Tactica Tuesday - Batman and Chess: The Fork

We've talked a bit about guns in BMG before - how to use them, how to deal with them.  Today, though, we're going to talk about a particular tactic that comes from Chess, but is absolutely essential when it comes to working with firearms in BMG.  I'll give you one clue as to what it is.

Ok, so I lied.  It's seven clues.

That's right.  Today we're going to talk about the Fork, and how you can apply it to your shooters.

In Chess, the Fork has a number of possible applications.  The easiest and most obvious is threatening two pieces, and capturing the least-defended (or most valuable) one.  Depending on the range of your gun, you might be able to threaten multiple pieces at once by just sitting in an open firing lane.  I sometimes just run up my gunner (usually Dallas with Night Vision, but any dude with a gun will do, depending on your lighting situation) just so that he can threaten multiple lanes next turn - even better if there are already models in those lanes, forcing my opponent to choose which one will activate first and which one will take a hail of bullets.

Handy Chess example of a Fork - only one can escape!

A slightly more complicated use of the fork involves applying force from other angles.  For instance, try to get your opponent stuck in a melee he doesn't want to fight, but make sure that all his retreat angles are covered with a firearm.  Now you're applying the Fork tactic to the situation, forcing your opponent to choose between a bad fist-fight and an even worse shooting.  If s/he sticks around for the fisticuffs, you're saving ammo for later.  If s/he steps away, you've now freed up your melee model to do bigger and better things.

Forks are, of course, most effective when you're forcing your opponent to choose between two good pieces.  If I'm facing the Watchmen and have both the Comedian and Rorschach in my sights (this has happened in one of my games with Tevesh's Watchmen), my opponent has to decide who's going to take the bullets.  This gets complicated when one of your Fork targets can fire back and eliminate the forking model (or just put enough damage on it to significantly reduce its action counters), but that's why you didn't put your shooter too close, right?

I guess we can say these are corrupt cops or something...?

As with any tactical manoeuvre, though, you need to accept that the Fork will often end up in a trade.  There's no guarantee that your opponent will leave your forking model alone after the Fork is executed (unless, perhaps, it's a gunman out of ammo...), so make sure that your model is worth whatever possible capture options you're thinking of.  The easiest way to escape a Fork is to kill the Forking model, but an opponent also has the option to threaten an even more valuable piece on your side - a Leader, for instance, or a key Free Agent.  Don't get tunnel vision; make sure you keep an eye on the entire board even while you're setting up some killer Forks.

Chess also has a related tactic (the Skewer/Pin), but it's very rare for models in BMG to fully block line of sight to other models that opportunities won't come up nearly as often.  Still, worth a quick read just to help you develop your understanding of how to apply pressure on your opponent.

Remember that your gaming experience doesn't start and end with the game you're playing.  You can draw on all sorts of gaming to develop your skills (playing paintball or CS for Infinity, for example), and just adapt it to apply to what you're into at the moment.  There are a lot of useful tactics and strategies to be found in other games (even if you suck at them - I can't win a game of Chess to save my life), and learning to adapt them makes you a stronger player overall.

And hey, if there are any tactics you've seen from other games that might help BMG players deal with (or successfully) employ firearms, share them below!