'if you are engaged with the target, add 1 purple"

A lot of ranged attacks say this, both spell and melee, but does it ever really happen? It is so easy just to perform a manoeuvre to step away and then do the action. Has anyone had a situation where they could not disengage and had to take that penalty, and if so, how?

I suppose if they were knocked prone already or you had a terrain hazard (swamp, dungeon hallways and mud come.s to mind).

There are also some actions that cause players to lose their free action.

As Emirikol pointed out- special circumstances could also dictate their use of their maneuver. Rolling banes on their action could cause them to trip, or run into a dead end. There could be weather, or maybe something happening in the combat that's keeping them close together. What if there is someone they need to protect within the engagement who can't escape?

Keep in mind, as well, that ranged weapons with the RELOAD trait require the use of a maneuver or else suffer from additional challenge dice. If the PC is close to passing out, they also might not have the maneuver available.

Lastly, many GMs rule that it requires a maneuver per opponent the PC is engaged with in order to disengage. Therefore, there might be times when a PC is unwilling or unable to disengage.

Yeah. Folks who use bows can get away with it, but most ranged characters have other things to be spending their maneuvers on, such as channeling & maintaining power, reloading, etc.

I don't know that I've ever seen anyone take the purple die, but I've certainly seen players choose to straight up not take the shot, or to burn fatigue for extra maneuvers.

The pistolier in my group has definitely been in situations where he couldn't use his best (Ballistic Skill) Actions because disengaging + reloading would be too much fatigue. It's not frequent, but it happens.

In my game I have limited manoeuvres to 2, and the only way to get 3 is if you get a free one from a card, or you use up your action for a 3rd, but this still hasn't caused that penalty to ever come up, at least yet.

That the penalty hasn't come up is a feature, not a bug. People are choosing to spend fatigue or skip their actions because of the penalty, which means it's working.

I frequently narrate the situation such that backing up is not an option. It's a bar-brawl, no place in the bar is not engaged with somebody, there's just too many foes all around you. You're against the wall, cliff edge, end of the passage and door not opened.

per noob question thread in GM section, IMHO if you don't narratively restrict the endless "back up shot, back up shoot" it becomes troubling. That said, the basic ranged action has the "close foe closes" (important for the NPC who is already engaged can, just like a PC, spend a maneuvre to get fortune die for friend in fight - distracting you for the attack by the next foe) and the ranged combat monster-PC in my last campaign passed out a couple of times from fatigue pushing the limit with those tricks. He also learned to put a premium on the few ranged actions without engaged penalties.

(this is how I solve the kite effect)

Disengage

Disengage cost 1 maneuver. You leave an engagement everyone close to you can perform a Melee Attack Action against you immediately, at added cost of <c> .

@GM discretion an Active Defense can be used to disengage, add the defense penalty to all attacks during the disengagement.

Step Away

If you leave an engagement without disengaging everyone close to you can perform a Easy (0<c> ) Melee Attack Action against you immediately, the action gains: " $ +2 damage".

Players did not like it at first but then we tried a combat against a few goblins kiting them......