[Kristoffer O]

Originally posted by Pocus:
is poison damage cumulative?


if you feel courageous, feel free to elaborate on this morale recovery rule.

Poison is cumulative.

Ugh! I'll try, but this is treacherous grounds. The lands of morale checks is ancient, dark and filled with sink holes. I do not believe there are any scouts left that know what lies hidden in that foreboding marsh.

When a unit is hit, repelled or if a squad-mate dies he is forced to make a morale check. This probably works in the same way as an attack/defence roll. Depending on the failure of the defending morale the unit is subjected to a morale loss of 1-3. This does not (IIRC) affect the actual morale of the unit. The sum of the morale losses are added. Each turn the total morale loss of the squad are compared with the number of units in the squad and the average morale (IIRC) of the squad. In ways I can't remember there are dice added and a resulting rout may occur.

Each turn a standard reduces the morale loss of all units it affects by one.

Sermon of Courage etc also reduces the morale loss of units affected. Not sure if this is limited to one point of morale loss. It might be more.

The sum of these checks are:
A cowardly unit in an otherwise brave squad will get morale losses as his friends die even though his brave friends don't. If he's chicken enough he will most likely cause the squad more harm by being a coward than the squad will gain from having him in the squad.

Larger armies rout less easily. They are also less affected by random chance. Larger armies needs more total morale losses to risk a rout. Thus a squad composed of five wardens might be unlucky if one of them is repelled, while a large squad of LI is unlikely to rout until several of their numbers are dead.

Mindless units might be useful to avoid routs as the rout check is based on average morale (IIRC), but in the case of soulless the sheer number of slain units in the squad might cause the living to rout regardless of the mindless units. The soulless will then dissolve.

Hope this clarifies something. I'm not clear myself (hello Hubbard ) and I'm not likely to become any clearer. I have occasionally grasped the mechanics, but they seem to be elusive theories