I have a question for you guys:

BBQ Squad and Joe Brown move adjacent to Battle Grenadiers with one activation and get ready to fire, the Battle Grenadiers roll Reactive Fire and succeed. Battle Grenadiers now fire all weapons that are within range.

1. Does that include Knife? I think yes.

2. Does BBQ Squad and Brown then react to the knife attack? I have no idea.

3. If yes, then after BBQ Squad and Brown fire, can they also knife attack again?

Conversation during actual game:

"I am gonna role Reactive Fire"

"Go for it"

"I am firing with everything"

"Ok....ha miss"

"Wait I get to roll my knife attack, it is in range....three hits"

"I get to roll in response to your knife attack....three hits too"

"You can't react to my reaction"

"I just did, now go get me a beer"

"Get your own beer..."

So far playing with the Reaction Fire rule is interesting. Changes play. Do I chance Reaction Fire to only be able to fire once instead of sustained but cause damage before they fire? Plus with my rolling I usually miss the Reaction Fire roll, therefore wasting an activation.

1. Yes

2. Good question. I think yes. A range C attack always causes retaliation.

3. Yes, BBQ's SHOOT action doesn't change in the slightest for being attacked with Reactive Fire. They attack with their knives and the Grenadiers retaliate.

I would agree with he-who-had-been-dubbed Loopie. It's just like if the BBQ made a knife attack on you and you activated what's left of the squad and knifed him. Except reactive fire lets you try to reverse the order of who gets first strike.

In the interest of exploring all the loopholes of this rule:

What if the unit that activates reactive fire is an Observer Squad? Can they call an indirect artillery fire with their reactive action?

I'd say NO, since the Artillrey Strike ability isn't exactly a SHOOT action, which is what Reactive Fire allows you to use. Reactive Fire only allows a squad to use Abilities that don't require an action, like Berserk,

bumping this back to the top

Dcal12 said:

A1. I say no. Throughout the rules description, examples and the title itself, stabbing with a knife is not Reactive FIRE. If the answer is no then it clears up all the other Reaction Fire rule querries. The idea behined reaction fire is to get a shot of before while the enemy is moving into/out of position, with a knife attack there is no reaction as the enemy is already in close stabbing you and visa-versa in a general melee, which is why both sides get to attack in a knife fight in the first place.

Don't agree. The Reactive Fire rules simply state that the unit "performs a single SHOOT action with ALL weapon lines that have sufficient range to target the opposing unit". Since a range C weapons would be in range and is part of a SHOOT action, I really don't see a justification for it being disallowed in Reactive Fire. As the enemy closes in, you take the initiative and lunge at it with your knives...

Of course, you can choose not to use your knives if it would be disadvantageous to you.

But your just taking one line out of context from the rest of the paragraph. The rule does not say you get a shoot action, it says you can shoot, you do not shoot by stabbing somebody. If the rule did say shoot action then I would agree with you as a close combat attack is part of a shoot action, there is a big difference between shooting and making a close combat attack - as defined by the rules.

Major Mishap said:

Actually, that's exactly what the rules say in the 3rd paragraph. The quote above was copy/pasted from the book, it says you get a "SHOOT action", even with that special font on "shoot" that they use when stating a general action, like "MOVE". Plus, the fact that they stress that you shoot with "ALL weapon lines that have sufficient range", makes it quite clear they are not just talking about guns.

Yeah your right, also says it on the summery. Still don't make sense to me and the rules still talk about shooting which you must agree does not include stabbing One for them to answer, if they ever respond

Yeah, the initial fluff text does talk about "shooting" and "opening fire", but while it doesn't mention stabbing, it doesn't rule it out either. The important thing is that when they get to the technical aspects of the rule, they clearly say SHOOT action, and don't really leave any room to exclude range C attacks. As I said before, it makes sense if you think of it as your unit deciding not to wait for the enemy to close in, but take the initiative and lunge at the incoming squad with their knives.

I would agree that Oberver Squads cannot call indirect fire as reactive fire, because it's not an attack action. Just like a Command Squad can't call in a mech because you charged at them.

To the OP: The BBQ squad WILL get their own Knife attacks when their activation resumes.

After all, they were just responding to YOUR Knife attack when you did your shooting. It's their activation and I can see no reason why they would not get their own Knife attack in their own activation.

I got a reply from FFG, you can use knives for Reactive Fire.

Great. Thanks.

Played my first game with Reactive Fire this weekend. We tried to use it twice, and failed at it. It really seems that there are just 2 situations in which I would attempt Reactive Fire: If I knew for sure my unit was going to die in the coming attack, so it might as well do some damage before being obliterated, or if my unit was under no immediate threat, and just happened to see an enemy moving by in the distance, trying to get out of range or LOS.

Yup, I see it as a very limited use, only when you are in great danger like BBQ squad moving adjacent to your units.

Heh, that really almost makes no sense to use Knives for Reactive Fire. I can see some design logic, but....

1. With plain Reactive Fire, the Target Grenadiers get a chance to shoot the BBQ Squad as they charge in. Fairly Standard Final Protective Fire.

2. Then what is left of BBQ Squad after Target Grenadiers have shot it up gets to shoot up the Target Grenadiers.

3. Then continuing the assault the BBQ Squad knifes the Target Grenadiers and the Target Grenadiers knife back.

Instead what we have is:

1. Target Grenadiers Shoot BBQ Squad.

2. Target Grenadiers countercharge the BBQ Squad to get their stabby in first. BBQ gets to stab back.

3. Target Grenadiers then go back to their places and allow the BBQ Squad to shoot them up normally.

4. Target Grenadiers wait for the BBQ Squad to perform their stabby attacks so they can stab back.

Yup, don't make any sense at all

Doesn't seem thata absurd to me. The grenadiers lunge at the coming BBQ, then they fall back to their original position, as the BBQ in turn attacks them then lunges at them.

Loophole Master said:

So, the BBQ squad just wait for the enemy to fix bayonets and charge them? I would have thout they would be able to pull a trigger before that happens.

Well, that's the whole point of Reactive Fire, it's a surprise counterattack. BBQ is preparing to open fire when they are surprised by the sudden attack of an enemy that they thought to be sitting ducks.

Of course it doesn't make perfect logical sense, but very little in this game does, like a soldier attacking with his rifle, grenade launcher, knife and grenade, all at the same time. But a more realistic system would mean a more complex system, and that would ruin the simplicity of this game. Don't overthink it, just go for it.

I don't think the attacker would be unaware when an enemy is only a few feet away and has already shot at ypu - nah, makes no sense whatsoever. Certainly woudn't overcomplicate it, just don't allow C weapons to react.

"Reactive Fire" is the standard concept known as Final Protective Fire, it only matters if the defenders have been suppressed or not (which is what the die roll is for). It does not include getting out of your positions and charging home. If it does happen to include this kind of counterattack, then reactive fire with knives should be the end of the attacker's action, except instead of shooting, then resolving the assault, the attacker gets shot by the defender and then resolve the assault. Pretty much, the attacker loses his ability to shoot first.

So it should read:

Attacker moves into position

Defender makes reactive fire shooting roll (maybe with side rule that since the attacker is committed to the assault, no cover saves apply)

Both sides then get to do C weapon attacks.

Both sides are then inactivated.

That makes sense.

That would be beyond cruel. With your system the attacker would completely lose his SHOOT action, just because the defender managed to use Reactive Fire.

hey my ruling here is based on

1. Reactive fire is reaction to movement in line of sight (it not have to be attack etc)

2.Reactive fire interrupts regular activation fase with another activation ( full round in full round)

"BBQ Squad and Joe Brown move adjacent to Battle Grenadiers with one activation and get ready to fire, the Battle Grenadiers roll Reactive Fire and succeed. Battle Grenadiers now fire all weapons that are within range"

1.BBQ Squad and Joe Brown move

2.Battle Grenadiers roll Reactive Fire

3.Battle Grenadiers acivate with Shoot action (reactive fire is action in this case)

4.Grenadiers shoot than C (if they wont to) with retaliation as in rules

5.BBQ Squad and Joe Brown activate with for example Shoot Action

6.BBQ Squad and Joe Brown shoots than C (if they wont to) with retaliation as in rules.

It basicly the same situation as in Unit A Activation -Attack-C next Unit B Activation-Attack-C just with change order.