Grappling Hooks

The grappling hook entry reads:

Grappling Hook: These large hooks are made of sturdy iron
and can be used for anchoring a rope. The hook may be thrown
or attached manually by a climber. A successful attack throw is
required to throw a grappling hook onto a target.

my questions are as follows:
1)what is the purpose of the successful attack throw? if this is out of combat, couldn’t the grappler make repeated attack throws until they latch it? Is it strictly meant to be an in-combat rule, possibly a rule for when failing means making noise and alerting someone?

2)What’s the range? I’d assume either a spear or throwing axe would be comparable, but then those ranges might be based on how close you need to be to do damage as opposed to just latching on, but it does require an attack throw so those might be the most accurate.

  1. Even out of combat, sometimes the amount of time required to latch the grappling hook might matter. For instance, the adventurers might only have 30 seconds until the guard shift walks past.

  2. I’d use hand axe.

IANAA (and Alex has already answered), but here’s how I’m looking at it:

  1. Sometimes you might be using them in combat, as when trying to bring ships together.

  2. I feel like hand axe ranges are good if you’re grabbing the shaft of the hook and tossing. For someone using the rope to swing and throw (similar motion to a sling), I would go with 30/60/90 as the range - less than a sling, but more than a thrown spear.

Thank you both for your responses. In my players’ case they are exploring a long abandoned tomb, so time that is less than 1 turn is a non-issue.

Thanks dark, I hadn’t thought of considering it like a sling, but the spinning motion would be somewhat reminiscent, so I could see using either that range or hand axe as alex suggested. I’ll have to think about it. I feel like going with anything longer than hand axe is going to negate almost any kind of span that isn’t otherwise guarded.

Well, no, I wouldn’t go with sling range. In ACKS, a sling is a VERY long-range weapon. (45/90/180 - only cross/long/composite bows outrange slings.)