BREECHES and Holding the Breach

Breeches: Wherever the walls of a castle are destroyed by artillery, war machines, or mines, a breech is caused. Troops may move through a breech at Rough Terrain speed. The defender may block a breech with abatis in three turns, providing no attackers are within it during that period. Abatis will act as movable mantlets as far as protection and defensive values are concerned. Destroyed abatis may be rebuilt just as original abatis was built. Attackers may tear it down in three uninterrupted turns, but if they are attacked or killed before destroying the abatis they are considered to have done no damage to it.

Holding the Breach: This game rule allows a unit to stand more solidly at an important defensive position such as a rampart on a wall, a gateway or doorway that has been smashed open, or even a breach in a castle wall. A breach must be a bottleneck or barrier of some sort, however; units holding a line across a wide corridor, bridge, or other long, straight passage are subject to the normal combat and morale rules.

If the breach is the top of a wall, a rampart, parapet, or other type of breastwork, all of the figures in the unit that are in contact with enemy figures must be protected by the barrier.

A player can declare that one of his units is attempting to hold the breach before it begins melee combat with a given enemy unit. If this declaration is made, the unit cannot choose to withdraw instead of making a required morale check. However, if the unit fails a morale check, it is not required to withdraw 4". Instead, it follows this special procedure:

If a unit in good or shaken order fails a morale check while holding a breach, some of the enemy figures force their way past the obstacle. The exact number is detemined by the difference between the morale roll needed to pass the check and the dice roll actually made. For example, if the unit needed a 12 and rolled a 15, then 3 enemy figures pass through the breach (or doors or window, or climb over the wall, etc.).

The defending figures must withdraw enough to allow the enemy figures through, but no more. The defender does not become shaken if it was in good order. If the defending unit regains its position at the breach, it can hold the breach again; until it does so, normal withdrawal rules apply.

If the defender inflicts casualties on an enemy unit that has passed partially, but not entirely, through any breach (whether or not a holding action was declared there), the figures killed must be taken from those through the breach. Defending figures can immediately move forward to fill gaps left by those removed figures.

A hero can hold a breach (and obviously, such an individual will never fail a morale check). This is a legitimate tactic, and indeed the bones of many heroes have come to rest in all the different types of breaches.