I was just looking at the outdoor side of the Tomb of Ice map pieces, thinking of using it in a homebrew quest, and wondering whether any of the brown terrain is supposed to be mud (following the rules from Well of Darkness), or just generic ground. Thoughts?

Also, is there any consensus or official word regarding how trees interact with spawning? In particular, do they count as "obstacles" for purposes of preventing spawning in their space?

Yes, the mud on those tiles works exactly like the mud from WoD.

As for the trees, you can spawn into the tree, a tree is not a blocking obstacle, more like a hindering obstacle. You do not have line of sight past a tree, but you have LoS TO the tree. You have to spend 2 movement points to enter any tree space, regardless if you are already in a tree space. Also keep in mind that the trees grant shadowcloak as well.

Antistone said:

Nearly all the terrain on the outdoor tiles is 'real terrain'. Some have mud, some water, some trees. The only ones I can think of that are not 'real' are 'snow' which is not a terrain type as yet (and is clearly different looking to ice, and has encounters/dungeon levels where ice tokens cover some snow spaces and some not-snow spaces). We know the terrain is real because it is referenced to in some of the outdoor descriptions/rules for encounters (eg an encounter location where all figures ending their move adjacent to water take a wound uses terrain pieces that have water on them in the specific spaces shown on the encounter map).

Trees are obstacles.
FAQ pg8
Q: Do the props "Sarcophagus", "Table", "Bed", "Fountain", "Throne", "Bone Heap", "Giant Mushrooms", " Tree " and "Ice" count as obstacles (for the effects of Acrobat and others )?
A: Yes.
Therefore you can't spawn on then by DJitD pg12
The overlord player may not place spawned monsters in a space that contains a figure or an obstacle , such as a pit, rubble, water, or slime .

This is already a function of the Secret Garden level in RtL, which uses a very large outdoor terrain piece inside a dungeon. The essence of the terrain is a hedge maze of trees.

I have to admit that I rarely remember that spawns are not legal in obstacles in general. Pits, and impassable obstacles, yes, always remember that. But general obstacles... well, I do remember my heroes fighting off a spawned Troll in The Secret Garden and the troll must have been spawned on a tree(s) because it was near the exit (but not at the exit and there are no areas big enough to fit a troll in that area IIRC.

EDIT: PS, I assume you have the RtL pdf rulebook at least, which details tree rules?

I have the RtL pdf. I also have the ToI rulebook, which also contains the tree rules. But neither talks about whether they're obstacles. The FAQ I suppose answers that, though it's somewhat difficult to trust the implication when it wasn't raised in the question and even people with much greater mastery of the rules than the FAQ authors seem to forget that spawning rule a lot...

Regarding mud, though...mud doesn't have an especially distinctive appearance. It's pretty easy to imagine that the 4x4 tile with a huge swathe of textured brown in the middle (tile A, I think) is supposed to be mud. But then I look at the 4x4 tile with the diagonal river (tile E, I think) and I'm not so sure. The brown areas on the 2x2 transition tiles (outdoors on one end, indoors on the other) look like they're almost certainly not supposed to be mud. The 2x3 corridor with green grass on one end, yellow grass on the other, and brown in the middle looks like it could have mud; the similar 2x3 corridor with a water space seems more dubious; there's almost no texturing on it.

Do you think it's all mud? Or just some of it?

And actually, it seems kind of odd that there would be mud at all, when the expansions are mostly non-interacting and the ToI rulebook doesn't include the rules for mud...

The ToI rules specifically say that the snow has no effect, so I wasn't questioning that. I assumed that the trees are trees and the water is water. And I assumed that any mud on the tiles would follow the only published rules for mud...I'm just not entirely sure which spaces are actually mud spaces (if any).

Yeah it is rather weird that there are mud spaces on tiles from an expansion that don't include mud rules. I think tiles A & E most definitely have mud squares (in the middle and near the river respectively). Also, some of the "corridor" and "T" type tiles look like they have some mud squares on them. I guess it is all rather subjective though, but I think anything that looks like the spaces in the middle of tile "A" should count as mud.

Antistone said:

I'm not actually sure if there is any 'mud' on the ToI pieces. There is 'clear' mud spaces on some of the RtL outdoor pieces though.
Looking at the ToI pdf pn pg 4 there are some samples tiles. The 4x4 piece 'clearly' has water and tree spaces. The shortened T tile has I think 2 trees spaces (difficult to make out in the pdf, but I am sure much clearer 'in person/tile'), The shortened right angle tile is mostly obscured. I think that might be mud in the corner and beside it, but again difficult to tell in the pdf. I am sure that the transition piece does not contain any 'terrain.

However it is entirely possible that there are no mud tiles in the ToI set, which would maintain rule integrity.

I am sure that I have found it to be fairly 'obvious' when a tile has mud spaces on it (except for the annoying 2x2s from the base game which are all brown but not mud!)

If I recall, and if the internet is working better when I get home late tonight, I'll try and look at the tiles.

Hmm, can't spawn in pits. I suppose you are right then. I guess it is time to go back and re-read all the rules cover to cover. Its been so long.

Corbon said:

ok, I had a look.

1st, I looked through the RTL encounter locations and couldn't actually find one that referenced mud, contrary to my recollection. So we don't have any proof from that direction at least.
2nd, mud does have a distinct appearance. Every mud tile has a distinctive circular pattern (or part thereof) somewhere on it, like water rings from a splash. A few of the RtL outdoor tiles (only two that I could find actually, + the reverse of the very large encounter starting tile) have what I would call 'obvious' mud spaces on them, and the distinctive water ring effect is present on those spaces.
3rd, I checked the ToI tiles. I count 8 outdoor tiles with 'potential' mud spaces. Most have the water ring pattern clear in the mud spaces, which makes them 'obviously' mud to me. The short right angle tile with three water space around the outside of the corner has a single brown space on the inside of the corner. This one is far from 'obviously' mud but there is a partial small water ring pattern on ene edge which leads me to beleive this is also definitely supposed to be mud. The 4x4 tile 'E' has 3, maybe 4, brown spaces around the 'stream' that could be mud. I think there are subtle water ring efects on several of these spaces but they are very subtle and really a little dubious. On 'E's dungeon side the entire tile is brown with a few snow patches but there is no water ring evidence at all. I think this is like the standard brown 2x2s and not actually 'mud', just dirt floor without paving stones showing through. Tile 'F' dungeon side is entirely brown but does not show eveidence of water rings at all - another tile with a 'dirt' floor rather than a 'mud' floor IMO. Tile 'A' outdoor side does have a large swathe of mud, with the water ring pattern conspicuously present.

I think the circular ring pattern is the qualifier for mud and in most cases it is clear when it is present. In a few though it is a little subtle and in one particular tile it is so subtle as to possibly just be my eyes deceiving me (which is not good,either for my eyes or on FFGs part).

I was going to say, I don't recall seeing Mud on any outdoor counters. At least not RtL. I'll have to dbl check my ToI ones, but I didn't think they were to be considered "mud"...

-shnar

shnar said:

There are definite mud spaces on some RtL outdoor encounter tiles, as shown by the distinctive water ring pattern. However they are not actively referenced as mud by the cards or anything, they just happen to be present. One of the tiles IIRC is a 6x2 and has 4 mud spaces in a T shape. The other can;t remember now but I think the mud was adjacent to water. Also the large 'starting tile' has a significant amount of mud on it's reverse in-dungeon side (which you virtually never see), scattered around and irregular shaped pool of water.

If you want a sample of the 'water ring' pattern, check RtL pdf pg33. The sample mud token there has the partial water ring pattern over it's lower left sector. AFAICT that pattern on a brown background is the 'mud' signifier.

I guess you're right:

I honestly don't think I've ever played with this tiles...

-shnar

shnar said:

I think it is used (with a pool tile on top) in teh silver legendary dungeon.

And of course, the reverse side is in every encounter...