Unit Merging

By Abwehrschlacht, in Rules

I may be missing something in the rules, but I couldn't find an answer to an issue that arose in one of our games. Two Rebel units were advancing, one had taken no casualties and the other had been reduced to a single figure, the two units converged at a point on the field and were then mixed. AFAIK the rules still treat them as two separate units, but it seems a it silly that a single trooper would not join their comrades in the larger unit, making one single unit for targeting and movement rather than two. Obviously, the smaller unit would bring all wounds and suppression with it but they would then be diluted by joining a larger group. Has anyone else come across this situation and what was your outcome?

Would unit merging be allowed at any other point as well? For example, before either had taken any casualties and you needed a larger force to achieve a particular goal (attacking a vehicle with combined firepower, for instance).

I’m sure thinking the rules will say he is Solo

Does anything in the rules say you can merge a unit? No? Then you can't.

It's an interesting idea, but it's not legal.

Have I had two units that suffered casualties happen to be near each other on the board? Sure.

What was the outcome? I just played the game the way I was instructed to ?

I'm not familiar with historic miniatures games, but none of the fantasy minis games I've looked at or played do anything like this. A unit as defined at the start of the game is a unit for that game.

Units never merge. Make sure you track each unit individually.

Merging is a whole bunch of complications. Which upgrades still apply? Does the unit now have two special weapons even though it can only have one?

Most games I know (including historicals) don't allow for units to merge in the middle of the game. With the exception of 50k, and that's one specific set of canon fodder.

Apologies, I forgot to subscribe to this thread, so I've only just seen the replies.

It may not be 'legal' in the true sense of the game, but I don't play Legion as a tournament, so I can change the rules as much or as little as I like. There are plenty of historical games that allow for unit merging, especially at skirmish level which Legion is (Through the Mud and the Blood, for example).

It's a pretty simple exercise, all wounds and suppressions of the merging units are combined as they stood at the point of merge. This means that a unit has a better chance of standing in the face of the enemy by joining a larger group. The troops bring whatever weapons they have with them, and if that means two special weapons, then they now have two special weapons.

Think about it from a real life point of view, if two sections of soldiers were fighting close by and one lost their corporal, they wouldn't stand around discussing the fact that if they joined their mates close by they'd now have two SAWs, which isn't what is laid down in their section manifest sheet. It just strikes me as unrealistic that if there were six figures (one from one squad and five from another), you'd either have to target one figure or five figures.

On 8/13/2018 at 10:50 AM, Abwehrschlacht said:

I may be missing something in the rules, ...

Would unit merging be allowed at any other point as well? ....

If you are talking about house rules, you maybe should not have specifically asked for a reference in the rule book.

Concerning your question:

Unit merging is not allowed in the official rules. We will all show up at your place to boo you if you should dare to play the game with your own minis how you want in your own basement.

All of us.

But why should someone would like to merge two Units? To trade a few extra wounds for a whole activation and a (possibly) scoring unit just sounds stu... unwise...

2 hours ago, M.Mustermann said:

We will all show up at your place to boo you if you should dare to play the game with your own minis how you want in your own basement.

All of us.

Yeah, I'm getting that impression...

2 hours ago, Robeck said:

But why should someone would like to merge two Units? To trade a few extra wounds for a whole activation and a (possibly) scoring unit just sounds stu... unwise...

Because it happens in real life?

After the Rebels are captured in the control bunker during the Battle of Endor all the units are merged when they escape.

Edited by Abwehrschlacht
On 8/18/2018 at 5:40 AM, Abwehrschlacht said:

Because it happens in real life?

Most board games are not written to exactly emulate real life. In games like Legion, there are game mechanisms such as point values, number of activations, and tokens attached to units that make it matter a lot whether you have two units of one mini each or one unit of two minis.

As for everything else...the forum description says that it's for discussion of the finer points of the rules. If your intent was to ask about creating house rules (which is explicitly not at all what your first post says), you might have gotten better results from the General forum.

Edited by Turan
17 hours ago, Abwehrschlacht said:

Yeah, I'm getting that impression...

Because it happens in real life?

After the Rebels are captured in the control bunker during the Battle of Endor all the units are merged when they escape.

So does splitting a unit up in the midst of combat, utilizing enemy weapons (less so in modern combat, but I'm sure happens quite often in rebellions), commandeering enemy vehicles, imperfect knowledge of enemy deployment and movement, weapon malfunctions, aircraft aren't ever affected by the ground under them, cover would be determined individually by weapon (which doesn't really work for the cover rules as written), unbalanced forces, and a whole host of other things that Legion as chooses not to simulate for various reasons. This game is not meant to be a simulation of "real" combat. I've seen the rules for wargames that try to be simulations, they are more akin to textbooks than rule books, with a TON of tables and a single action taking nearly an hour.

You asked if it was allowed in the rules, then say you are using house rules... Which is fine, they are your miniatures, use them however you wish. But if you plan to play the game differently than the written rules, then you're play a different game based to some degree on Legion, and the rules become whatever you and your opponent(s) agree on.

Edited by Caimheul1313