Can someone explain melee overwatch to me?

[McGrey]

I played this great game for 60 hours by now, but I still don't get, how exactly melee overwatch works and how to predict, how it's resolved.

The basic part is easy: You do something adjacent to an enemy unit that can use melee overwatch and it still has action points, it hits you. So far so good. But once you attack the enemy unit with a melee unit of your own, the confusion starts for me.

What determines, if the enemy can strike back at all (some things seem to cancel melee overwatch?), when it strikes back (sometimes my unit gets one hit in, sometimes two, before the enemy reacts and I've no idea why) and how often it strikes back?

Also on the topic of overwatch, does someone know if it's wad, that you can walk into the enemies range overwatch zone without being shot at, but if you do something else, the shooting starts?

 

[LordTheRon]

If your unit fully hits the enemy unit it won’t get the opportunity to strike back with overwatch.

But if during the attack your unit grazes or misses the enemy the melee overwatch is triggered.

So you take a big risk if your hit chance is quite low. If your hitchance is something like 90+ you can pretty safely do a melee attack without triggering overwatch.

If you are flanking a unit with melee overwatch it never gets the chance to activate overwatch even if you miss.

 

[HousePet]

Also on the topic of overwatch, does someone know if it's wad, that you can walk into the enemies range overwatch zone without being shot at, but if you do something else, the shooting starts?

This is intended. You get to walk in range, then if you try to do something, they shoot.
I find it odd too.

 

[Lyesmyth]

You do something adjacent to an enemy unit that can use melee overwatch and it still has action points, it hits you. So far so good. But once you attack the enemy unit with a melee unit of your own, the confusion starts for me

If u are hitting mele unit with other mele unit it depend if u flank or not
if u are flanking ur melee unit will hit 3 times, then if enemy unit survived it will turn to your troop and retaliat with one hit
if u are not flanking unit will retaliate after the first hit. if it succefly staggers u (wich is pretty much 100%) it will remove one action point from its attacker, and thusly reduced the number of attack it suffers

What determines, if the enemy can strike back at all (some things seem to cancel melee overwatch?),

melle overwatch is always active, unless unit with it suffers non mele stagger in that turn, like for instant heavy snipe shot, blinding arrow from amazon basic unit, or any explosive

how often it strikes back?

always once

Also on the topic of overwatch, does someone know if it's wad, that you can walk into the enemies range overwatch zone without being shot at, but if you do something else, the shooting starts?[

u can usualy dip one hex into overwatch zone, the next action wheter ability, shooting or movment triggers overwatch

 

[McGrey]

That made things a lot clearer, thanks!

 

[Mechalibur]

If your unit fully hits the enemy unit it won’t get the opportunity to strike back with overwatch.

But if during the attack your unit grazes or misses the enemy the melee overwatch is triggered.

That's not quite correct. The rule is as long as you stagger an opponent, melee overwatch is canceled. Most melee attack cause a stagger on a hit, but not on a graze/miss, which is why the message displays as "Melee Overwatch (on miss/graze)" This is relevant in case you're against a stagger-immune enemy. For them, overwatch will always trigger after your attack even if you hit, unless the attack kills them or otherwise incapacitates them.

 

[LordTheRon]

That's not quite correct. The rule is as long as you stagger an opponent, melee overwatch is canceled. Most melee attack cause a stagger on a hit, but not on a graze/miss, which is why the message displays as "Melee Overwatch (on miss/graze)" This is relevant in case you're against a stagger-immune enemy. For them, overwatch will always trigger after your attack even if you hit, unless the attack kills them or otherwise incapacitates them.

You are right. Good and important addition to what I said.

 

[TheDeadlyShoe]

Also on the topic of overwatch, does someone know if it's wad, that you can walk into the enemies range overwatch zone without being shot at, but if you do something else, the shooting starts?

Ranged overwatch only triggers if a unit *Starting Inside* the overwatch zone conducts an action that triggers overwatch, after that action is resolved. This is important to note because it means that you can use a teleport or jetpack ability to move from outside the overwatch area to anywhere inside the overwatch area without triggering overwatch. But if you so much as use a Free Action while inside an overwatch zone (including Melee Overwatch), you will be attacked.

There are some abilities that specifically do not trigger overwatch. Namely Tunnel. I am not sure if there are any others.

 

[Arilou]

I played this great game for 60 hours by now, but I still don't get, how exactly melee overwatch works and how to predict, how it's resolved.

The basic part is easy: You do something adjacent to an enemy unit that can use melee overwatch and it still has action points, it hits you. So far so good. But once you attack the enemy unit with a melee unit of your own, the confusion starts for me.

What determines, if the enemy can strike back at all (some things seem to cancel melee overwatch?), when it strikes back (sometimes my unit gets one hit in, sometimes two, before the enemy reacts and I've no idea why) and how often it strikes back?

Also on the topic of overwatch, does someone know if it's wad, that you can walk into the enemies range overwatch zone without being shot at, but if you do something else, the shooting starts?

Stagger cancels overwatch. Most melee attacks stagger, so most melee attacks will cancel overwatch on a hit (miss or grace does not cancel!)

As for ranged, the way overwatch works is that when an enemy "acts" while *within* the overwatch zone, you get a shot. So they don't get shot moving into the zone, but they do once they have to move from the square that is covered by your overwatch.