some siege rules questions

[cjbennett22]

Do siege towers and battering rams and sow’s retain their hits from shooting throughout the game instead of regenerating like infantry stands and removing all outstanding hits after the shooting phase?  It was basically impossible for the high elves to gain 3 hits on any of the siege equipment because of their 3+ armor but then again, other races have cannons that will ignore the armor so that must just be a high elf thing.  I played the models as if they were any other warmaster unit and disregarded outstanding hits at the end of the shooting phase.

If a unit of infantry uses a siege tower to assault infantry on a wall and they lose and need to retreat should the siege tower be destroyed no matter how the siege tower model holds the infantry unit, per the spirit of the game?  See my siege tower and walls in the image as the entire chaos warriors unit is able to charge in column from on top of the siege tower and its opened door/ramp and then it still has enough room to retreat up to 4cm while staying on top of the siege tower.  With this in mind, no matter how big or small the siege engine model is, should all shooting and melee and moving be measured to and from the unit of infantry in column pushing the engine?  I played shooting to the engine and melee to the infantry stands.

Lastly, when 2 wall sections are on opposite sides of a tower, can I attack 1 wall section from the other through the tower, or do I need to attack the units in the tower and take the tower first.  I played it as I could choose to attack the other wall THROUGH the tower, but then realized that could put a unit of bolt throwers between my stands of chaos warriors and I got confused by that.

[jchaos79]

I should re-read the siege rules.. I am afraid that all I could say can only bring confusion to you.

sorry

[Ole]

What siege rules you are using?

The original rulebook ones.
The Warmaster Mag ones.
Or the Warmuster ones.

I don't thing there are more than that, are there?

Ole

[cjbennett22]

I am using the warmuster rules. They seem like they are the same to the updated rules in the warmaster magazine. I should have specified in the beginning, thank you.

[cjbennett22]

I am re-reading all of the rules myself....original rulebook text and the warmuster #2 rulebook.

1.)  There is no talk at all about the hits from shooting so I will need to use the default rules of shooting a unit and disregard all outstanding hits at the end of the shooting phase.  Even the high elves could cast a 3 shooting attack spell that ignores armor and should be able to focus fire on the siege engine per the warmuster rules and take them out.  Just never happened in my case, I tried. 

2.)   In all examples of an assault on walls using a siege tower, the troops are on the ground, behind the tower, and you are forced to IMAGINE the troops assaulting from it.  I see a rule again and again about how "if the accompanying troops are ever forced to retreat from combat, the tower is destroyed".  So, no matter how your towers are represented on the battle field, to scale and very useable like mine, they seem to not be physically used at all in the rulebook so I would have to say that if a unit uses a siege tower to assault a wall section and loses the assault, forced to retreat, then the siege tower must be destroyed.  All of this makes me want much smaller siege towers and actually put them behind the infantry to clarify what you are shooting at and what you are charging against and to actually just imagine the fight on the wall.

3.)   As for the tower.  Towers are not mentioned very much at all in the original rules but have a lot of text in the warmuster e-zine.  specifically, stands can assault from up to 3 facings at one time "but must be from different units".  The three faces may be, in my case, the 2 attached wall sections and the courtyard.  So then there would need to be 1 unit on each side of the tower and 1 unit in the courtyard to get 3 stands into combat with a stand of the tower defenders.  From what I get from the text and the example rules text, you cannot just simply make your way through the tower to the other side.  I would have been forced to assault the defenders of the tower.  Once I wipe them out and capture the tower I could then use all three faces for my own movement and use it's doors to get to the other wall sections or courtyard.

I am not a master at this so these are my suggestions only,  I could be wrong.  Let me know what you think.

Thank you.

[Lex]

Having visited a LOT of medieval castles and fortified towns (as recent as last weekend) I can explain this to some extend.

Depending on the actual set-up towers where either "on the outside" of the wall or integrated. The Siege rules assume the later variation. This means that the towers actually block exit on both sides of the walkway, and as not all walkways have an inner courtyard stair or ladder, this means that although the troops "gained a foothold", there was still a LOT of work to gain ground.

Also figure in that fighting INSIDE a castle, or in this case, inside a tower, in 90% of the cases has attackers fighting UP the stairs. And those are thight-wound stairs that spiral up clockwise. Now grab a sword or spear. Most people are right-handed, which makes fighting UP stairs pretty awkward, more so as the guy defending the stairs can easily wield a (cheap) spear to poke at your face.

I hope this explains some of the rules and invokes a fresh respect for troops holding your towers !

ps. besiegers would always LOVE to sap a tower, as the breach would be wider and harder to defend

[cjbennett22]

1 more question.....

Does a siege tower or battering ram actually block a frontal assault?
So, for example, cavalry using a sally gate in an attempt to sweep the coming attack off the field of combat SHOULD attack the front, but because the siege tower model is positioned there then a flank attack is all that could happen.  Nothing in the rule books anywhere talks about this but they make it very clear that the siege equipment is meant to be positioned there and the infantry pushing it, in column, behind it.

Thanks again.
Lex, I always knew of tower staircases circling up in a certain direction just like you say but your description of a cheap spear poking me in the face really brings home the point of a defender's strategies. 
stairwells would become a wall of dead bodies really quickly I'd imagine.

[Lex]

1 more question.....

Does a siege tower or battering ram actually block a frontal assault?
So, for example, cavalry using a sally gate in an attempt to sweep the coming attack off the field of combat SHOULD attack the front, but because the siege tower model is positioned there then a flank attack is all that could happen.  Nothing in the rule books anywhere talks about this but they make it very clear that the siege equipment is meant to be positioned there and the infantry pushing it, in column, behind it.

This was discussed but never explicitly written. Yes, being hampered with moving siege equipment makes you more vulnerable, so the flank attack would be logical.

Thanks again.
Lex, I always knew of tower staircases circling up in a certain direction just like you say but your description of a cheap spear poking me in the face really brings home the point of a defender's strategies. 
stairwells would become a wall of dead bodies really quickly I'd imagine.

Yup, even IF you take out one defender, he actually will become an extra obstacle, either tumbling down doing bowlingbal impression OR end up blocking one or more steps, making it harder for the attacker to push upwards.

[cjbennett22]

Thank you Lex, one last question for anyone though.

lets say 2 units of infantry are on a wall, separated by 50 - 79 mm.
Can I order a unit of infantry with ladders to just move up onto the wall and have no fight so that I can just stand up there on the wall with 1 stand of infantry?  If I can would they get chased back down the ladders if they lose a fight the next half turn?  Same situation for a siege tower as well?

If I cant, would a fight actually need to happen?

Thank you for everyones help, I have played a few games now and I think this will be all of my questions.

[Lex]

Thank you Lex, one last question for anyone though.

lets say 2 units of infantry are on a wall, separated by 50 - 79 mm.
Can I order a unit of infantry with ladders to just move up onto the wall and have no fight so that I can just stand up there on the wall with 1 stand of infantry?

if there is room, you can get up.

 If I can would they get chased back down the ladders if they lose a fight the next half turn?  Same situation for a siege tower as well?

If I cant, would a fight actually need to happen?

Thank you for everyones help, I have played a few games now and I think this will be all of my questions.

[cjbennett22]

I finally got around to making an image that will best demonstrate my questions.  Please see attached.

[Aldhick]

I'm gonna revive this thread as there's no point of making new one.

There is no specification in assault rules (I'm talking Warmuster 2 siege rules), whether a unit charging a wall using ladders is obliged to "form a battle line" as it is usual in the open field situations or whether they can charge the wall section in column for example (assuming they want to). The illustration 1 on pg. 8 is kind of missleading in this regard, as it depits units consisting of single stand, which is rarely the case. From the pictures in back section of the rules I can see both way used.
  Any thoughts? Maybe Lex might shed light on the authors' intention.
  Thanx.

[Lex]

I'm gonna revive this thread as there's no point of making new one.

There is no specification in assault rules (I'm talking Warmuster 2 siege rules), whether a unit charging a wall using ladders is obliged to "form a battle line" as it is usual in the open field situations or whether they can charge the wall section in column for example (assuming they want to). The illustration 1 on pg. 8 is kind of missleading in this regard, as it depits units consisting of single stand, which is rarely the case. From the pictures in back section of the rules I can see both way used.
  Any thoughts? Maybe Lex might shed light on the authors' intention.
  Thanx.

Is that in my article or David's?

[Aldhick]

I'm talking about the Assault rules in Warmuster 2: Under siege!. I know that authors are Gerald and Bel, but I suppose you were close to the development and therefore might have an idea how it was ment to work.

[Lex]

AFAICR the intention was/is to stick as close to normal rules as possible, which does imply expanding frontage (unless you manage a charge in column that forces you to stick in formation