A few questions from last night

Good morning to all,

Great game last night with three more new players at the club and another excuse to get the Sassanids and Romans out again.

With quite a bit going on around us in terms of other games, half a dozen observers and general chit chat we worked our way through the rules however a couple of small points came out which I would greatly appreciate some information and then direction to teh correct section of the rules:

Combat - what is the maximum amount of units you can have any one combat when the enmeny has only one unit?  

We had the circumstance when a unit of isolate Roman equites was in combat with two units to its front of Saravan "clibinarii", one as the main opponent and one as the support.  Another unit of Sassabids wanted to charge the flank of the Rmans but we thought that you could not enter an exisiting combat.

Is that correct?  Doesn't sound quite right howevr we are still learning the rules.

Elsewhere it mentions simultaneous contact (7.7.3 point 4).  On what occassions can this occur?

I was under the impression that you moved a unit and resolved its actions then and there and then moved on to the next unit.

Oblique and sideways movement of a unit.  

Can a unit make part of its move sideways and then oblique with the remainder?  Thinking of skirmishers who may have evaded from enemy cavalry just behind friendly foot and then rally and wish to move to the side of that same foot unit.

Under what circumstances if any can evaders fire at chargers?  

Wheeling

Point 5.4 looks pretty straight forward however I can be a bit thick! A unit of CM wants to move straight ahead wheel 90 degrees and them move again to his maximum 10 cm move. Is this possible or does he need to take a Discipline Test? I think we interpreted that as long as he has the movemnt he can do as part of his 10cm but just wanted to check as others thought a test was in order?



Thanks gents

Carlo

Combat - what is the maximum amount of units you can have any one combat when the enmeny has only one unit?  

As long as a unit can touch the base on an enemy unit it can join the melee. Practically I’ve never seen more than 3 but I suppose it would be possible to get 5 or more in on one unit.

Elsewhere it mentions simultaneous contact (7.7.3 point 4).  On what occassions can this occur?

Perhaps the word simultaneous is incorrect here but the example is correct. Substitute in 7.7.3 “at the same time” for simultaneous and you may be a bit closer to the idea represented. Imagine a unit that charges the enemy from the flank. In this melee the main unit for the active side is the obviously the flanking unit. Then imagine later in the turn another friendly unit attacking the enemy from the front. The enemy unit is now in melee with a unit to its front and a unit to its flank. The Front unit is always the main unit and in this case the main unit shifts from the flanking unit to the frontal unit.  That’s what is being outlined in this section.

Oblique and sideways movement of a unit.  
No, oblique and sideways movement are different moves and require different movement phases. You can’t split a single move up between them up.

Under what circumstances if any can evaders fire at chargers?  
No circumstances. Assuming that the evading unit  is on opportunity it may fire but it cannot then evade in the same enemy move.

Wheeling
CM moves forward, move 1
CM wheels, move 2 (discipline test required at end move)
if CM passes test he may move forward, move 3 (discipline test with -1 one dice roll.)

Hi Gaius,

Thanks so much for the quick response.

7.7.3 point 4.

So does that mean that the unit fighting in the flank earlier in the same turn now can provide support dice to the unit who has charged that unit to the front subsequently in the same turn?

Cheers

Carlo

Yes, Carlo. The flanking unit is now the support unit and contributes its dice to the melee.

Was thinking after my response to Carlo how others play his one scenario.

Imagine a CM 20U away from a CL on opportunity. The CM makes its first move of 10U. The CL fires on the CM and misses. The CM then charges the CL in the second movement phase. We play it that the CL cannot evade because it fired in the other unit's activation. Is that how others play it? The alternative would be that the CL could evade because the CM is charging in a different movement phase from the movement phase it fired.

Gaius Cassius wrote:Was thinking after my response to Carlo how others play his one scenario.

Imagine a CM 20U away from a CL on opportunity. The CM makes its first move of 10U. The CL fires on the CM and misses. The CM then charges the CL in the second movement phase. We play it that the CL cannot evade because it fired in the other unit's activation. Is that how others play it? The alternative would be that the CL could evade because the CM is charging in a different movement phase from the movement phase it fired.

5.11.2 states that a Unit on Opportunity can fire instead of evading. But once the CL have fired at a target and they are not going to be contacted by that target they are no longer on Opportunity. Thus, provided they are not both firing and evading in response to the same movement pulse of the enemy they can do both.

So in your example they fire at the CM somewhere between 20U and 10U as they see fit (presumably inside 15U) and when the CM make the second move which is the one that would bring them into contact with the CL it is at that point the CL can choose whether to evade or not.

If the CL had chosen not to use Opportunity fire during the first pulse of CM movement then during the second pulse they would be in an either/or situation, they can either fire or they could evade but not both.

Hey GG, what you say does make sense. I wish 5.11.2 was a bit clearer on this. And I have this sneaking suspicion that Lorenzo ruled differently than what you say a few years back. But I can't remember for sure.

Ah great, another one we need the boss for.

I've always tried to think of the 'opportunity action' as a separate thing (...well it is a previous move sacrificed after all )

It does also say you can only shoot once per turn though so in this case I would say no to a second shot but yes to anything else. eg counter charge , evade