Special Abilities - Are these just notes ?

Started by AJ at the Bank, 18 May 2019, 12:10:49 PM

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AJ at the Bank

I am a bit lost with a couple of points regarding Special Abilities - can someone please advise?

Are they just rules that apply to certain units as per army lists ...or is there some way these are meant to be applied/allocated to units ?

E.g. The segmentation of abilities as either Common or Rare - so what? Cant seem to find anything in the rules that indicate the point of this segmentation.

E.g. Special Forces [R] ability (happened to be the first ability I randomly turned to when looking at this section) - hints that abilities may be given to units .."..Special Forces can have more than 1 Rare Special Ability". Again I can find nothing on this in the Rules or Optional rules. Have I missed something fundamental please?

It would seem that Special Abilities are already perscribed to units ...rather than being potentially allocated by the players in some way?


Thanks - and sorry if being a thicko here!





In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king.

Cross698

I believe at the moment they are as described on the lists, and i suppose that for Special Forces" you can pick appropriate abilities like FIERCE. There are no point values, but I was thinking that at some point "SAs" would be added to Battlegroups on line with points for purchase and limitations.

AJ at the Bank

Thanks - for the speedy reply!

There is a rule on picking abilities I've missed please?
Or is this a house rule perhaps - and if so - how does it work please?
Its quite confusing in looking at Abilities for first time.

Note - There do seem to be point values on abilities (at least in some cases) - E.g. German Army Early War - Heer Infantry have same stats as Waffen SS...but SS are Veteran ...and cost 5 points more.
British Army, Italy - Engineers have same stats as Green infantry ...but cost 35 points more.

But then again - some dont ..E.g. First army in the listings....American Army , Far East - Jeeps (Scout) and Jeeps (Utility) ....Scout Jeeps have the Reece ability ..Utility Jeeps not ....but cost is same (20 points). Come to think of it - I suspect this is an error in the Scout Jeep listing location (Vehicles & Wagons) and cost - and maybe stats too!
Adam


In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king.

fred.

There are no rules in the book to assign abilities to units.
The stats in the army lists are what you use, along with the special abilities assigned to them.


But saying that, as WWII was such a wide ranging conflict, there is an implicit rule that you can modify stats of units, including special abilities to better model specific historical scenarios. There aren't points given for this, as really if you are building an historical scenario, points aren't that relevant.

I too did wonder at the point of Rare and Common. The only reference I can see to Rare is the special forces rule. To me the labelling of the respective special abilities with (C) is just visual clutter. It is only necessary to note the Rare ones. And its not even clear why its necessary to do that.
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AJ at the Bank

Thanks Fred

This all makes sense.

To me it seems that Abilities have been lifted from something else (perhaps other rules in the Commander series) - but not fully translated into BKC as anything other than per stats in army lists.

Perhaps someone more knowledgable on origins could add something on their potentil use into the Optional Rules if that is appropriate. Otherwise I guess its ignore anything on Common/Rare/Special Forces for now in mandatory rules.


Cheers!
In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king.

petercooman

Some notes under the army lists say that you can add special abilities to some units. For example some stands can add the sniper ability for a 5 points. Maybe it has something to do with that? Maybe extra army lists in supplements will have options to add more than 1 special rule to a stand?

Norm

18 May 2019, 06:25:15 PM #6 Last Edit: 18 May 2019, 06:39:33 PM by Norm
From my initial reading, I just got the impression that the Special Abilities were just an extra, so that the gamer can attribute them as appropriate and tweak forces, but that the COMMON and RARE notes were simply indicators for friendly guidance, so that when organising forces, players could strike the right balance and / or reflect historical reality when assigning Special Abilities.  

So for example, Special Ability CULLEN ..... These were devices fitted to SOME allied tanks and were an implement specifically designed and attached for the peculiar and specific problem that the Normandy Bocage presented. This in effect makes them rare in overall game terms, but it is for the player to understand their nature at the time of creating a force and how best to allocate the ability. If they were simply given to everything including Churchills, then the German player might, quite rightly, feel inclined to remind the Allied player that the ability is a rare and not a common 'ability'.

Or - Special Ability ALPINE ...... if you were building a scenario around an assault by elements of a German mountain Division, then this being a COMMON ability, would allow all the Mountain Division infantry in the scenario to have that ability ..... which they did!

i see them just as helpful notes to help make a scenario have greater character / depth.

Big Insect

Special Abilities

The idea behind special abilities is that certain units behave differently from others in different circumstances. Some are positive and some are negative and points are added or deducted accordingly.
The army lists allocate certain abilities to certain units - so ... as previously discussed a Panther is classified as Unreliable and has the unreliable characteristics as standard.
A lot of Russian tanks have both Alpine (so they can move at no disadvantage across snow terrain), but also are Restricted Vision, due to cramped and poorly designed turrets, fewer crew and also doctrine. Tiger tanks are Tough, Ghurkas are Fierce etc.etc.etc. British Guard units are interesting as they might be great to have as your rear support.

Not all the Special Characteristics are used in the lists - yet.
As there will be more lists coming out on-line and also once we get the BKCIV army list calculator sorted out, you'll be able to add characteristics that you feel appropriate.
This is also where the Common (C) and Rare (R) will start to come into their own, so as to stop players overloading specific units with Special Characteristics.

There is currently only 1 Rare characteristic - which is an error - as Independent should also be Rare as well, and there are a couple of others. I also missed Elite off the list and that will be rectified in the errata.

The whole thing about the Special Characteristics is that they are highly subjective.
So for example, British Commandos were Elite - but were not necessarily Veterans. Likewise they were very capable in combat, but also didn't generally want to be engaged in combat - so they are not Fierce. We can get into a whole Flames of War type argument about US Marines ... but I am not going there  :-X

Where the lists specifically state a special characteristic is assigned to a unit, it should be taken into account in the units game play.
But again, the rules are designed to allow players a choice, as long as both players agree and maybe in a scenario, for example, you can use the characteristics to add flavor to your game.

I hope that helps?

Mark
'He could have lived a risk-free, moneyed life, but he preferred to whittle away his fortune on warfare.' Xenophon, The Anabasis

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AJ at the Bank

Very helpful understanding of intentions Mark.

With current RAW - Abilities are prescribed to units as per Army Lists.

Ability rules  may be updated in future (Mandatory rule changes or Optional rules)...but Common/Rare redundant for now.


Many thanks
Adam
In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king.

Big Insect

Common and Rare still applies Adam but only if you start to alter the lists for your own scenarios

Thanks
'He could have lived a risk-free, moneyed life, but he preferred to whittle away his fortune on warfare.' Xenophon, The Anabasis

This communication has been written by a dyslexic person. If you have any trouble with the meaning of any of the sentences or words, please do not be afraid to ask for clarification. Remember that dyslexics are often high-level conceptualisers who provide "out of the box" thinking.