How to remove fallen stands in odd situation

[wmchaos2000]

Hello.

Had a game last monday and the situation below almost came up.

CK-ChaosKnights
UC-UndeadChariots
S-Sphinx

Combat Phase 1:
UCCK
UCCK  S
UCCK

Retreat Phase 1:
UC  CK
UC  CKS
UC  CK

Description:
CK loses the phase but no stand is lost. They retreat towards the Sphinx, but only the middle stand comes into contact with it due to the angle in which the Spinx is positioned (not shown in diagram).

What happens?

Should both the blocked stand be removed and the new stand that takes its place also? Seems odd.

Rulewise:
"A retreating stand is destroyed if its retreat move is
blocked. A retreat is considered blocked if any part of
the stand’s base is obliged to move through any of the
following: enemy stands,"
and
"A retreat is also blocked if a stand’s move brings it into
contact with a stand from an unengaged enemy unit.
Note that in this case contact alone is sufficient to
block a retreat – the retreating stand does not need to
move through the enemy stand. For example, a stand
that retreats 1cm into contact with an unengaged
enemy stand 1cm away is destroyed."

"Luckily" the UC killed off a CK stand so the actual situation never came up, but we do not know in which way we would have ruled if it did.

How does the council judge? 

[jchaos79]

At the endo of the section "blocked retreats" reads:

"players may occasionally feel that in the interests of playability a certain leeway is allowable when repositioning units along their line of retreat. This is considered aceptable if both players are in agreement"

So I imaging if this paragragh is writen is because it could be a number of odd situations. And your situation could be one of those.

My logic says:
- Central stand has to be removed. --> there is a gap of discontinuity in the CK unit --> the rules forbid this situation--> one side stand of CK must displace (to give unity coherence) beside it is been pursuit, to the center the side stand is choose for the CK player --> this stand is now in contact with sphinx --> it is detroyed too

oooo Cannas was a hard battle

[wmchaos2000]

Yes, we figured this would be the outcome.
Boring way to die though, but that is the hard world of WM.
Thanks for the answer and clarifying rule quotes.

[spiritusXmachina]

My personal opinion:
If the Sphinx is really positioned perfectly like this I'd say all three Chaos Knight stands touch the Sphinx (corner to corner at least) and are killed.
In reality in most situations the Sphinx will not be placed so perfectly but a little bit more left or right. Then two stands would be killed.

The easiest way to avoid such situations is to turn the Sphinx 90° when placed by the Undead player (if it is intended to block the Knight's retreat) - so there is no discussion afterwards.

[wmchaos2000]

Yes.

But, as said in first post, the Sphinx were in an angle compared to the Knights, so that it only could come into contact with the middle stand. The angled position due to failed order in which my opponent tried to get the Sphinx to charge the rear of the Knights.

IF my opponent would have said "I will position the Sphinx so that (if next order fails) it will block the retreat of all three Knight stands" I would of course have answered "Certainly!"
It does not matter that it nearly not can be positioned in that way: What is agreed upon, is agreed upon.
We always play by the highest sportmanship possible, but when something is not agreed upon beforehand, there may be a discussion.

[Lex]

The easiest way to avoid such situations is to turn the Sphinx 90° when placed by the Undead player (if it is intended to block the Knight's retreat) - so there is no discussion afterwards.

Assuming it had still movement distance left to turn....