When are you in melee combat?

[cps 686]

The following situation happened in my last OW game. I threw a grenade and blasted an enemy off his feet in my direction. On that enemy's turn he spent a half action to stand and another half action to move in my direction. His half-move is 4m and I am 4m away.

 

Are we in melee combat?

[Adeptus-B 926]

No- to be 'engaged' in melee, an attack roll must have been made. Just being adjacent is not enough.

[Fgdsfg 1,017]

Yes, he must actually attack you to tie you up in melee. The turns are just an abstraction of ongoing events that are assumed to happen roughly at the same time (offset by Initiative). Unless he actually engages you in melee, even if he has a weapon up, you have essentially started backing away or move away before he's actually reached you.

[Magellan 185]

There are no actual definitive rules for when you are and are not in melee combat, as I have found. Personally, I ruled it that entering close combat with an adjacent (not within your reach, but adjacent) creature is a free action. Actually fighting them with melee attacks also engages you in close combat, naturally.

 

I did this to make life easier for close combat characters, who - I find - often get shot before they make it anywhere. Lets a cc character charge one enemy, and not have the enemy's two adjacent buddies melta him in the face at point blank range.