How to counter door blocking + Crossbow LoS issues

[Goblin-King]

The Elf isn't allowed to shoot through the Barbarian.

Let me counter the counterargument: He's not allowed to shoot diagonally through the door if the square in front of the door and adjacent to the Elf is occupied.
Correct me if I'm wrong.

The elf shooting isn't really the central problem in door blocking, but interesting issue regardless.

If we assume the rules are the same as Spellcasting, we can all agree you can't stand directly behind the barbarian and shoot straight through the door.
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But can you stand next to the barbarian and shoot diagonal?
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The LoS rules doesn't tell, but they certainly allow you to shoot around a corner. Even though though the line is mathematically blocked!

[The Road Warrior]

Here's another great idea by Big Bene.

If you can't be bothered to read through the final 5 pages of the game (and I don't blame you!) basically the Orcs spawned, 2 per round, from the trap door. Because of the set up of furniture around the doorway the Heroes could only take down two Orcs per round without entering the room. Slowly whoever was blocking the door was going have their BP whittled away. The objective for the Heroes was to get into the room and block the trapdoor by standing on it. Eventually Daedalus stepped in, survived a possible beating and the Heroes won the quest.

I loved playing that one BigBene, it could have ended up so differently

[torilen]

The spawning from a trap door - relies on something other than magic that can easily be overcome. Nice!

A slightly heavy-handed trick, thought not horribly, would be to create a special trap that targets the
spot in front of the door, and attempts to hit it each turn someone stands on it or moves across it. It
would not need to be powerful, just annoying enough to make them move. And, typically, traps offer
the chance to not to be hit, so it most likely wouldn't be very lethal. Again...just an annoyance.

[chaoticprime]

The rules pretty clearly depict this scenario with picture and writing. If one hero is blocking the doorway, and there is a monster directly in front of him, heroes to his right and left can attack the space in front of the Barbarian with diagonal or ranged weapons, but only that square. If there is no monster blocking the door, the shooter can fire on any square he can trace line of sight to. Why is this still an issue, we've been playing this game for 25 years, and in that time I have never had an issue with door-blockers. The game was designed to account for this.

Daedalus, you finish this, I got stuff to do.

[crom_atlantian]

The last game we played we used the house rule that if you damage your opponent in melee (killed or not doesnt matter) you swap spaces with them. It really gave the morcar player some interesting tactics and the heroes themselves had some extra thinking to do.Sometimes killing a monster put them into a much worse position. Door blocking never arose doing it this way, and was surpisingly easy to keep up with the rule after a few turns getting used to it.

[Anderas]

- Very simple: disallow diagonal attacks through the door

Or, take turns in using this:
- give the Monsters some spears
- give some shooting weapons to the Monsters so they just don't stand in front of the door
- Use double doors
- put wandering monsters behind the group (There is a nice house rule: You could place a wandering monster out of line of sight, instead of next to the hero. Then you use it when you want)

[knightkrawler]

The rules pretty clearly depict this scenario with picture and writing. If one hero is blocking the doorway, and there is a monster directly in front of him, heroes to his right and left can attack the space in front of the Barbarian with diagonal or ranged weapons, but only that square. If there is no monster blocking the door, the shooter can fire on any square he can trace line of sight to. Why is this still an issue, we've been playing this game for 25 years, and in that time I have never had an issue with door-blockers. The game was designed to account for this.

I don't have the Phallic Phalanx issue. In theory, monsters would stay in the room, but keep away from that diagonal line of sight cp refers to. Mexican standoff. If nothing happens and the heroes still stay outside the room doing nothing and standing there, you simply have pricks as players who refuse to have fun over trying to be oh so clever and lure you out. This game doesn't work that way. It's not a video game, it's not Paintball, and it certainly isn't Mordheim or Malifaux.
Of course my ruleset is heavily modified in some respects and that helps, but... well... I don't have the blocked door problem and nobody should have even when playing plain old HQ.

[mitchiemasha]

yeah never thought of that. it's bad DM if you charge at them at the door. Just wait til they enter. I never even knew it was aproblem til i seen it on a Forum.

I like the Push Back & Exchange Squares rules but just because it spices up combat regardless to this issue.

Another thing we should realise, if reflecting real life and the heroes choose to all stand behind the barbarian in a narrow corridor, they should be allowed to do this. Mighty Warriors is very much a holding doors game and people didn't like it for that reason. Not do they realise this is how it would of been in reallife, holding on at doors for as long as possible til one side gives and the room floods with characters and falls to combat!

[knightkrawler]

I like the Push Back & Exchange Squares rules but just because it spices up combat regardless to this issue.

I used to have it as a mandatory rule which opened up tactiacal play for both Heroes and me. The phallic phalanx wasn't a problem after that and combat was just fun.
Then I decided to keep it as an Optional Rule* and yet, even if it's not used, PhPh is still not an issue with the same group of players. I suppose they saw the point I made with implementing it as mandatory, monsters of course ALWAYS using their opportunity to exchange squares. But I agree, Push Back is fifteen kinds of fun for everyone involved.
Thanks, ghan, for inventing it.

*Before a quest where I deem an optional rule fun or something new to try out, the players and me decide on if we use it or not.

[chaoticprime]

The two most important factors to victory in grid-based tactical games are frequency and mobility. HQ does not allow you to alter how frequently you take an action and movement for heroes isn't at a fixed rate. This makes monsters superior to heroes in terms of overall mobility. If the heroes didn't get to take all their actions in unison, for instance if the Evil Wizard were allowed to move one type of monster between each hero turn, the game would be more challenging just because enemies would be able to best-utilize their superior tactical advantage.