Line of Sight

[dreicunan]

"seeing" and "line of sight", have always had a different meaning (otherwise why use two different terms)

From a language perspective, I'd say that holds no water. Multiple terms get used all the time for the same concept, and line of sight is just the line drawn from the eye to the object that allows you to see it. "I can see it" and "I have line of sight to it" are both expressing the same thing ultimately, that the object is able to be perceived by your eyes.

Your stronger argument is that LoS for merely seeing something (being aware of it) and LoS for being able to successfully shoot at something are different.

[Bareheaded Warrior]

"seeing" and "line of sight", have always had a different meaning (otherwise why use two different terms)

From a language perspective, I'd say that holds no water. Multiple terms get used all the time for the same concept, and line of sight is just the line drawn from the eye to the object that allows you to see it. "I can see it" and "I have line of sight to it" are both expressing the same thing ultimately, that the object is able to be perceived by your eyes.

Your stronger argument is that LoS for merely seeing something (being aware of it) and LoS for being able to successfully shoot at something are different.

Agreed on the semantics, but my comment was within the context of the HeroQuest game rule text (after all we are under the "Official Rules" section of a forum dedicated to the HeroQuest game) hence "seeing" meaning being aware of the presence of something and therefore it being placed on the board is a different concept and would therefore be better understood if it used a different term than having "a clear line of sight" which would allow you to successfully shoot at said target.

If I dare refer back to the now infamous "official" diagram, whether the individual lines are correct, it actually shows 3 different principles but muddles them in the name of clarity

1) The "clear line of sight" to monsters that can been seen and can be targeted by missile attacks
2) The "blocked line of sight" to monsters that CAN be seen but CANNOT be targeted by missile attacks (because the line of sight is blocked by an intervening figure)
3) Also labelled "blocked line of sight" from the Elf to the Orc vertically through the closed door where the Elf can neither see nor target the Orc, which should not even be placed on the board, at least not based on the information presented in the diagram.

It also omits a 4th category that implicitly exists within the rules where a figure can be "seen" and is therefore placed on the board, even though there is no clear line of sight, because it is blocked by a wall or closed door rather than another figure. You are left to imagine another Orc placed in the top right hand corner of the bottom room, for this one.

Does anyone else fancy commenting on HispaZargon's well thought out and document earlier examples?

[CavemanLogic]

Agreed on the semantics, but my comment was within the context of the HeroQuest game rule text (after all we are under the "Official Rules" section of a forum dedicated to the HeroQuest game) hence "seeing" meaning being aware of the presence of something and therefore it being placed on the board is a different concept and would therefore be better understood if it used a different term than having "a clear line of sight" which would allow you to successfully shoot at said target.

Which is why I have adopted the "Line of Sight" vs "Field of Vision" terminology.

Line of Sight is a more narrowly focused line required for targeting enemies with spells and ranged weapons.

Field of Vision is much broader in scope, and includes objects and enemies within your peripheral vision, as well as those which are partially obstructed by other figures. It includes things such as partly visible enemies and furniture and doorways that are partially obscured by other objects. Field of Vision is used when exploring and opening doors to rooms, or revealing new stretches of hallway. You can "see" that there is a line of three Monsters with a closed door behind them, because you can catch glimpses of bits and pieces of each as they shift around within their square. You cannot "target" any except the first Monster because the enemies and objects behind him all have cover.

You can have many Lines of Sight to different Monsters all within your singular Field of Vision. You can "see" everything within your Field of Vision, but you cannot "target" everything within your Field of Vision. You can only target those enemies and items that are within your Line of Sight, within your Field of Vision.

...

Ahhh, reading back in the thread a bit, I see where you replied to my use of terminology almost two years ago, and I don't think I ever subsequently responded to it...

I think that the official interpretation of the rules would be that spell casting uses the "Targeting with ranged weapons" designation as you have said and that is my standard approach too.

I am currently experimenting with spell casting using a broader interpretation of "line of sight" i.e. ignoring intervening figures, as a boost to spell casters whether they be Wizards hiding valiantly behind Barbarians or Sorcerers hiding cowardly behind Dread Warriors

Our use of terminology is interesting as I would consider "Field of Vision" to be the cumulation of all of the lines of sight for a given figure at a specific moment in time but I definitely do need a better phrase than "Targeting with ranged weapons"...

In my mind, Field of Vision is a hazy sort of "I know you are there, but I can't really focus on you" sort of thing. It seems you interpret the verbiage differently, sort of as a more hyper-visual(?) thing. As in, your Field of Vision is the sum of *all* your Lines of Sight, period. Well, for me yes, Field of Vision necessarily incorporates all of your individual Lines of Sight, *as well as* all the things you can "see" but cannot target because other figures block them from your clear view. That is what I mean when I say "Field of Vision."

Hopefully my meaning is clearer now.

Oh, and I absolutely love your differentiation between Valiant Wizards and Cowardly Dread Sorcerers in your quote above! Classic!

Cheers!

[Bareheaded Warrior]

Yes, that is clear, but terminology aside we agree on the principle that there are 2 different aspects here:

The narrow "Line of Sight" used for the purposes of missile attacks and the wider "Seeing" used for the purposes of placing figures on the board which includes all Lines of Sight and more...

#28 Seeing versus Targeting

Seeing defines what can be seen and is revealed on the board to the heroes, the restrictions on what can be targeted for missile attacks, including certain spells, is different.

What can be seen?

Characters can see:
• All squares in the room or passageway that they are currently in
• All squares in a room or passageway that they are adjacent to
• All squares that they have line of sight to.

A line of sight exists if you can trace an unobstructed straight line between the centre of the two squares. If the line passes through a wall or a closed door, then no line of sight exists, and the contents of the square is not visible.

What can be targeted by missile attacks?

Missile attacks can be made against characters provided that a clear line of sight exists between the attacker and the target square. A clear line of sight exists if you can trace an unobstructed straight line between the centre of the attacker's square and the centre of the target's square. If that line passes through a wall or a closed door, then no line of sight exists. If the line passes through a square occupied by another figure, then the line of sight is blocked, and the attack cannot be made.

Squares occupied by a blocked square tile or a tall piece of furniture (cupboard, bookcase & fireplace) block line of sight in the same way as closed-door pieces and walls, squares occupied by other furniture do not block line of sight.

Tall furniture should be placed against a wall when designing quests.

[Bareheaded Warrior]

Post from 25th Feb 2016:

Using Sotiris first map, if this was SH but it's not, lol, the 1st Orc is blocked (obviously), the 2nd Orc is visible, blocking the 3rd, 4th, 5th from attack, the 6th Orc is the next visible.

Just for clarity there is a difference between the line of sight rules for 2nd edition and the 1990 remake edition.

The 2nd edition contained two LOS rules, one to determine what you can target with a missile attack (and some spells) and a different one to determine what is visible and should be placed on the board.

The 1990 remake used a single LOS rule for both situations.

Some of the questions on this topic are asked from the point of view of one or the other rulesets, equally some of the answers are given from the point of view of one or the other rulesets but the questions and answers don't always line up!

That said I think there are some issues common to both versions...

1) The confusion (in both the 1990 remake and the 2nd edition missile attack LOS) around whether a square occupied by a model/figure should be considered as a solid blocked square (or even cube) or whether you only take into account the model/figure itself.

2) The diagram provided shows the line being traced from centre of the source square to the centre of the target square EXCEPT for the Elf to centre right Orc, it isn't clear whether this is an error on the diagram, or if not how exactly we are supposed to be tracing our line.

3) The diagram provided indicates that target squares that are 50% visible, Elf to Top Left Orc, count as being visible, but no example is provided around squares that are blocked on both sides (e.g. a corner blocking visibility of the left side and another corner blocking visibility of the right side of the same target square)

[Kurgan]

Yeah some things on the board can be hit with spells despite them being outside line of sight in these rules (Fire of Wrath, Genie target any character on the board, as the cards say).

[Bareheaded Warrior]

But those are examples of spells that, in the classic edition at least, don't use line of sight, so I'm not sure that they are relevant to a line of sight topic.

Only for Hero and Monster movement is horizontal space quantified abstractly into "squares". For calculating what a Hero can "see," space remains actual--there is no quantum involvement of height and width like there is with distance. Basically, a square occupied by a Hero or Monster is not considered to be a "one-square cube" of obstructed space, and neither would be squares containing furniture. There is no actual width to the imaginary line that you must trace between your Hero and the Monster. As the rule specifies that central mass must be exposed for an action to range on a target, central mass of a miniature would then also be what causes obstruction, save for perhaps bulky Monsters such as Fimirs and Gargoyles.

Whilst I find the quote from an earlier post in this topic to be very well worded I'm not convinced that I agree.

It is true that the wording of the relevant rules refer to models or miniatures (depending on edition) blocking LOS and not squares containing models or miniatures blocking LOS, which favours chaoticprime's stance, the wording of the relevant rules is not complete without the infamous diagram.

For example
(1) many players think that LOS is traced from centre of the square to centre of the square, that information is not provide in the wording of the rule (at least not in either the 1st or 2nd edition of the game) but in the accompanying diagram (ignoring the controversial Elf to middle Orc for a moment)
(2) many players think that LOS that touches a single wall corner counts as clear, that information is not provide in the wording of the rule (at least not in either the 1st or 2nd edition of the game) but in the accompanying diagram

So it is clear to me that the full explanation of the rules is supposed to include both the wording AND the diagram.

Following the wording only, that it is the "model" that blocks, makes the LOS rule much more complicated to apply because it is actual and not abstract, well the Wizard's arm is partially in the way, but that only blocks some of the chest of the Fimir, can I still shoot it in the head, does that decrease my chances of hitting, could I hit the Wizard by mistake, does the Wizards cloak count as blocking, can I wait a couple of seconds as the Fimir and Wizard are moving in different directions and so on...? Some argue that this is more "realistic" but the use of fixed pose static models and a turn based system to represent a bunch of people (or at least humanoids) that are in constant, simultaneous movement is already "unrealistic" so that ship has sailed. For example; the Barbarian is clearly taller than the Dwarf and some choose to reflect this in rulesets, but who is actually "taller" the Barbarian when he has dropped to one knee to slash under the guard of an Orc or the Dwarf when he has leapt into the air to perform an overhead axe swing on the head of a Fimir?

As we already have the concept of abstraction in the game, of an occupied square being a "one-square cube" of obstructed space that we use for movement, for wall corners and blocked squares in terms of line of sight, and for hand-to-hand attacks why would we want to introduce a different, inconsistent, more complicated approach for figures for missile attacks into a game that is supposed to be simple?

Returning to the infamous diagram and picking a non-controversial example, the Elf to Right Hand Side Bottom Orc the diagram shows that the line of sight is blocked by the Wizard (something I suspect most of us agree with), but the diagram is an overhead, vertical, top-down view of an abstract board using icons to represent the models, so it is an abstract representation of the physical components which are themselves already an abstract representation of an imaginary setup, what the diagram is NOT is a horizontal depiction of the scene, a photo or drawing, a view from the shooter, so even if we all agree that the line of sight from Elf to Right Hand Side Bottom Orc is obviously blocked, we have to remember that it may not be if we take the model view, the Elf model might be on the upper edge of his square, same as the Orc model and the Wizard model might be presses up against the wall, it is impossible to tell from the diagram and yet the diagram shows it as blocked.

[BlackJax]

There is another similar topic Is "see" the same thing as "line of sight?" and I attached a single page explanation of how line-of-sight rules work in HQ (in my opinion) and didn't want to attach it to all these different topics, so if you are interested it is here: Line-of-Sight One Pager

[The Admiral]

Yes these two have always been tricky and interpreted differently so I don't think you'll ever get a definitive answer. This is how I play it:

For me LOS is easy. It is used when trying to hit something. It is blocked by walls, closed doors, figures and tall furniture.

Seeing is different. When you open a door to a corridor or room you can see everything in that location, so you place it all even if you haven't got an actual LOS to it all.

I allow spell effects which finish when you can no longer see a monster to last as long as you have a LOS to a monster or are in the same room or corridor as monsters not actually in your LOS. For me it's like you know they are there.

As I say, this is only how I play it. I find this easy and logical but may not be correct. But, anyone who knows how I play, knows I don't care.

[CavemanLogic]

...For me LOS is easy. It is used when trying to hit something. It is blocked by walls, closed doors, figures and tall furniture...

Question: It is not clear from your wording how you treat LoS. Do you treat the whole square occupied by figures and tall furniture as blocking LoS? Or do you just treat the figures and the tall furniture themselves as blocking LoS?

For instance, how realistic with the rule are you? Do you maneuver your head down to the eye level of your Hero to test if they can see around that outstretched hand, or that cloak, or between the legs of that Hero or Monster to target a Monster past them? Do you attempt to rotate a mini in its square, or shove it into a corner of its square, so that your LoS can pass through its square (only to have Zargon move the mini back into your LoS)? Or do you simply call that whole square off limits? Or something in between?

Personally, I think it's too much work and game overhead to try to draw a LoS line *through* an occupied square, so I call the *whole square* off limits for LoS, regardless of if the square contains a Goblin, a Gargoyle, or a Bookcase.

Cheers!