Weird and troublesome questions

1. Can warrior decide not to attack/wound, make "offensive" rolls against other warriors while in cc?
I'm asking because: week ago Aureus and I had a battle (averland vs sisters). Situation occured when my assassin was in combat with two sisters. He was stunned by one and then aureus came up with an idea of not taking him OoA. Reason was simple: sisters were in open with my two hunting-arrows-bearjagers in short range and 2 shots from mountain guard at full range. If he'd left assassin alone I coudn't shoot him.
So what do you think?
2. Cover from fighting warrior: two warriors are in combat. My archer wants to take a shot at enemy warrior partially hidden by one of fighting warriors. He fails his roll by 1 - shot stikes a cover. Is fighting warrior hit? And what if target is obscured by TWO fighting warriors?

ehm...forgot other questions. For now. cheers

1. When stuff like that happens we generally start to shun that particular player. The rules don't envision not attacking to avoid being shot. His warriors may leave your warrior alone, but then they may not remain adjacent to him and may not claim to be in combat.

Now that I think about it, similar situations have happened when a warrior fails an attempt to charge a fear causing enemy while next to a stunned or knocked down enemy from the previous turn. In which case we ruled them not in h-t-h anymore since they tried to leave.

2. If we shoot into a combat or hit a combat by accident, we randomize among the possible victims, ignoring things like elven cloaks but allowing Dodge and Lucky Charms. By our house rule, you can shoot your own warrior by accident in this circumstance.

1. I'd say thats a fair tactic and though I've not ever tried it I see nothing wrong with it. It seems like a valid tactical choice that I can imagine the Three Musketeers using!

2. The player controlling the model gets to choose which enemy he is claiming cover from! So the assassin would declare whuch Sister he's hiding behind before the shot us fired so the Sisters player can choose nit to shoot. Having said that this onky applies if they are not in combat as you can't shoot at or through a close combat ... IIRC.

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So the assassin would declare whuch Sister he's hiding behind before the shot us fired so the Sisters player can choose nit to shoot. Having said that this onky applies if they are not in combat as you can't shoot at or through a close combat ... IIRC.

That was entirely different combat (although the same battle). In this specific situation my mountainguard was trying to shoot a sister partially (about quarter) covered by another sister fighting with my captain. So generally only fighting sister should be hit. I don't like it - in this way if I fail to shoot a target, and hit (wound) engaged enemy model instead, my fighters would be able to OoA them with ease. That doesn't sound fair

@von Kurst This situation never happend before (or most likely did but we didn't pay attention to details ) We're definitely not a kind of players who stretch the rules to exaggerated level. Of course he eliminated the assassin - that was only a question.

That made me wonder. If a targeted warrior is covering behind models engaged in combat, can shooter accidentally hit his own warband member?
Archers often shoot from the rear, so it is quite probable, that first warrior (engaged in CC) in his line of fire would be one of his own. Hmm, warrior getting accidentally shot in the back by his buddy - seems kind of funny

Second thing - to shoot you need only to see target. So, just to clarify, theoretically you can shoot right through warriors in CC (since most often they do not completely obstruct LOS), in order to hit enemy (unengaged) model on the opposite side of CC?
From What I recall we always played that CC blocks LOS for purposes of shooting (unless archer shots from an angle or elevated position, so the shot has "a clear path" to the target).

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Hmm, warrior getting accidentally shot in the back by his buddy - seems kind of funny

Sounds exactly like some bad animosity rolls

catachanfrog wrote:

Sounds exactly like some bad animosity rolls

Naaw That would require shooting into combat, and even angry orcs don't do that Besides, Animosity is no accident - bastard deserves it!

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Animosity is no accident - bastard deserves it!

True that.

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From What I recall we always played that CC blocks LOS for purposes of shooting (unless archer shots from an angle or elevated position, so the shot has "a clear path" to the target).

We play that way as well. Our main issue is remembering that a miss by 1 hits the cover, since mostly it doesn't matter.

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@von Kurst This situation never happend before (or most likely did but we didn't pay attention to details ) We're definitely not a kind of players who stretch the rules to exaggerated level. Of course he eliminated the assassin - that was only a question.

No worries.

Funny that you mention "friendly fire". Our newest player accidentally shot one of his own men in the back today! and then the poor guy got charged by an angry orc and ghoul.... To quote Treygard, the host from Knightmare, "Eeeewwww... nasty."

I think i have read somewhere that a modell cannot restrain from attacking models in close combat, but i cannot find the rule yet.

I would have done that often to prevent henchmen from killing to save the exp for heroes...

I agree with you, Saranor. I'm sure this has been discussed before and the rules say you have to attack. I'll have to start looking.

I think I found it. In "moving from cmbat" paragraph there is:

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Once models are engaged in hand-to-hand combat
they cannot move away during their movement
phase. They must fight until they are either taken out
of action, until they take out their enemies, or until
one or the other breaks and runs.

IMO, interpretation of the word "fight" is the key here, and I would rather go for "fight=remain in CC", than "fight=use all of your attacks". One way or the other, it's "moving from combat" part of the rulebook, and it does not concern the matter of attacking/allocating attacks - these are merely the conditions that must be met in order to, well, move form combat.

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MO, interpretation of the word "fight" is the key here, and I would rather go for "fight=remain in CC", than "fight=use all of your attacks".

Interesting interpretation. I always thought tha the point of close combat was taking every enemy OoA.

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One way or the other, it's "moving from combat" part of the rulebook, and it does not concern the matter of attacking/allocating attacks - these are merely the conditions that must be met in order to, well, move form combat.

It does matter because it describes combat neverthless.

catachanfrog wrote:

Interesting interpretation. I always thought tha the point of close combat was taking every enemy OoA.

Well, that is my interpretation of the word "fighting" in "moving from combat" rules. More generally speaking, true, you fight to win - in a broader sense restraining yourself from finishing off enemy at hand may be a valid tactical choice (edit - damn, I just noticed, that somebody already used exact same words in this tread, now I feel unoriginal ). Just like in movies - use enemy as a meatshield Pretty much what I tried to do with the assassin

catachanfrog wrote:

It does matter because it describes combat nevertheless.

An aspect of combat, so to speak, not combat in general. I simply think, that this fragment is not enough to settle the matter.
Unfortunately, I couldn't find anything in rulebook that would refer directly to the discussed issue.

Anyway, I find the lack of other people opinions disturbing

I have another rule passage in mind, which i couldn't find yet, where it says explicit, that you have to use all your attacks.

If warriors are in close combat then they need to try to hit their opponent. If you have the option not to hit your opponent then you get problems some of which are:
1) Choosing not to attack with a henchman to improve the chances of a hero getting experience, or
2) Choosing not to attack during animosity.
(Of course each gaming group can come up with their own house rules which is fine.)

Here are some rules that all imply that warriors must roll to hit each round. None are silver bullets but they all point towards being required to attack rather than just standing and blocking blows.

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Models fighting in hand-to-hand combat do not shoot in the shooting phase. They are far too busy fighting for their lives.

If they are far too busy fighting for their lives then they won't know that there might be a crossbowman in a window across the square waiting to get a shot off. They are trying not to get killed and the best way to achieve that (from their perspective and the rules are often written from the warrior's perspective and not your own) is to take their opponent out of action.

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If only one model ‘strikes first’ then it does so and the remainder of the combatants strike in Initiative order as described above.

The remainder of the combatants strike in Initiative order. Striking implies hitting so this means that every warrior has to try to hit their enemy.

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If a warrior is touching more than one enemy, he can choose which to attack. If he has more than 1 Attack, he can divide them in any way the player wishes, so long as he makes this clear before rolling to hit.

This says that a warrior may choose which enemy to attack and can divide attackes between multiple enemies when appropriate but does not allow for choosing not to attack.

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If an enemy is fighting a warrior who is knocked down, he may attack him to put him out of his misery.

Here is an example of being given the choice of attacking or not attacking. If this choice was always available then it would not need to be explicitly mentioned here.

RationalLemming wrote:

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If an enemy is fighting a warrior who is knocked down, he may attack him to put him out of his misery.

Here is an example of being given the choice of attacking or not attacking. If this choice was always available then it would not need to be explicitly mentioned here.

That's a very good point!