Art De La Guerre

[Psiloiordinary]

Please and thank you: I thought that this was a nooby type question, but its failed to generate a consensus or clear quote from the rules that answers it.

Impetuous foot (unmanoeuvrable) are moving straight towards a wood 2.5 UD in front of them. They normally move 3UD but difficult terrain slows them to 2UD but if they only move 2UD that leaves them short of the wood.

So:

How far do they move? 2UD? Stop at the edge of wood without entering? 3UD?

How many CP's does it cost? 1 or 2CP?

Thanks,

Mark

[SteveR]

They chose to make a move that did not use up all of their movement allowance. They could have remained stationary or moved in a different way but they chose to do this.

When you choose to make a move that does not use your full movement allowance, and you are impetuous, you must pay 2 CP

[Zoltan]

Like a number of experienced players said on your FB post, it costs 2 CP (for the reason that Steve has explained very clearly).

[SteveR]

Hi Mark,

Your question was perfectly reasonable and it is one that everyone had at one point. So keep asking. Facebook is good for instantaneous answers and it is easier to post pictures but suffers from lots of opinions.

You'll learn over time to recognize the experienced folks who are more likely to give you the right answer. In this case Francesco Velotto knows what he is talking about.

But no one is perfect.

This set works well because the players cross pollinate a lot and the committee translating the keeping the rules does a good, even if at times deliberate, job.

So keep asking.

[Mike Bennett]

I would disagree with Steve, and say if depends

With a built up area parallel to the group all use their full move (more than 2ud, less than 3) and touch the straight edge at the same time Therefore they have all used their full move and pay 1cp move. If someone tells me they have not used their full move I would say great, please tell me how much further they are allowed to move and I will move them on.
On the other hand hand for an irregular shaped piece like a wood couod probably be 2cp as only one unit will touch, and have used its full move and the others would still have movement left.

Ps For me this is similar to starting in delaying terrain where they move at the terrain speed. They do not pay more because they did not use their full good terrain speed.

[madaxeman]

[Mike Bennett]

I thought that the idea of the 2cp cost was a penalty for making a clever manouvre that would be beyond these troops and their eaders. It therefore seems wrong to me to penalise them for a simple move straight ahead as fast as they can go just because it reaches terrain

Especially when you can use wheels to loose distance and effectively move at half speed anyway perfectly within the rules letter, if not the spirit

[madaxeman]

[Hazelbark]

[Psiloiordinary]

Thanks all,

It does seem that there are different ways within the rules to interpret this. After giving it some thought it seems to be that the two ways to look at it depend on if you think the movement allowance table is just a summary that reveals the speed of moving units, who actually gradually move during their turn, as the terrain they are in dictates. This would be a "realistic" view. The alternative is that you think in more "quantum" terms that the table gives the only distances the troops can move with nothing in between, not without paying for it. Which does seem at odds with the rational for the rule i.e. "go over there as quick as you can" being a simple order for one CP.

It sems reasonable for the authors to give us which of these guiding principles we should all apply to this and other situations.

The crucial question is if we need rulers with small units than an UD.

This all reminded me of something early the other morning and I waffled on about it on facebook but no one has responded as its probably too waffly.

- -- - - - - - - -
Facebook waffle:
I think the reason we are all convinced that these contradictory answers are all true (well I am) is because of the way the question is framed. Perhaps it’s just the same as when quantum physics results don’t jibe with relativity results.
In the question and in the rules as stated we have an implication that time is split into indivisible quantum “turns”. Our “plank time” if you will (PLAyers Not Knowing what’s happening).
In the realm of the Quantum gamer turns are indivisible and are the shortest possible units of time. Troops are moving from the start to the end of the turn a certain distance as if teleporting/quantum leaping from place to place in accordance with the standard model of the movement allowance table. We are all using measuring sticks that only have lines on whole number UDs which in the quantum gamers world are the smallest possible unit of length. Our Plank length.
But recent work at CERN shows that the UD can in fact be split into small lengths called “nudges” hinting at a new gaming paradigm just waiting to be discovered.
I am today proposing a grand unification theory utilising a relativistic framing in which our troops are in fact being moved by the hands of God (Gaming Old Dudes). BTW: Einstein was wrong Gods definitely do play dice!
In this framing of course things move at a certain speed in the terrain.
In the game it’s at a speed taken from the movement allowance table which is calibrated to one game turn. In my proposed relativistic framing a game turn can be split into smaller units and it actually lasts for a highly variable length of time made up of smaller units: usually three dice rolls, several sighs, two shakes of my head, any number of chin scratches, and a simultaneous shrug and grimace, only recently identified as separate expressions in work at the Large Gamer Collider.
In the scenario above this means the troops reach the wood 2.5/3 of the way through the turn. They then move in the wood for the remaining 0.5/3 of the turn at a speed 2 UD per turn.
This means they move in total a distance of 2.8333…UD so they end up mostly into the wood.
So switching back to quantum gaming language this is their full move allowance and so they pay 1 CP.
So anyway we just need a couple of extra chapters in the rules. One explaining relativity and another for quantum physics. Oh and measuring sticks that let us split the UD.
QED

[Zoltan]

Dear Psiloi you are overthinking this.

The rules make it clear that if a unit moves through two different terrain types, it’s Movement Allowance is that of the slower terrain.

So in the case of an impetuous Medium Infantry unit moving through open terrain AND woods, its Movement Allowance is 2UD. As long as the impetuous MI move a full 2UD it costs them 1CP.

But in your original post you stated that the impetuous MI start 2.5UD from the wood. So it is NEVER going to be possible for the MI to move through both open terrain AND woods with a single move (let’s leave out the multiple move scenario).

As the impetuous MI is moving only in open terrain its Movement Allowance is 3UD. If it choses to only move 2.5UD and stop at the edge of the woods (because it has already exceeded the woods 2UD Movement Allowance) that costs 2CP.

It really is as simple as that.

By comparison, if you had stated that the impetuous MI started 1.5UD from the woods, then of course it would only cost 1CP for the unit to enter 0.5UD into the woods.

[Psiloiordinary]

Thanks Zoltan,

I do understand what you are saying.

As others have pointed out this answer doesn't satisfy everyone for the reasons given which seem reasonable enough. The question of a decent level of realism is what is ultimately at stake here and whichever way one chooses to go I personally think its important to have a basic principle in mind that seems to make sense to guide the decision. ( The horrors of the multi wheelers is not something I'd want to play against. )

The rationale you outline seems to lose on the decent level of realism front and the underlying principle is in fact, as others have pointed out, just one interpretation of the movement allowance table.


Cheers,

Mark

[madaxeman]

I'm pretty sure all of us who have been here for some time would recognise and accept that we are basically playing a game of toy soldiers, with little tin* men attached to rectangular bits of card, MDF or metal taking turns to be shoved around a tabletop whilst their fates are decided by the rolling of dice and (occasionally) the highly abstracted military skills of their commanders and owners.

As such, I think us old timers all now accept and understand that trying to rely on notions of "realism" as a foundational basis for assessing which reading of any given rule is correct is, as Hazelbark has articulated, inevitably flawed on the basis that any such notions will always be entirely subjective.

Past experience suggests that considerations of playability, simplicity, and above all consistency with other rules are all likely to be more significant than our varied and individual subjective views of what constitutes realism - but the bigger issue, which many new players miss, is that the rules were originally written in French, with their syntax and format therefore being influenced by the structures and formats of the Napoleonic legal system.

This does mean that unlike many other previous English-penned sets there is no underlying "Grand Theory of Everything" in ADLG. Instead the rulebook is set out as a series of lists of "what is possible", followed in each case by a series of bullet points citing all of the exceptions to those "what is possible" top-level categories.

That does in turn make it much easier for situations where clarity is genuinely lacking in the text, as the answer will (at some point) be "whatever Herve and the DT decide is right" - and we will all accept it, scrawl it into our rulebooks and move on having all been given a definitive, unarguable answer as to how to play this particular wrinkle in this particular game of toy soldiers anyway.

(* other materials are available)
_________________
www.madaxeman.com

[Neep]

As Mad Ax hints, the situation is frustrating for all of us.