NA Rules Query:Boardings with multiple sides and troop types

[lastbesthope]

It concerns troop loss on ships where there are:

1) Troops from different sides on the same ship
2) Troops of different types on the same ship, e.g. Normal, Elite and/or Marauders

Should either side involved in the boarding, or indeed an entirely neutral party cause a Crew loss hit, how is it decided which side, and in the case of differing troop types, which troops suffer the damage.

A similar question in a normal boarding situation, when successful dice are rolled, how do you determine which of the opposing sides you hit, and indeed which troops of that side do you hit?

In a 3 way troop infestation with multiple troop types on each side it could get quite complicated.

Cheers

LBH

 

[Rick]

I agree that there needs to be a touch of clarification there - I would guess that for part 1 who attacks first would be determined by Initiative in the same way as the other phases - the defender would always be the original owner of the ship, and if he beat off all attackers would have a choice of ships to counterattack onto.
It's part 2 that I'm interested in seeing the answer to, lol!

 

[Gamethyme]

Page 15 of the rulebook has this:

The player losing Troops Dice may always select which dice he will lose if he is using different troop types (see page 16).

But it doesn't specify what happens if players A and B both attempt to board a third-party's ship.

 

[lastbesthope]

Page 15 of the rulebook has this:

The player losing Troops Dice may always select which dice he will lose if he is using different troop types (see page 16).

But it doesn't specify what happens if players A and B both attempt to board a third-party's ship.

Thanks for that, still doesn't clarify the effect of a Crew crit scored by party C on a ship belonging to Party A, which is involved in a boarding action by Party B, which is part of my question,.

LBH

 

[Gamethyme]

Page 15 of the rulebook has this:

The player losing Troops Dice may always select which dice he will lose if he is using different troop types (see page 16).

But it doesn't specify what happens if players A and B both attempt to board a third-party's ship.

Thanks for that, still doesn't clarify the effect of a Crew crit scored by party C on a ship belonging to Party A, which is involved in a boarding action by Party B, which is part of my question,.

LBH

Perhaps I should have read the question a few more times before responding.

I'd guess that the critical hits only impact the current controller of the ship, but I don't know for sure. And I'm no expert - I haven't played a game, yet (and won't until my bundle arrives).

Eric

 

[Rick]

Ok - breaking it down a bit here.
A is the defender on his own ship, B has initiated a boarding action, C is firing into A's ship. In the first turn of the boarding action, B doesn't have troops on A's ship yet, so A will choose which of his own troops will take the crew critical. If B overwhelms A, then C again fires in the next turn, B is the new owner and will choose which of his troops will take the hit. If A and B were stalemated in the first turn of the boarding action and were still fighting when C fired again, in theory A, as the owner of the ship, should be able to choose some of B's troops to take the hit instead of his own!

 

[Gamethyme]

Ok - breaking it down a bit here.
A is the defender on his own ship, B has initiated a boarding action, C is firing into A's ship. In the first turn of the boarding action, B doesn't have troops on A's ship yet, so A will choose which of his own troops will take the crew critical. If B overwhelms A, then C again fires in the next turn, B is the new owner and will choose which of his troops will take the hit. If A and B were stalemated in the first turn of the boarding action and were still fighting when C fired again, in theory A, as the owner of the ship, should be able to choose some of B's troops to take the hit instead of his own!

I don't think A can designate B's troops to take the hit - the rules say that the player who is suffering the loss of dice chooses which dice to lose.

Eric

 

[Stormrider]

So...

At the start:
Player A has control of ship 1.
Player B has control of ship 2.
Player C has control of ship 3.

Turn 1:
Movement Phase:
Player B initiates a boarding action with Ship 2 on Ship 1, successfully grappling.
Attack Phase:
Player C fires on Ship 1 with Ship 3 - any hits are taken by Player A, any critical against Player A's troops.
Boarding Phase:
Ship 2 and Ship 1 are moved together - I assume they both move towards each other, the rules don't specify...
Player B moves troops from Ship 2 to Ship 1 in a boarding action and they fight.
Ownership of Ship 1 is updated at the end of the boarding phase (page 23).

During turn 2 when Ship 3 fires on Ship 1 again, if a crew critical is caused and troops lost I would make the assumption that the troops lost are lost by the OWNER of Ship 1, whoever that might be. Likewise if Ship 3 tried to board Ship 1, my take would be that they Ship 2 and Ship 3 would both target the defending Ship 1 troops, though how ownership would be determined in this case I'm unsure but as Rick said, I would suggest they fight in initiative order (see p22-23) and whoever defeated the defender would become the defender for the remainder of the turn and it would possibly keep changing hands. Until ownership was determined at the end of the boarding phase.

But who am I to say, I still don't understand the scout rule fully (don't get me started!)...

 

[Stormrider]

Sorry, looks like it double posted... very odd...

 

[Gamethyme]

SNIP FOR SPACE

I think that's how I'd rule it - but I'm not official in any way/shape/form/idea.

It's not entirely realistic (If A and B are invading C's ship, they'd probably shoot at each other, too), but it's a game - the rules are never going to cover all possible situations and partial realism is as close as we can get.

The other option is that the player who is rolling to attack in a multiple-boarding situation chooses who the target is.

Eric

 

[lastbesthope]

I think the rules are clear that the owner of the troops taking the hit decides which troops take hits.

The question then becomes how do you decide who taskes the hits?

In a 3 way troop on troop boarding I suppose it's fairly simple you decide how many troops you're going to engage each other faction with, analogous to dogfighting in old B5:ACTA

However, when the damage to troops on board comes from a Critical Effect, you need to decide which faction takes the loss, then that faction player decides which troop takes the hit.

During the Open Day, I did one crew pointof damage to a ship with 1 troop from player A and one Troop from Player B on board, we riolled randomly on a d6 to see which faction took the hit, and it killed their troop, giving control of the ship to the other player, who happened to be the boarder rather than the boardee.

I've emailed Matt for clarification on this, but it only becomes a big problem in 3 or more player games, or when firing on a ship that is being boarded as well in 2 player games.

LBH

 

[starbreaker]

In a 3 way troop on troop boarding I suppose it's fairly simple you decide how many troops you're going to engage each other faction with, analogous to dogfighting in old B5:ACTA

That seems reasonable, although it raises the question of who decides first (initiative order?) or whether it's simultaneous-and-secret (eg left hand has dice against player A, right hand for B). The former is more tactical, maybe, the latter more entertaining IMO.

However, when the damage to troops on board comes from a Critical Effect, you need to decide which faction takes the loss, then that faction player decides which troop takes the hit.

I'd be inclined to assign loss from criticals to all factions at once, ie if A & B both have troops on ship taking a -1 Troops crit, each suffers a hit rather than one or the other. Crowding a bunch of troops onto a ship should produce more casualties than normal, and they should be intermingled enough during the fighting that blowing a big hole in the ship kills some from both sides.

 

[Rick]

Starbreaker - I think you have a great, workable solution - I'm all in favour. It'd be a rare situation, but if it did happen, there should be a penalty to be paid.

 

[Greg Smith]

That does sound like a good idea to me.

 

[Stormrider]

The only issue I see from losing 1 troop from all factions is that if 2 troops are boarding a ship with 2 troops defending, so 4 onboard, how is that different from a ship with 4 defending troops on being shot. In the first situation 2 are lost, in the second only 1. I'm not sure mixing the shirt colours should cause more casualties from a single hit.

I'd err on the side of randomise which player takes the hit and allow them to choose which of their troops takes the hit.

Oh, and for the 3-way boarding fight, if we're going down the route of everyone fighting everyone I would recommend open declaration of die alloaction to targets in reverse initiative order (lowest initiative player being forced to reveal his intentions), so lowest initiative declares his dice split first, then the next and so on, since all dice rolls are made simultaneously and casualties removed at the end of the boarding action, not after each individual 2-way skirmish.

 

[lastbesthope]

Well here is the entire conversation between Matt and I so far by email

have a rules question for you. It concerns troop loss on ships where
there are:

1) Troops from different sides on the same ship
2) Troops of different types on the same ship, e.g. Normal, Elite and/or
Marauders

Should either side involved in the boarding, or indeed an entirely neutral
party cause a Crew loss hit, how is it decided which side, and in the case
of differing troop types, which troops suffer the damage.

A similar question in a normal boarding situation, when successful dice are
rolled, how do you determine which of the opposing sides you hit, and indeed
which troops of that side do you hit?

In a 3 way troop infestation with multiple troop types on each side it could
get quite complicated. I'll post it on the forums as well if you want to
answer there instead.
http://www.mongoosepublishing.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=46852

Cheers and Thanks

LBH

> 1) Troops from different sides on the same ship
> 2) Troops of different types on the same ship, e.g. Normal, Elite and/or
> Marauders
>
> Should either side involved in the boarding, or indeed an entirely neutral
> party cause a Crew loss hit, how is it decided which side, and in the case
> of differing troop types, which troops suffer the damage.

The owning player always decides which of his Troops buy it.

> A similar question in a normal boarding situation, when successful dice
> are
> rolled, how do you determine which of the opposing sides you hit, and
> indeed
> which troops of that side do you hit?

As above.

Matthew

Ok, owner of the troops decide which troops take the hit, but what about
when there are troops from more than one side on a ship and someone scores a
crew crit which causes Troop loss by firing on the ship. Whether the firer
is one of the combatants or not how do you decide which troops take the
hit(s)?

At the tourney we rolled randomly between the 2 sides, is that what to do?

LBH

>> At the tourney we rolled randomly between the 2 sides, is that what to
>> do?
>
> Sounds fair
>
> Matthew

Ok Matthew one last question regarding loss of troops. once who gets which
dice has been sorted out by our discussion.

Say I have 3 Marauders and 2 normal troops involved in a boarding action,
and I get 4 succesful dice rolled against me, can I assign 3 of those dice
to one each of my Marauders and only 1 to the normal troops, thus only
losing one troop or am I not allowed to swing it that much in my favour?

Cheers

LBH

Still waiting on the clarification on that last part. Just to be clear, I'm not trying to power game by asking it that way, I'm just trying to figure out what is and isn't allowed.

LBH

 

[katadder]

I would say you have to take whole troops much like 40k and it's multiple wound infantry. One to stop silliness and two to make admin easier.

 

[Greg Smith]

Ok Matthew one last question regarding loss of troops. once who gets which
dice has been sorted out by our discussion.

Say I have 3 Marauders and 2 normal troops involved in a boarding action,
and I get 4 succesful dice rolled against me, can I assign 3 of those dice
to one each of my Marauders and only 1 to the normal troops, thus only
losing one troop or am I not allowed to swing it that much in my favour?

Cheers

LBH

The rule states you take half as many troop losses with marauders. So you can allocate dice between normal troops and marauders. But you can't split between individual marauders.

However (and this is based on a conversation with Matt) you can simply chose to allocate one (or an odd number) to your marauders and so negating the single hit.

 

[lastbesthope]

Agree with you both katadder and Greg, makes sense to me, but it never hurts to be sure evryone is on the same page, or at least using the same hymn book

LBH

 

[lastbesthope]

Well I heard back from Matt

> Say I have 3 Marauders and 2 normal troops involved in a boarding action,
> and I get 4 succesful dice rolled against me, can I assign 3 of those dice
> to one each of my Marauders and only 1 to the normal troops, thus only
> losing one troop or am I not allowed to swing it that much in my favour?

Yes, you can do that

Matthew

I'm not sure I agree with it, seems a bit too Munchkiny too me.

The rules do say:

B o a r d i n g C omb a t
Both players then roll their Troops Dice. Every roll of a 5 or more
will result in their opponent losing one Troops Dice.

The player losing Troops Dice may always select which dice he
will lose if he is using different troop types (see page 16).

But I think allocating which troops take hit dice is a little beyond that.

I'll put the case to Matthew and point h8im back here.

LBH