Oh yeah, I wasn't advocating for huge dramatic effects from guts like LoL or Retreat. I'd say LoL is one of the most interesting mechanics of Infinity because it breaks the whole turn structure when it occurs and really represents a breakdown of communication. Retreat seems like a huge effect but I rarely see it happen, and by the time it does happen the game is usually decided anyway.
Ahhh! Okay, I got the gist of it I think, but to respond in order: 1) That's okay, that nesting of skill is my issue here as well. 2) I'd rather the rules produce tight gameplay than be broken to serve fluff as well, but if we can do both at the sametime that is absolutely the best way. 3) I know they do, so making them use the religious rule so they have to TRY to fall back makes them less good. Which i'm all for :D
Personally I dislike the way Guts works but then I mostly play units that ignore it so, *shrug* barely affects me in-game. I just then forget to remind my opponent (if they forget) that THEIR guys DO have to take a Guts roll.
There's a very rare condition that causes the centra in the brain that handles fear to be completely encased in the same material your ear's structure is made of (I don't know it's name in English). Apparently these people make for terrible soldiers and have massive difficulties navigating traffic. Fear is good, lack of it means a soldier will have worse reactions and take more risk. Succumbing to fear is something different entirely. I'd like to see Guts Roll to be that difference - a potential benefit if you succeed and a clear drawback if you fail.
The guts rule is an extremely important rule IMHO and for not quite the reasons you mention. It's important because it's one of the few ways movement can be enacted in the reactive, and as designed can be manipulated to tactical advantage by both the active and reactive players in different situations, depending largely on the exact circumstances of that situation. Because it enables significant counterplay in both directions like that, I think it often provides very interesting choices, and therefore I would be reticent to see it changed. The Dogged rule makes sense to me as an extension of courage. Level one of courage allows you to remain in a dangerous position despite being shot at if you choose to. Level two of courage (dogged) lets you continue to act effectively even though you've been grievously wounded for a short time. Level three of courage (NWI) indicates some close to superhuman disdain for injury, which allows you to continue to operate at full efficiency for the duration of a short firefight, despite wounds that would fell a lesser mortal. They all have real world (or at least fictional) analogs to tremendous courage under fire we could reference IMHO.
Since they're known for dying (almost) to the last to protect the pope, I think their unflagging devotion is part of their character.
Forcing guys to guts away is big for both sides here all the time. You often want to fail it but also often don't, losing suppressive fire or ending up in a situation where the opponent can get close and get asymmetrical cover can kill a model. Plus you need to prevent objectives from being completed. The picture of both sides trying to stay hidden throughout the game feels like describing an entierly different game than what I've been playing. Units like Geckos and Djanbazan would be so much stronger with Courage. I've lost count of losing Geckos because of a failed Guts, out of cover no supp fire Gecko is at best useless and at worst dead meat. Plus I've won something like 3 games in retreat using Courage. I agree that there are too many skills with Courage and that it would be better to leave it out and for many of them adding Courage. Mostly MA though, Rem Pres should probably stay and I agree that Courage/Dogged/NWI make sense as stages of grit. Dogged at least would be dumb to lose it mechanically, that's usually the point of having Dogged on a troop.
Only marginally related, but were those games perhaps games that end at end of turn in which you enter Retreat! ? (I.e. were those games where your opponent lost out on one or more turns?)
That happens more often I was talking about games where I specifically remember Courage allowing me to win when I would have otherwise lost. Actually one time was just getting a tie instead of loss but still good. The most recent at least was on turn 3.
No reason to let this make you lose a game if you still have a command token. You can spend one to change the results of a Guts! Check.
The fact the game lets you ignore a guts check by spending a command token is indicative of how cheap the Courage skill is. Command tokens are an incredibly valuable resource and this functionality is incredibly common.
To be fair, I think that Command Token usage is just a holdover from being able to do the same thing with the Lieutenant Order in N2.
The part of guts I dislike is that things caught out in the open will be stuck instead of continuing to move towards some form of cover. It doesn't happen much but it is more realistic to me that if you can keep passing arm rolls you could keep falling back. Working solution is to just play better and not leave things in the open.
That actually depends on the type of attack. From my understanding of the Guts rule, you can keep moving if you keep getting bombarded by a template weapon, to attempt to escape the danger zone, or attempt to leave the ZoC of a hacker/repeater/jammer, provided that you pass the BTS roll or win the FtF roll on Reset.
Today I Learned! Sorry, bad reddit habits spilling out into other forums... I think ive never used that 'danger zone' rule before, makes sense though. Think I might have lost some units to repeated guided missile air strikes because I didn't know that rule. Interesting indeed.
