In looking up solutions to my last quandary about charging over obstacles and down slopes, I noticed that a lot of people play obstacles very differently. Some ignore verticality, some only look at distance displaced, some make you measure ascent but not descent, and some people look at it on a case by case basis.

So, I am going to pose a hypothetical and see if I can find a consensus.

There are four models standing behind a 2'' high obstacle. All of them want to move straight forward over the obstacle as far as they can go. Assume the obstacle is negligibly wide for the purposes of the scenario.

The models are:

A: A great eagle who is 3'' tall and can ignore obstacles and has a 12'' movement due to flight.
B: An ent who is 5'' tall, more than twice the height of the obstacle, and has an 8'' movement.
C: A giant spider who is 1'' tall with a 10'' movement and who ignores obstacles due to Swift Movement.
D: A cave troll who is 3'' tall and has a 6'' movement, but rolled a six on his jump check.

How far past the obstacle will each of these models be after one turn of movement?

Thanks!

Seems to me that everything but the spider would move its full distance minus the width of the wall. The spider would crawl up and over the wall and would move its full distance minus four inches and the width of the wall.

It seems to have always been the consensus of the people I have been playing with, and this is going back to the first introduction of the rule in the late 2000s, that spiders treated all terrain (obstacles, walls, trees) like open ground that it could walk on but that it had to pay the movement cost to do so just like a real spider. The swift movement rule's first sentence is a statement about what the spider can do (climb on all terrain) and then the second sentence tells us the applications that are a result of that power. The implication my group has taken from that is that the ignoring is linked to the climbing. In that sense, we read "ignoring obstacle" as meaning that it ignores the rules for obstacles and treats all terrain the same as a byproduct of being able to climb on any surface in the same way as a real spider. This is also why we never make it take climb tests for anything, even though the rule doesn’t state the model with the rule doesn’t have to take such tests; only that the model is able to climb on any surface. Strictly speaking, that wording is an exception to unscalable terrain rule on pg. 30 and not to the rest of the climbing section on the same page. Even though the swift movement rule also says that difficult terrain is not treated as having any slowing effect.

To me, the climbing on the surface is what makes it distinguishable from say, an ent, stepping over the obstacle or a man vaulting it because these methods don’t make the model take any extra steps. Meaning, no additional movement is absorbed by the end or the vaulting man.

Now, is there an argument to be made that the true purpose of the swift movement is to allow the spiders to treat obstacles as open ground and to basically phase through them? Sure. I could see reading the rule with that interpretation given above wasn’t already long standing, and well accepted precedent. I think the rules lay out what an obstacle is well enough that no one would disagree with a spider being able to ignore a fallen long but not be able to phase through a building. That said, I think Asamu’s position on the obstacles vs general terrain determination being model specific and based on the height of the model in question is sound given how the rules for obstacles, jumping, climbing, and barricades are all written to use the height determination. (See Asamu at https://www.reddit.com/r/MiddleEarthMiniatures/comments/ujrned/swift_movement_rule/). Therefore, I’d say that the spider in your hypothetical would need to spend 2 inches of movement to climb the wall and then one inch to climb part way down the wall before falling the rest of the way without taking damage. So, the spider would end up being its full move minus three inches and the width of the wall away from the wall at the end.

This of course, suppose that the logic about the spider not needing a climb test from my earlier explanation holds up. Technically the rule only says it can climb on any surface. There is no mention of it not needing to take a climb test when it wants to climb something.

_________________
"Draw your sword with a heavy heart, but swing it with a heavy hand"

Thanks for the response!

Yeah, that does seem to be how people play it.

I just don't see any support for it.

Its a shame that the rules text hasn't been updated or clarified in an FAQ since Shelob was first introduced back in 2003. It even makes references to jumping chasms, even though those are now leaped.

From a realism perspective, in my opinion, spiders ignoring an obstacle is no more "phasing through it" than an eagle flying over it or a man jumping over; all three take times and energy to gain and lose altitude, and irl hurdles times are roughly 25% slower than sprinting times as a result. Of course, this being a game, I can see ignoring such things for the sake of realism.

Likewise, in the case of an obstacle like a flagpole, lamp post, column, or tree, the spider would run along the side rather than actually climbing up and over, and afiact that is allowed by the rules, but I have no idea how one would actually measure that on the tabletop.

And yeah, on the flip side (no pun intended), I don't see anything in the rules implying that spiders don't have to roll climb or jump tests.


Out of curiosity, is the climbing part of the way and then jumping the rest actually supported by the rules? My friend said the same thing, but afaict the book doesn't actually support it.

Idk what to tell you other than to go to GW at this point and ask them to clarify the rule in an FAQ. Given that spiders are a big part of the new War for the North book, I'd wager the team would take it up.

As for climbing part way and then dropping the rest, that makes sense to me. If you don't think the rules allow for it, then you'll have to explain why that is to me.

*Edit*

Well, on further reflection, I do see how climbing and dropping are not something that can be joined together in that way. The wording implies that it is a binary choice. When the distance is the height of the model or less, then the model descends automatically, otherwise it must attempt to climb if the surface is scalable. The climbing charts results state that the model climbs until it is out of movement, or it reaches the top/bottom. Meaning there isn’t a point during the climb there you could let go, even once the model reaches a safe distance to drop from.

This also means, I suppose, that it is not actually possible to order your own model to jump off a cliff anymore, which is quite disappointing. Since the model must either be able to descend automatically or climb, the rules exclude voluntarily falling. I know that did used to be a thing because the rules for compel/command used to expressly forbid doing that when you controlled another model with the spell. The current spell omits that language. I am disappointed, truly.

I also see that a climb test is only used to go straight up or straight down, there is no ability to climb and move vertically. Meaning that, in your example with the tree or the lamp post (without conceding that these are in fact, obstacles within the meaning of the definition on pg. 27) the spider would only be able to climb and go to the top of the tree or lamp and then it could try to climb down if it roles a six and had movement remaining and there was also some way to balance the spider on the top of the tree or lamp post so that it could then test again to come down. There doesn’t seem to be a way to climb up the tree part way and move vertically then then come back down.

_________________
"Draw your sword with a heavy heart, but swing it with a heavy hand"

Thanks again for the speedy reply!

I guess I will try and e-mail the GW FAQ. I haven't had good luck getting in touch with them in the past, but we shall see! Thanks for the suggestion.

The edit matches my reading of the descending rules as well.

The thing about spiders is that we are told they can "climb at any angle", so I would think that the bypassing a pillar by climbing on the side makes the most sense from both a rules as written as well as in the fiction, but again, what exactly this means or how it is supposed to be played on the table is anyone's guess.

Aug. 2022 FAQ

"Q: Does a model with the Swift Movement special rule still
measure the vertical distance when moving over obstacles?
(p.107)
A: Yes."

It seems that GW has decided that the rule works like I originally thought. The spider does not climb with a test, it moves over obstacles vertically and spends its movement going up and down again.

_________________
"Draw your sword with a heavy heart, but swing it with a heavy hand"

Based on the scenario and the abilities of the four models, here's how far each model would move past the obstacle after one turn of movement:

A: The great eagle can ignore obstacles and has a 12'' movement, so it can move straight over the obstacle and fly an additional 12'' forward. Therefore, the great eagle would be 15'' past the obstacle after one turn of movement.

B: The ent is more than twice the height of the obstacle and can simply walk over it without any penalty. With an 8'' movement, the ent would move 8'' forward and be past the obstacle by that distance.

C: The giant spider ignores obstacles due to Swift Movement, so it can move straight over the obstacle and move an additional 10'' forward. Therefore, the giant spider would be 11'' past the obstacle after one turn of movement.

D: The cave troll rolled a six on its jump check, which means it can jump over the obstacle and move an additional 6'' forward. Therefore, the cave troll would be 9'' past the obstacle after one turn of movement.

So, to summarize:

The great eagle would be 15'' past the obstacle after one turn of movement.
The ent would be 8'' past the obstacle after one turn of movement.
The giant spider would be 11'' past the obstacle after one turn of movement.
The cave troll would be 9'' past the obstacle after one turn of movement.



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