Issues with FAQ 1.1 Climb changes

Can confirm locally we also set up tables to allow vaulting onto sufficiently sized 'steps' between elation levels to encourage verticality.

 

Setting up vaulting steps here and there is a good patch, but a self-made one that actually does not save the current climb rule at all.

Actually, one that is almost too good, as sequential vaulting gives so much free movement that is changes quite drastically the gameplay if widely implemented.
And it also underlines even more the painful difference between free elevation gain with vaulting steps and the cumbersome and clunky climbing full order. Even the realistic and cinematic feeling starts to suffer when one model is jumping between crates gaining 4" out of nothing (and shooting as well during the same order!) and the other needs 3 orders to do the same without the in-between box.

 

I prefer to call those kinds of steps as "improvised stairs" because I've seen the confusion it creates when people think about it as vaulting and they get surprised when the vaulting rules actually say something diametrically opposite to what they expect as they try to apply it on other things.

 

So I'll try to move on from my joke in a serious way, merging the discourse about multiple vaulting.
At the moment, and in my opinion, the gap between the two "modes" for vertical movement is so huge that the game is suffering from that. After all, a good management of the 3D aspect is a crucial element of a miniature game.
In the image below, the trooper is close to a building (but not adjacent yet) and needs to reach the green line on top of it to gain LoF to its target. The building is twice as tall as the trooper, so "slightly" taller than 3". As in figure:



With the climb skill, this takes FOUR orders, being able to fire with the second short skill of the fourth: one full order just for the 0.5" to touch the building, one order to climb close to the top, but not enough to snap on the roof, one full order just for snapping and, finally, a fourth order to move and shoot.
In case there is a volume exactly as tall as the trooper large enough to support its base, the same action would take 1 order: first half order to reach the firing point, second half to shoot, gaining 3.1" free vertical movement for the double vaulting.

Of course this is an extreme condition, but the sense is there.

Just out of curiosity, I tried the same situation in case the climbing rules were similar to a merge between climbing plus and prone rules. Something like:

Climb - short movement skill
Climbing allows the user to move along vertical surfaces as if performing a normal Movement on a horizontal surface. Troopers have both their MOV values and movement bonuses halved while moving this way.



The result would be two orders. Twice compared the the vaulting example, but still doable. But most of all, this would eliminate the preposterous situations when you need full orders just to move an inch or less just to get the position to start a climb or to snap on the roof from almost close to it.

Of course this rule would need its own work to polish and integrate it with the rest of the game, but just as a first look, it looks like a substatial improvement to me, with the additional bonus of having ladders, climbing and climbing plus work is a much more consistent way among each other.

 

The funny thing here is that with "jump" you don't need so many orders, but you have to be certain you can reach the obstacle's top with the frst half movement.

I'm agree with the current of thinking about "climbing" right now need too many orders to be usefull.

Best regards

 

It's actually a bit odd that Infinity treats climbing so differently than other miniatures games - if the current system actually worked well there'd be a good reason for it maybe, but I'm in agreement with everyone else that climbing is incredibly rare because it's so clunky to set it up (not to mention the preponderance of railings that you need to climb over to get to the tops of buildings and lack of dodge or partial cover while climbing meaning that you easily expose yourself to uncontested ARO almost every time you try and climb anything). @Sirk is absolutely right that there's a weirdly punitive difference between the ease of vaulting and the difficulty of climbing.

The Infinity designers don't seem to love mixing movement modes in a single order (e.g. prone affects an entire order, difficult terrain stops you initially rather than just slowing you, climb and jump generally require their own order, barring the Super/Plus variety, etc.) but I feel like doing a variation on what other games do and have something like: figures climb at half the rate of normal movement (and you're allowed to transition to climbing during normal movement). Very simple and easy to understand, especially if you've played other games that function this way.

With the improvement to vanilla climb, it might be worth tweaking Climbing Plus and Super Jump a bit. Maybe by allowing Climbing Plus figures (in addition to the ability they already have to climb without penalty to their MOV) to retain partial cover while on vertical surfaces and Super Jumpers to 'fall' straight down up to the value of their second MOV value as part of a short Jump skill.

 

Actually I agree that mixing movement modes inside the same order could lead to confusion, in fact my proposal is the ENTIRE movement is halved when you declare a climb skill, so also the part you walk on horizontal surface.
For a 4"-4" model is not that different in many situations compared to now (4" movement total with a full order), but with the big advantage that the movement does not stop cold when you touch the wall and when you end the climb and you can mix match. Also, you can declare a climb short skill if very close to where you need to go.
So if your first move is 4" and you declare a climb short skill, then you move 2" but you treat vertical surface as horizontal for that movement. (Obviously, that's the only movement you can declare if you start on a vertical surface as the other movement would not be allowed by your position and become idle in resolution).

 

I can live with that. It's agreed, then, we're changing the rules

 

I would very much like to see both Climb and Jump changed to Short Movement Skills with the Attack label (i.e. cannot be combined with other skills with the Attack label). Climbing Plus and Super Jump should simply remove the Attack label, plus the long-jump Entire Order of Super Jump.

I have been playing Carnevale (basically Assassins Creed 2 the miniatures game) lately, and they do vertical movement so much better than Infinity. It's quick, it's easy and it makes your vertical terrain useful outside the deployment zone since you can quite easily change levels without investing a whole turn into it. I think Infinity with this kind of mobility would be fantastic.

 

So that you can't jump or climb if stunned? I mean, kinda makes sense, but that's one of the primary uses for the attack label in this game.

 

Yes, exactly, that is one of the intended effects.

 

"Retaining" cover is how it works, at least partially, back in N2".

I think with only change how the movement is "counted" when you change the silouette position to place the base in contact against the walls, all will change. Your entire silouette is in contact with the wall, please climb vertically, when the "base" reach the top, please, move to the roof.


Something like this (I know my "draw" is not so pretty than others). I hope the idea are well represented.

With this change I think "climb" will be more "useable".

 

How so?

(I'm not objecting to proposed changes to climbing, just wondering how it would be possible under the current rules to block a ladder and stop the opponent from drawing LoF)

 

Add a parapet to the building (like 99% of the used ones) and there is no way a model climbing in the official way can see that

 

Hmm. I think that most buildings with parapets have gaps in the parapets where the ladders go up. I can't recall seeing many buildings where the ladder goes up to the top of the parapet like that.

That said, for such a building, I'm not sure the rules fully define what would happen when the climbing trooper reaches the top of the ladder. I think the most likely answer is that the trooper flips upright and is standing on top of the parapet (base supported by the roof below per the vaulting rules), then moves a few mm further in past the parapet and drops down to the roof level.

So I think the climbing trooper can get LoF by moving to the top of the ladder, up over the parapet so that it's hovering above the prone trooper, then back down to end its movement back on the ladder. In fact, the climbing trooper keeps cover (the parapet blocks a sliver of its base) while denying the prone trooper cover. Like so (pardon my poor photoshop skills):

 

I was curious too on how it was possible, but after seeing the draw, the "Corvus Belli" building of "paper" have the stairs until the parapet... @QueensGambit Maybe is this the kind of buildings @Diphoration had in mind. The thing is a miniature couldn't be "without" base contact with the "surface" because the rules say ir, the base should be in contact with the surface where the model moves all the path... If we do here a RAW, the situation with the "prone blocker" could be possible.

I have sometimes the discussion about how the parapets should be treated, like "an obstacle lower than the Silouette troup?" or like the "surface movement? I wasn't capable of finf the right answer in the rulebook. I use to take it as an "obstacle", but I'm not certain if I'm doing it well.

 

Right, but the vaulting rule deems the base to be in contact with a surface below it, as long as distance from the surface to the base is less than the trooper's height. In this case, the trooper is vaulting as it goes over the parapet. As soon as it moves 2mm to the left, it stops vaulting and drops down to the roof.

If vaulting weren't allowed in this scenario, then it wouldn't be possible for a trooper to go up the ladder and onto the roof at all (even if no enemy model present) because the parapet would block the path from the ladder to the roof.