Hey all, brand spanking new to this game, I have only played one a quick game with my son after purchasing the box set and decided this game is one I want to have more of, so I invested in the expansions as well.

The question I have is in regards to asteroids or even any other objects in the play area, natural assumption is you can not shoot through them, just as you can not land on them if your ships base is in the asteroid. Is this right? Or is there a way for certain weapons to fire around an asteroid?

Question 2:

If a friendly ship is in between your ship and the enemy ship, can you still fire, or does the friendly ship "block" the shot?

Read Page 20, on Obstacles:

oBSTacleS

Outer space contains many hazards including

asteroids and floating debris. Some missions call

for obstacles, and players can use obstacles to add

variety to the standard game.

This game box includes asteroid obstacle tokens,

and future expansions may introduce new types of

obstacles.

adding oBStacleS to a Standard game

During setup, before the “Gather Forces” step, both

players can agree to use obstacles for this game.

Starting with the Imperial player, each player takes

a turn placing one obstacle inside the play area.

Obstacles cannot be placed within Range 1–2 of

any edge of the play area. After placing all of the

obstacles, the Rebel player chooses which edge of

the play area is his. The Imperial player’s edge is on

the opposite side of the play area.

Players may agree to increase the size of their play

area to account for these extra elements.

moving into and through oBStacleS

When a ship executes a maneuver in which either

the maneuver template or the ship’s base physically

overlaps an obstacle token, follow these steps:

1. Execute the maneuver as normal, but skip the

“Perform Action” step.

2. The player rolls one attack die. The ship then

suffers any damage or critical damage rolled

(see “Suffering Damage” on page 16).

important: When overlapping an obstacle token,

the ship stays where it lands (on top of the token).

A ship that is overlapping an obstacle token during

the Combat phase cannot attack any ship but

may be targeted by other ships as normal.

attacking through oBStacleS

Obstacles represent space features that are difficult

to fire through.

When measuring range during combat, if the edge of

the range ruler between the closest points

of the two ships overlaps an obstacle token, the

attack is considered oBStructed. Because of this

obstruction, the defender rolls one additional defense

die during the “Roll Defense Dice” step of this attack.

Remember that range is always measured as the

shortest distance between the two ships’ bases.

The attacker cannot attempt to measure range

to a different part of a base in order to avoid

obstructing obstacles.

And Page 10 under "Firing arc:"

Other ships do not obstruct firing arcs. For

example, if a ship has multiple enemy ships inside its

firing arc, it can target any one of them. Thematically,

this represents that ships can attack above or below

the other ships in 3D space.

Very cool, thanks Magadizer, I obviously missed that part skimming through the rule book! Spot on what I was looking for, one important part is that your ship stays where it lands, where as if my maneuver would take me in to the base of a friendly ship, I have to place mine behind it, but I risk damage from the object.

Thanks again!

Even though the rules are relatively straightforward, there are a few non-intuitive parts to the game, and some confusing interactions. I recommend you read through the rulebook cover to cover, play a few games with the rulebook handy, then probably read through it again. There are some aggravating things about the organization of the core rulebook. Some important rules are buried under headings where you would not expect them. Some rules would also benefit from being repeated in more than one place in the rulebook for clarity and emphasis as well. But we have what we have, and we work with it.

Have fun playing with your son!

Also, this is not a criticism, but you might look in the rules sub-forum for answers to some of the more advanced questions you will eventually run into, and also post future rules questions in that folder as well.

Hey slightly related question, if your playing tournament with asteroids and player 1 has inicitive, does player 1 or player 2 put the first asteroid down?

Also check the FAQ there are some important changes there as well

The player with initiative places the first asteroid in a tournament setting, regardless of faction.