Assaulting a building and initiative steps.

[Ratarsed]

I have a question about initiative steps and who can fight who during building assaults.
I have an idea for any watch-tower games in the up-coming campaign weekend I am attending.
If I gain control of the watch-tower my plan is to scout with a unit of 10 rubbish troops and a character (with scout ability) 4" away from the tower as opposed to start a unit in the tower. Then on my Turn 1 walk them into the tower, to hopefuly hold a 1 turn of assault, before being replaced by a more substantial unit in my turn 2.
So I allocate the 10 rubbish troops to defend the tower. My question is under what circumstances will my scouting character be drawn into the fight and thus be targetable by assaulting enemy troops?
If the enemy all have the same higher initiative and go first they can only fight the 10 unfortunates and not the character correct?
Now if they have a character of higher initiative still and he kills one or more ordinary guys, when it comes to the other attacks from the slightly slower troops my character will now be targetable as I don't have 10 ordinary men left, correct?

"If one side suffers casualties before it fights, extra models are assumed to step up and join the assault party in place of fallen comrades." BRB page 128

What if, however, I have already fought with my men or passed the initiative step in which my character could fight. Will he be dragged into the fight if the enemy has multiple initiative steps.
Say for example My character is Initiative 4 and my troops initiative 3. The enemy has a character of initiative 3 and troops of initiative 2. I send in my 10 troops on Initiative 3 and they fight as does the enemy character. He kills 3 of my men so now when we move to the initiative 2 step I only have 7 men fighting. Can they now target attacks against my character or is he safe because he has passed his chance to fight?
What if I was fighting Ogres and they killed all 10 of my troops, could they stomp my character?
Sorry if it's a bit involved but the building assault rules are themselves rather complicated.

[Artiee]

They would be able to target your character on their init step, since the char steps forward. As for the stomp, The way I read it is that only one ogre would get to stomp since the "Special Attacks" section states that a model is assumed to be in base contact with one enemy model.

[Iraf]

Q&A answers this, characters are unable to step up during an assault on a building. If you want to use a character you must choose him in the initial 10. Page 9 of the errata.

[Artiee]

I think that Q&A is talking more about if there is rank and file models left. The char can not be moved up instead. In the example in the 1st post, Theres is only 10 RnF and champ, After 3 dies, the char has no choice but to join.

I look at it like a refused challenge in a unit of 11. The char goes back to the back but enough was killed to move him back up into contact to be attacked.

[Iraf]

I can see what you mean. He can't be chosen to move up, but in this case he has no option. I can agree with that opinion.

[T10]

1. As far as I can tell the character will need to step up (and may thus be exposed to up attacks from up to half the enemy models) once you've resolved an initiative step where friendly models have been removed as casualties.

This means that if the enemy causes a casualty with a character at Initiative 4 the character steps up and joins the fight at Initiative 3-or-later.

I can only assume he has missed out on his opportunity to make attacks of his own if his Initiative count had passed.

2. Models with stomp attacks are allowed to make them if they are in contact with an enemy. In an assault any abilities that rely on base contact are resolved as if the model is in base contact with 1 model of the players choice.

This leads to the weird situation that the sole surviving model, the character, may count as being in contact with one Ogre, but each of the up to three Ogres fighting in the assault count as being in contact with the character.

You can rationlize this with the character and ogres fighting from room to room rather than standing toe-to-toe and slugging it out.

-T10

[Rhuell]

Ben Curry did a thorough analysis of this situation in his daily Bad Dice podcast and argues that regardless of hoe many models are killed, the character (assuming he was not chosen as one of the original fighting models) is never moved into a combat situation and therefore cannot attack or be attacked.

[Arli]

I would agree with that. The way I have always played it, the 10 chosen models go out and fight, the rest are in the building.

[T10]

Ben Curry did a thorough analysis of this situation in his daily Bad Dice podcast and argues that regardless of hoe many models are killed, the character (assuming he was not chosen as one of the original fighting models) is never moved into a combat situation and therefore cannot attack or be attacked.

Perhaps you could sum up this analysis?

[T10]

I would agree with that. The way I have always played it, the 10 chosen models go out and fight, the rest are in the building.

Please notice that the rest of the models will not remain in the building and patiently watch as their comrades get slaughtered. As casualties are removed the empty "slots" are filled from the pool of waiting models.

The building rules do not give waiting characters any special treatment in this regard.

[Ratarsed]

So if my character has missed his chance to fight and the enemy has multiple initiative steps, if any of my men are killed in one initiative step models with a lower initiative still could direct attacks at my character? Is that what you are saying?

[BlackPawl]

I have a question about initiative steps and who can fight who during building assaults.
I have an idea for any watch-tower games in the up-coming campaign weekend I am attending.
If I gain control of the watch-tower my plan is to scout with a unit of 10 rubbish troops and a character (with scout ability) 4" away from the tower as opposed to start a unit in the tower. Then on my Turn 1 walk them into the tower, to hopefuly hold a 1 turn of assault, before being replaced by a more substantial unit in my turn 2.

Regardles of the dabate of the Ini and step-up this strategy did not make any sense to me: If you control the watchtower the enemy did get the first turn and can walk into the tower - so you could not walk into the tower in your turn 1 ...

[Artiee]

Regardles of the dabate of the Ini and step-up this strategy did not make any sense to me: If you control the watchtower the enemy did get the first turn and can walk into the tower - so you could not walk into the tower in your turn 1 ...

If the enemy didn't set scouts close to the watchtower or vanguard warbeasts they can not move into the watchtower since you can't march into it. So he could walk into if he was close enough.

[Ratarsed]

Regardles of the dabate of the Ini and step-up this strategy did not make any sense to me: If you control the watchtower the enemy did get the first turn and can walk into the tower - so you could not walk into the tower in your turn 1 ...

My problem is my army does not have any suitable candidates for occupying the watchtower should I win the roll for it. I'm taking a Witch Hunter army which has a special list for the campaign and I am limited to Archers, crossbowmen, Handgunners, Free company, Sigamarite zealots (WS2 T3 nutters with no save) and warhounds. My experience with the Watchtower scenario has been that 20 WS3 T3 no save guys cannot hold out for 2 turns of assault. So I have come up with this cunning plan. Send in a Witch Smeller ( A Ld9 scouting Witch Hunter) who can be joined by some sigmarite zealots (who also get to scout if they are with a Witch Smeller). When the enemy assault on turn 2 the zealots are asked to demonstrate their faith by sacrificing themselves in the name of Sigmar whilst the Witch Smeller sniffs out what might be hiding in the wardrobe. When all goes quiet the brave, righteous Witch Smeller leaves the building and informs the big unit of Flagellants or Witch Hunter General and her horde of Free company that the building is free of witches and safe to Enter. In they go and now the enemy has to work really hard to dislodge them.
What could possibly go wrong?

Well in a practice game this week, my opponent miscast whilst in the unit assaulting the watchtower and the template hit the building killing 6 of the zealots so when we came to fight the assault I had only 5 guys and the Smeller left! Apparently this Watchtower was bereft of cupboards!

[T10]

So if my character has missed his chance to fight and the enemy has multiple initiative steps, if any of my men are killed in one initiative step models with a lower initiative still could direct attacks at my character? Is that what you are saying?

As far as I can tell, yes. Once he "steps up" to take the place of a fallen comrade he is eligible to be attacked.