Originally posted at BGG:

Hi everyone. My gaming group has played this game 5 times now and really enjoy it. After reading the "Compiled List of Accepted Q&A" we are more confused than ever about the resolution of battles. Specifically look at:

Q: How do abilities that require a unit to retreat in the middle of the battle work (such as the Sorceress special ability)?
FAQ-A: The retreating unit is no longer considered to be participating in the battle, and must immediately move out of the area (following normal retreat rules). Since it is no longer in the battle, it will not draw fate cards or count its strength.

Q: What happens when an attacking Pegasus Rider uses his special ability to route a
Berserker who is also using its special ability?
FAQ-A: Even though they are both the same initiative, the attacker’s ability is resolved first. Any routed berserkers may not use their special ability (which requires them to be standing).

This conflicts sometimes with the idea that "All drawn cards will be resolved". So here's what we are doing now, and we'd like to know if we're doing this right (it seems to have worked out okay for us so far).

1) The attacker draws all cards for a single type of initiative 1 unit. If the defender has an initiative 1 unit, the defender also draws for 1 type of unit. The defender then places 1 card under each of his units for which he just drew.

2) The attacker resolves specials. Should a special rout or destroy one of the units the defender has yet to reveal cards for, that unit and card are removed or tilted on it's side (routed). This resolves both of the questions and answers cited above (the sorc's ability, etc.).

3) The defender resolves any specials.

4) The attacker resolves routs. Again, should a defender whose card has yet to be revealed be routed, the card is removed and the unit routed.

5) The defender resolves routs.

6) The attacker reveals any "whiffs" and damage, as does the defender. Both are resolved.

This process is repeated for other 1's and then for initiatives 2-5.

This is about as clear as we've been able to make out the conflicting rules. It seems clear that should any specials be triggered for the attackers that might remove a defender who has drawn, the defender doesn't get to resolve his attack. Is this how everyone else is reading this?

Thanks much in advance.

As you seem to suspect your group is in fact not understanding the core combat mechanics. I will try to explain a few points.

pendrag2k said:

If the unit has not already attacked (ie: higher initiative rank) they yes they do not attack and no matter what they will not be counted towards the final strength tally. If however the unit forced to retreat is in the same initiative rank as the sorceress and will have already drawn a card that card is resolved as well.

pendrag2k said:

If attacking the berserker can trigger it's special followed by the riders. If defending however, the pegasus's ability will route the berserker THEN the beserker's ability will trigger. Since the berserker is routed though and his ability requires a standing unit nothing will happen.

pendrag2k said:

This seems wrong and needlessly complex. Let me break down how a fight should go. Let's use for this example 3 archers ATTACKING 3 flesh rippers. First both players start the combat with the initiative 1 units (the archers and rippers are the only units in this example and are both initiative 1). Both players have 3 units here so they draw 3 cards each. The archers draw 1 damage and 1 special, the rippers draw 1 special and 2 damage. Since elves are attacking the first thing resolved is the archers special deciding to deal one damage to a ripper that ripper has one health at this point and dies. Then the flesh rippers special goes off, now the remaining 2 have 3 health. Next comes damage, the elf player hands one damage token to the uthuk player and the uthak player hands 2 tokens to the elf. Note that even with a ripper dead the uthak player does NOT lose one of the cards drawn. The players resolve the damage given the elf player decides to lose 2 archers and the uthak player lets his ripper take 1 which does not kill it as it now has 3 maximum health (another note here had the uthak player been attacking the rippers special would have triggered first giving them 3 max health saving it from the archers special).

So to sum everything up the attacker resolves his specials first but units routed or killed in this way do NOT have their fate cards removed if already drawn. The only difference is their status for their own specials that may require them to be standing to activate or specials that add health for survival. Essentially this makes creatures like flesh rippers far more effective offensivly than on defense. If you kill or route units of an initiative that has yet to draw their cards however than they do NOT get to draw when it comes time for that initiative range to draw. This basically gives lower initiative units a bit of an advantage as they can potentially remove units from combat that have yet to attack. I'm not sure if I explained clearly enough but it is actually a fairly simple system once you get the hang of it and the rules do not conflict, it just seems your group has had a misunderstanding on how they work.

Kirenx said:

It's also worth point out that, AFAIK, cards are not individually assigned to units of a type when drawing them. The only way the berserker's ability will fizzle is if there are NO standing berserkers left. It doesn't matter "which berserker drew the orb" as long as there's still a standing one left when you try to resolve this ability. This may not have been obvious in the original question, but it was asking about a single Pegasus attacking a single Berserker.