Ice Pillar from Silent One trigger

[Bengt]

Silent Ones have a trigger (Spreading Ice) on their attack (Freeze) that places an Ice Pillar in base contact with their target. It has no text about not being able to place it on other models or markers like Rasputina's do and there are no general restrictions on p 49 of the rule book. The Ice Pillar is impassable, so what happens if you place it over a model that is standing close to the target? Can the covered model move (assuming no Incorporeal, Flight, or similar)?

[zFiend]

I think that because it's ice, it forms around the model and the model can't do anything until the ice pillar is removed.

Oh come on.

It seriously does not do that.

[Myyrä]

I think that because it's ice, it forms around the model and the model can't do anything until the ice pillar is removed. 

Fun fact of the day: Rules don't prevent you from leaving impassable terrain. They just prevent entering it.

[zFiend]

Fun fact of the day: Rules don't prevent you from leaving impassable terrain. They just prevent entering it.

Haha. Well that's good in this case.

[Math Mathonwy]

Silent Ones have a trigger (Spreading Ice) on their attack (Freeze) that places an Ice Pillar in base contact with their target. It has no text about not being able to place it on other models or markers like Rasputina's do and there are no general restrictions on p 49 of the rule book. The Ice Pillar is impassable, so what happens if you place it over a model that is standing close to the target? Can the covered model move (assuming no Incorporeal, Flight, or similar)?

:D

But seriously, if this gets a FAQ entry (or errata) I can predict somewhat accurately what the result will be.

[PraetorDragoon]

I would say you cannot place the Impassible terrain marker on/under a model. Aren't there some restrictions on marker placement in the FAQ? 

[decker_cky]

I think that because it's ice, it forms around the model and the model can't do anything until the ice pillar is removed. 

[admiralvorkraft]

As thematic as that may be, Silent Ones are already about a stone cheap for what they do, lets not add a pseudo Paralyze to their routine.

 

I would rule that they cannot be placed on or under another model or marker.

[binkys]

I would treat this the same as placing corpse/scrap/scheme markers.  Touching but not overlapping.

[Bengt]

I would treat this the same as placing corpse/scrap/scheme markers.  Touching but not overlapping.

The rules explicitly allow you to place markers on top of other markers, p 49.

[binkys]

The rules explicitly allow you to place markers on top of other markers, p 49.

 

Meant in the case of the FAQed ruling on placing a ht 0 marker in base contact with yourself.

 

Q: If a model is placing a Marker in base contact with itself and the Marker is Ht 0, can the Marker be placed underneath the model’s base?

A: No. The Marker must be placed touching the model’s base, but not overlapping it.

 

It's may not a valid comparison in this case since the ice pillar marker has a height and the impassible trait, however because of that I'd lean even more to not being able to do it.  Since a model cannot enter impassible terrain, I would be hard pressed to accept impassible terrain "Forming around" them given the rules of the game.  Yes, I understand placement is not movement.  But given the way everything else has been written to work, and the following comment in the FAQ, I would say that no, you cannot freeze a model in place by forming the impassible terrain around it.

 

 

When reading rules, keep in mind that they were written in the English language with all of the restraints and foibles that come with it; when in doubt, please interpret them with a grain of common sense. The easiest way to misinterpret a rule is to overthink it.

 

 

Referring to the comment re:Rasputina's Ice pillars wording:

 

 

Rasputina's has the caveat of not within 1" of a model or marker as I believe in most cases that prevents a model from easily being boxed in to a location as 2 ice pillars in base contact with each other and another model which is pressed against another piece of impassible terrain would then be stuck there forever(or at least until Rasputina decided not to cast the spell again).  Even if you did box a model in, it could move 1" into base contact with a marker, then the next time Raputina cast the spell, the pillars would need to be further away, leaving room for the trapped model to escape.  The marker part is that since there is no need for a resist or trigger for her pillars, you could easily stop the enemy crew from reaching a strat/scheme marker for the entire game.  Combined with the wendigo casting the same spell, it would be possible to flip 2 squatters rights markers(as an example) on turn 2, then cover them for the remainder of the game with no chance at all of the enemy being able to attempt to flip them again unless they kill Rasputina and/or the Wendigo.

[Bengt]

The FAQ entry only explains what it means to place a marker in base to base contact. There is no rule stopping you placing a marker so that overlaps another model.

[binkys]

Well, ignoring everything else, and given that I still don't believe that putting impassible terrain over a model works.  The rules for impassible are specifically:

 

 

Models  cannot enter impassible areas of terrain, which includes moving through the walls of a building or into other solid objects.

 

So, even if you can do it, it would not stop the model that you covered with it from leaving as they are not entering the terrain.

 

As for "There is no rule stating you can't," there have been numerous discussions in the past that go down this road which I am not about to link to, nor am I going to go down the slippery slope of "the rules don't say I can't <insert some ridiculous thing here> so I'm going to."

 

I am of the opinion that based off of the existing way other things work that this you can't place impassible terrain on top of a marker and that is how I will rule it in any event I run unless FAQed otherwise.  However, given the rules above, if I were to come to your tournament where you ruled that it could be, I would use the rule quoted above to allow me to walk out of it.

[Myyrä]

Well, ignoring everything else, and given that I still don't believe that putting impassible terrain over a model works.  The rules for impassible are specifically:

 

 

So, even if you can do it, it would not stop the model that you covered with it from leaving as they are not entering the terrain.

 

As for "There is no rule stating you can't," there have been numerous discussions in the past that go down this road which I am not about to link to, nor am I going to go down the slippery slope of "the rules don't say I can't <insert some ridiculous thing here> so I'm going to."

 

I am of the opinion that based off of the existing way other things work that this you can't place impassible terrain on top of a marker and that is how I will rule it in any event I run unless FAQed otherwise.  However, given the rules above, if I were to come to your tournament where you ruled that it could be, I would use the rule quoted above to allow me to walk out of it.

If you place impassable terrain on a marker the marker is simply moved on top of the terrain. Why is placing terrain on markers addressed in the rule book if it should be always impossible to do?

[Bengt]

For reference Kaeris' trigger Pyre on the Born of Fire upgrade also lacks placing restrictions. Pyre markers are blocking, hazardous.

[Bengt]

As for "There is no rule stating you can't," there have been numerous discussions in the past that go down this road which I am not about to link to, nor am I going to go down the slippery slope of "the rules don't say I can't <insert some ridiculous thing here> so I'm going to."

While the rules are permissive, some things that are not stated outright can be inferred from other rules. In this case the rules state outright that markers and models can occupy the same space (third bullet on p 49) and many special markers (e.g. Ice Pillars cast by Rasputina) are very clear that they can not be placed over models. From this I draw the conclusion that a marker without restrictions (typically scheme, corpse, scrap) can be placed overlapping the base of other models. Obviously I can be mistaken since the issue isn't addressed in the rules.

[binkys]

If you place impassable terrain on a marker the marker is simply moved on top of the terrain. Why is placing terrain on markers addressed in the rule book if it should be always impossible to do?

 

I will agree on placing it on top of a scheme marker.  My comments were specifically speaking about why Rasputina had the conditions put on hers, which would be able to move the markers 5" up into the air and lasted until her next activation, which means that it becomes somewhat problematic to get into base contact with the marker to interact with it and using the FAQ to reference placing a marker in base contact with regards to a model, which I also conceded in a further post may be incorrect as it is not a ht 0 marker and is not in base contact with yourself.  Also, these markers only last until the end of the turn, and require a model to be nearby the marker you are trying to block AND a trigger to go off.  So it becomes more difficult to just lock off a marker from most crews.

 

Pyre markers are blocking and hazardous,  not impassible.  The impassible trait is what causes the problem with this interaction with me.

 

And while I do not personally agree that it can be placed over a model as a model cannot enter impassible terrain, I also gave a reason that even if it is possible(since technically the model is not entering the terrain, the terrain is being placed where the model already is), it does not lock that model in place as the rules for impassible specifically reference entering the impassible terrain, not leaving it.