attacks" every turn until they're all dead.

Looks like an off-topic lure to the Sidetrack Swamp. I'm not taking the bait.

"The caustigus, the caustigus...
once you're in, you're lost to us..."

[TippetsTX]

Originally Posted by larsdangly

My reading is that the pole-arm defender against a short (1-2 hex) charge gets the +2 bonus to adjDX but not the 1d damage bonus. Do people agree with this or not?

TBH, I don't think a one or two-hex move (followed by an attack) should be considered a 'charge' at all. Having a 3-hex minimum, straight line or not, just makes sense to me.

[MikMod]

Originally Posted by TippetsTX

TBH, I don't think a one or two-hex move (followed by an attack) should be considered a 'charge' at all. Having a 3-hex minimum, straight line or not, just makes sense to me.

Yeah, me neither. The rules said 'move one hex and attack' or 'move up to half MA and charge attack', and we always took this to mean you could move one hex and not be charging. Or to put it another way, you had to move more than one hex to get charge bonuses. This seemed sensible as the damage bonus presumably worked off some kind of momentum. It worked fine for us and pole weapons were still dangerous, albeit they were doubled on a charge.

I have been roundly told we had it completely wrong tho. :)

[TippetsTX]

A one-hex charge only works in football or rugby.
;)

[hcobb]

Here's the wording I'm going to use.

A charge attack occurs when the attacker and defender entered three or more new hexes during movement. A multi-hex figure doesn't count any movement spinning in its own hexes for this. Only hexes newly moved into during the current turn count. (If the attacker backed up a hex and the defender entered a starting empty hex then the attacker's old hex and was therefore engaged this would be three hexes moved into.)

Any melee attack used when the charge attack totaled eight or more hexes does +2 damage.

Pole weapons used in charge attacks strike before other melee weapons. This is resolved at the adjDX of the attacker or defender, whichever is higher.

If the attacker entered no new hexes during movement then she gets +2 DX for her pole weapon charge charge attack.

If the attacker entered no new hexes or moved the last three hexes in a straight line she adds one die of damage for a pole weapon attack.