Well it looks like the can of worms, alluded to by Lawrence, has now been opened. It appears popular opinion is that elements are being treated as if directly lined up behind for the purposes of not paying an irregular ineptness penalty despite the wording on page 27 stating "Any element moves other than straight ahead, unless along a road, river or terrain feature edge." Popular opinion has extended the 3 stated exemptions to now include columns.
What is the implication of this? How will this be selectively applied? Lawrence brought up an example earlier in this post, but it might now be worth exploring other potential fish-hooks.
These are from my post on the Yahoo group (
http://games.groups.yahoo.com/group/DBMMlist/message/87975). Consider then the impact on the following:
1) attacking the kink of a column; {addressed in another thread}
2) ending moves completely in GGo but near DGo (are the rear elements in or out of the DGo if there is a kink pointing back to the DGo?);
3) ending moves partially in DGo with a kink outside the DGo (are the rear elements in or out of the DGo?);
4) attacking the elements in a column behind the kink where it could be deemed such elements were in going other than that of the lead element of the column;
5) attacking elements in a column behind the kink where they are in going other than that of the lead element of the column;
6) reconsider questions 3, 4, 5 & 6 with a view to thin pieces of terrain such as boundaries and gullies where the rear of the column could pass right through that terrain and the elements could be deemed to be either in the terrain or on the other side of it;
7) does the first element after the kink exert a TZ ahead of himself, or is it assumed to be directly behind the element in front? {this was discussed in another thread}
8 ) recoiling columns (I believe this was the original intent);
9) rear supports (ditto); and
10) zones of death (does an element kinked exactly 90 degrees behind the lead element die in the zone of the death if the zone of death rules apply?)
Also, if the head of a column leaves difficult terrain and ends his move kinked on a road (facing down the road) but the rear of the column is still in the DGo - is the rest of the column now deemed to be on the road? Or is it still in the DGo?
Lets say there is a column of Spears where the lead element has turned through 90 degrees, and the opponent attacks the leading Spear element with a double overlap. Does the Spear get rear support? Given the attacker double over-lapped the lead element, is the 2nd element of Spear (still facing 90 degrees to the lead element) in the TZ of one of the over-lappers or not?
The examples provided above (and Lawrence's previous posts) are no less absurd than the current popular opinion regarding irregular ineptness penalty exemption.
Andrew
