Clarification on Skinnies in SST Evo.

[Xorrandor]

I'd say up until he rolls the die for the last skinnie armor save before his army shatters... but I guess that's only if you are CRAZY enough to think that "any time" means the same thing as.... "any time"... :wink:

Hey, I don't mind there being a line (although I'd hope it was before he rolls the die for the last skinnie agility check ). I just don't want to go into a game thinking the line is in one place, and then discover my opponent thinks it's somewhere else.

 

[Voracioustigger]

I'd say up until he rolls the die for the last skinnie armor save before his army shatters... but I guess that's only if you are CRAZY enough to think that "any time" means the same thing as.... "any time"... :wink:

Hey, I don't mind there being a line (although I'd hope it was before he rolls the die for the last skinnie agility check ). I just don't want to go into a game thinking the line is in one place, and then discover my opponent thinks it's somewhere else.

There are a lot of ambiguous rules in any wargame, and if you think they'll come into play, you should simply talk with your opponent beforehand. This, however, is not ambiguous in the least. It doesn't say "at the start of any action" or "at the start of any turn" it says, "ANY TIME"

If your opponent ever tries to question it... follow this conversation....

Enemy - You can't ambush now! I've already targetted your squad!
You - Yes I can!
Enemy - No you can't!
You - What time is it?
Enemy - Umm.... 2:30... why?
You - So it is in fact... a TIME right now... correct?
Enemy - Uh yeah... but...


And you win

 

[Xorrandor]

I am sure all of you can think of half a dozen more ways to abuse this rule if you think about it.

Well, so far I've only come up with one way, but I will agree that this is a bit abusive:

Opponent: OK, I'm going to take a Shoot action with these guys.
Sneaky Skinnie Guy: OK.
O: I'm centering the Fire Zone here, so that all 5 Venerables are covered. The Fire Zone is in front of your guys, so my six guys all have unobstructed LOS.
SSG: OK, I'm going to Ambush. My 6 Raiders are revealing themselves. Coincidentally, there is one exactly between each of your firing units and the center of the Fire Zone, so LOS is blocked. Your shots all go wild.
O: %($*%&($*%&(_

Of course, the first objection is that models probably only obstruct LOS, not block it. (The jury is still out on this one, AFAIK.) That's still bad enough, though.

The second objection is that the shots would impact the "cover", but since the basic rules don't cover damage to terrain or how to handle stray shots, there really isn't a mechanism for handling that.

This strikes me as an abuse of the Ambush rule, largely because it doesn't involve damaging the surprised unit. Even then, I could live with it if the Raiders were boldly throwing themselves in harm's way to save their fellows. It's the rules lawyering that says the shots are "illegal" that puts this one over the top. (And note that your change of allowing a Reaction wouldn't help, since O is already in the middle of an action. It would allow a reaction to blow the Raiders away, but that would happen after the wasted Shoot action was resolved.)

 

[Xorrandor]

Another annoying exploit: wait until your opponent has moved all but one of his models during his second movement action. (Or, alternately, wait until he has almost finished a second Shoot action.) Then Ambush, placing your models so at least one is within 10" of the acting unit. Now, when the final piece is moved (or the final die is rolled), the unit will have completed an action within 10", and the ambushing unit gets a free reaction.

I'm not sure this one is as bad: you don't actually negate an opponent's action, which you do with the LOS trick. You get an extra free shot, but that just means that the follow-up troops will now pick you off with impunity, as long as your opponent moves his front line first. Either that or you've wasted several turn waiting for his back line to catch up to you, and at that point you've given up enough actions that I don't begrudge the extra one too much. I suppose you could even combine the two tricks, although that takes some pretty precise placement. And again, I'd be far more annoyed about the lost Shoot action than an Ambush attack that was going to show up eventually anyway.

 

[Voracioustigger]

I'd say those cases are a bit different. With pre-measuring and everything, you can plot out exactly where you are going to move, so if you say "my models are moving here", then I wouldn't think that just because the models aren't PHYSICALLY at that point that the skinnies can then reveal themselves to react. The moment you SAY that they are there, they're there. And if the skinnie player says he is revealing BEFORE you finish your move, then you simply say, "well then I haven't moved yet" You complete one entire action at a time, not half or 3/4 actions, so I don't see how you can say that the first player is forced to move somewhere if the skinnie player reveals... BEFORE he has technically moved.

Shooting is different however... there is the declaration of the action, the targetting/killing, and then armor/dodge saves. I'd say that you can declare that you're revealing at any part of this, but once again... you can't declare that you're revealing the moment the die for armor is clearly a 1 even though it is slightly moving. The roll is going to be a 1, so the roll is complete.

I think a 30 second talk before the game with a player with ambushing units should be enough to ensure that this behavior won't happen, and if I were a judge at a tournament, I would definitely side with the spirit of the game when a rule is this ambiguous.

 

[Xorrandor]

Fair enough, although I'm pretty sure someone on this thread posted a pithy little exchange involving asking for the time to cover this situation...

What's your opinion on the blocked LOS trick, though? I guess we still haven't determined (on the forums, anyway) if models block LOS or merely obscure it; I have drastically fewer objections if my opponent wastes an ambush to give someone a one-time +1 to Target, than if my action just disappears into the aether.

Oh, and another exploit: reveal your Raiders after the Fire Zone is set, such that they are the closest models. This is the "boldly throwing themselves in harm's way" option I couldn't figure out how to implement before. It's probably best to combine all three options, if you think you can escape suppression: reveal the Raiders to add obscurement, soak up fire from more important units, and fire back for your reaction. I'm still not sure you aren't better off waiting for a more "traditional" ambush, though...

 

[cordas]

Its really quite simple, deploy your raiders before the shooting happens and they are on the table and they count, deploy them after the shooting happens and you are shattered and its to late as you are already shattered as it happens immediatly.

This is correct and, indeed, is _exactly_ why the victory conditions are worded that way. . .

I'd say up until he rolls the die for the last skinnie armor save before his army shatters... but I guess that's only if you are CRAZY enough to think that "any time" means the same thing as.... "any time"... :wink:

Sorry but read what my post said that msprange responded to, you can deploy your raiders at any time before the shooting dice are rolled, not the armour or agile saves. I would assume this is because the models die when shot, not 5 minutes later after a bit of discussion, a drink of coffee, some failed armour rolls, a bit of cursing about dice, a last gasp agile save, opps failed.....

Any time means any time before the game has ended, and the game ends the instant you are shattered, unless you think it would be fine and acceptable to deploy your raiders after your opponent has packed his models away and just before you put the table away.... If we accept that reading of any time as you suggest then the Skinnies will win every battle. :roll:

The question now is the debate about how abuseable the deployment of raiders are during the opponents turn. I think it will be extremely hard to deploy them in LOS blocking (not impossible, but once in a blue moon) simply because they have to be deployed in cover and will have to be so close the the FP that they will be in the FZ and become targets.

I agree that the ambush rule should mean that the unit is able to ambush a unit, but too allow it to do so without consequences in the opponents turn is IMHO just far too abuseable. Ambushes that are careful planned and timed are devestating and should be, but ambushes can also go wrong, and when they do it tends to be the ambusher who pays.

The Skinnie player gets to choose when they spring the ambush (and where to a degree), if they get forced to do this in their opponents turn (to avoid the risk of being shattered for example) then I would feel that the ambush has been messed up and is no longer an effective ambush. They can still spring to the attack if they wish (as a reaction), or they could jump out IN COVER and more than likely be able to do this out of LOS and not be shot at, however this should create a reaction oppotunity for any units that haven't already reacted . This in my mind would still make ambush very powerful just not over powerful and game breaking.

 

[cordas]

I'd say those cases are a bit different. With pre-measuring and everything, you can plot out exactly where you are going to move, so if you say "my models are moving here", then I wouldn't think that just because the models aren't PHYSICALLY at that point that the skinnies can then reveal themselves to react. The moment you SAY that they are there, they're there. And if the skinnie player says he is revealing BEFORE you finish your move, then you simply say, "well then I haven't moved yet" You complete one entire action at a time, not half or 3/4 actions, so I don't see how you can say that the first player is forced to move somewhere if the skinnie player reveals... BEFORE he has technically moved.

Shooting is different however... there is the declaration of the action, the targetting/killing, and then armor/dodge saves. I'd say that you can declare that you're revealing at any part of this, but once again... you can't declare that you're revealing the moment the die for armor is clearly a 1 even though it is slightly moving. The roll is going to be a 1, so the roll is complete.

I think a 30 second talk before the game with a player with ambushing units should be enough to ensure that this behavior won't happen, and if I were a judge at a tournament, I would definitely side with the spirit of the game when a rule is this ambiguous.

I don't see that movement or shooting are any different in these regards, they both have various steps that need to be taken and models moved / dice rolled before the action is complete. In fact if either action was to be able to be interupted it should be movement, as the raiders would see the models moving to such and such place, where as with shooting they would see gun fire and maybe some of their mates falling over. Moving guys take noticable time to get from A to B, shooting is in "human" timescales instant.

I think it would be reasonable to say that raiders can only ambush between actions and before declaration, NOT during actions. When a squad decides to move or open fire on an enemy position it does't get on the radio and tell the enemy what its about to do and give them a chance to get ready or react to it, they do it and then the enemy reacts.

 

[MongooseMatt]

This is correct and, indeed, is _exactly_ why the victory conditions are worded that way. . .

And yet, earlier you made the point that Ambush could be triggered "at any time". So, what times don't count as "at any time"? When is the latest point that a Skinnie player can say "OK, these guys are using the Ambush ability"?

You can indeed do it at any time - what you cannot do is 'retro-ambush'. That is, have a bunch of models slaughtered by an enemy, then quickly chip in and shout 'ambush!' The victory conditions are applied immediatly.

Put another way. In the above situation, you might eye up the declared attack on a unit and decide that you stand a good chance of being wiped out - that is when you might declare the ambush to avoid shattering (which, incidentally, is not a good use of ambushers, but I digress). Not after your men have all died!

 

[cordas]

You can indeed do it at any time - what you cannot do is 'retro-ambush'. That is, have a bunch of models slaughtered by an enemy, then quickly chip in and shout 'ambush!' The victory conditions are applied immediatly.

Put another way. In the above situation, you might eye up the declared attack on a unit and decide that you stand a good chance of being wiped out - that is when you might declare the ambush to avoid shattering (which, incidentally, is not a good use of ambushers, but I digress). Not after your men have all died!

I am not sure its needed, but it would be nice to have a definition of when an ambush can be revealed. My understanding is that is that it can't take place during an action, but I am sure some will argue otherwise. A simple Ambushes can be revealed between between any actions, but not during actions would be fine. 8)

As for using an ambush unit (before firing) to avoid the risk of shattering, I agree its a bad ambush but it is a good use of troops to turn a potentail defeat into a possible victory, then there is the issue of abusive use for which we have already come up with a few really dodgy ideas and I am sure there are many more uses.

 

[The Legend]

You can indeed do it at any time - what you cannot do is 'retro-ambush'. That is, have a bunch of models slaughtered by an enemy, then quickly chip in and shout 'ambush!' The victory conditions are applied immediatly.

Put another way. In the above situation, you might eye up the declared attack on a unit and decide that you stand a good chance of being wiped out - that is when you might declare the ambush to avoid shattering (which, incidentally, is not a good use of ambushers, but I digress). Not after your men have all died!

Thats fairly cut and dry!

I am not sure its needed, but it would be nice to have a definition of when an ambush can be revealed. My understanding is that is that it can't take place during an action, but I am sure some will argue otherwise.

Sounds more like Ambush can be revealed after declaration and before resolution which sounds about right.

 

[cordas]

I am not sure its needed, but it would be nice to have a definition of when an ambush can be revealed. My understanding is that is that it can't take place during an action, but I am sure some will argue otherwise.

Sounds more like Ambush can be revealed after declaration and before resolution which sounds about right.

Fine, then people can simply declare their actions as they roll the dice.... Which to my mind is just a recipe for arguements. If you can premeasure at any time you can work out your firing options before you declare you are going to fire......

As I said, in battle units don't tell the enemy commander what actions they are going to take before they take them and allow him the chance to react, the unit acts and then the enemy reacts. Yes I know this is a war game and not real war, but the principle still holds true.

Make it simple and avoid arguements by just saying before each action is declared wether you are going to reveal your ambush or not. Yes its a bit clunky but no more that Sisters spending Faith points in 40k, which worked fine once we started implementing it.

 

[The Legend]

Sounds more like Ambush can be revealed after declaration and before resolution which sounds about right.

Fine, then people can simply declare their actions as they roll the dice....

Eh?!?? :? not sure what you're getting at mate. As far as we've been playing an action is declared before we roll dice not as the dice are hitting the deck!

Make it simple and avoid arguements by just saying before each action is declared wether you are going to reveal your ambush or not. Yes its a bit clunky but no more that Sisters spending Faith points in 40k, which worked fine once we started implementing it.

Yeah but this isn't 40k and these are not faith points. Plus Matt has cleared this up now. I think thats a fair way to do it. Not too overpowered to the point of being crazy but still allows the skinnies to do some amazing things on the reaction if they're close enough.

 

[Xorrandor]

You can indeed do it at any time - what you cannot do is 'retro-ambush'. That is, have a bunch of models slaughtered by an enemy, then quickly chip in and shout 'ambush!' The victory conditions are applied immediatly.

Put another way. In the above situation, you might eye up the declared attack on a unit and decide that you stand a good chance of being wiped out - that is when you might declare the ambush to avoid shattering (which, incidentally, is not a good use of ambushers, but I digress). Not after your men have all died!

OK, now we're getting somewhere. So, here's the basic situation: your horde of Skinnie Militia has been decimated, so you're down to your last 8 man Militia squad, 3 Venerables, and a unit of Raiders still in hiding. Your Shatter limit is 7, so you're looking at bringing the Raiders out of hiding. (And if using a special ability to keep from losing the game doesn't count as "good", we've got different definitions of the word. Non-optimal, I'll happily grant...)

Scenario A: Do you have to reveal the Raiders immediately, since once someone announces a Shoot action you can't Ambush until after the attack is done?

Scenario B: If (A) doesn't apply, suppose your opponent points to his Big Shooty Unit and says he's going to take a Shoot action. Do you need to ambush now?
C: You expected Big Shooty Unit to take out your Venerables, so you didn't ambush. Your opponent surprises you by targeting your Militia instead; the odds say he's going to kill 7 of them. DYNTAN?
D: BSU rolls poorly, and only gets 4 hits on the Militia. You get 1 Armor Save and 4 Agility saves, though, which you haven't rolled yet. DYNTAN?

If we're restricted to declaring an Ambush only between actions, then scenario A applies. You're response above, though, implies that scenario C applies, which I find to be an odd response. I can see A, D or E (the not given "before you pull the units off the table", which I think we can safely rule out) in the rules, but C just seems weird.

 

[cordas]

Fine, then people can simply declare their actions as they roll the dice....

Eh?!?? :? not sure what you're getting at mate. As far as we've been playing an action is declared before we roll dice not as the dice are hitting the deck!

Yeah but this isn't 40k and these are not faith points. Plus Matt has cleared this up now. I think thats a fair way to do it. Not too overpowered to the point of being crazy but still allows the skinnies to do some amazing things on the reaction if they're close enough.

Yes that is how it has been played in the past, but where in the rules does it say a player can't do that? What Matt has said is that its too late to deploy raiders once the dice have been rolled, he didn't say anything about when you declare / roll. Yes I know this could be seen as very childish, and could cause all sorts of arguements and bad feelings. Thats why I asked for a clear guide line for when you can announce an ambush.

To me the idea that you can deploy an ambush in the enemy turn is harsh, but thats what ambushes are meant to be..... nasty, but during an enemy action is just far too abusive.

For example: Your exo suits in cover (1inch back from the edge) declare they are shooting a unit (which has a risk of shattering my skinnie force) outside the cover, at this point I reveal my ambush putting my Raiders between your exo suits and the edge of the cover, granting my other unit obscured (blocked sounds to harsh as you are size 2 shooting size 1 over size 1). When you have finnished your declared action I get to react shooting you, then its my turn, I again get to shoot you, then you can react. Oh and just to add insult to injury I place my constrictor cannon within 1 inch of your sergant, with a little luck he will be dead from 2 rounds of fire taking you out of command.

You might think that is perfectly acceptable, but I don't and will argue against it. Ambushes are great when used correctly, but they can also go really wrong and when they do its the ambusher who pays.

I have 2 arguements about how ambushes should be defined / changed.

1. I think deploying an ambush in the middle of an opponents action is just plain and simply wrong. Its so abuseable its not funny (see numerous examples of this in the thread), and if its the case I don't want to fight against them.

2. As I have said before the Skinnie player gets to choose when and to a degree where the ambush takes place so he has all the advantages. If the opponent player can force the Skinnie player to reveal the ambush in his turn (making them deploy to avoid being shattered) then I feel that this should create a reaction from any unit able to react because of reaction distance and because they haven't currently reacted. All this is going to do is make the skinnie player think where they will deploy, as they can only deploy in cover they only have to be more than the size of the opponent figure away to avoid being shot, or more than 3 inches to avoid being charged by bug warriors. I don't think this will seriously down power them, it will just reflect a little closer what ambushes are irl.

Also I know its not 40K, I was just refering to how we handled a situation in a different game where one player was able to act "out of the normal game sequence" in a similar way that deploying raiders at "any time" is out of the normal game sequence, it took a little getting used to but once we did it was easy enough to do.

 

[MongooseMatt]

Guys, you really, _really_ need to try the Ambush rules in the real world. And I'll tell you why. . .



A lot of the examples you are coming up with as to why they are broken are simply not going to happen. Not unlikely, not in one game in ten - they just can't happen. You are missing a few key points because you are theorising from the armchair, and not trying them out in anger, as it were.

Give them a whirl. You'll see a lot of things resolve themselves when you play (and, incidentally, this goes for a lot of comments made on SST Evo thus far - we can usually tell when someone hits a problem in a game and when they are just doing thought experiments ).

 

[The Legend]

To me the idea that you can deploy an ambush in the enemy turn is harsh, but thats what ambushes are meant to be..... nasty, but during an enemy action is just far too abusive.

1. I think deploying an ambush in the middle of an opponents action is just plain and simply wrong. Its so abuseable its not funny (see numerous examples of this in the thread), and if its the case I don't want to fight against them.

I'm sorry but I disagree. We know how it works now and yes there are lots of horrible things that the Skinnies can do with this but the other units in wave 1 have some really nice rules that make them really good in as many ways.

Anyway there are plenty of examples in every war of an ambushing unit jumping on their enemy when they are already involved in a firefight.

Also I know its not 40K, I was just refering to how we handled a situation in a different game where one player was able to act "out of the normal game sequence" in a similar way that deploying raiders at "any time" is out of the normal game sequence, it took a little getting used to but once we did it was easy enough to do.

I know that! But, the instance you are talking about was not an action that was performed and we should porbably not reference 40k to a game that is better and completely different in so many aspects. The rules are supposed to be idiot proof and I can see that this may not have been achieved with the wording of the rules sheet. Hmmm. Whens the 1.5 version due out? :lol:

 

[cordas]

Guys, you really, _really_ need to try the Ambush rules in the real world. And I'll tell you why. . .

Sorry but that doesn't help Matt.

Just say yes or no, can raiders deploy from ambush during the middle of an opponents action, and if so when during the action is too late to deploy?

As you have said the V & D conditions make it quite clear that at some point during a shooting action that shatters a skinnie force that it is too late to deploy to avoid being shattered. What is that magical some point? (Also an explanation of why that point would be nice.) Making semi-ambigous sweeping statements solves some questions but not all.

 

[cordas]

I'm sorry but I disagree. We know how it works now and yes there are lots of horrible things that the Skinnies can do with this but the other units in wave 1 have some really nice rules that make them really good in as many ways.

No arguement about you disagreeing, thats what the forums are here for, and better here than in the middle of a game.

Yes lots of units have nifty nasty rules, all I am asking is for is some clarificationon one in particular (see my above post to Matt) as its not clear despite what has been said.

P.S. There are also lots of cases of ambushers being sprung by being attacked, which tends to end very nastily for the ambusher.

 

[MongooseMatt]

As written in the rules, you can deploy them at any time. _Any_ time. That is the point of the rule.

As soon as your army is reduced to the Shatter Point, you lose. No ifs, no buts, no winding time back to place more models on the table, be they ambushing, tunnelling or flying.

In your example, you can place ambushers on the table at any point, up to but not including the dice roll for a Shoot or Charge action because, as soon as those dice are rolled, models will be dying.