When both the defeated and the victor have to retreat from battle (more then 8 figures in the battle area), who starts?

Also, there are a couple of cases which can be infered from the rules techically, but I feel that other rules make it seem nonconsistent.

1. 'One area away' (usually in hero ability description) - does an area on the other side of mountains count? Nothing says it doesn't, but I'd rather have it that way.

2. Can heros move through areas with neutral units during Strategize? The rules say collectively about all figures that only empty or friendly areas, but it seems like an unnecessary limitation in the heros case, as there's nothing stopping them thematically.

There where some more, but I forgot...

Turin said:

The defender retreats as part of Step 6 of the battle. The attacker doesn't retreat until after the battle is over. Thus, the defender retreats first.

Turin said:

When something says "one area away", it basically means "1 movement away". If the units can move over mountains or water, then they can move there, but if not, then the mountains block the movement.

For Strategize, for instance, it basically means each unit moving has 1 movement point, which cannot be enhanced by "Fast".

Turin said:

That is indeed the rule. I'm not sure it's any less thematic than the fact that Heroes only go questing in the Summer, or that they can only heal in friendly areas. It's just part of the rules of the game.

sigmazero13 said:

Thanks for the replies. As for the quoted fragment, I should have been more specific - I was talking about abilities not concerning movements, but such as Battlemag Jaeg's ability to kill units one area away, or other heros who can peek at rewards, runes, and so on. Do

sigmazero13 said:

Thanks for the replies. As for the quoted fragment, I should have been more specific - I was talking about abilities not concerning movements, but such as Battlemag Jaeg's ability to kill units one area away, or other heros who can peek at rewards, runes, and so on. Does it still mean 'one movement away'?

Turin said:

No, there is no limitation preventing Battlemage Jaes' ability from going over a mountain. Considering how large an area of land one hex represents (several hectares, at least), if Jaes can hit something that far away across open fields, then I see no reason why a mountain would stop him. Line of sight is not a question - I highly doubt any figure can draw line of sight to something in an adjacent hex at this scale. Obviously, his power is magical and magic, by definition, defies common sense.

Other hero abilities that operate on a similar scale are likewise not limited by terrain (unless the ability actually says that it is.) I'd be willing to bet that most, if not all, of such abilities could reasonably be written off as magic, too.