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Originally posted by jgsugden

http://homepage.mac.com/guyf/DDM/Clarifications.html

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Originally posted by Richard II

Ooh. Hostile Empathic Transfer on your own kobold miners looks like fun.

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Originally posted by Dagni

The Warforged Bodyguard ruling is kinda lame. For example, if you attack a Warforged Bodyguard, and a second Bodyguard takes the hit instead, neither creature's 'Reinforced' ability reduces the damage?!?

- Dagni

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Originally posted by robbdaman

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Originally posted by Dagni

The Warforged Bodyguard ruling is kinda lame. For example, if you attack a Warforged Bodyguard, and a second Bodyguard takes the hit instead, neither creature's 'Reinforced' ability reduces the damage?!?

- Dagni

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Well that's because it's not actual damage from a melee attack when it's taken from a special effect. It's damage transference sort of like shield other.

R~

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Originally posted by Dagni

The ruling isn't intuitive at all, and I don't like it.

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Originally posted by Vash

Maybe I'm missing it. But wasn't it said that there was going to be a clarification stating that you can't use the combination of Brass Samurai and Dark Traveller to give your followers a Reach 2 Whirlwind attack?

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Originally posted by Vash

Maybe I'm missing it. But wasn't it said that there was going to be a clarification stating that you can't use the combination of Brass Samurai and Dark Traveller to give your followers a Reach 2 Whirlwind attack?

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Originally posted by LeClaire

(03/01/06, War Drums) Multiple Threats: All enemies adjacent to this creature are considered to be flanked. Whenever such an enemy is attacked in melee, the attacker is considered to be flanking it. The attacker gets the usual +2 bonus on the attack roll and may use Melee Sneak Attack or other abilities that require flanking.

- It sounds like a creature with reach can hit someone suffering from Multiple Threats and gain the benefits of flank. I can't off-hand think of any Melee Reach pieces with Sneak Attack, but you could create one. Dark Traveler + Halfling Sneak for example.

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Whirlwind Attack (On its turn, if this creature moves no more than 1 square, it can make a separate melee attack against each enemy creature within its Melee Reach). Entering difficult terrain or being slowed in some other fashion prevents using Whirlwind Attack. This ability replaces a creature’s attacks. If a creature has no Melee Reach listed on its stat card, it can attack each adjacent enemy once.

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If you do not have melee reach "on your card" you can only attack adjacent units.

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Originally posted by guyf

Dagni, you're making at least one assumption that isn't true: "... If the damage dealt isn't melee damage anymore ..." Where/how does this come into play? Neither the Bodyguard card text nor the clarification says anything about that.

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The original target's Conceal and Incorporeal abilities *must* be resolved before Bodyguard. Bodyguard can't function until you know that the original target would take damage from an attack. You can't know whether the original target would take damage until you check whether the original target's Conceal and/or Incorporeal caused the attack to miss.

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Also, you have some key details wrong about how Pushback works. The example you describe can't happen that way. The oddity you describe doesn't happen.

Finally, there is no choice (mine or otherwise) regarding whether the WB's Reinforced ability can reduce damage taken via Bodyguard. The card says what it says.

Basically, you're making assumptions about how the ability is supposed to work from a "realism" point of view based on the fact that the WB's Reinforced ability can't reduce damage taken via Bodyguard, and that's not a good idea.

Though I haven't asked Shoe about it, I believe the reason Reinforced can't reduce that damage is for balance, enhanced playability, and interesting decision making. Do you attack the AC 25 Marut when the WB is just going to take the damage if you hit, or do you attack the lower-AC WB directly even though your damage gets reduced? In other words, it's not necessarily always the right choice to attack the WB instead of the Marut. This promotes (albeit slightly) attacking the Marut instead of the WB, which actually makes the WB a bit *better* than it would be otherwise.

Finally, we have a lot of experience dealing with Bodyguard from Star Wars Minis. In SWM the ability works more-or-less the way you described, and new players are typically *very* surprised and shocked about that.

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I guess to boil it down there's exactly one problem I have with the ruling. As a 'rules lawyer' myself, I think it's hard to justify this ruling with the rules in the book and on the cards.

In the hypothetical scenario where the Bodyguard somehow gains Incorporeal, I'd have to reread the definition of Incorporeal again, but I think that the rules there would *require* a roll against Incorporeal, regardless of how the Bodyguard took the damage.

The main ruling is enough of a gray area that it can be 'clarified' either way, but whatever a new player might or might not expect, I think a typical 'rules lawyer' is going to expect the opposite ruling.

Again, that's because it says "takes the damage". 'the damage' has logically already been calculated (or how would you know any damage was dealt?), therefore it's a constant, therefore it was the original target's DR and resistances and creature type that changed the damage, not the new target's. Likewise, the general rule is that if the card does NOT mention something, then that something doesn't happen. Therefore, if the Bodyguard only takes the damage, he does NOT also take the '+ Constrict', '+ Pushback', or '+ Paralyze' right?

Personally, I feel that the wording on the card could use errata to something like: "If an adjacent creature in your warband is hit by an attack, this creature can become the creature hit instead".

That would change the practical effect of the ruling almost not at all (how often will he want to take a hit that would do no damage to the original target?), but would be MUCH clearer as to what happens when the bodyguard ability is used. With that wording it suddenly is obvious that the second half of the Reinforced wording is an exception to the rule, not merely a clarification of what happens in that situation.

- Dagni

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Originally posted by warchanter

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If you do not have melee reach "on your card" you can only attack adjacent units.

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Pardon me, but that's just insane! If it was true, then the commander effect of the Dark Traveler wouldn't work for anyone! If you don't have melee reach, you can strike only andjacent creatures. With dark traveler you have melee reach 2, so you CAN strike foes two squares away. ERGO, if you use whirlwind attack all alone without melee reach, you can do it (as the glossary says) only against adjacent enemies. BUT with melee reach 2 (it can't be PRINTED on the card, it's a commander effect!) you can whirlwind against an enemy two squares away. Guy can confirm or deny this, but if it denies it, well, that just wouldn't make sense.
(I didn't want to sound rough or anything, mind you, it's just that sometimes being too "strict" goes angainst the fun of the game, for me, at least)
: ))))

Sorry for the rant.

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The commander effect still works, it just doesnt combine with whirlwind attack. To use whirlwind at reach, it has to be on the card.

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Originally posted by warchanter

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The commander effect still works, it just doesnt combine with whirlwind attack. To use whirlwind at reach, it has to be on the card.

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Is there any rule clarification on this subject by Guy or others? Beacuse it is abnormously absurd to stick to those guidelines (I, for sure, wouldn't have even thought about asking myself if it was possible or not to whirlwind at melee reach 2 with Dark traveler, because it seeemed utterly OBVIOUS).

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Well when people were posting earlier about being able to whirlwind at reach, guy popped up and said you didnt read the whole rule, basically saying you cant combine them. And the rule is pretty specific saying it must appear on the card.

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Originally posted by guyf

LOL [:)] I make it all up. All of it. And I *never* pass it by R&D. I do it to torture you. R&D can't change it, either, 'cuz the info is on my website! Wahahaha! [)]

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Originally posted by robbdaman
If that's how it's supposed to work the entire description of the ability is bad.

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Originally posted by Dagni
As a 'rules lawyer' myself,...
- Dagni

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Originally posted by warchanter

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Well when people were posting earlier about being able to whirlwind at reach, guy popped up and said you didnt read the whole rule, basically saying you cant combine them. And the rule is pretty specific saying it must appear on the card.

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That's sad. But why can't they combine? It doesn't seem such a powerful "combo" (especially by taking nearly 100 points of commanders to pull such a trick). I know that that it's what's printed on the rules, but it still amazes me as incredibly... wrong. Oh, well, I'll just ignore it in friendly games. Thanks for listening to my rants!

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