mahkra said:

If I have learned one thing from playing Descent and working on the FAQs its that statements like that can not be taken literally word for word like you are doing here.

it is entirely possible that KW meant in that sentence that you don't "move" though those spaces as in spend movepoint points or enter the spaces for the purposes of traps. If the figure is never actually in those spaces, he then magically teleports to the end space? Even if he is passing over everything in the space, he still moves through the space regardless if he is affected by anything in that space.

And if anything, a lack of change to the knockback rules strengthens the case that boulders and crushing walls act as walls for the purposes of knockback. There was no reason to update it because it was already covered by the rules.

A lack of change to the knockback rules means nothing. Three possible explanations immediately come to mind, all of which are plausible:

1. There was no reason to update the knockback rule because crushing walls and boulders are treated as walls for purposes of movement, and "knockback movement" is a subset of 'normal' movement. A figure therefore cannot be knocked back through a crushing wall or boulder.
2. There was no reason to update the knockback rule because walls and closed doors are the only things that stop "knockback movement", and those are both already listed in the knockback description. A figure therefore can be knocked back through a crushing wall or boulder.
3. The designers never thought about how knockback should interact with crushing walls or boulders.

I think you're making the mistake of assuming the rules have to be logical in an RPG "does this work physically" sense. But the physical interpretation does not determine the rules. If it did, figures in pits would be treated more consistently. If they're far enough below ground level to have limited line of sight and to have boulders roll over the top of the pit without harming them, then why do they still block line of sight for other figures?

The rules of the game can seem arbitrary and really need not make physical sense. Rules might exist for simplicity or for balance reasons; you use your imagination to explain the rules as written, not to figure out what the rules should be. Here are a couple ways a figure might not be affected by intermediate spaces when knocked back:

• The figure does not travel through a determined path to the final space. He 'bounces around' off the walls and simply comes to rest in the final space. There's no way to know which spaces he moved through en route, so you disregard costs or penalties from those possible spaces.
• The figure is knocked over or through obstacles. He is 'smashed' through obstacles, so he can fit through spaces that are too small to move through willingly.
• Knockback is not a physical effect. Knockback weapons are actually enchanted and cause a "teleportation" effect like quantum tunnelling. It's magic!

mahkra said:

All three of those explanations contradict the part about knockback not moving figures through walls or closed doors; "through" requires that some determinate path exists, or it's meaningless.

The far more plausible explanation is that "you don't move through the intervening spaces" is really supposed to mean "you do not trigger any effects related to entering or leaving the intervening spaces." That nullifies aura, damaging terrain, and the like.

Regardless, if walls can block it at all, then the only possible way that rolling boulders and crushing walls would not is if knockback movement does not count as "movement" for purposes of things that "block movement."

Antistone said:

Exactly. And I can't find anything definitive in the rules that says "knockback movement" is restricted in the same way as 'normal' movement.

Everything else is just fluff, trying to "make sense" of rules that do not actually have to make physical sense.

mahkra said:

You mean you can't find anything to say it isn't restricted. You actually can find something that says it is, you are just choosing to ignore it by reversing a fundamental rule.
A single specified exception does not create a host of unspecified exceptions. Rather, it indicates everything else carries on as normal.
This is a fundamental of rules reading.

Lacking an instruction otherwise, 'knockback movement' is still 'movement', of a type, and follows normal 'movement' rules - except where there is instruction otherwise.

Corbon said:

No, I can find something that could mean it is restricted. But 'movement' has so many different meanings in this game (as Antistone pointed out) that I'm not sure.

EDIT:

Also, your fundamental of rules reading can support either side. "As such, this “knockback movement” is not blocked by any intervening figures or obstacles (though a figure cannot be moved through a closed door or wall)." The only specified exceptions are closed doors and walls; nothing else should block knockback movement.

mahkra said:

Can you find a description of movement in the rules of the game that supports your viewpoint?

You mean a description other than knockback, which does not work at all the same way as normal movement?

mahkra said:

Yes, mainly because you are the first person on this forum that I know of and in any gaming group I've played in that has ever interpreted the knockback rules to state what you are claiming.

mahkra said:

This is the statement where you deviate from standard rules reading fundamentals. There is nothing that says knockback movement does not work as normal movement 'at all'. It merely does not work the same as normal movement in a certain specified way .
By default, as it is described as movement, it works the same way as movement in all non-specified ways.

Corbon said:

+1

Big Remy said:

I have no problem with your reading of the rules; I just can't find anything that actually specifies. I would not object to playing by the rules as you describe; I mostly find it very interesting that there's a significantly different interpretation that seems perfectly consistent with RaW.

These things are all "movement" in some sense, but they do not all work the same way:

• Staircase
• Glyph
• "Normal" movement
• Knockback
• Poltergeist
• Telekinesis
• Leap
• Being swallowed
• Being moved by a tentacle

Some of these are fairly well defined (Telekinesis - "move any figure ... 1 space, following normal movement rules "), but others are not (Poltergeist - "Move all figures ... up to 2 spaces, however you choose "). Knockback just happens to be not well defined with respect to boulders and crushing walls. In fact, it's not even well defined with respect to what "move each ... figure up to three spaces away" means, which I find much more interesting as I think it would come up more often in an actual game. (See the question about abilities with a radius in the FAQ, p. 7-8. Must the final square of knockback be reachable by moving 3 spaces, or does it simply have to be in a square template with side length 7, centered on the figure?)

Corbon said:

Yes, the specified way is that the figure does not actually pass through the intermediate spaces so is unaffected by obstacles. The only specified things that can block this knockback movement are walls and closed doors. Boulders and crushing walls are not specified.

Doesn't the rules for boulders and crushing walls that say they are treated as walls cover this?

Big Remy said:

No, because it doesn't say they're treated as walls in all cases. It only says they're treated as walls for (line of sight, attacks, and) "movement", a term which is not well defined in the game. Does that mean 'normal' movement, or everything on that list I made a couple posts ago?

Abilities like command and spiritwalker cannot go through walls, but there's nothing to stop them from going through boulders. Why should "knockback movement" work like normal movement instead of working like an ability with a radius?

Because knockback movement, by its very name, is a type of movement. The comparison to abilities with a radius like Spiritwalker isn't accurate.

Big Remy said:

Movement is a generic term which is overloaded in this game. If that's the only reason, I don't think it's enough.

Well I'm done going around in circles cause we are most definitely not going to resolve this. I'm quite comfortable with my view being accurate.

mahkra said:

No; read that more carefully. It says it is not blocked by intervening figures or obstacles . Since rolling boulders and crushing walls are neither figures nor obstacles, the sentence you quoted provides no information on how they should be treated, even by implication, unless they are covered under "wall".

If anything, this sentence is evidence against your argument, because the phrasing implies that closed doors and walls would have blocked "knockback movement" already, even if they weren't mentioned here, and the text is merely reminding you of this fact, rather than giving walls and closed doors a new behavior that they didn't previously have. The only way that could be true is if "knockback movement" counts as one of the things that closed doors block: movement, attacks, or line-of-sight (p.13). In which case, it is also blocked by rolling boulders and crushing walls, because they block all of those things, too.

Of course, technically, we're never told that walls block movement in the first place. There is no section that gives rules on walls at all; they're only mentioned in the line-of-sight, Blast, and Knockback rules. So if you insist on allowing everything that isn't explicitly forbidden, an ordinary figure, with no special abilities or effects of any kind, can walk straight through a rolling boulder or crushing wall at will (even if you prevent movement through actual walls with some abusive interpretation of "must remain on the board").

Beyond a certain level of precision, the movement rules in Descent just evaporate in a puff of smoke. Those details were simply never written.

I'm really not trying to be difficult, and I'm not trying to break the game. I just don't see it. Maybe the parenthetical text at the end of knockback is really just a reminder. Or maybe it's actually part of the definition of knockback. I just think that limiting "knockback movement" in the same way as "movement" solely because of the name is a pretty big assumption in a game that notoriously overloads terms.

EDIT: Also, note that boulders in fact are "dangerous moving obstacles ," even though they're in the Traps section of the rules.

Interpreting flavor text from the component list as rigorous mechanical text is a Bad Idea. There's a list of new obstacles in the WoD expansion, and rolling boulders are not on it. The Acrobat skill card allows you to "move through obstacles (but not other props, such as scything blades or boulders)". That's two clear indications that boulders are not obstacles.

And Descent is unplayable without making important assumptions. If you make the contrary assumption that "knockback movement" isn't movement, then important, fundamental parts of the ability - such as how you determine whether a given path is obstructed by a wall or not - are simply unspecified, and you need to make them up, from whole cloth. Anything you use to fill that void is also a pretty big assumption.

And if you accept my argument that the parenthetical remark is much more plausibly a reminder than a stand-alone rule, then the determination that "knockback movement" follows the movement rules (except as noted otherwise) is not based purely on the use of the word "movement."

But sure, you could be right. The actual rules for determining what spaces are affected by Breath attacks or radius abilities are not even hinted at anywhere in the rulebook; they were created from whole cloth in the errata and there was no plausible way you could have predicted them (and certainly no way you could have supported them with the printed rules) before that time. But I think that shows that the Descent writers make up new rules after the fact, not that anything in the current rules provides support for your interpretation.

Antistone said:

I'm not making any assumptions; I don't claim the reading I'm defending is 'right'. I'm not advocating one reading of the rules over another. My stance this whole time has been that the rule is incomplete and does not specify enough to be playable without guessing at its actual meaning.

Let's get away from the boulders for a bit, though. I think we both understand the other party's reasoning (even if we disagree), so I'm not sure it's a fruitful discussion any more on that front.

I'd like to know if there's anything really clarifying what the rule means by "up to three spaces away". Must the target space be reachable by moving 3 spaces, or does the target space just have to be within a template and not blocked off by walls (and possibly boulders/etc.)?

_ _ _ _
X X X _
X X X _
X X X O

(X = walls, _ = open spaces)

If the hero starts at O, can he be knocked back to the top left space? If "up to three spaces away" means "within a square template with side length 7, centered on the hero", then the answer is yes. If "up to three spaces away" means "reachable by moving 3 spaces", the answer is no.

Spiritwalker uses a similar wording and has been clarified to use the template concept.

Spiritwalker : "you may cause the attack to originate from any space up to 10 spaces away that contains a friendly figure"

Knockback : "move each affected target figure up to three spaces away"

Thoughts?

From the FAQ:

Q: Can abilities with a radius that don't require Line of Sight (Command, Word of Vaal, Spiritwalker, Kirga's hero ability from Altar of Despair, etc.) go through walls and/or doors? When checking the distance for these abilities, must the target space or figure be reachable by moving a number spaces less than or equal to the radius, or do these abilities work like the Breath example (fly to anywhere within a template, in this case a square of edge length 2xradius + 1 centered on the figure)?

A: Abilities, not attacks, with a radius may go through doors, but not through walls. These abilities work like the Breath example. Note that attacks cannot go through closed doors.

First, apart from the initial attack knockback movement never says it requires LOS. So you can potentially lump it with all these other radius effect abilites/attacks like you suggest in your first case. So if you call it an ability with a radius that follows a template, by this FAQ entry it can pass through a door but not a wall.

So in your example, it could never reach that space since it can't pass through the wall to get there.

Now, we have the rules for Knockback

Knockback
After inflicting at least 1 damage (before applying the effects of armor) to a figure with a Knockback attack , the attacker may immediately move each affected target figure up to three spaces away from its current location. The figures must be moved to spaces that do not contain other figures or obstacles that block movement. The figure does not actually move through the first two spaces - it is knocked completely over them. As such, this “knockback movement” is not blocked by any intervening figures or obstacles ( though a figure cannot be moved through a closed door or wall ).

By its own rules, Knockback cannot pass a figure through a closed door or wall.

Combine those two:

If Knockback is an ability with a radius, it can't pass through walls but could pass through a door except that its own rules prevent it from doing so. So putting aside boulders and crushing walls, you would never be able to reach that space with a knockback attack.

Big Remy said:

But it doesn't have to pass through the wall to get there if you use the radius/template reasoning. If you go up three and then left three, you never leave the template, you never pass through a wall, and you end in a space that is within that template of radius three.

mahkra said:

You can't use the template idea to argue the template possibility.

There is no template. There is no 'radius'. You just completely made those up as an 'idea'. They have no basis in the rules.

The figure is moved 3 spaces. It specifically ignores some (quite a lot) movement rules. It does not ignore all movement rules and it does not get to be moved 32 spaces so long as it ends up within a 3 space radius.

It is only you making this complicated because you keep making stuff up out of thin air and then using those things to argue the basis of them being possible. If you stop doing that, and just read and apply the rules as they are written it gets a lot simpler.