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Javelinier
Inscrit le: 25 Fév 2016
Messages: 13
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 Posté le: Lun Sep 29, 2025 4:22 pm Sujet du message: Commander in ambush |
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One tricky question.
If a commander (not the c in c) is in ambush and not visible, how can you determine where his visible units can deploy?
Do you measure the command range from the ambush marker? |
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lionelrus
Magister Militum
Inscrit le: 21 Mar 2009
Messages: 4865
Localisation: paris
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| Posté le: Lun Sep 29, 2025 5:15 pm Sujet du message: |
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| pichuleante a écrit: | One tricky question.
If a commander (not the c in c) is in ambush and not visible, how can you determine where his visible units can deploy?
Do you measure the command range from the ambush marker? |
J'attend toujours:
1) de voir ceci en tournoi (cacher le général et montrer les troupes)
2) qu'on m'explique l'intérêt de cette tactique.
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"Quand on a pas de technique, faut y aller à la zob"
Perceval à Yvain et Gauvain. |
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pichuleante
Javelinier
Inscrit le: 25 Fév 2016
Messages: 13
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| Posté le: Lun Sep 29, 2025 5:45 pm Sujet du message: |
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I mean, in the rulebook it says you can ambush a commander, but not the c in c
If you do so. The commander is hidden and in his group of command there are several units some in ambush with the commander and some other visible.
How do you determine if the visible units are in range of command to deply them? |
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pichuleante
Javelinier
Inscrit le: 25 Fév 2016
Messages: 13
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| Posté le: Mar Sep 30, 2025 7:43 am Sujet du message: |
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| lionelrus a écrit: | | pichuleante a écrit: | One tricky question.
If a commander (not the c in c) is in ambush and not visible, how can you determine where his visible units can deploy?
Do you measure the command range from the ambush marker? |
J'attend toujours:
1) de voir ceci en tournoi (cacher le général et montrer les troupes)
2) qu'on m'explique l'intérêt de cette tactique. |
I'll put you and example, imagine you are defender and have a plantation in a flank sector near the center of the table and you decide to ambush 4 heavy cavalries and the commander is included in one of them.
If the command group is composed i.e. 4 hcv + 2 LH, where can you deploy the 2 LH visible in range of command if the commander is not visible? |
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Andy Fyfe
Légionaire
Inscrit le: 14 Fév 2024
Messages: 121
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| Posté le: Mar Sep 30, 2025 8:40 am Sujet du message: |
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| pichuleante a écrit: | | lionelrus a écrit: | | pichuleante a écrit: | One tricky question.
If a commander (not the c in c) is in ambush and not visible, how can you determine where his visible units can deploy?
Do you measure the command range from the ambush marker? |
J'attend toujours:
1) de voir ceci en tournoi (cacher le général et montrer les troupes)
2) qu'on m'explique l'intérêt de cette tactique. |
I'll put you and example, imagine you are defender and have a plantation in a flank sector near the center of the table and you decide to ambush 4 heavy cavalries and the commander is included in one of them.
If the command group is composed i.e. 4 hcv + 2 LH, where can you deploy the 2 LH visible in range of command if the commander is not visible? |
I would say that the commander counts as being on the ambush marker.
However, often the answer on these forums is very simplistic and based solely on the rules as written etc.
In that case the ruling would be that the commander is not on the table and therefore has no command range. So either you can't place any other units on the table or you can't chose to include the commander in the ambush.
Andy |
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madaxeman
Magister Militum
Inscrit le: 01 Nov 2014
Messages: 1672
Localisation: Londres Centraal.
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| Posté le: Mar Sep 30, 2025 9:44 am Sujet du message: |
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This is such a niche and unusual scenario that - as you have spotted - it's not really covered in the rulebook.
The approach of the author and rules team in such cases has generally been to not respond to such queries, and instead trust the two players to behave like responsible adults playing a game together for mutual enjoyment, and assume that the players will be capable of agreeing between themselves what to do if something which is too obscure to warrant inclusion in, or amendment of the rules does come up.
The alternative would be for the author and rules team to continually be issuing an endless stream of errata, amendments and additional rules in response to every hyper-niche, theoretical, never-seen scenario - many of which are conjured up by those who lurk in the dark corners of the internet with nothing better to do with their time than read wargames rules looking for obscure ways to pick holes in them.
Authors trying to contort their prose to cover every imaginable tabletop scenario, and trying to instantly respond to every query is an approach which has ruined many an otherwise popular and successful ruleset over the years, so the approach of treating us all like consenting adults and leaving the hyper-niche unlikely-to-happen stuff largely unanswered is, on balance, probably for the best...
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lionelrus
Magister Militum
Inscrit le: 21 Mar 2009
Messages: 4865
Localisation: paris
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| Posté le: Mar Sep 30, 2025 10:52 am Sujet du message: |
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| madaxeman a écrit: | This is such a niche and unusual scenario that - as you have spotted - it's not really covered in the rulebook.
The approach of the author and rules team in such cases has generally been to not respond to such queries, and instead trust the two players to behave like responsible adults playing a game together for mutual enjoyment, and assume that the players will be capable of agreeing between themselves what to do if something which is too obscure to warrant inclusion in, or amendment of the rules does come up.
The alternative would be for the author and rules team to continually be issuing an endless stream of errata, amendments and additional rules in response to every hyper-niche, theoretical, never-seen scenario - many of which are conjured up by those who lurk in the dark corners of the internet with nothing better to do with their time than read wargames rules looking for obscure ways to pick holes in them.
Authors trying to contort their prose to cover every imaginable tabletop scenario, and trying to instantly respond to every query is an approach which has ruined many an otherwise popular and successful ruleset over the years, so the approach of treating us all like consenting adults and leaving the hyper-niche unlikely-to-happen stuff largely unanswered is, on balance, probably for the best... |
I agree with Tim's answer.
I can add "et en tournoi, il y a un arbitre pour traiter les cas tordus, improbables et impossibles".
_________________
"Quand on a pas de technique, faut y aller à la zob"
Perceval à Yvain et Gauvain. |
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Ramses II
Magister Militum
Inscrit le: 17 Juil 2015
Messages: 1278
Localisation: London
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| Posté le: Mar Sep 30, 2025 2:02 pm Sujet du message: |
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As others have said, this is very niche, though even more so than apparent.Â
P77 in placing the units in ambush state
| Citation: | | Â All units of the ambush must form a valid group and must be inside the terrain or out of sight of the enemy at the start of its movement. |
I would suggest that the commander can only be placed in ambush if all the units of the corps are in the same ambush. In this case the commander must be with the group, though does not count towards the ambush restrictions. Â
Personally, I would require the commander to be on table if there are LH (or other units) on the table. By  placing the commander on table, these units can be seen to be in command  range etc.  Â
This also removes problems with revealing the commander and his properties. |
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Neep
Signifer
Inscrit le: 09 Jan 2023
Messages: 368
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| Posté le: Mar Sep 30, 2025 2:41 pm Sujet du message: |
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Let's not surrender to negativity. This question has been raised twice before. But search seems broken, probably because the forum needs re-indexing. Maybe someone could take a break from manning the barricades and do some maintenance?
MAdlGGA! |
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Mike Bennett
Légat
Inscrit le: 11 Nov 2017
Messages: 599
Localisation: Carnforth, Lancashire, UK
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| Posté le: Mer Oct 01, 2025 11:44 am Sujet du message: |
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| Ramses II a écrit: |
….
I would suggest that the commander can only be placed in ambush if all the units of the corps are in the same ambush. In this case the commander must be with the group, though does not count towards the ambush restrictions. Â
Personally, I would require the commander to be on table if there are LH (or other units) on the table. By  placing the commander on table, these units can be seen to be in command  range etc. |
For an included general that would be less reasonable than for a free standing one. |
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navigator
Auxiliaire
Inscrit le: 09 Sep 2018
Messages: 91
Localisation: robin hoods bay UK
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| Posté le: Mer Oct 01, 2025 4:22 pm Sujet du message: |
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| id refer you to the game etiquette page on p11.. it has a solution for all anomalies |
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Ramses II
Magister Militum
Inscrit le: 17 Juil 2015
Messages: 1278
Localisation: London
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| Posté le: Mer Oct 01, 2025 5:30 pm Sujet du message: |
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| Mike Bennett a écrit: | | Ramses II a écrit: |
….
I would suggest that the commander can only be placed in ambush if all the units of the corps are in the same ambush. In this case the commander must be with the group, though does not count towards the ambush restrictions. Â
Personally, I would require the commander to be on table if there are LH (or other units) on the table. By  placing the commander on table, these units can be seen to be in command  range etc. |
For an included general that would be less reasonable than for a free standing one. |
Agreed that an included general is trickier, and when there are external units there are arguments both ways for allowing the general to be in the ambush or requiring it to be outside.Â
For clarity and ‘fairness’, I still feel the included general should be outside if he commands other units outside. The intended use of ambushes forms part of the army design, which can take this question into account. As such, people submitting tournament lists could be warned of this restriction, though as Navigator suggests, a friendly solution is an obvious solution. |
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madaxeman
Magister Militum
Inscrit le: 01 Nov 2014
Messages: 1672
Localisation: Londres Centraal.
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| Posté le: Mer Oct 01, 2025 5:33 pm Sujet du message: |
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| Mike Bennett a écrit: | | Ramses II a écrit: |
….
I would suggest that the commander can only be placed in ambush if all the units of the corps are in the same ambush. In this case the commander must be with the group, though does not count towards the ambush restrictions. Â
Personally, I would require the commander to be on table if there are LH (or other units) on the table. By  placing the commander on table, these units can be seen to be in command  range etc. |
For an included general that would be less reasonable than for a free standing one. |
I'm not convinced that "more reasonable for an included general wishing to place himself in an ambush whilst also choosing to leave some of his other troops in the open" would be the basis for what is "more reasonable" in overall game terms.
- If the general is on table, then there is no debate and everything about this situation is already covered by the existing rules.
- If the general and all of his command are in ambush, then there is no debate and everything about this situation is already covered by the existing rules.
- If the general is in ambush, and also has troops visible on table then we're heading into uncharted territory, the resolution of which would require a number of entirely new rules to sort out.
Given the current deployment rules have been written to err on the side of simplicity (ie the idea of a "reserve" has been largely sacrificed in order to remove even the possibility of a "floating command"), I would hazard a guess that if a call were to be made then inconveniencing an included commander wishing to place themself in a very unusual situation in the hope of gaining a fairly dubious tactical advantage would be the one that loses out ...
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Zoltan
Légat
Inscrit le: 18 Jan 2015
Messages: 521
Localisation: Wellington, New Zealand
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| Posté le: Mer Oct 01, 2025 7:12 pm Sujet du message: |
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| pichuleante a écrit: | One tricky question.
If a commander (not the c in c) is in ambush and not visible, how can you determine where his visible units can deploy?
Do you measure the command range from the ambush marker? |
When deploying the visible units you must ensure that they are in command range of the position you (mentally) expect to deploy their ambushing commander.Â
In effect, the location of the deployed visible units will “constrain†where you subsequently place the commander’s figure (or his unit if he is included) once the ambush is revealed.
You’d measure the command range from the visible units to a point that complies with the ambush deployment rules. That point is where you MUST deploy your commander figure (or unit if he is included). |
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Ramses II
Magister Militum
Inscrit le: 17 Juil 2015
Messages: 1278
Localisation: London
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| Posté le: Mer Oct 01, 2025 10:10 pm Sujet du message: |
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| Zoltan a écrit: | When deploying the visible units you must ensure that they are in command range of the position you (mentally) expect to deploy their ambushing commander.Â
In effect, the location of the deployed visible units will “constrain†where you subsequently place the commander’s figure . . .Â
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As Tim says, this approach opens a can of worms Eg, what if the unit with the included commander canny be legally deployed (rare I agree).Â
Along with Tim and Lionelrus, I strongly suggest that a commander must be placed on table if he commands visible units. |
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