An Acrobat-related question came up in a recent game, and I discovered I wasn't actually sure what the answer was. I have just checked the FAQ, and found no assistance. Anyone care to help?

Which of the following, if any, may a hero with Acrobat do when in a space occupied by a figure or obstacle: pick up potions, pick up gold piles, activate glyphs, open chests, open doors?

All of the above, though if you're not using the big list of answered questions at the top of this forum, the base rules disallow opening chests while sharing a space with another figure.

James McMurray said:

There's nothing in the GLoAQ that I can find that would change the base game rules in that respect. The word "chest" doesn't appear in the first page of the thread, at least, and the section on acrobat discusses picking up coin piles and rune keys, but not opening chests.

To the best of my knowledge, while in another figure's space:

Picking up potions, coin piles, and rune keys, and opening doors are ALLOWED .

Activating a glyph is MANDATORY (glyphs activate automatically when a hero enters their space, whether you want to activate them or not, and even if it's not your turn).

Opening chests and making attacks are FORBIDDEN .

Everything Antistone has said is correct.

For clarification, do the same allowances apply to a hero who is flying (Wings of Regiroth, Carried By Air) ?

(I would guess yes, since Flying and Acrobat are worded nearly identically)

I believe the only difference between Acrobat and Fly is that Acrobat does not allow you to make an attack while overlapping an obstacle that blocks movement.

Well crapola. Looks like our group got hit by another stealth pseudo-errata. It definitely used to be there, because we had a long discussion about it and changed how we were playing because of it.

And people wonder why my group avoids semi-official FAQs and errata.

Fly and Acrobat have differences in how they work at Sea as well, if you're playing SoB (flying creatures ignore shallow and deep water, those with Acrobat do not).

Thanks everyone.

I managed to miss the rule about not opening chests while in the same space as another figure- sorry.

Anyone else find it a little illogical that opening chests is not allowed, but opening doors is? I could entirely understand potions/keys/gold/glyphs=OK (mandatory in the case of glyphs, though why a hero would ever not want to activate a glyph I can't imagine, unless they thought it might be a Dark Glyph, I suppose), doors/chest=NOT, on the basis that the last two require the expenditure of movement, but I can't really see the reason for door=OK; chest=NOT.

YellowPebble said:

Not in the slightest.
Opening a door is affecting something adjacent to the crowded space. No big deal there. If the door was a trapdoor leading down in the same space....
Opening a chest while two figures are standing on it (and then distributing the contents)... umm, requires incredible strength and impossible leverage???

Lol, I'm not really sure why you can open doors but not chests, but then again why can a hero in a pit only see the spaces next to the pit, but blocks LoS for people trying to see through him? Or why does a soaring monster not allow heroes to pass through them even though they are so high up they can't be hit by melee attacks? Yet breath or blast hits them automatically?.....Sometimes with Descent I just have no idea, lol.

James McMurray said:

"Used to be there?" And, what, someone edited it out...purely to remove useful and relevant information...on a forum whose software doesn't normally allow editing more than a few minutes/hours after a post has been made?

Whatever you say...

Kartigan said:

Really?

I thought if a hero is in the pit, i can draw a LOS through him because he is down the hole...

Same applies to spawning, am I allowed to spawn monsters near a lone hero in a hallway? Because he has only LOS to spaces adjacent to that pit.

Yes you can spawn monsters near a lone hero in a hallway so long as that hero is down in a pit (since he can only see the spaces next to the pit). But IIRC, that hero still blocks LoS for other figures trying to see through him.

There's no rule saying that a figure in a pit doesn't block LOS, so the default rules apply, and he blocks LOS in exactly the same way as if he wasn't standing in a pit. At least, by rules-as-written.

A hero in a pit only has LOS to spaces inside or adjacent to the pit, so he doesn't prevent spawning in other locations (barring special cases, like Kirga). However, the reverse is not true; you can't avoid LOS of a hero by spawning inside a pit, because you can trace LOS into a pit from any distance...though there's also an oft-overlooked rule that stops monsters from spawning on obstacles, so you actually can't spawn in a pit even if all the heroes are in town.

thanks for the clarification