I had never considered this topic to be an issue until a couple days ago when I played an interesting game. My opponent had a saboteur on a shuttle and insisted that he had the right to look at my face-down damage cards prior to picking which ship to target with the saboteur, or indeed if he would pick a different action for the shuttle entirely.

I didn't think the rules forbid the action. Also, I doubted it could make much difference, so I let him look at the cards. After all, how often in a game will there be multiple damaged targets within range 1 of the shuttle at the same time?

I think there was only one instance in the game where he looked at the damage card on my ship and then chose a different action instead of the saboteur. The card was a munitions failure on an X-Wing without a secondary weapon installed, so of course the sabotage would have been pointless.

I don't know that the face-down damage cards are really meant to be secret. My assumption has always been that face-up or face-down is simply a means to distinguish between critical and non-critical damage results. Still, I couldn't quite shake the feeling that peeking at the cards to gain an edge during the game was kind of a d-bag tactic.

Have you ever encountered this before? Is it normal and I just haven't seen it before?

The card text says he picks a card at random. I've never heard it explicitly stated that you can't look at an opponents face down damage cards, but I guess I consider that implied. In my eyes, d bag move and borderline cheating...

Nah, no borderline, he did you dirty. Forgive and move on.

I don't think it's mentioned in the rules, but personally Ild make it illegal to prevent card counting.

If you were meant to see what was on the cards at any given time, you might as well play with the deck face up. Kind of seems like common sense. I wouldn't let him do that again, if I were you.

The card says "Choose 1 random face-down damage card..."

Random means not selected intentionally, so I would say your opponent was wrong.

If he looks at the cards then there goes the "RANDOM" part of Saboteur.

If he want the chance to look at a card then he'll need to spend the action and get lucky. Even if some of the face-down cards would be "known" because they were dealt (or previously turned) face-up before having something turn them face down the Saboteur can NOT explicitly pick those cards to turn face-up again.

If my X-Wing has two face down cards on it and you 'know' that one happens to be a Direct Hit because it was turned Face-down by R5 before I picked up the second when you use Saboteur on it there is no guarantee you flip the Direct Hit instead of the other card because the selection is completely random.

The card says "Choose 1 random face-down damage card..."

Random means not selected intentionally, so I would say your opponent was wrong.

There was never a case where he was trying to look at the damage cards during the actual execution of the saboteur action. So, if there were two face-downs on the ship, one of them was in fact getting picked at random. He just had prior knowledge of what the two options were before he chose to attempt the sabotage.

Anyway, thanks for the feedback. It's in line with what I always felt the rules implied for fair game-play.

It's just one of those fringe cases in the rules where something is never explicitly allowed, nor is it explicitly forbidden, and in nearly all case it is irrelevant -- until it isn't.

Yeah, that's an odd case. What your opponent did does seem to go against the spirit of the game, even if it isn't strictly against the rules. I'd probably disallow it in a home game, though in a tournament I'd call the TO over unless I was way ahead or something.

If he had prior knowledge, then his choice wasn't random, and that goes against what the wording on the card says.

I would definitely let the TO make that call.

You should've asked him if you could look at his dials before you set yours in return.

If it is legal to look at a face down damage card then I guess it would be perfectly legal to know what the next card in the deck would should it get dealt out face-up. That future A-Wing with DTF and Determination becomes a LOT better when you KNOW the card that will be dealt for taking the [crit] will be a Pilot card allowing you to discard it with Determination.

SORRY but what your 'enemy' did was cheat. The situation with saboteur is no different than the one I just described. If you want to use Saboteur that is the risk you need to be willing to take. This game tells you want you can do and if it doesn't say you can look at a face-down card then you can NOT look at the face-down card.

If he had prior knowledge, then his choice wasn't random, and that goes against what the wording on the card says.

That's like saying knowing what cards are in the deck makes drawing any of them not random. The logic you're using doesn't work, even though I agree what he did was probably cheating, as is there is no mention of ever turning a face down card face up. They probably aren't meant to be public knowledge. Nothing in the game gives the guy the right to look. It's just that nothing denies him that right either(beyond common courtesy of not touching other people's stuff.

My opponent had a saboteur on a shuttle and insisted that he had the right to look at my face-down damage cards prior to picking which ship to target with the saboteur, or indeed if he would pick a different action for the shuttle entirely.

Then he's a cheat and is using forceful behaviour to hide his cheating. You pick a random card and flip it up. You don't get to look at what the facedowns are. Ever.

I'd say he cheated too. The card is to be drawn entirely at random.

In your situation, after he looked at the cards, he could very easily have pulled the "Oh, on second thought I won't do that right now" if, hypothetically that they were both Munitions Failure cards (and you had no secondary weapons), thus rendering the face-up card pointless.

Nope. Cheating. Plain as day.

Even on heavy medication, I agree with everyone.....he flat out is a cheating fool, who has to resort to pitiful methods to try and cope for his underwhelming skills in the game

Honestly, I have never seen or heard of a set of conditions that allow for what he did in your game.

I say we go old school, tar and feather him!

Have to agree with everyone else, looking at the face down cards is against the rules, even without saboteur if you could look at what cards are already out then someone who has memorized the damage deck would know how powerful a given crit is likely to be. That is simply not something that should be permitted. It would be the same as demanding to let you roll your reds before declaring if your target is the guy with one green and no way to modify or the guy with three green and a focus.

Just to stir the pot, was your "opponent" by any chance an Imperial Slug, as it sounds like their style?

Are you allowed to pre-measure to make sure a Barrel Roll puts you outside a firing arc? After all, you might choose a different action if it didn't.

Same logic applies to Saboteur.

EDIT: I would hope his opponent is playing Imperial. Otherwise, he's really cheating with that Shuttle.

Are you allowed to pre-measure to make sure a Barrel Roll puts you outside a firing arc?

No.

You may measure before committing to a boost action or barrel roll to ensure that you can actually perform that action.

Rules text:

A ship cannot perform a barrel roll if this would cause its base to overlap another ship or obstacle token. The

Are you allowed to pre-measure to make sure a Barrel Roll puts you outside a firing arc?

No.

You may measure before committing to a boost action or barrel roll to ensure that you can actually perform that action.

Rules text:

A ship cannot perform a barrel roll if this would cause its base to overlap another ship or obstacle token. The

player may measure to see if his ship can perform a barrel roll before committing to this action.

FAQ text:

Q: When a player wishes to perform a boost action, can he measure to see if his ship can perform a boost before committing to this action (similar to a barrel roll)?

A: Yes.

The rules do not allow for you to measure to see if it puts someone in or out of arc.

Pretty sure that was rhetorical...

Next time stick his saboteur card up his nose.

Are you allowed to pre-measure to make sure a Barrel Roll puts you outside a firing arc?

No.

You may measure before committing to a boost action or barrel roll to ensure that you can actually perform that action.

Rules text:

A ship cannot perform a barrel roll if this would cause its base to overlap another ship or obstacle token. The

player may measure to see if his ship can perform a barrel roll before committing to this action.

FAQ text:

Q: When a player wishes to perform a boost action, can he measure to see if his ship can perform a boost before committing to this action (similar to a barrel roll)?

A: Yes.

The rules do not allow for you to measure to see if it puts someone in or out of arc.

Pretty sure that was rhetorical...

Well.

Yes.

Obviously.

Ehrm.

Derp?

In games you cannot do whatever you want unless the rules forbid it. You can only do what the rules allow. Looking at face-down cards is not mentioned anywhere in the rulebook. So you cannot do it.

I suppose you can check if the target has at least one face-down damage card before committing to the saboteur action.