Attacking from behind?

[Axly Suregrip]

I am with Shostak on this. That is, a jab should get the facing bonus. Here are the reasons:

1) logic: if you get a +4 DX because the target cannot see your attack behind him, why then would the length of the weapon make you loose that +4 due to range?

2) "hex" in documentation: Hex is used to mean hexside in the documentation in other places. ITL 108 states this about shields, "Shields protect against physical or missile-spell attacks from the 3 front hexes (or, if slung on the back, from the back hex) ." From that statement, if I were to read it literally as Henry did about jabs, then shields would not work against jab, missile attacks, thrown weapons, or anything that did not come from range 1 front hex. Since we don't do that for shields then we should be consistent with how jabs work.

[Cmdr_Bonehead]

Do missile or thrown weapons get a facing bonus to attack? If so, then it stands to reason that the two hex spear jab should, too. If not, then why would the spear get such a bonus, while these other attacks don't?

If we house rule that the two hex spear jab does get a facing bonus, then shouldn't missile or thrown weapons also benefit from facing?

[phiwum]

That seems to be a long debate around here. As far as I know, the consensus is that neither missile nor thrown weapons get the bonus.

I think that it's easy to conclude that missile weapons shouldn't get the bonus, since the standard such weapons travel mighty fast. Knowing they're coming wouldn't provide much benefit. (Something like a boomerang may be an exception.)

Thrown weapons tend to be slower and you might say they get the facing bonus (in effect, the to-hit without the bonus takes into account the ability of the target to pivot, duck, etc.). You could even argue this is sensible, since the rules explicitly say "A thrown-weapon attack is treated exactly like a regular attack" aside from the range penalty. But obviously, that quoted bit isn't meant literally, or else one could Defend a thrown weapon attack[1].

Anyway, I go with the consensus and do not give facing to thrown or missile weapons. A spear isn't all that much like those two attacks, however.

[1] Which, actually, the rules on Defend kind of make plausible, since they say it is only good for "non-missile" attacks and that might mean it works for thrown weapons!

[hcobb]

Melee page 10: "NOTE: Missile weapon attacks don’t get DX adds for facing."
Wizard page 11: "An enemy’s facing does not affect adjusted DX of spells cast against him."

[Shostak]

Originally Posted by Cmdr_Bonehead

If we house rule that the two hex spear jab does get a facing bonus, then shouldn't missile or thrown weapons also benefit from facing?

The polar arm jab getting the facing adjustment is not a house rule. While Missile Weapons are specifically described as not getting the facing adjustment, no such mention is made under Thrown Weapons, so one could argue that they do benefit from facing.

[phiwum]

The polar arm jab is an old Inuit UC III special attack, I suppose.

[Shostak]

Originally Posted by phiwum

The polar arm jab is an old Inuit UC III special attack, I suppose.

Frackin' autospell!

[Axly Suregrip]

Originally Posted by phiwum

The polar arm jab is an old Inuit UC III special attack, I suppose.

ROFL.

Inuit Harpoon, ST 10, jab capable & throwable. 1+0 damage. Talent:Polar Harpoon.

:-)

[Axly Suregrip]

The GM screen says Defend works vs melee and thrown attacks (not missile). "+1 die on to-hit roll by thrown weapons or regular “melee” attacks."

Has we determined if that is an error or is that correct?

[phiwum]

I never noticed that.

If that's not an error, then one can Defend against thrown weapons. This makes some sense, because you can't Dodge while engaged, so if you can't Defend, then thrown weapons are especially good when you're throwing at someone engaged.

On the other hand, this means that thrown weapons can be either Dodged or Defended. The quoted bit on the screen doesn't say you have to be engaged with the thrower in order to use Defend, which means that thrown weapons are now *weaker* than missile in this respect: if A is engaged with B and C is firing a missile weapon at A, then A cannot Dodge. In the same situation, if C is throwing a dagger, say, then A can Defend.

Thanks, Axly, for pointing that out. It really is consistent with RAW's description of Defend. However, consensus seemed to be that RAW's description was a bit sloppy, and it could be that the screen just made explicit what was mistakenly implicit in RAW.

But at present, I'm thinking Defending a thrown weapon was intentional.