Frostgrave - Rules

[Lotan]

If the spellcaster doesn't know the spell he sacrifices the scroll to autocast on the cast value.

If he knows the spell and fails to cast it, he can sacrifice the scroll to make it cast. It doesn't require another roll, and counts as casting on the minimum number needed to pass. Thhe scroll is then removed.

[Argonor]

If the spellcaster doesn't know the spell he sacrifices the scroll to autocast on the cast value.

If he knows the spell and fails to cast it, he can sacrifice the scroll to make it cast. It doesn't require another roll, and counts as casting on the minimum number needed to pass. Thhe scroll is then removed.

Ah, OK, thanks. The wording confused me.

I now have to finish another batch of 16 skellies for an Undead army, and then I should have time to start tinkering with a Frostgrave warband...

[ChaosChild]

A few creature related questions that came up during our game tonight.

1: When do controlled creatures (e.g. animal companion or raised zombie) activate? P30 says all creatures activate in the creature phase but P45 suggests that this is just uncontrolled creatures.

2: Whenever they normally activate, canthey activate in the Wizard or Apprentice phases if they're close enough?

3: We couldn't find anything saying that controlled creatures couldn't pick up treasure, not even animals. It's specifically stated for warhounds and the animal companion spell but not for wandering creatures that have been controlled.

4: Can zombies be raised directly into combat, if the spellcaster is close enough? Summon Demon specifically says no, but Raise Zombie doesn't.

[tomogui]

Ooh, I've got one!

Spell Eater:

This spell cancels the effects of any one spell currently in play, and the spellcaster immediately takes 1 point of damage.

Who takes the damage? The caster of the cancelled spell, or the caster of Spell Eater? It's not really clear.

[joe5mc]

Spelleater - the caster of the Spelleater spell takes the 1 point of damage.

Creatures -

A creature under the control of a wizard is treated as a soldier for the purpose of activation, so it can be activated with the wizard or apprentice or will go in the soldier phase.

Hmm...you are correct, I wasn't clear about controlled monsters. I would say creatures can pick up treasure - accept those labeled animal or that are immaterial.

A zombie can be raised straight into combat, provided he is in base contact with the wizard that cast the spell. (and remember, a spellcaster can not cast a spell while in combat).

[JamWarrior]

One that came up in our first (excellent) game.

Figure A is unlucky enough to be outnumbered and in combat with figures B and C.

A fight action is activated between A and B, and A wins.  Can A use the 1" push for winning on himself to pop free of C as well?

We played no as it seemed a bit cheeky to escape a mob by just beating the weakest member of it, but the rules didn't seem to say you couldn't.

[joe5mc]

You played it correctly. He can push the one he beat in combat back, but is still held in place by the other one.

[Erekosse]

Hi,I have a few questions:

The first 3 spells MUST come from your school,the next 3 MUST come from de aligned school but the last two CAN come from the neutral ones...that means that I can have another spell from my own school or the aligned ones with those spells?

If I cast Raise undead can I cast control undead to another type of undead(ghoul for example) and keep both creatures?

Imp,summon demon,control undead,bind......do they count for the maximun warband limit?

Can I cast steal health if Im at full health,just for make 3 health damage?


And finally I can't see the point of loosing 1 health for casting spelleater,Dispel is the same spell,easier and with no damage for the caster.


(Yes,Im going to take the Necromancer)

[joe5mc]

Hey Erekosse,

The last two spells MUST come from neutral ones. You can only ever start with 3 spells from your school, 1 each from the three aligned schools, and 2 from any two different netural schols.

Yes, you can cast Raise Zombie and then cast Control Undead on another undead, and use both of them during the game. The Control Undead will cease at the end of the game.

Unless a spell specifically says 'takes the place of a warband member' then the creature is in addition to your normal warband.

Steal Health, the two halves of the spell are independent. If successfully cast, the targets takes 3 points of damage, or whatever he has left, and the caster regains 3 health (or 1 or 2 if that's all he is currently down).

Spelleater - The school of Necromancy developed a different (and more painful) technique to get rid of unwanted spells. They could learn Dispell, but as it is a Thamaturge spell (the school directly opposed to Necromancy, the base casting number would be 18!)

[Dalcor]

I realy realy loves to play the game, its fantastic and I enjoy every second.
I realy realy loves the system and how it works.
I realy realy hates how the rules are written.
Thats 2 for and 1 against. My love for the game wins!!!!

There is a lot of possibilities for multiple explanation, something is totaly missing. Power Gamers and Rule Lawyer Haven. But you can play the game without problems just if you employ common sense. I have to say that even Cadwallon written in frenglish language has been more explicit in written rules. So far in playing we have found following "problems" which need explanatory or to be written more explicit according to me. Some thing should rise up as we are no native speakers and can therefore it could be lost in translation. But remember not every potentiall buyer is native speaker and what you consider clear they have to think about it.

Please be kind on me - I realy like Frostgrave and the job you done!

Two Weapon Combat
Page 19 If A Wizard is Armed with both a sword and the dagger, he recieves +1 Fight, which should be written ias a split stat for starting wizard
Page 24 Miniatures Carrying a hand weapon and dagger are always considering to strike principally  with hand weapon. They do recieve a +1F for fighting with two weapons and this is already incorporate into their stats.
Is there difference between spellcasters and henchmans in the two weapon fighting?
If Decay spell target any weapon of the Treasure Hunter will he get -1F? He does not have split stat
If Miniature with two weapons get magical dagger are daggers magical effects effective in combat? He is striking with his mundane Hand Weapon (as per rules) does he add a bonus from the dagger like +2 to dmg ?

Movement
Two different rules to hinder movement with diffent effect.
Page 44 Collecting Treasure says that movement is halved if carries the treasure
Page 33 Obstructions and Rough terrain says that every inch or partial inch a figure move through is countes as 2 inches.
So there are two different way how to calculate the movement. Obstruction and Rough Terrrain si sometimes very hard to calculate and it limits the movement very much.

Please consider this as this could be fault in understanding english. But all my friends came to same conclusion.
If any wall is five and a half inch height, you need to do movement 12, to climb on to the top. It does not matter if your base movement is 6 or 7; your actual movement in rough terrain or during climb is three inches. Rules as written says, that even to move addition 2mm miniature need to spent 2 points of movement. With 7 movement afterr miniature moved three inches in rough terrain, its left with only one point of movement and therefore can not move any more.Sorry thief. Also if you do movement and movement action the result is same. With movement 6 or 7 you do movement three inches during first action and one inch during second action. Thats because according to rules there is not full round movement but two movement actionsm where second move action should be only half of the Movement value. I assume that both actions are evaluated separately (Precedent taken from group activations) Am I right?
Now running away with treasure means that you are moving half your movement. It means move 3 (3,5) in first action and move 1,5(1,75) in second action for movement 6 (7). Realy 1.75?? Now you want to climb or go through rough terrain with treasure? Your movement is 1+1. I realy hope I don‘t understand the rules well, because this is really silly.

Can Dog climb vertical surfaces? There is no objection in the rules (OK I know its silly question, but you know all those rule lawyers)

Moving Off the Board:
Is miniature under effect of friendly spell (such as leap spell) considered as leaving board willingly. If I will be the running thief, I will be ver happy and very willing to leave the ruins by any means including friendly leap spell.

Falling
What will happen if I move miniature by LEAP SPELL 10 inches in the sky? Does  he get 15DMG. Just got info that i tis only for for friendly models from my brother, that he saw that on internet (EDIT: here actualy). Why is that so? Its fantastic and funny tool. It can be FAQed into something like tahat "LEAP movement must end on solid terrain" I like to push oponents 10 inches back! If I have to face bone art, why not to move oponent wizard behind terrain or so, so he will be unable to cast it on me next time. Thats realy only tools elementalist have to do some real problem to oponent. OMG?!!

Combat
If miniature grants its flanking bonus to fight, it still do attack in its activation, right?

What happen if miniature decide not to attack. Will both miniatures stay locked untill oponents activation?

Bestiary
You know Vampire is the bloodsucker but wraiths drains life force. What kind of Archetypes are those  ;-)


Shooting
Page40: Unless the target is completely concealed from the view its considered to be in line of sight
Measured from where? (well  probably from the shooter, but from the eye level, or base or ribbons, or feathers on top of the bow?)

Are Ribbons on Red Riding Hood‘s hood , or feather on top of the staff  enough to draw LOS?

Every piece of intervening terrain or figure between the shooter gives +1 modifier

If I translate it to Czech it says that „every piece of terrain between shooter and target“. So what If I am on the tip of the tower and there is molehill (rough terrain) between me and target?

Also shooting is the only roll in the game where activated model must beat not equal target number.

Spells
Decay: What happen when  mundane weapoin is decayed after the battle. Does the guy needs to buy a new weapon, or he stays without weapon untill he will ne replaced? For how much he can buy a new mundane weapon? If weapon was decayed, then, as per rules, you can not give that poor guy magical weapon because he does not carry the mundane one, right?

Enchant Armor: As per rules, spellcaster is unable to cast enchant armor upon himself, because he does not carry Armor. Right?

Leap and Teleport wording has been already explained ;-)

Elemental Ball vs Grenade vs Plannar Tear
Elemental Ball and Grenade have almost same effects.  But for elemental ball you need to draw LOS even to additional target (not with grenade).  Now  as i tis shooting effect the additional targets has to roll fight including cover  and intervening terrain. From the caster, or from the point of impact? Why there is difference between Grenade and Elementall Ball. There is 10% differenci in casting number and 10% difference in Shooting attack. But for elementall ball there is additional disadvantage.
Area effect for Plannar Tear is 2 inches, for grenade and Elementall bal lis 1,5?!

Embed Enchantment
You can find some +2F magical items in the game, but you are unable to made them, right (those spellcasters of old were good).

Construct vs Animal vs Demon
Demon does not take place of the soldier in the warband even casted out of game by summoning circle. Construct and Animal do.

There are two wall effects  in game each with different size.

Bone Dart seems to overpowered for CN8 and +5 shooting, its for 20% cheaper then Elemental Bolt but there is only 15% difference in damage. Is there any meta or exerience behind it? Could you please elaborate. Because Bone Dart is brutaly effective when caster gets +1shoot and gets +1 for casting

Does +1 to shoot from magical item also increase effectivity of the shooting attack spells?


Thank you very much

[tomogui]

A couple of super simple questions:

1) I couldn't see anything preventing a model from Shooting while engaged in combat (i.e. in base contact with an enemy model). Can my Archer simply shoot his melee opponent in the face instead of fighting hand-to-hand? It'd be much safer, since there's no chance of getting hit back!

2) While engaged in combat with enemy model A, can my Archer shoot at enemy model B who is 15" away?

3) I realise that models cannot take movement actions when engaged in combat, but could my Crossbowman (1) reload (instead of taking a movement action) and then (2) shoot, all while engaged with an enemy model?

[joe5mc]

Okay,

Tomogui, let me answer yours first before I dive into the Dalcor list.

1) Once a model is In Combat, the only action it can take is to fight (unless something expressly says it can be done while in combat). He cannot shoot, move, or cast a spell. This should have been clearly stated in the book, but it is definitely the intent.  Models with bows and crossbows are dangerous enough!

2) No.

3) No.

[JamWarrior]

A quick one from a club mate.

Can the elementalist's wall spell be climbed?

Rules as is nothing says not so I was inclined to say yes, but he was imagining it as a fire wall whereas I was imagining it as an earth wall and we were curious as to author's intent.

[joe5mc]

All right, Dalcor, here I go!

I will try to be clear. I realize English isn't your first language, but its the only one I know! (I took Biblical Hebrew in college, but it is mostly forgotten and probably not that helpful at the moment anyway).

Thanks for all of the enthusiasm you have shown for the game so far.

Two Weapon Combat

Soldiers that carry two weapons, such as the Treasure Hunter already have the +1 incorporated into their stat. Wizards and apprentices do not. If they equip with two weapons, they write it as a split stat - this is so the player can easily remember what the wizard's actual fight stat is.  

Anyone fighting with two weapons who loses one (such as from Decay) will have their Fight drop by one. The Treasure Hunter will just get a -1 until he replaces the weapon. The wizard or apprentice will just lose the split stat.

If armed with a regular hand weapon and a magic dagger - it works like this.  The figure will get any Fight bonus of the dagger. This is a magical effect that makes the wielder a better fighter. However, the figure will not get the damage bonus as it is stated that strikes are actually made with the hand weapon. So, if you have a magic dagger that only has a damage bonus, it only makes sense to give it to a thief, or be used as the only weapon by a spellcaster.

Movement

I'll be honest. When I play. We just half all movement for carrying treasure and for rough terrain. If a player is carrying treasure through rough terrain, we use quarter movement.  You are technically correct with how the rules are written, but it's a bit more confusing that it needs to be. So, a thug carrying treasure, doing nothing but move, will move 4.5 inches in a turn. If he goes through rough ground, his movement is down to 2.25 inches. (Makes that Mud spell start looking like a good idea!).

The climbing dog question! All terrain in Frostgrave is climbable unless specifically stated in a scenario. If we think of the terrain as just representational, it's not a problem. There will be lots of rocks and stuff lying around that can be used as stairs and such.  So, yes, a dog can climb - unless you and your opponent agree otherwise about terrain before hand.  Actually, as many trips to the Lake District have shown me, dogs are great climbers, and, in most cases, can go up very steep surfaces much faster than a human can.

Movement Off the Board -

I think I've answered this before, but I want to make a definitive statement on this one -

The only time a miniature who was not part of your starting warband, but is currently under your control, can be moved off the board is if he is carrying treasure. In this case, the controlling wizard gets the treasure, but the soldier will return to his starting warband after the game. Any other use of a movement spell or mind control can move the soldier to the edge of the board, but not any father.  Basically, using spells to move an opponent's soldiers off the board is not allowed, unless it is to secure treasure or is specifically stated as allowed in the rules or a scenario.

Falling

Leap is way too powerful if it can be cast on an opposing figure - not just for the reason you mentioned (yes, he would take 15 damage), but just because it has no Will Roll.  If you want to house rule it and allow an opponent to make a will roll, go for it.  Officially, leap can only be cast on a model you control.

Combat

Miniatures in combat do not have to attack. However, they can't do much else, so will just sit there until they are attacked or something happens to free them.

If a miniature is in combat with two opponents. Each of those opponents may spend an action to attack. Each one will gain the bonus of support from the other figure.

Bestiary

The Vampire/Wraith is just a typo. A Vampire is a vampire is a vampire.

Shooting

Draw line of sight from the eyes of the shooting model. To take a shot, he must see a part of his target that would actually be hurt if hit. So, no feathers, tips of staffs, bits of cloak, etc.

+1 shooting modifier applies to any terrain that sits between the shooter or target, that partially obscures line of sight. So, if you are in the tower looking down on the target, nothing on the ground is likely to be in the line of sight.

Spells

Decay: It costs 5gc to replace any mundane weapon that is destroyed. You could give him a magical weapon if it is of the type he normally carries. So you could give your thug a magical hand weapon.

Enchant Armour: Correct, if a figure isn't wearing armour, and spellcasters don't, then you can't enchant it.

Elemental Ball/Grenade/Planar Tear - These are all just different spells. The biggest difference is that they are different schools, so different wizards have a harder or easier time casting them.  Elemental Ball & Grenade are both shooting attacks. For purposes of cover, draw line of sight from the caster for the actual target of the spell, anyone else in the blast area should draw line of sight from the target. Planar tear is a different type of magic that actually warps space, it doesn't care what kind of cover you've got.

Embed Enchantment: Correct. for the moment, modern wizards just don't know how to make stuff like that.

Construct vs. Animal vs. Demon: there is good reason for this. The Construct and the Animal become a permanent addition to the warband. The Demon leaves at the end of each game as stated under Bind Demon.

Bone Dart: First off, the Shooting Stat does not effect spells. So, that part won't actually get any better. The big difference is that Bone Dart is NOT a magical attack. This doesn't matter much when just fighting against other warbands, but can matter A LOT when fighting monsters that are immune to non-magical weapons.  So, Bone Dart is better for a starting wizard, Elemental Ball and Bolt are better for an experienced one.

That said, this spell has generated a lot of comment (probably because so many people are playing Necromancers) so, I've got my eye on it. If everyone decides it is to powerful, it might have to be taken down a notch or two.


Hope that clears a few things up. If not, just ask again!

[joe5mc]

Yes, a wall counts as a terrain piece. It can be climbed. It can also be crumbled. That said, a fire wall is a pretty cool idea. I'll have to think of a way of working that in!