A7.72 Upper Levels - Encirclement

BattleSchool

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Situation:
An enemy stack occuplies the upper level of a two-storey, two-hex building. During the MPh, a (BU) PzIB ends it MPh in Bypass of one of these hexes. Immediately thereafter, a second PzIB ends its MPh in Bypass of the building hex occupied by the enemy stack.

Is there any reason why the enemy stack would not become Encircled once the second AFV ends its MPh in Bypass?

TIA

A7.72 UPPER LEVELS: Encirclement also applies to any non-heroic/non-berserk unit in an upper level building Location that cannot trace a path free of an unbroken, armed, unconcealed enemy unit/Blaze to ground level through (or past, if Scaling; B23.424) Locations it could legally traverse if so inclined. This type of Encirclement is broken the instant such a path can be traced.
 

Steve H

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Both Pz IB are concealed.

JR
So..I am the other player in this scenario. But I am not an experienced one. My interpretation of encirclement is that it needs to be done by fire. Neither of his AFVs fired at all, the just moved and ended in bypass in the building hex. Doesn't A7.72 also require the vehs firng?
 

jrv

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So..I am the other player in this scenario. But I am not an experienced one. My interpretation of encirclement is that it needs to be done by fire. Neither of his AFVs fired at all, the just moved and ended in bypass in the building hex. Doesn't A7.72 also require the vehs firng?
No. "Regular" encirclement requires fire. Upper-level encirclement does not. The only requirement is that the units upstairs need to know that they have no way down without a fight. We just had a similar discussion: http://www.gamesquad.com/forums/index.php?threads/upper-level-encirclement.155165/

JR
 

Michael R

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The bypassing AFV do not block the stairwell, however. I think that there is no ULE in this situation. NRBH
 

semenza

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The bypassing AFV do not block the stairwell, however. I think that there is no ULE in this situation. NRBH

Hmmm, well, nothing about blocking the stairwell is mentioned in the rule. I think it has to be read as "legally traverse" meaning move through in one move (not Advance into). The units up stairs still can't just go through the ground level.

Seth
 

jrv

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The bypassing AFV do not block the stairwell, however. I think that there is no ULE in this situation. NRBH
As far as I know nothing "blocks" a stairwell. A unit upstairs can't move into the downstairs because of the presence of the enemy unit. It might advance down, but not being able to move down makes for upper level encirclement.

JR
 

BattleSchool

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Presumably a ground-level Melee also blocks egress from upper levels, provided the Melee Location contains at least one "unbroken, armed, unconcealed enemy unit."
 

Michael R

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A7.72 UPPER LEVELS: Encirclement also applies to any non-heroic/non-berserk unit in an upper level building Location that cannot trace a path free of an unbroken, armed, unconcealed enemy unit/Blaze to ground level through (or past, if Scaling; B23.424) Locations it could legally traverse if so inclined.

In some weird parallel universe, I thought that infantry could move into the building location from an upper level even though there is an enemy vehicle in bypass of that location.
 

jrv

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A7.72 UPPER LEVELS: Encirclement also applies to any non-heroic/non-berserk unit in an upper level building Location that cannot trace a path free of an unbroken, armed, unconcealed enemy unit/Blaze to ground level through (or past, if Scaling; B23.424) Locations it could legally traverse if so inclined.

I interpreted "could legally traverse" to mean the enemy units must prevent the theoretical traverse. Perhaps I am mistaken.
A tank in bypass will prevent theoretical traverse during the MPh. But even a MMC won't prevent Advance, so you can always theoretically traverse a route to a ground level location in all cases if you include the Advance phase as long as there are still stairwells. If you use an unrestricted traverse test there would be no possible way to cause upper level encirclement except to rubble all the stairwells.

The way the rule should be read, if all of the paths to the ground level contain an unconcealed, armed, unbroken enemy unit, the unit is upper-level encircled. The unit in the upper level might even be able to traverse a way during the MPh (e.g. it is a MMC and can infantry OVR a SMC at ground level), but even though it is able to traverse to ground during the MPh (or APh), it is still upper-level encircled.

JR
 
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