This came up in a game this weekend. Nanotechnology states that your dreadnaughts and warsuns cannot be targetted by an opposing player's action cards. Does this only apply to action cards that require you to target a particular ship. For example in our game, the player with nanotech brought in 4 dreads and a carrier into a system in which opposing player had 2 dreds and a couple of other ships. The opossing player played the action card "Rule by Terror" which states that the attacking player takes two immediate casualties (I'm paraphrasing this). We were unsure whether nanotech would prevent this card from applying to the attacking players dreads thereby requiring him to take a single casualty that being his carrier. Also, had the carrier not been in the fleet would the card have had no effect? We ruled that the card itself did not target any individual ship, so nanotech did not apply and the attacking player took off two of his dreads. Any advice on how to handle this situation?

Rule by Terror target the enemy fleet and not the Dreadnaught so the card is not affected by Nanotechnology.

Nano Technology only helps against cards that directly target the DN or WS. Cards that target the player or a fleet are perfectly legal to play.