Littoral Landing

It is certainly possible for an action to be legal and dodgy. That latter word has lots of meanings, however, so what did you have in mind? In any event, the Littoral Landing rule does not state how much of an element must touch the Waterway. We know that corner to corner element touching is contact so, element corner to Waterway edge touching is contact.

The flee situation seems clear: "or if it enters any river" If it is in the river, and must flee, then it is not entering it. Phil knows the difference between entering and starting in. Note the language of the pursue rule which includes both being in and entering.

An element in . . . in bad going (other than marsh or gully) or . . . enter such bad going, does not pursue.

For the element to be destroyed if starting in the river, would not the rule be

"It is destroyed if it starts with an enemy front edge in contact with its flank or rear edges, or if after turning it cannot move at all, or if it >starts in< or enters any river. "

By the way, you had quite a wet battlefield, with both a Waterway and a River.

With respect to the waterway question I don't believe the positioning described defines the intent. I base this on the additional wording in the Big Battle section where it clearly states all elements must deploy within 1BW of the waterway. I find it hard to accept deployment is restricted to a smaller area in the larger game.

re BBDBA twrnz,  the rules state "this ( BBDBA ) differs from the standard version only as described below"

One would read from this that the Standard Version of the DBA rules re deploying from waterways " At least 1 element of the group must touch the waterway " is totally different from BBDBA.

Something to think about ?

The BBDBA rules are different in several respects, not merely "further clarified". The 1BW limit for waterway deployment is one of them. The rules are pretty clear about how a Littoral Landing is to work in the base game. About fleeing, it does seem odd that a flee result from within a river is not as severe as one that starts near, and ends in a river, however again you look for the aggregate effect of the rules over the length of a game, and not individual instances that seem out of place.

DBA is a game where the rules must always be considered in the overall, average, and long term effects they have. Absent this thinking, some of the outcomes for ties, for instance, appear to make no sense. Fleeing into/out of a river I sub,it is one of these cases, if it can indeed be shown that Phil intended these to be different. Recall, a stubborn problem in older versiosn of DBA was the D-Day landings required to cross a river. If you make flee results that begin in a river to turn out fatal, you will radically strengthen river defences. Is that desirable?

There are many differences between littoral landings in big battle and standard game. In standard game the maximum number that can land is three elements and they must be in a group, and one element "must touch the waterway". There is no restriction given as to what part or how much of an element must do the touching. In the big battle game, a full command must land, so up to 24 elements can land. An army is divided into three commands, each a minimum of six elements. So if 2 commands of six, then one command of 24 elements. There is no restriction as to how the 6 - 24 deployed elements along the waterway are arranged, that is as a group or not, only that each element is within one BW of the waterway. The rules imply that the same element restrictions apply to landing in the big game as to the small game, no elephants, artillery or Warwagon. Therefore, a full Carthaginian army with the elephants cannot be landed. It is also implied that the 24 elements, like the three in the small game, are reserved at deployment, and not placed along the waterway until the first bound. This is somewhat confusing. As it is not explicitly stated in the rules, which do say that all commands are placed during deployment, with no reference to reserving anything. So this must be implied as being like the small game.
"Either the defender deploys all commands, then the invader deploys all his (the quickest method; and note that the defender has first move); or the defender deploys 1 or more commands, then each in turn places a command."

Interesting situation that 24 elements can make a Littoral landing within the 15 minutes of a bound. Are bounds longer in big battle games?

I believe that the rule stating that elements must be within one base width of the waterway supersedes the requirement for a group of to be touching the waterway. This is an example of a difference between the small game in the big game. Note not 1-3.

Small game = " If a waterway has been placed, either side can reserve 2-3 elements (whose army's home terrain is LITTORAL) to be deployed at the start of its first bound (before PIP dicing) as a single group anywhere along the waterway. At least 1 element of the group must touch the waterway."

Big game
" This differs from the standard version only as described below"

"A littoral landing must be by a full command provided by an army whose own home topography is LITTORAL; and all that command's elements must deploy within 1 BW of the Water Way."

Thus single blade element can be placed a base width away from the waterway not in a group or touching the WW.  It does not seem correct that all 24 elements of the littoral command must be in a group, touching the waterway.

All - if you have two littoral armies say Carthaginian and Syracuase, and the defender lands an element(s), and does not move it / them, can then the attacker who lands, land elements that ZOC the just landed defenders or with configurations where they can actually land in contact and straight into combat....which seems feasible.