How to implement HotT-style Lurkers?

[tajones]

As someone who moves glacially slowly in such things, I've collected 15mm figures for mythical Greek and Egyptian armies. I'd planned to use Hordes of the Things, and I have Dryads to use as Lurkers. Lurkers have unusual properties in HotT, including: starting off board, using command pips to summon them in contact with an enemy that has just entered bad going terrain, and are then restricted to that terrain, if "left alone" or retreated out of that terrain, being removed from the board and can be redeployed for +1 PIP. Lurkers are weak (+2 combat), don't suffer a -2 penalty for bad going, and flee off table (but can return) if beaten. They are cheap 1 pt units, in the context of a 48 pt army.

What are the recommendations for Lurkers in Fantasy Triumph? (I've read the rules but not played any games.)

I think the only way to start a unit off map is with Away, but that gives too much flexibility to the unit. The battle cards I'm considering include some combination of:
* Ambush (home topography) +1 # allows flexible deployment away from the battle line
* Terrain Affinity +1/2 # thematically and functionally appropriate
* Disguise +2 # a psychological trick, akin to having one appear from nowhere, but expensive and not very thematic
* Craven -1 # might be appropriate for Dryads, that are merely a nuisance
* Brittle -1 # might be appropriate for a dangerous spider-like lurker
* Slow -1/2 # somewhat tying the Lurker to it's initially deployment position
* Unruly -1 # Lurkers aren't really part of your army, should be difficult to control, and the unit should be cheap
* Regenerate +1 # somewhat recreates the redeployment ability from HotT, but too flexible and not necessary?

For Dryads, I'm leaning towards: Ambush (home) +1, Terrain Affinity +1/2, Slow -1/2, Unruly -1. The is a net +0. To make a cheaper unit, I might use Craven or Brittle for a total of -1.

I don't have a good sense of what unit type a Lurker (or Dryad Lurker) should be. Some sort of Open Order foot (for Terrain Affinity).

Finally, I think a Craven unit is allowed to simply not move when in an enemy ZOC, they're not forced to move out of ZOC, right?

[David Kuijt]

As someone who moves glacially slowly in such things, I've collected 15mm figures for mythical Greek and Egyptian armies. I'd planned to use Hordes of the Things, and I have Dryads to use as Lurkers. Lurkers have unusual properties in HotT, including: starting off board, using command pips to summon them in contact with an enemy that has just entered bad going terrain, and are then restricted to that terrain, if "left alone" or retreated out of that terrain, being removed from the board and can be redeployed for +1 PIP. Lurkers are weak (+2 combat), don't suffer a -2 penalty for bad going, and flee off table (but can return) if beaten. They are cheap 1 pt units, in the context of a 48 pt army.

What are the recommendations for Lurkers in Fantasy Triumph? (I've read the rules but not played any games.)

I think the only way to start a unit off map is with Away, but that gives too much flexibility to the unit. The battle cards I'm considering include some combination of:
* Ambush (home topography) +1 # allows flexible deployment away from the battle line
* Terrain Affinity +1/2 # thematically and functionally appropriate
* Disguise +2 # a psychological trick, akin to having one appear from nowhere, but expensive and not very thematic
* Craven -1 # might be appropriate for Dryads, that are merely a nuisance
* Brittle -1 # might be appropriate for a dangerous spider-like lurker
* Slow -1/2 # somewhat tying the Lurker to it's initially deployment position
* Unruly -1 # Lurkers aren't really part of your army, should be difficult to control, and the unit should be cheap
* Regenerate +1 # somewhat recreates the redeployment ability from HotT, but too flexible and not necessary?

For Dryads, I'm leaning towards: Ambush (home) +1, Terrain Affinity +1/2, Slow -1/2, Unruly -1. The is a net +0. To make a cheaper unit, I might use Craven or Brittle for a total of -1.

I don't have a good sense of what unit type a Lurker (or Dryad Lurker) should be. Some sort of Open Order foot (for Terrain Affinity).

Finally, I think a Craven unit is allowed to simply not move when in an enemy ZOC, they're not forced to move out of ZOC, right?

First off, I think this has come up in the past -- you might want to experiment with the Search function on the forum? I'm pretty sure I've responded to this idea before.

Some fast responses:

• Ambush is army-level, not stand-level. So that doesn't much work.
• Terrain Affinity is mostly for mounted types. Which doesn't fit the "Lurker" concept very well.
• Disguise can be VERY thematic for Dryads etc. -- have four blank bases (decorated and flocked nicely, with trees). Put them out. Which ones are the real Dryads and which ones are actually just ... trees? BWAHAHAHA (evil laugh).
• Away is your bread and butter. That's the best thing.

Rabble with Away, maybe some Disguise or Ambush at the army level, is how I'd do it. They'll totally suck out in the open, so even though you could come and do that (outside your terrain) that isn't usually a survivable exercise.

On your last question -- nobody is ever forced to expend command points to move. "Craven" means they don't want to get into melee combat. If they were TRULY as Craven as your example (forcing them to move away from enemy in ZOC) then they'd be no damn use in a battlefield, and no general would expend his precious logistics and supply on them!

[tajones]

First off, I think this has come up in the past -- you might want to experiment with the Search function on the forum? I'm pretty sure I've responded to this idea before.

Before posting, I searched the forum here and the Facebook group. Lurkers are barely mentioned, and this question is not addressed.

• Ambush is army-level, not stand-level. So that doesn't much work.

Ambush is certainly more flexible than you need for 1-2 Lurkers. But it guarantees that 1, and most likely 2 Lurkers could begin in terrain much closer to the enemy. You propose Away as the solution. It's your game, and I've not even played, but that feels like a much more flexible lurker than HotT had. I guess it recapitulates the ability to leave the board (by being killed in HotT, voluntarily in FT), and then popping back up somewhere else at a pip cost. I guess I should try it out.

• Terrain Affinity is mostly for mounted types. Which doesn't fit the "Lurker" concept very well.

I was thinking of the penalty for close order foot, but maybe even horde or warriors wouldn't make sense for a lurker. Though maybe it allows you to have a "water lurker", by giving it affinity to stream or marsh?

• Disguise can be VERY thematic for Dryads etc. -- have four blank bases (decorated and flocked nicely, with trees). Put them out. Which ones are the real Dryads and which ones are actually just ... trees? BWAHAHAHA (evil laugh).

That sounds like a cool setup, but I don't see how to do that. I thought you were only allowed to disguise one stand for a single battle card? Illusion doesn't seem to work that way, and doesn't seem to allow you to field bases that are not an actual troop type.

[David Kuijt]

First off, I think this has come up in the past -- you might want to experiment with the Search function on the forum? I'm pretty sure I've responded to this idea before.

Before posting, I searched the forum here and the Facebook group. Lurkers are barely mentioned, and this question is not addressed.

No offense meant! I'm fairly sure I responded to a similar question in the past, but that might have been years ago, or even in email.

• Ambush is army-level, not stand-level. So that doesn't much work.

Ambush is certainly more flexible than you need for 1-2 Lurkers. But it guarantees that 1, and most likely 2 Lurkers could begin in terrain much closer to the enemy. You propose Away as the solution. It's your game, and I've not even played, but that feels like a much more flexible lurker than HotT had. I guess it recapitulates the ability to leave the board (by being killed in HotT, voluntarily in FT), and then popping back up somewhere else at a pip cost. I guess I should try it out.

Ah, if you're basing your questions on a reading of the rules without trying them yet, yes, trying first is a good idea.

Back to lurkers -- there won't be a perfect match for what is a very specific (and slightly odd) game tool in HotT. No matter what, you won't be able to create a stand that can only magically appear in difficult terrain, can do so only on the first turn after an enemy stand enters that particular patch of difficult terrain (and never ever ever again, if it stays inside it), and sorta kinda regenerates in a weird way. If you want all those things, no, not going to happen.

What I was really responding to, now that I think on it, was a related but not identical question -- "how do I simulate in FT something in fantasy fiction that I would simulate in HotT using a Lurker stand." If you see the distinction.

• Terrain Affinity is mostly for mounted types. Which doesn't fit the "Lurker" concept very well.

I was thinking of the penalty for close order foot, but maybe even horde or warriors wouldn't make sense for a lurker. Though maybe it allows you to have a "water lurker", by giving it affinity to stream or marsh?

Water Lurkers -- the weirdest part of Lurkers! I remember Lurker ambushes in rivers that tried to turn stands so they were perpendicular to the river, and recoiled that way rather than "across" or "out of" the river, and therefore destroyed the stand they attacked (because moving perpendicular to a river was illegal in HotT or something like that).

Regardless, I'd point out that anything that would be classed as a Lurker in HotT is something that can unexpectedly ambush from difficult terrain -- which in my view of the world, could never be close-order anything.

• Disguise can be VERY thematic for Dryads etc. -- have four blank bases (decorated and flocked nicely, with trees). Put them out. Which ones are the real Dryads and which ones are actually just ... trees? BWAHAHAHA (evil laugh).

That sounds like a cool setup, but I don't see how to do that. I thought you were only allowed to disguise one stand for a single battle card? Illusion doesn't seem to work that way, and doesn't seem to allow you to field bases that are not an actual troop type.

You can buy 4 Illusion cards (or 4 Disguise, but Illusion was what was meant).

There is no difference between having 4 "we're just trees" bases, two of which are marked on the bottom as Dryads; or alternatively having 4 Dryad bases, two of which are marked on the bottom as being illusions. It's just a modeling difference, so long as you tell your opponent what's going on. I've got an army of an Illusionist with 2 stands of Ghost Knights (Raiders). I wanted to have 4 stands, of which 2 are illusions. Sadly, those figures are bitchin' expensive, and I didn't want to spring for the additional $60. So what did I do? Make 4 blank stands which represent the Ghost Knights hidden by illusion. Two of which are real Ghost Knights (and when spotted by the enemy, I sub in actual Ghost Knight stands). And two of which are illusions (and when spotted by the enemy, I remove them). That's pure modeling, nothing to do with the rules -- as long as I tell my opponent that these 4 stands are Ghost Knights hidden by illusion, but two are not real, everything is fine.