Forced qithdrawal of prisoners guards form melee

[keethrax]

In the process of playing my first ASL game, we came across one spot we were a bit usure of. As it had no real bearing on the results of the game at that point, we just let it drop.

But now I'm curious, so here's what ahppened:

We were palying "The Guards Counterattack" wiht myself as the Germans.

I had squad captured, and later on the Russian squad guarding it was broken. I tried and (eventually) succeeded in makint the NTC required to try to break free, and so began a melle involving the broken guard unit and my prisoners trying to escape. As per the escaping prisoners rule, the guards are not required to withdraw from combat with their former prisoners, so the melee continued.

Later, I moved a heroic (and woudned)leader in to help out. At this point, is the russian unit required to attempt to withdraw (as it is broken) or can it still stay as it's still fighting the prisoners? If it must withdraw, then my final roll against it was high enough to eliminate it (and thus win me a victory condition building) if not my roll only reduced it and so the building was still not under my control. A the number of buildign wasn't close enough for this one to matter, and as playing someone in Australia live makes me tired, we just reduced the squad and finished the game (that was the final CCPh).

So what do you guys think?

 

[Chris Milne]

The prisoners don't escape until there are no enemy units in their Location, so the Soviets were still Guards and subject to the exemption from required withdrawal.

In that situation, it's probably a good idea for the prisoners to attempt withdrawal; the broken Guard can't do much about it and will then have to withdraw itself, giving the armed attackers a -4 CC DRM. Not guaranteed, but pretty good odds.

 

[Reepicheep]

Looks like we got that one right, keethrax! That'll teach observers to interfere with a game in progress by offering incorrect advice!

 

[Chris Milne]

That's assuming I'm correct. I've never had the situation arise in a game myself, so I might be missing something. But I couldn't see anything in the rules that suggest otherwise...

 

[Reepicheep]

That's assuming I'm correct.

Of course!

 

[hydrou]

I had a similar event recently, which secured my victory. Two soviet 4-4-7 of mine became disrupted and surrendered to twoFinish elite units. Instead of eliminating them, my ftf opponent captured them. Afterwards I fired on the stack and managed to break the guarding two units, which had to rout back with my prisoners and were locked up in a melee, which I later reinforced with two unbroken squads of mine. They finally turned the wheel my way and I killed the two elite Finish squads and regained two rearmed 4-4-7´s. The one thing we were unsure about, was the questions, if broken units in melee may rally or not.