DVexile
Senior Member
The Russian unit at the start of its rout must declare I8 as its destination as the 548 is not in LOS and thus is not a KEU.
The Russian routs first to H7 at which point the 548 is now in LOS and becomes a KEU.
The newly seen 548 does not prevent the Russian from continuing to I8, but can the Russian now optionally ignore I8 and chose K7 as a new rout destination because I8 is no further from the 548 than H7?
Relevant rules excerpt:
A10.51 DIRECTION: ... At the start of its RtPh, a routing unit must designate its destination and must attempt to reach it during that RtPh [EXC: if using Low Crawl]. If a newly-Known enemy unit prevents this, a new destination is re-figured from that point. ... [EXC: ... A routing unit may also ignore a building/woods hex if that hex is no farther from a Known enemy unit than its starting hex ...]
Does the above mean that the rout destination can only be changed when encountering a new KEU that actually prevents reaching the original destination? Or can the EXC at the very end of the rule apply when discovering any new KEU?
Relevant Q&A:
A10.51 A broken unit starts to rout toward the nearest building/woods hex, but during its rout the building/woods hex is not farther from a Known enemy unit than its present hex. Can the broken unit now choose to ignore the building/woods? Or must it continue to rout toward that target?
A. It must continue (assuming it is otherwise able to). [An97; Mw]
The one ambiguity with this the Q&A is whether discovering a new KEU is a different situation.
Fun wrinkle:
If the Russian instead chose to rout through I7 now it would be prevented from reaching H8 by the newly discovered 548 and thus would have to select K7 as a new rout destination. It would also suffer interdiction in I7 though.
Thoughts from the rules gurus?