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Post by menacussecundus on Aug 25, 2020 9:45:40 GMT
And common sense would probably suggest that you can't put an entire element's worth of troop on scaling ladders at the same time. You will have some throwing things at the defenders (spear cannot shoot of course) and some available to give side support - which isn't necessarily a shield wall. You could have Solid Blades assaulting the BUA while also giving side support to an element of Sp.
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Post by stevie on Aug 25, 2020 10:37:22 GMT
In my defence, why don’t Spears receive side-support in rough going?
It’s because they are assumed to be somewhat disordered, and unable
to form a nice neat orderly ‘shield-wall’.
Well, when an element of Spears is assaulting a city wall, and placing dozens of
scaling ladders against those walls, with dozens of men halfway up those ladders,
and dozens more awaiting their turn to climb those ladders, and and dozens more
holding those ladders steady, and dozens more holding their shields high to protect
the ladder holders from the missiles raining down on them from the defenders..
...that sounds pretty disordered to me.
Do you honestly believe that Phil Barker intended troops in such a situation to be
capable of lending ‘side-support’ to nearby friends?
Or is it just another case of this particular situation not being conceived, so players
resort to using another side-support rule, meant for other situations, to cover the loophole?
As I said, we can’t except the rules to cover every possible situation.
Sometimes we have to use our common sense to fill in the gaps.
Anyway, if we can add the words “Cities/Forts/Camps never overlap” (which I agree with),
why can’t we also add the words “Troops assaulting or defending Cities/Forts/Camps use
their combat factor against foot and neither give nor receive overlaps or flank or rear-support.”
If we can add words in one poorly described situation, why can’t do the same in another situation
in order to get a logical common sense outcome?
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Post by menacussecundus on Aug 25, 2020 11:59:38 GMT
Stevie,
To quote you back at yourself, "I didn't write the rules". I don't know why Sp don't get side support in rough going - or why 4Wb, which, according to the description on p4 "kept a shield wall in adversity" don't get side support in any circumstances - or why solid Bw in the (rough going) ploughed fields at Agincourt don't get side support from any solid Bd next to them. I don't know what Phil Barker intended in these circumstances either, but before changing anything, the test I would apply is not "do I believe PB intended ..." but the more stringent one of "I believe PB cannot possibly have intended...."
I don't think there is any need to add that "cities/forts/camps never overlap" because, as I said earlier, they don't satisfy the criteria for acting as an overlap. House rule for the other by all means, but I shan't be following you.
Menacus S
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Post by stevie on Aug 25, 2020 20:49:53 GMT
So if Spears are very busily trying to assault a city they can still give side-support to nearby friends...
...but if one Spearman has as much as a foot in rough going then the whole formation cannot.
I know that DBA is a set of abstract rules, but it would be nice if the abstractions were consistent
instead of being completely arbitrary.
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Post by paddy649 on Aug 27, 2020 17:38:50 GMT
I think this is a case of timing. If the red player assaults the fort first then the Dp will either have beaten the defenders and entered the fort/city and not be able to provide side support OR they will have been beaten back/destroyed- in which case ditto.
BUT if the red player fights against the spear first then the element to their flank can provide flank support because they haven’t got their ladders out yet!
So the city/fort does not provide overlap but the spear can provide flank support.
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Post by stevie on Aug 28, 2020 7:33:33 GMT
Could be Paddy, could be... ...on the other hand, a simpler explanation is that this situation was never conceived of when the rules were being written, and players are trying to stretch the other side-support rules to cover the loophole (which is fine providing it gives a sensible outcome, and doesn’t lead to bending reality just so that it fits a gap in the rules). I still think that if having a single Spearmen even partially in rough going is enough to prevent the whole formation from receiving side-support, and assaulting a City/Fort/Camp is considered to be enough disorder to prevent Spearmen from receiving side-support, then it should also be enough disorder to prevent them from lending side-support as well As I keep saying, we can’t expect the rules to cover every single situation. It’s a bit like scanning through the Bible to see how a computer works... ...the answers we seek are just not there. So sometimes we have to use a bit of common sense to fill in the missing bits. An example of this is having X-Ray Threat Zones being blocked by perimeters of Cities, Forts and Camps, which I raised in May 2019 (see fanaticus.boards.net/thread/2002/walls-cities-forts-block-threat ). Nowhere does it say this in the rules, but by the first quarter of 2020 it was included in the latest FAQ. Who knows. Perhaps one day “Assaulter’s neither give nor receive overlaps, flank, or rear-support” will also be added to the FAQ, because it is a sensible, logical, and realistic way of plugging a gap in the rules. |
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Post by medievalthomas on Sept 9, 2020 21:17:36 GMT
I tried to get Phil interested in defining BUAs & Camps as Man Made Structures (MMS) so that we could list their specific characteristics. But no luck. For now we can assume even a garrisoned Camp/BUA doe not count as an element (the garrison having lost its element properties) so cannot Overlap. However if I have learned one thing from my many years as a Phil playtester is to never assume what Phil may think about something he has not yet thought.
TomT
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