Another basic q. Last night we had a situation whereby Vader engaged one trooper out of a unit of 3. In this situation should the two non engaged troops move into combat with vader or remain idle? The rulebook says they should engage other enemy units[sorry, minis] on a one to one basis, but the balance here was uneven. (We just left them alone. It was round 6 and the rebels were bound to lose no matter what.)

It also said that unarmed minis cant do melee, but they also had a black die on their card. Does this come into play if theyre engaged at the start of a new round, meaning they could counter-attack their original attacker?

16 hours ago, Alan Noir said:

In   th  i  s situation should the two non engaged troops move into combat with vader or remain idle? T  h  e ru  lebook says they s  ho  u  ld engage other enemy units on a one to one basis, but the balance here was uneven. 

Yes, they are obligated to move into base contact. I’m not sure what you mean by “one to one basis”, but I think you’re referring to the fact that you cannot start a melee with more than one unit with a single move. The unit of three in this scenario is still just a single “unit”, so no problems there (remember that there is a very important distinction between “units” and “minis”).

Just as a side note: if there is no space to place all minis in base contact, just put them as close as possible. The units are still in a melee and all minis are eligible to suffer wounds from melee attacks.

16 hours ago, Alan Noir said:

It  a  l    s  o  sa  id    th  at unarmed  m  inis cant do mele   e

Not quite. It actually says units that lack a melee weapon cannot start a melee (I’m paraphrasing, but it’s on page 36). “Unarmed” is a melee weapon (it has the red range icon). The trooper units can certainly perform attacks in melee.

Thanks for that. Still keep using 'unit'to mean mini. Old habits.

To make it simple, if a unit has a melee weapon, when an enemy unit enters in melee with them, they MUST move into base contacto with that unit. But if the unit doesn't have melee weapon, it doesn't have to do that. This happens for example when Luke goes into melee against a unit of 2 speeder bikes. As the speeder bikes doesn't have a melee weapon, the mini which is not in base contact with Luke doesn't have to move into base contact (but still if Luke attacks it is considered to be attacking the unit, not just the mini he is touching, so the mini which is not in base contact with him may still suffer wounds).

Gotcha