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So, on the PB front page there's been a link in place for RRT's little news page that seems to be updated separately from the one that gets copy/pasted for the weekly newsletters.

Guess what got changed fairly recently (it may have been a while since I looked, but it can't have been too long ago):

Release Dates: Ships in early June to Kickstarter supporters. Ships a few weeks later to distributors. Should be in your hands no later than June and in stores by the beginning of July, 2014.

As noted in the KS comments, that's a lot more specific then they usually are.

Yes, obviously it assumes that mold tooling, production and multiple rounds of shipping go smoothly to make that timeframe, but it's almost suspiciously specific compared to their usual "it'll be done when it's done, so awesome, made an entire room of adults achieve simultaneous climax just by glancing at two pages of rules, etc, etc" platitudes.

I moved this LOS stuff over to the FB page for some additional discussion. I wanted to get more input from more people.

Mike, does the center LOS have any other restrictions like a minimum % cover amount?

 warboss wrote:
Mike, does the center LOS have any other restrictions like a minimum % cover amount?

None. If you can see center to center you can shoot. If you can't you can't.

Cover is a seperate affair and comes into efffect IF you have valid LOS.

Mike1975 wrote:

 warboss wrote:
Mike, does the center LOS have any other restrictions like a minimum % cover amount?

None. If you can see center to center you can shoot. If you can't you can't.

Cover is a seperate affair and comes into efffect IF you have valid LOS.

Houston, we have a problem with using the "center" as the primary indicator of LOS. One battlepod below is invisible due to strategic placement of a street lamp whereas the other is a valid target. Now obviously I added the crude lamp with my pro-MSPaint skills to the cartoon still but it illustrates the point that tiny stray pieces of terrain like stop signs or tips of trees that happen to block "centers" but not much else of the model will be completely legal blockers of LOS. Adding a % minimum restriction puts a band aid on it but the "center" LOS system still is a clunky mechanic. This isn't just semantics as the both pickup game and tourney players (since they said they're going for both) will have their fair share of people who try to abuse this on top of people who just find themselves in that odd situation.

I'm not saying I completely disagree but for tourneys you have to use rules. Not everyone uses common sense the same way. That much we can all agree on. I understand your point but those examples are the extreme and not the norm.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Plus a fig placed like that cannot fire back and you also ignore the fact that on your activation you move and then fire so obviously you can move into a position where this street lamp is not a problem.

And if that comment echo's PB's sentiments I just lost all interest in this as anything but a casual kitchen table game with friends.

Because it is possible to write rules to handle things like that. Refusing to do it means you're trending towards GW rules. That's not a good goal.

That is the way it is written in the rules that I have. Things may have changed. No idea since my set is from back in December. If you write overly complicated rules on the same token you open things up more to rules lawyering. I don't agree with it as written but all LOS systems have room for abuse.

Now if you could pose a workable and simple system in it's place I'm all for sharing it. You say it's broken that way. I partially agree. Now what is the fix?

Mike1975 wrote:
That is the way it is written in the rules that I have. Things may have changed. No idea since my set is from back in December. If you write overly complicated rules on the same token you open things up more to rules lawyering. I don't agree with it as written but all LOS systems have room for abuse.

Now if you could pose a workable and simple system in it's place I'm all for sharing it. You say it's broken that way. I partially agree. Now what is the fix?

I posted the band aid fix in the same post as I brought up the problem (add a % cover minimum to the "center" LOS rule i.e. "a model whose center is covered and who is over 50% obscured by cover) as well as hinted at with the initial question. The better solution is to simply drop the problematic and abusable "center" LOS system and go with something else (whether TLOS or "main body with exceptions").

Another issue we are bantering about.

I can see players placing FPA in cities to get cover and with the DF bonus of Hover they essentially double up on cover and make it nealy impossible to hit them (Building plus Hover). So can you hide in a city or on a hill behind terrain and still consider yourself Hovering in order to double up your defense bonuses?

Would a Veritech in guardian mode hiding behind a building on the ground still get the Hover bonuses. Common sense says not but there will still be players who try it.







Automatically Appended Next Post:

 warboss wrote:

Mike1975 wrote:
That is the way it is written in the rules that I have. Things may have changed. No idea since my set is from back in December. If you write overly complicated rules on the same token you open things up more to rules lawyering. I don't agree with it as written but all LOS systems have room for abuse.

Now if you could pose a workable and simple system in it's place I'm all for sharing it. You say it's broken that way. I partially agree. Now what is the fix?

I posted the band aid fix in the same post as I brought up the problem (add a % cover minimum to the "center" LOS rule i.e. "a model whose center is covered and who is over 50% obscured by cover) as well as hinted at with the initial question. The better solution is to simply drop the problematic and abusable "center" LOS system and go with something else (whether TLOS or "main body with exceptions").

But as Forar pointed out you have people who will argue if a unit is 45% or 52% hidden. So out comes where you have players with little common sense and you are asking them to use common sense judiciously??? I had a similar idea. In fact that is close to what I wrote up in my Tactics rules.

Mike1975 wrote:
Another issue we are bantering about.

I can see players placing FPA in cities to get cover and with the DF bonus of Hover they essentially double up on cover and make it nealy impossible to hit them (Building plus Hover). So can you hide in a city or on a hill behind terrain and still consider yourself Hovering in order to double up your defense bonuses?

Would a Veritech in guardian mode hiding behind a building on the ground still get the Hover bonuses. Common sense says not but there will still be players who try it.

Why not? They hovered close to the ground a lot in the show. Or am I misunderstanding the question?

But as Forar pointed out you have people who will argue if a unit is 45% or 52% hidden. So out comes where you have players with little common sense and you are asking them to use common sense judiciously??? I had a similar idea. In fact that is close to what I wrote up in my Tactics rules.

Instead of caring about that, make cover a smaller advantage and give it more judiciously. From base to base, anything in between? Cover. No? No cover.
Or TLOS - just define the "eyes" or sensors on every model. If there's something blocking in the path, cover.

If they're flying it would have to be essentially TLOS - anything blocking? Cover. No? no cover.

As I said on the facebook page, I really like the cylindrical method to LOS. I have played Warmachine and it is awkward at 1st glance, but really clear cut and definitive. I haven't had or heard an argument on LOS or cover using there rules. But as long as it isn't as ugly as 40k's LOS/cover system, I will be fine.

Mike1975 wrote:
I'm not saying I completely disagree but for tourneys you have to use rules. Not everyone uses common sense the same way. That much we can all agree on. I understand your point but those examples are the extreme and not the norm.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Plus a fig placed like that cannot fire back and you also ignore the fact that on your activation you move and then fire so obviously you can move into a position where this street lamp is not a problem.

Rules should be as solid as possible for ALL play as even friends can argue about interpretations. Also, common sense is not that common. You should really take a peek through the You Make the Call section of this forum to see how minis players in the wild actually interpret rules. I posted an extreme example to illustrate the point but not all the issues that will come up with this needlessly complicated and abusable center system will be so clear cut. As for the "can't fire back", that did occur to me in the past when I initially brought this up in May. Models who don't primarily fire (like VEF-1 and recon pods) can "creatively" be models hugging the ground to abuse LOS. If the electronic warfare rules those units get don't have LOS requirements, they can use them with impunity while being immune to fire with their centers 1" off the ground. Also, you're wrong about not being able to fire if the game uses a 180 degree fire arc (not sure if it does currently but the gencon gameplay videos seemed to indicate it). You're only NOT able to fire at the units in front of you if you're behind the terrain. If my lone veritech has 12 battlepods far off in front and two off 60 degrees off to the side, I can easily angle the model to have most of the big squadron denied LOS while still getting shots off on the ones on the side.

Mike, in the end, strong rules benefit everyone (Palladium, Tournament organizers, players, etc) and weak yet complex rules hurt everyone. No set of rules are bullet proof and even a clear cut rule about 50% cover will have people occasionally arguing about 49% versus 51% cover interpretations but you try to plug the really big holes before you ship. The center LOS system is a big potential hole in normal play and not just a fringe TFG thing (although there will likely be a fair amount of those as well abusing it).

Exalted for truth, Warboss.

The latest murmur is out.

http://palladium-megaverse.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=49&p=2762523&sid=5629ab0722615d0905343e4d737c1b59#p2762523

Although I'm not sure if this is a cheeky backhanded insult.lol

"While I cannot honestly say that “I love all of you,” I can say that all of us at Palladium Books appreciate and respect you. We welcome your comments and input, and love your passion."

Mike1975 wrote:
Another issue we are bantering about.

I can see players placing FPA in cities to get cover and with the DF bonus of Hover they essentially double up on cover and make it nealy impossible to hit them (Building plus Hover). So can you hide in a city or on a hill behind terrain and still consider yourself Hovering in order to double up your defense bonuses?

Would a Veritech in guardian mode hiding behind a building on the ground still get the Hover bonuses. Common sense says not but there will still be players who try it.

For the first part, no, it shouldn't in theory but it's difficult to fix in practice. Other games with flying type units that get similar bonuses basically are immune to cover. In Heavy Gear, the aircraft (although admittedly they're a token resource in that game) are considered to always fly above terrain. Unfortunately, when you're talking about so many models in robotech having that type of rule then you have additional concerns. One way to fix it is to assign a constant "height" to models that are using "hover" like 6" that would negate most (but obviously not all) cover. It simulates the effects of actually hovering (not just walking on the ground) but it's not without perils as it would slow down gameplay. For instance, if the model is at 6", that introduces whole other LOS issues with units then being able to shoot it that don't see the model on the tabletop. I wouldn't advocate that method even though I've seen it's use occasionally.

Ultimately, I think simply including and REQUIRING models with the hover rule to use the elevated base stands is the best solution. If a model has hover, you MUST use the elevated flight base. They get the benefit of Hover but they also have a higher LOS profile that makes them less likely to be able to use most non-building cover. It won't help in the city situation you're talking about but it will nip modeling for in game advantage like gluing FPAs flat on their bellies 3mm off the base.

Mike1975 wrote:


But as Forar pointed out you have people who will argue if a unit is 45% or 52% hidden. So out comes where you have players with little common sense and you are asking them to use common sense judiciously??? I had a similar idea. In fact that is close to what I wrote up in my Tactics rules.

I'm sorry Mike but those two are different things. The % cover is an interpretation whereas the abusable cover is clear cut rules as written. The latter may be abuse of those rules and against their spirit but it would be completely in line with the poor choice of rules we've been talking about. In my example, the "center" was absolutely covered and LOS was blocked. In your counterpoint, you're bringing up a difference of opinion as to an interpretation of cover which is something that you can never get rid of in a tabletop game. The two examples are not the same.


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 Cypher-xv wrote:
Here's a work in progress of Max. Hence why it looks cartoonish. Yes I know what I just said.

Looks good! Also, cartoonish isn't a bad thing when you're talking about Robotech models! My favorite painted robotech model I saw online was one done up specifically to look cell shaded like cartoons and the borderlands video games. The below pic is a PAINTED MODEL by a talented Japanese modeller.

 warboss wrote:

Mike1975 wrote:
I'm not saying I completely disagree but for tourneys you have to use rules. Not everyone uses common sense the same way. That much we can all agree on. I understand your point but those examples are the extreme and not the norm.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Plus a fig placed like that cannot fire back and you also ignore the fact that on your activation you move and then fire so obviously you can move into a position where this street lamp is not a problem.

Rules should be as solid as possible for ALL play as even friends can argue about interpretations. Also, common sense is not that common. You should really take a peek through the You Make the Call section of this forum to see how minis players in the wild actually interpret rules. I posted an extreme example to illustrate the point but not all the issues that will come up with this needlessly complicated and abusable center system will be so clear cut. As for the "can't fire back", that did occur to me in the past when I initially brought this up in May. Models who don't primarily fire (like VEF-1 and recon pods) can "creatively" be models hugging the ground to abuse LOS. If the electronic warfare rules those units get don't have LOS requirements, they can use them with impunity while being immune to fire with their centers 1" off the ground. Also, you're wrong about not being able to fire if the game uses a 180 degree fire arc (not sure if it does currently but the gencon gameplay videos seemed to indicate it). You're only NOT able to fire at the units in front of you if you're behind the terrain. If my lone veritech has 12 battlepods far off in front and two off 60 degrees off to the side, I can easily angle the model to have most of the big squadron denied LOS while still getting shots off on the ones on the side.

Mike, in the end, strong rules benefit everyone (Palladium, Tournament organizers, players, etc) and weak yet complex rules hurt everyone. No set of rules are bullet proof and even a clear cut rule about 50% cover will have people occasionally arguing about 49% versus 51% cover interpretations but you try to plug the really big holes before you ship. The center LOS system is a big potential hole in normal play and not just a fringe TFG thing (although there will likely be a fair amount of those as well abusing it).

Sorry, had a phone call. I'm not pushing PB's set of LOS rules. I chimed in to answer on how these rules are interpreted in Tactics. I happen to agree with what you are saying on both counts, LOS and Strong Rules sets are good and important factors to a mini's game . I've just seen and read a lot of arguments for and against all the different ways to write up and do LOS. I agree, common sense is not common that is why I said not everyone uses it the same way . What makes sense to you and me might be nonsense to other and vice-versa. So it comes down to allowing players to use some common sense vs Iron rules or somewhere in between. Iron rules means no room for interpretation but some things will get lost in translation . In order of how open the rules are to interpretation....

1. Straight LOS: Players can see any part of a unit they can shoot. Is it fair to shoot at a unit even where the only thing you see is the foot. (40K style?). Players tend to place minis in advantageous positions to take advantage of system.

2. TLOS: Open for players to model miniatures in such a way as to reduce LOS and adds some room for abuse of the system. Players tend to place minis in advantageous positions to take advantage of system. My guy is crouched so he get better cover.

3. Cylindrical: Never played this way before but I have heard that it leaves a lot open since you base LOS on the size of the base and the height of the mini. I've also heard that it is simple and leaves less open for interpretation than the above systems. Mini postion not as important.

4. Center of Body (interpreted): Allows way to get around fault of Center to Center LOS but opens up games to some interpretation.

5. Center of Body to Center LOS: Center of body might be blocked? Makes no sense to ignore LOS on units if that is all that is blocked. Tree/Street lamp example.

So it appears we both prefer a #4 style rules set balanced between rules definitions and allowing some room for common sense interpretation. The conundrum is to define the center of body in such a way as to leave only a small window for interpretation. Too big a window and you get abuse, too small and you lose all flexibility and #4 becomes #5.

Are we on the same page here?

 warboss wrote:


For the first part, no, it shouldn't in theory but it's difficult to fix in practice. Other games with flying type units that get similar bonuses basically are immune to cover. In Heavy Gear, the aircraft (although admittedly they're a token resource in that game) are considered to always fly above terrain. Unfortunately, when you're talking about so many models in robotech having that type of rule then you have additional concerns. One way to fix it is to assign a constant "height" to models that are using "hover" like 6" that would negate most (but obviously not all) cover. It simulates the effects of actually hovering (not just walking on the ground) but it's not without perils as it would slow down gameplay. For instance, if the model is at 6", that introduces whole other LOS issues with units then being able to shoot it that don't see the model on the tabletop. I wouldn't advocate that method even though I've seen it's use occasionally.

Ultimately, I think simply including and REQUIRING models with the hover rule to use the elevated base stands is the best solution. If a model has hover, you MUST use the elevated flight base. They get the benefit of Hover but they also have a higher LOS profile that makes them less likely to be able to use most non-building cover. It won't help in the city situation you're talking about but it will nip modeling for in game advantage like gluing FPAs flat on their bellies 3mm off the base.

That is exactly my thinking. I posted Hovering veritechs on sticks that raised them up about 3 inches from gound and fighters on ones that raised them about 6 inches.

I think it would come down to #s 3 through 5 for me. 1 and 2 are just 40k-style junk that can be thrown out.

Mike1975 wrote:

That is exactly my thinking. I posted Hovering veritechs on sticks that raised them up about 3 inches from gound and fighters on ones that raised them about 6 inches.

That would work both in theory and practice. I don't think that they'll have two different flight base sticks though but requiring the use of flight bases on models who have hover or flight would be a good and more importantly easy idea as it just requires a sentance and making sure the models include the stands if they have that trait. I'd be fine with just the curved elevated clear plastic flight stand they've shown previously.

 Ironwill13791 wrote:
I think it would come down to #s 3 through 5 for me. 1 and 2 are just 40k-style junk that can be thrown out.

Agreed 100%

Mike1975 wrote:

Sorry, had a phone call. I'm not pushing PB's set of LOS rules. I chimed in to answer on how these rules are interpreted in Tactics. I happen to agree with what you are saying on both counts, LOS and Strong Rules sets are good and important factors to a mini's game . I've just seen and read a lot of arguments for and against all the different ways to write up and do LOS. I agree, common sense is not common that is why I said not everyone uses it the same way . What makes sense to you and me might be nonsense to other and vice-versa. So it comes down to allowing players to use some common sense vs Iron rules or somewhere in between. Iron rules means no room for interpretation but some things will get lost in translation . In order of how open the rules are to interpretation....

1. Straight LOS: Players can see any part of a unit they can shoot. Is it fair to shoot at a unit even where the only thing you see is the foot. (40K style?). Players tend to place minis in advantageous positions to take advantage of system.

2. TLOS: Open for players to model miniatures in such a way as to reduce LOS and adds some room for abuse of the system. Players tend to place minis in advantageous positions to take advantage of system. My guy is crouched so he get better cover.

3. Cylindrical: Never played this way before but I have heard that it leaves a lot open since you base LOS on the size of the base and the height of the mini. I've also heard that it is simple and leaves less open for interpretation than the above systems. Mini postion not as important.

4. Center of Body (interpreted): Allows way to get around fault of Center to Center LOS but opens up games to some interpretation.

5. Center of Body to Center LOS: Center of body might be blocked? Makes no sense to ignore LOS on units if that is all that is blocked. Tree/Street lamp example.

So it appears we both prefer a #4 style rules set balanced between rules definitions and allowing some room for common sense interpretation. The conundrum is to define the center of body in such a way as to leave only a small window for interpretation. Too big a window and you get abuse, too small and you lose all flexibility and #4 becomes #5.

Are we on the same page here?

I don't personally see the confusion as Ironwill said about 40k style LOS but that is a preference and not a hard fact and I acknowledge other people can differ in opinion. I would add though that the above are NOT mutually exclusive.

I would however change #2 as I don't think it's much different from #1.

#2: Modified TLOS: If you see a part of the model not including the base, limbs, wings, tail, weapons, or antenna, you have LOS. Use the entire model excluding the base to determine cover % when necessary.


The new alpha rules of Heavy Gear (check out their site dp9forum.com for links to the files or the Heavy Gear thread in this subforum) have a combination of the above. They use TLOS to encourage modelling variety like kneeling models but have a fallback of the warmachine standard defined cylinder if players can't agree to cover the TFG situations. That way you can creatively build your models to look better but if you encounter someone who is doing that not for the cool factor but rather to abuse the rules, you have the option to default to using a standard sized paper cutout with set dimensions (like what you pictured above).

I'd prefer my #2 followed by #3 personally.. with #5 (nebulous center to center) as the worst followed by #1 (shooting at battlepod barrels) as the second worst.

Most players so far prefer something in the #3 to #4 range. I have never used #3 so I can't really comment on it.

It's trivial to fix modeling abuse with #2. Publish official pictures of the models - anything deviating significantly from that defaults to no cover.

That might be a bit harder to pull off outside of particularly egregious examples.

Sure, if someone is using a "flight base" that's only 2mm tall, they're being a jerk, but given that we're talking about multi-pose minis, there has to be some wiggle room in how the figure stands.

It's a big part of why I like the malifaux style that recognizes the base as opposed to the model for determining cover, with adjusted rules for the model's height (as in, listed height number) for seeing it over cover or not (and some extrapolation for when the height of the model, due to design or circumstance doesn't accurately reflect its intended height against terrain and other figures).

Sure, it's not perfect either, but at makes "modelling for advantage" irrelevant for the most part. Doesn't matter that your battle pods are all 'crouched and ready to spring, and also happen to be as small as they can possibly be built', the base doesn't change.

There are always exceptions and fringe cases, but my crew (yes, they're back) found few issues that couldn't be resolved with a tape measure.

 Forar wrote:
That might be a bit harder to pull off outside of particularly egregious examples.

It's only the egregious examples that people complain about.

Sure, if someone is using a "flight base" that's only 2mm tall, they're being a jerk, but given that we're talking about multi-pose minis, there has to be some wiggle room in how the figure stands.

Absolutely! Hence the word "significantly" in my post.

It's a big part of why I like the malifaux style that recognizes the base as opposed to the model for determining cover, with adjusted rules for the model's height (as in, listed height number) for seeing it over cover or not (and some extrapolation for when the height of the model, due to design or circumstance doesn't accurately reflect its intended height against terrain and other figures).

That'd work also, but it's not as fast IMO

Thanks for the compliment warboss. I had seen that pic of the vf-1d too. Wish I had the skills to paint miniatures like that. I know its a large scale model 1/72 maybe.

The problem is that the egregious ones are those that are caught, but even a little hunch (all of the battloid's are leaning into a run!) or the right sweep to the guardians could prove advantageous. Even if it's not intentionally done for that result.

Basically, the models will shift from person to person. If the exact model as it is has in game effects, those variations that might simply be done for aesthetics can become a benefit or detriment to either player.

So I'm suggesting that we take them out of the equation.

The bases shouldn't change, especially since they have the "forward facing and flanking arrows" present (either using the included bases or appropriately marked custom ones), so they're the common denominator, at least in my eyes.

 Forar wrote:
The bases shouldn't change, especially since they have the "forward facing and flanking arrows" present (either using the included bases or appropriately marked custom ones), so they're the common denominator, at least in my eyes.

I'd completely forgotten about that.
The Malifaux system is 1000% better than anything else with that in mind.

Hopefully there's an update tomorow if not today.