I am making some terrain, notably some elevated terrain for some games. I am thinking of trying a few house rules with the elevated terrain (lots of it.. two levels, and so on), just for a "king of the hills" sort of battle.

Anyways, as I was re-reading through the rulebook, I was baffled by one of their rules. It just seems wonky. Why in the world can you make a close combat attack at two different elevations? If I have a Mech standing on a plateau, and some infantry on the ground far below.. how are they making a close combat attack? You are supposed to "look from above" to determine if there can be a close combat attack or not. Not only does this seem very innacurate, it really stretches even the most stretchable of minds that support the bits of lack of realism in the game. My non jumpjetted foot soldiers can attack a Mech far above on a hill? They or two Mechs duking it out could well be literally a hundred yards apart. Kind of difficult to do with a melee weapon especially!

I suppose of course I can make a house rule that you can't do this. :p

But does anyone know why they did this? It makes little sense to me at all. If you want to control a hilltop, you shouldn't be able to attack a unit there from the ground, especially if your troop or Mech doesn't even have jumpjets.

fleabitfox

Well, it's supposed to represent the smooth slope of a hill. The unit that's higher up on the slope is still "next to" the unit that's lower. Think of it like swordfighting on a stairway! :)

You are definitely thinking of abropt elevated instead of a sloping hill.

Now even with the abrupt elevated, its a game mechanic. Not much to it.

Yup, I was thinking of AET, stupid me. :rolleyes:

Don't know what I was thinking.

Little plastic pieces don't rest to well on a slopey hill anyways, so I can see the issues. Maybe I'll have reaaaal gradual hills where you do have to be in contact.

In faaaact.. now that I think about it, I think I am going to have a 3x3 hilled area, all rollings hills. I will draw the nice change of elevations with dotted lines like you see on maps, and then go from there. Yeaaaa... :cheeky:

The only problem I have with the little plastic Mechs and such is that they are not terribly terrain friendly. That is, if I create the fake realistic water, the 'edges' will make placing units along them innacurate. Feh.

I actually use cork for my unit placement btw. I have thin cork cut out in the 3 shapes, the units sit on them perfectly. The exact middle is marked with a + and an arrow in the middle of the 'front' is marked. This allows me to move units easily, pick units up to change the dial and so on, and they are never out of place. I wonder if cork sticks to fake hills better than plastic bases. :)

fleabitfox