Question about retreating

By player566928, in Battlelore

In our last game we were face with an interesting situation which isn't explicitly mentioned in the rules. When a unit is forced to retreat several hexes, but becomes flanked by two friendly units in the process, can it ignore a flag, even though it wasn't bold at the moment of attack? In our game last night, I rolled no less than 4 flags against an enemy unit. My friend wondered if he could retreat his unit to a hex supported by two of his other units, therefore ignoring the second flag. He then would retreat a hex for the third flag, again going to a hex supported by two units, ignoring the fourth and final flag. We jugded it was the best way to resolve the action, as it was a literal interpretation of the rules. It seems a bit fidgety however. In reality, I cannot imagine an army unit going through such a morale roller coaster within the space of one attack :)

Prosperoo said:

In our last game we were face with an interesting situation which isn't explicitly mentioned in the rules. When a unit is forced to retreat several hexes, but becomes flanked by two friendly units in the process, can it ignore a flag, even though it wasn't bold at the moment of attack? In our game last night, I rolled no less than 4 flags against an enemy unit. My friend wondered if he could retreat his unit to a hex supported by two of his other units, therefore ignoring the second flag. He then would retreat a hex for the third flag, again going to a hex supported by two units, ignoring the fourth and final flag. We jugded it was the best way to resolve the action, as it was a literal interpretation of the rules. It seems a bit fidgety however. In reality, I cannot imagine an army unit going through such a morale roller coaster within the space of one attack :)

Hi there,

I don't have the rule book with me so can't cite page and chapter but if a unit when retreating can not move into a hex it looses a figure from the unit instead for each hex of retreat it can't make (treat it as a hit). So in the example above your friend would have chosen to block his own line of retreat and lost a figure from the unit.

This does raise an interesting question, one of the rules of the game is you can't target your own units with attacks (so you can't nuke one figure units to save the game) would this be a way round it or do the rules say you have to move into clear terrain if you can?

Chris

Elberon said:

Prosperoo said:

In our last game we were face with an interesting situation which isn't explicitly mentioned in the rules. When a unit is forced to retreat several hexes, but becomes flanked by two friendly units in the process, can it ignore a flag, even though it wasn't bold at the moment of attack? In our game last night, I rolled no less than 4 flags against an enemy unit. My friend wondered if he could retreat his unit to a hex supported by two of his other units, therefore ignoring the second flag. He then would retreat a hex for the third flag, again going to a hex supported by two units, ignoring the fourth and final flag. We jugded it was the best way to resolve the action, as it was a literal interpretation of the rules. It seems a bit fidgety however. In reality, I cannot imagine an army unit going through such a morale roller coaster within the space of one attack :)

Hi there,

I don't have the rule book with me so can't cite page and chapter but if a unit when retreating can not move into a hex it looses a figure from the unit instead for each hex of retreat it can't make (treat it as a hit). So in the example above your friend would have chosen to block his own line of retreat and lost a figure from the unit.

This does raise an interesting question, one of the rules of the game is you can't target your own units with attacks (so you can't nuke one figure units to save the game) would this be a way round it or do the rules say you have to move into clear terrain if you can?

Chris

Chris a person can retreat in any manner they wish. So thus if their retreat is blocked and they still need to retreat more squares, they would then lose figures for every square they need to retreat. Plus also don't forget that for Goblins, retreats are even more painful since they need to roll a die for every square moved back.

Cab

I should specify that there was a hex in between the units my friend retreated next to. So while they provided support for the retreating unit, they did not block its path.

Prosperoo said:

I should specify that there was a hex in between the units my friend retreated next to. So while they provided support for the retreating unit, they did not block its path.

Prospero, my original reply still stands. A person can retreat in any manner they wish and if they retreat to a position that blocks the rest of the way to retreat, then they would lose 1 figure / square they could not retreat just if the figure was on the last squares of the respective sides.

Also note that if a unit does retreat to a position that would NORMALLY give it bold status, it still does NOT get that ability to ignore one flag till the retreat as well as the attack (since mounted could do a 2nd attack on that same unit).

Hope that clarifies your query.

Cab

Yup, it does. Thanks, Caboose.

Think Caboose has cleared this one, but basically a unit retreating only alters the dice based upon their situation at the point of the attack. Therefore, if they retreat along a line that would embolden them they get no advantages as the damage (mental and emotional, in this case) is already done.

The only exception to this comes with the Heroes expansion, where a unit that retreats into a space containing a Champion immediately ceases their retreat. This creates an intriguing dynamic to the game and provides Heroes with one of many interesting tactical skills on the field of war :)