Tactica: Challenges Mk II

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This is a rewrite and update of my previous Challenges Tactica that is hopefully a bit clearer and also takes into account lessons I've since learned.

Let’s think about the different situations:

Characters in Units

• Your character is better than my character and you challenge

• I accept with my champion (or challenge myself using him).
• You kick his ass and potentially get +5 overkill but rather than real wounds on the unit, those are virtual wounds that only affect the combat resolution. I’ve limited the amount of combat resolution he can do to 5 plus my wounds and my guys are still alive.
• CONCLUSION: Accept challenge with champion

• The characters are evenlyish matched
• 1) I accept the challenge (or make my own).
• It’s a cool fight that improves the narrative.
• Excess wounds aren’t wasted because if you’d not challenged and just allocated your attacks against the character then they wouldn’t be used for Overkill.

• 2) I accept the challenge/challenge myself with a unit champion
• You kick his ass while my character does more wounds against the unit.
• You get good overkill while I get good real wounds.
• I lose one guy, you lose several guys.
• We both do the same amount of wounds (all things being equal) but you’ve lost more men. I can still allocate an attack or two against the champion if I want.
• CONCLUSION: Challenge/accept challenge with champion
• My character is better than your character
• 1) I challenge and1 you take the challenge with your champion, putting me in a bad position as shown above
• 2) I challenge and you accept with a character
• I kick his ass and get overkill but could I have killed more unit guys?
• 3) I challenge and you don’t have a champion and have to retire a character to avoid the challenge
• a) This is a combat character: You lose his ability and Leadership in the combat
• This is a Wizard: He is saved from having attacks allocated against him
• CONCLUSION: Don’t bother challenging unless you want to challenge with a champion to tie up their combat character and limit him to Overkill wounds

Characters Not in Units

• I challenge you with an uber character on a monster or a lone character on foot
• 1) You accept the challenge with a champion or character.
• I kick his ass and get overkill. Your unit can’t fight back. I win.
• 2) You don’t accept. I choose the character to be withdrawn. I kick unit’s ass and you do minimal damage back. Your character is wasted.
• CONCLUSION: Always challenge with monster characters or lone characters on foot
• You attack me with an uber monster character or lone character on foot.
• 1) I accept the challenge with combat character and maybe do a few wounds before dying. But probably die first.
• You get good combat result. My unit can’t attack.
• 2) I accept with my champion.
• You kick his ass worse. My unit and good character can’t attack.
• 2) I refuse the challenge.  
• You choose to retire my character
• My unit can still fight as normal but I don’t have my character’s attacks or Leadership
• All these are bad.
• CONCLUSION: This is a tricky one and I don’t know the perfect answer. I’m going to say accept the challenge with your combat character if you have one. If you don’t have one, refuse with the unit champion.

• The top tip here is to kill the monster as a priority. However good their character is, removing their transportation will limit the damage they can do to the rest of the army. And monsters tend to have less armour. If you have enough attacks wounding on sixes if nothing else you may whittle it down eventually.

OVERALL CONCLUSION:

ü  If their character in a unit challenges, accept with your champion

ü  Don’t bother challenging yourself unless you don’t have a unit to back you up.

ü  Always challenge if you have a lone character or a character on a monster

ü  Bite the bullet and accept the challenge with a combat character if an uber character on a monster attacks

ü  Always take a unit champion