Overwatch question...

[LilNewbie]

Overwatch allows a figure to place the overwatch marker anywhere within his "Line of Sight" (and in an area with no visible enemies). Does that mean the same as "Line of Fire" from the shooting section? If not, does that mean the marker can be placed outside the effective range of the ranged weapon? I wouldn't think so and just wanting to make sure.

Thanks!

[richjones]

It can be placed anywhere in LOS but not where there is visible enemy - the last was to stop a cheesey trick I came up with when we started and you could place it near visible enemy ... with enough actions you could shoot and if missed set up overwatch so you got to shoot in the enemies turn.

As it is if the marker is placed further away than the weapons maximum distance (not that there are many max ranges) then it is obviously a waste in most cases ... however sometimes it is handy to place it so it is out of the 'visible enemy' range but still cover some of the area needed - harder to explain in words than pictures.

BUT the answer is it is LOS not necessarily LOF; although often the two are the same thing.

Another interesting point is that placing the overwatch you have to think in '3d' where there are buildings involved as placing a marker on the ground with a 3 storey building probably means you can't fire on targets on the roof etc ... so bear this in mind when placing it.

Overwatch models the firer's field of concentration really, which is why there is no test to see if they can fire like in a lot of rules, just the -1 as it will probably be less effective.

Rich

[LilNewbie]

Thanks for the quick response. Shooting modifiers for the attacker are the same as a normal shot to the target with the extra -1 Overwatch modifier. For some reason, I was thinking you measured the distance from the overwatch marker to the target to determine range which seemed broken. The distance from the marker is just to determine if an overwatch shot is triggered.

I was reading too much into it.

Thanks again.

[richjones]

No worries ... it's what I am here for