You may ignore 1 figure or obstacle when tracing line of sight for a Ranged or Magic attack.

So i just want to confirm obstacles are things like water pit rock etc. I have someone in my game saying he can shoot through a wall to hit my sorcerer on the other side. the wall he is shooting through does not exist its just a perfectly spaced square in between the dungeon walls you can't put anything there..

can that be considered an obstacle he can shoot through?

Walls are walls, not obstacles. The list of obstacles is in the rules book if you're playing Journeys in the Dark, Well of Darkness, and/or Alter of Despair. I believe after that they just list everything as props not differentiating what are obstacles, traps, or just general props (like a glyph) so some interpretation is required by the players in those cases.

So, to answer your question, no he cannot shoot through a wall.

Dred said:

Obstacles are a defined subset of props (and terrain).

In each rulebook for vanilla descent there is a section that introduces the new tokens. In DJitD it starts on pg16 with the heading 'Props'. After a short paragraph there is the first sub-heading 'Obstacles'. These include Pits, Rubble, and Water. Then there is a new subheading 'Other Props' (which, obviously, are not obstacles!). Similar sections can be found in each rulebook so you can define exactly what is and what isn't an 'obstacle' by what section of subsection the item is described under.

In the Advanced Campaign expansions FFG got sloppy and just put in one big section marked "Collected Obstacles and Props" without defining which of the new props were obstacles. Subsequently they have been forced to list which new 'props' are obstacles in their FAQ. THey will have to do the same thing in the next edition of the FAQ for SoB.

Walls, are not obstacles.
Not-spaces (even 0 sized ones) between tiles do not exist. You can't 'count range' or connect through them, so even if there were no walls at all your player couldn't do that.

Check this thread for a list I compiled of the things that are called obstacles in the rules or the FAQ. Be sure to read the discussion though, as the list was rather contentious. I was very literal-minded when looking for what things had been declared obstacles, and several people objected to my choices. I even agree with their interpretations in many cases, meaning I'd play against what a technical reading of the rules would indicate. Also, it was at least one FAQ ago, so some of the things may have changed (especially the SoB stuff, as that didn't have a FAQ at the time IIRC).

Corbon said:

Thanks for the quick replys as were in the middle of a game. So what you said above does that also apply to spiritwalker? can i count spaces in between walls for spiritwalker?

Dred said:

No.
They aren't 'spaces'.
Outside the game board does not exist.
Anything that has a 'range' must be counted actual space by actual space, around corners etc. The common (I think official) method is to consider that a flying creature must be able to get to that location making X moves, if that location is within X range (ignoring doors for 'range' calculation, though doors still block LOS and attacks and actual movement until opened).

Corbon said:

Latest FAQ disagrees with you (p.7-8):

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 7 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.

Antistone said:

Umm, that's basically what I thought I said. The flying creature has to be able to move there through normal spaces and being able to go through (ignoring) doors - although doors still block LOS, attacks, and actual moves unless they are open.

Unless you think that the FAQ means that it is a 'complete radius' and even if the flying figure actually has to move 30 spaces around a long and convoluted corridor to reach a point which is 3 'spaces' away but separated by walls and no-spaces?

Take the right hand diagram FAQ pg3. I would say that the 'range' for a radius affect to reach from the hellhound to the bottom hero (through the door) is 6 spaces, not 4 spaces. The 'count' must go around the corridor, not through the non-spaces.

There is a slight complication with the 0-space thin walls created by having two rooms adjacent without a corridor. Can the 'count' go straight through the wall from space to space even though a moving figure would have to count two spaces to get around the wall? Is C->D 1 count or 2 count?
AB
C|D
This is one of 30+ questions I am slowly working through for the next FAQ submission. (All of which will have public imput once they are a bit more fully prepared, before we send them to FFG).

Corbon said:

That's exactly what I think, because that's exactly what the question asked:

"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 7 anywhere within a template, in this case a square of edge length 2xradius + 1 centered on the figure )?"

By the example diagram you pointed out, the Breath attack can still reach Mad Carthos, even though the distance "as the razorwing flies" is longer than the size of the template; similarly, if there is a "command template", it would be a 7x7 square centered on the originating figure, and (according to this FAQ answer), the ability applies everywhere that is reachable without leaving the template, regardless of the distance of the actual path you'd have to trace.

I'll be the first to admit that's kind of a weird ruling, and makes it very difficult to get out of range of Spiritwalker (or even Kirga's ability), but that's * specifically* what the question was about, and they said it works like Breath. I don't see much room for interpretation there.

Antistone said:

Yeah, I thought it was wierd and just figured the breath reference isn't quite what they are thinking it is. The figure still has to stay on the board in the breath example, so for example, if the 'radius' effect was range 4, the space below the bottom hero isn't reachable by the breath effect (see left diagram on FAQ pg3) - even though it is still strictly within the radius of 4 .

So my understanding is that it is similar to the breath effect in that the 'flying figure' can move anywhere within the 'area covered' freely in order to reach the target, except that the 'range' is the fastest possible count of actual spaces 'outwards' - around 'non-spaces' as necessary, not through non-spaces.

Corbon said:

For a radius effect, the "range" just defines the size of the square template that is used. If there are 'non-spaces' beneath the template, that might cut off part of the template from the source, in which case that part would not count (as in the bottom left picture on FAQ p.3), but it doesn't change the way range is counted for the effect. You never have to count range around spaces or non-spaces for a radius effect. Just drop the template around the source and then anything that is within that template AND reachable by a flying figure is affected.

AOOB
OXXO
OXXO
HXXC

H = hero with command; O = open spaces; X = 'non-spaces'

The hero's command ability has a radius of 3. Other heroes in A, B, and C would all be affected.

"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."

I think the statement that abilities cannot go through walls is fairly unambiguous. I don't see how Command could reach a hero in space B or C of Mahkra's example without passing through a wall to get there. If the Xs are "non-spaces" (ie: empty table space showing between tiles) then there must be walls in there somewhere.

If the Xs instead represented something like Rubble, then I would agree all three denoted spaces are affected by Command. Rubble spaces are still spaces, just impassable ones (barring certain special effects.)

Command reaches B and C because both are under the command template, and a flying figure could start at H and fly to either without leaving the template.

"Not through walls" only comes up if you alter my diagram:

AOOBO
OXXWO
OXXOO
HXXCO

The template still covers A, B, and C, but now C is not reachable without leaving the template.

The number of spaces traversed by your imaginary flying figure does not matter, as long as your imaginary flying figure doesn't leave the template. To reach C in my original example, the imaginary flying figure traces a path around the 'non-spaces', not through them. (This is like the top right example on p.3 of the FAQ.)

I'm probably not the first to say it, but here goes anyway. The question in the FAQ leads to the answer. Honestly, the first couple times I looked at the question, the second part, about the radius vs breath thing, I had no idea what the person asking the question was trying to describe with the radius movement stuff. If I was confused and needed to answer the question, I would just say it's like the Breath example because I need to answer it and they gave me an easy out. I do know now what it was asking, but when you need to read stuff quickly, to keep a game moving for example, you don't have time to nit pick a question and answer. The second question should have been simply, how do you determine distance of effect for these types of abilities? If examples needed to be given to get a proper answer, then they should have been provided, but not as part of the question.

All in all, I interpret the statement in the answer about using it like the breath example is for the "movement" part. That is a flying creature needs to be able to get there. If they can't get there within the allotted movement, say 3 spaces for Command, too bad. No template, no moving 12 spaces to give a creature command because it's around 3 walls, none of that. That may not be how it's technically worded, but I think being able to do something like Spiritwalk through a figure that is effectively 20+ spaces away is absurd. This is possible if you use the template way on some official maps I think.

Breath itself would be different simply because it says to ignore range when determining who is affected. None of these abilities in question (like Kirga or Command) say to do that.

Sorry if anything is hard to understand, I should stop trying to post things before I go to bed.

My 2 cents:

There is no blast template, there is no command template or anything like that. Example from the rules:

Blast
Attacks with the Blast ability affect every space within X spaces
of the target space, where X is equal to the rank of the Blast
ability......

For blast 3 we always played it like this, can a small flying figure with movement 3 reach from source to destination.

I would not compare breath with any other area of effect ability regarding whether or not it hits a figure.

Maybe we play this wrong, but it is easy to play it this way, and we never get to argue about whether a figure is reached or not.

Edo..

Edo77 said:

First of all, you're playing blast incorrectly, because blast requires line-of-sight, so blast can't reach around corners or past rubble. And in any event, the FAQ ruling I'm explaining is for radius abilities that do not require line-of-sight. Like command or Kirga's ability.

Secondly, the "command template" is imaginary, just like the flying figure used to determine which spaces under the breath template are affected. The fact that there's no physical piece of cardboard in the game labeled "command template" does not mean the concept is invalid. In fact, the template concept is in the FAQ; I didn't just make it up.

Solairflaire said:

Those abilities do not tell us to ignore range, but the problem is that the abilities never even explain how to calculate range in the first place. Apart from the FAQ answer, there's nothing in the game that tells us what "within X spaces" actually means. And that's why it needed to be in the FAQ.

Solairflaire said:

This is precisely the concept that was rejected by the FAQ answer. I really don't understand why there's so much confusion about what that FAQ entry actually means.

Blast is not at issue here, because it explicitly requires line-of-sight to be effective.

There's almost no possible question you could ask where I would be surprised if the FAQ writers misunderstood it, but I've never heard any theory for those abilities that is unlike the Breath example except in exactly the way Corbon and Solairflaire want it to work (and in being able to go through doors, which was answered separately and explicitly in the same paragraph), and the question was fairly detailed. I have difficulty imagining what else they could have thought was being suggested as an alternative to "like the Breath example", if they actually believed they understood what they were choosing between. And even if they thought the alternative was something different, you're still arguing that the answer is actually wrong , not that I've misunderstood it.

If you want to ignore it on the basis that you think the writer didn't know what he was saying, you can go right ahead, but it would be dishonest to claim to others on the forums that the "official" rules are anything other than what it says.

mahkra said:

Hmpf, after 2 years of constant playing and reading FAQs and rules over and over I am still missing some parts... I just rechecked the blast ability and have seen that we indeed were playing this wrong...

+1 to the second part. I never intended to allege that you've made it up, I just wanted to say that sometimes even FAQs are better to be ignored for certain situations. But after reading it again and again and again, and also having this discussion in mind, I stand corrected and have to admit that in this case the FAQ IS quite clear... (and have to tell my fellow players that we were playing wrong.... again )

Thanks for clarification

Edo..

Edo77 said:

But after reading it again and again and again, and also having this discussion in mind, I stand corrected and have to admit that in this case the FAQ IS quite clear... (and have to tell my fellow players that we were playing wrong.... again )

Thanks for clarification

Edo..

+1

I never meant to insist my way was right, just explaining what I thought the FAQ answer meant (before).
SImply put, I hadn't read it properly - largely because I couldn't comprehend that they could actually mean it to be that way...

Antistone said:

I never meant to imply anyone misunderstood it. I did mean to assert that the FAQ answer is wrong. I'm probably alone in that, however. A couple question I have.

1) When given a number of spaces for an ability (say 3 spaces for Command), how is that not the range of the ability? Why is that suddenly a radius for abilities when every example in the book would say that is the distance from the origin point to the ending point using the spaces on the board?

2) The FAQ question assumes automatically that Command, Kirga's hero ability, Spiritwalker, etc. have a radius and don't just travel a number of spaces away from the figure. Everybody here seems to assume that these abilities must be circular (well, square in Descent) in origin. They don't need to be. Why the assumption that they require a radius?

Solairflaire said:

It's not an assumption. It's a question that was asked and answered.

The rules were never clear, and we had arguments about this topic on the forums, so someone submitted the question to the FAQ to resolve them. The entire point of asking that question was that we couldn't conclusively support either answer without asking it.

If you won't accept a ruling from the FAQ unless someone can prove that it's right based on the original rules, that kind of defeats the purpose.

They are assumed in the question itself before the answer was given. By stating that the abilities have a radius, that means they have some sort of square template, literally or imaginary doesn't matter. There were only two things in the game that use a template before the answer was given, breath and bolt. It would be logical to assume that the answer given would follow the breath example then. They are both templates; they should function the same.

As an extreme example that's not possible currently, let's say a hero has a ranged attack that ignores LOS for an attack but still only targets a single space. He targets a monster that is actually 8 movement spaces away around 2 corners (so staying on the board), the monster would be 4 spaces away through the wall. The hero rolls 5 range on the dice. Does the hero suddenly get a template (which the monster would be in) of size 11x11 centered on himself where he could hit any one space within it? According to everyone here, the hero would hit, unless I'm missing something. The monster would be, after all, withing 5 spaces of the hero.

Solairflaire said:

No, the question asked whether they used a template. It suggested two distinct possibilities:

1. "the target space [must] or figure be reachable by moving a number spaces less than or equal to the radius"
2. "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)"

The first option says nothing at all about templates. Yes, it mentions a "radius", but the "radius = template" idea is something that you just pulled out of thin air. The abilities definitively DO have a "radius", in common English parlance, in that they extend out in all directions ("radiate") up to a fixed range. "Radius abilities" was the most common way of referring to that set of abilities in use on the forum at the time, including people who favored option #1 . The question also explicitly listed several examples, so there could not reasonably have been any confusion about the class of abilities being discussed.

Solairflaire said:

If they invented such an ability, I would expect them to explicitly tell us some rule that would allow us to decide whether the attack would be successful in such a case. In the absence of such a rule, I would recommend that a question about it be added to the FAQ, exactly as this question was added for "radius" abilities .

Solairflaire said:

Where were you before? What you are basically saying is that the question was badly worded in that it made leading assumptions, right?
I now vague recall some discussion on this trying to make sure the question was clear , perhaps not enough making sure that the question was well worded . However, that would make me as guilty as anyone in screwing it up!

As a general aside, is it worth representing this to FFG in the next FAQ update?
We bring up the subject (initially at least) in the form of a 'check'. It would appear to me that according to the FAQ ruling, the bottom hero on the FAQ pg3 breath examples is within a 'Radius 4' of the Hellhound. This could be used as an expanded answer example to make it clear. Eg.

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 toanywhere 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. For example, in the diagrams on page 3 of this FAQ document, Carthos is 'Radius 4' from the Hellhound. If Carthos had the Spiritwalker abilty in an Advanced Campaign (range 5) he could use it through a hero standing one space directly south of the hellhound .

Is that worth proposing, for total clarity? In the example I used above the hero standing south of the hellhound would be Range 7 from Carthos by 'flight method' but range 4 by 'radius method'.