03-30-2021, 04:31 PM | #31 | |
Join Date: Dec 2017
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Re: How do you adjudicate initiating HTH?
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03-30-2021, 06:55 PM | #32 |
Join Date: Oct 2020
Location: Haubstadt, IN
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Re: How do you adjudicate initiating HTH?
The way I read HTH Combat, the rules are defining the exceptions to engagement rules. The second paragraph "To initiate HTH combat, a figure moves onto the enemy's hex. If the attacking figure is disengaged, this is a regular move." That is telling me the attacker does not have to worry about engagement. The next sentence "If the attacking figure is engaged, he may shift onto a figure engaging him to attempt HTH, even if he is engaged with other figures as well." This sentence lets you disengage without choosing option (n).
I'm interested to see how the pole weapons discussion goes. Just a thought. "Therefore, on any turn when a pole weapon is being used in a charge attack or against a charge attack(or both), roll all the pole-weapon results first, in order of adjDX, before resolving any other ATTACKS." Could this be part of the reason for stating initiating HTH combat is considered an attack? |
03-30-2021, 08:12 PM | #33 | |
Join Date: Oct 2015
Location: New England
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Re: How do you adjudicate initiating HTH?
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03-30-2021, 08:12 PM | #34 |
Join Date: Dec 2017
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Re: How do you adjudicate initiating HTH?
It's impossible to say what the intent was - the RAW are vague and incomplete on these points and we are not likely to get a direct clarification. But I think combining both the suggested pole weapon house rules (letting them deliver an attack in the movement phase) and the suggested reading of the HTH rules (letting you jump someone from the front in a single move, ignoring engagement and actions) could be ok. But doing the latter without the former could spell trouble.
Personally, I prefer the most parsimonious rulings whenever I can think of them, and to me the use of the engagement rules I suggested at the start of this thread feels like the best way to make one simple ruling and get all the outcomes you want. |
03-30-2021, 10:08 PM | #35 |
Join Date: Jun 2018
Location: Durham, NC
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Re: How do you adjudicate initiating HTH?
Even when HTH is initiated during movement (through moving onto the foe through a rear/flank hex), the attack does not happen until the action phase. This keeps it consistent with all else.
If engaged or became engaged during movement, then you would shift onto your foe during actions phase (just like you shift away during actions when disengaging), and then you are immediately entitled to an attack. There is no conflict with pole weapon rules as you do not get to move into engagement and onto your foe. You have to stop since engagement does this. The only way you can get onto someone into HTH and avoid the stand-against charge is by moving onto him during movement through a rear/flank hex. Note that if you had stopped adjacent, he could have turned to face you and got you with the pole arm. This is the advantage of moving onto someone during movement but the must first error in giving you this opening. |
03-31-2021, 01:49 AM | #36 | ||||||
Join Date: Jun 2019
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Re: How do you adjudicate initiating HTH?
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Acceptance of the rule as is doesn't mean I'd let anyone nerf it by running around in multiple front hexes first, then jumping on the defender to attempt HTH. Surely it's SJ's intent that anyone using option (b) to get into HTH on the movement phase do so in as direct a manner as possible. The attacker, upon entering one front hex, has to continue on to enter the defender's hex without stopping if they are using (b) to attempt HTH. Nor would they get to ignore anyone else's front hexes en route to the defender. And those are hardly house rules -- that's just disallowing anything silly.
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03-31-2021, 01:57 AM | #37 | |
Join Date: Jun 2019
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Re: How do you adjudicate initiating HTH?
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03-31-2021, 08:18 AM | #38 |
Join Date: Dec 2017
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Re: How do you adjudicate initiating HTH?
'Exactly what the rules say' is a stretch, I would say. The rules never sharply state that you can do what you are using in your table rulings. As a point of contrast, Option o makes it explicitly clear that BOTH the attempt to initiate HTH and the first HTH attack comes in the action phase, not the movement phase:
"(o) ATTEMPT HAND-TO-HAND ATTACK. During the movement phase, the figure stands still or shifts; when its turn to attack comes, it moves onto the hex of any adjacent enemy, and attempts to hit with bare hands or (if it was ready) its dagger" (from p. 103 of ITL). Option b doesn't spell this out, but groups entering HTH along with other forms of charge attack, the others of which follow the principle that you move during movement phase and attack during action phase. I'd say this could go either way, though it would be strange to use option o as written but a contradictory ruling for option b. All of this is even more ambiguous because the later section providing more details about HTH says: "When a figure is attacked HTH, it immediately (that is, still in the movement phase) rolls one die to determine its defense against the HTH attack, as follows:" (from p. 117 of ITL) It is inescapable that option O of p. 103 simply contradicts the quoted passage from p. 117. There is no reading of the two that makes them consistent with each other. So, we are stuck with having to make house rules that reconcile them. My approach (you enter HTH during movement phase if you can do so without becoming engaged by your target or anyone else on the way in; you have to do so during the action phase if you became engaged as you approached or started the turn engaged) isn't the only solution, but it is maybe the only one that lets p. 103 be correct all the time and p. 117 be correct some of the time. They can't both be correct all the time, so some sort of compromise is the best you can ask for. Plus I like the outcome, in terms of balance and general consistency with the flow of the rest of the rules. |
03-31-2021, 10:52 AM | #39 |
Join Date: Oct 2015
Location: New England
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Re: How do you adjudicate initiating HTH?
Perhaps useful questions for us to ask are "What is it that we gain by making at least some HTH initiations an exception to the standard turn sequence? What are the domino effects of that exception? How does any of this make the game more fun?"
From my perspective, allowing the HTH initiation during movement adds only confusion (and plenty of it), it opens the door to other thorny questions, like "What about set polearms and last-shot missile attacks?", and that is less fun for me than just following standard rules for movement and engagement and having the actions take place in adjDX order, as normal. Last edited by Shostak; 03-31-2021 at 10:52 AM. Reason: grammar |
03-31-2021, 02:37 PM | #40 |
Join Date: Dec 2017
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Re: How do you adjudicate initiating HTH?
It is definitely confusing, that is for sure. I am satisfied with the way I've been playing it, but a simpler hack all around would be to say that initiating HTH is always performed during the action phase, regardless of facing, engagement, etc. If you follow option (o), you would do this as a special roll just before your attack rather than in place of your attack. Alternatively, you could think of initiating HTH as happening with a timing equivalent to the 'push back' that large figures can do vs. smaller ones. That happens at the end of your movement and is a special event separate from either the normal parts of your move or your actions. The practical difference between these versions is that if you treat it as a part of the agressor's action then the target might get to act before them, whereas if it is a special thing that happens at the end of movement, like a push back, they do not.
Speaking of which, maybe we need a separate thread about the crazy consequences of how push backs work w/r to set pole arms and other issues... Last edited by larsdangly; 03-31-2021 at 02:46 PM. |
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