Hi there, question on attacking units at the top of ladders in vanguard… If a unit is at the top of a ladder and as n opponent wishes to engage them in melee is this possible? For example can the snow troll attack the goblins in this picture?
Rules as written, you need to be in base contact to engage in melee, and you can’t half climb a ladder, you’re either at one end or the other. So no, the troll can’t attack the goblins in this picture.
This is why having great vantage points like this over objectices within ranged attacks range is probably a bit unfair.
House rules wise though, you could do something like models can attack things standing on a height that is one height higher than their height. So a height 3 model can attack things standing on height 4 buildings. I’d probably also throw in a one-way “defending obstacle” bonus to the models on the high thing. So ground level attackers don’t get a bonus dice for charging when attacking models on the building, and defenders get +1 to their Ar rolls.
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That’s a good idea. I agree with what you say about the official rules but it does seem a bit silly. In another situation you could have someone with a bow on top of something only accessible by a ladder and they then cannot be engaged. For warbands with few ranged options this seems rather unfair. Perhaps mantic should make a small rule tweak?
I think our house rules will be no charging bonus and a modifier to hit. I figure that hitting someone up a ladder is tricky, but if you’re hit by a height 3 unit like a snow troll you stay hit!
In terms of being near an objective the other side of the portal is shielded from that building. My son made a strange choice about how to attack (and he had choice of Deployment Zone too…) But I think again you’re right that we should avoid that in the future.
Thanks for your help!
Actually, thinking through and making it general the follwoing could be a decent first stab at some “ladder combat” rules:
If attacking from the bottom of the ladder (attacker is assumed to be climbing up)
- Attacking model loses charge bonus
- Melee combatant climbing up the ladder gets -1 melee for every height value of the ladder greater than the model height
- Melee combatant climbing up the ladder gets -1 armour when defending
If attacking from the topof the ladder (attacker is assumed to be climbing down)
- Attacking model loses charge bonus
- Melee combatant at the bottom of the ladder gets +1 melee
- Melee combatant on the ladder gets -1 armour when defending
Basically, fighting whilst hanging on to a ladder is really tricky, but possible!
What do you think?
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Hi,
Afraid I have not played Vanguard for some time. The issue with multi-level combat is quite great and for the time being I think the best option is to not use it. Issues include how do fliers attack targets on the edge of a higher level and so on.