1) No matter what the terrain is, no matter what the narrative nor how creative the players are, the rules specify that the defender chooses the defense zone (baring GtA of course). If you are playing a scene where some TIEs can only fire at their target's Aft zone then you aren't following the rules.

2) This is a case where the rules are actively working against the narrative. Which is precisely the point of this thread. Why have rules that seem to support narrative gameplay but actually work against it?

1) Well, in one way you're right, but it's a very inhibiting perspective, with a very simplistic view on gaming, the rules and space combat. There's always what some call rule 0. I mean, if the rules becomes this framework within which you must rigidly fit everything, you're doing it wrong, there's nothing wrong with the game. Also, there might be upcoming products that flesh out more on the use of terrain in space battles, which could adjust the rules. Of course we cannot implement non-existent material, but to ignore the possibility and create ones own solutions to this isn't breaking the rules (not that it matters really, if you think it is) it's adapting the rules and the game to fit the narrative, which is the whole point of roleplaying - in my book anyway.

2) The rules don't work against narrative gameplay, how is that even possible, with some creativity and autonomy you use the narrative to inform the rules, the rules to inform the narrative and you improvise and go with what makes sense. For instance, a starship that has it's whole front end hidden inside a form-fitted hangar bay cannot be hit in the forward defensive zone, regardless of your reading of the rules, because simply it doesn't make sense. To argue that it should be possible is leaving reasoning at the door before entering the game.

Observation: Here's what I'm seeing from those who dislike defense zones, in a nutshell:

"Capital ships aside, defense zones are pointless"

and then once GtA is explained, we see this:

"GtA aside, defense zones are pointless."

If we discount large portions of the rules, of course we can make other portions of the rules largely obsolete. But this does little to facilitate discussion. Gain the Advantage is a "big deal" action in this system. Pilots want to gain the advantage over their opponents. The reason that Gain the Advantage is so powerful in a dogfight is because you can target whatever zone you want, in addition to ignoring the effects of Evasive Maneuvers.

Rule: In general, pilots Silhouette 4 and smaller craft choose where incoming attacks go.

Rule: A gunner on a ship that has successfully Gained the Advantage on an enemy ship chooses which defense zone to hit on that enemy ship, and this specific rule ignores the previously mentioned general rule about smaller craft choosing which of their defense zones is targeted.

Rules observation: Silhouette 4 craft have 4 defense zones, and smaller craft have 2. This is more flavor than anything, but it is far from pointless. In general, larger craft have more Defense points to play around with. They can devote ALL their defense to one zone, say aft (for narrative sake) if they're being chased, or forward if they're flying through an asteroid field, or on a defense zone near their gunners if they're trying to engage in a dogfight. Then the pilot can juke and maneuver so as to only present defended zones to enemy pilots, unless that enemy pilot has gained the advantage. This is all narrative-driven, because obviously RAW they can choose whatever zone they want to be targeted, but it just makes sense for flavor.

Far from being pointless, defense zones are narrative tools that can add narrative dice to the dice pools, and in turn inform the narrative interpretation of the dice results, making it that much more rich. Setback dice came up blank? "The shields were penetrated!" No setback dice due to GtA? "The enemy TIE fighter that you are chasing does a loop so fast that you weren't ready for it. His corkscrew maneuver puts him solidly behind you where he takes a shot at your undefended dorsal section."

Defense zone are point...full.

Gain the Advantage is a "big deal" action in this system. Pilots want to gain the advantage over their opponents. The reason that Gain the Advantage is so powerful in a dogfight is because you can target whatever zone you want, in addition to ignoring the effects of Evasive Maneuvers.

Actually GtA is something I don't like how is it done to represent "dogfight". GtA is a very good action for multi-crewed starships like the YT-1300 (with the upgrade in speed for example), while it is very poor for starfighters like the X-Wing or the Tie. In such vehicles the pilot (and only crew) has to choose in a round between doing GtA or firing one of the weapons. I don't think GtA is worth a good shot from the torpedos, linked laser cannon or any weapon.

Then of course, deep in the pilot talent tree, there is a talent with which the pilot can take an action as a maneuver, and we can argue if it is better to do GtA / Shot or Shot / Shot (I still think it is better the shot / shot option). Besides this, 95% of the NPC won't have this talent.

I have the impression that GtA should be something to represent "dogfighting" between fast small starfighters, but actually is a fantastic action for bigger multi crewed ships.

Just an impression,

Yepes

Thats a common mistake Yepes. GtA does represent jockeying for position, but its not really the "dogfight maneuver." The trick is GtA isn't supposed to be used all the time. That's where TIE fighters actually get their edge, they are so fast and maneuverable there's rarely a good reason to waste an action trying to GtA back from them once they have it.

Plus that, TIEs have no defense, so GtA is even less of an attractive option against them.

To yepes' point, I do agree that GtA is especially beneficial to ships with multiple crew members. This makes up for the fact that those ships are usually slower and less maneuverable. So if a ship with negative handling can GtA over a superiority fighter with positive handling, it can really put the hurt on.

I think GtA is great for representing dogfights. It can be anything like jockeying or covering an area with blasterfire to get your enemy ships to go where you want/expect them to go.

I'm reminded of a dogfight scene between Wedge Antilles and Soontir Fel where Wedge kept leading Fel with his X-Wing, and at the last second broke left when he knew that Fel was expecting him to break right. IIRC he ended up winning the fight, though I can't remember how it was a long time ago. Anyway, I see GtA as that kind of thing. Trade your chance to hit for a much better chance next round, and a much worse chance for your opponent in the meantime.

EDIT: and don't forget the initiative structure in this system...if you take the last slot in one round and GtA, you can potentially take the first slot in the following round and use your advantage without your enemy having had time to react!

If I'm honest, I could do without the excessive use of the word'narrative'. It's not an answer to every issue in the rules. The game is add much about rules add it I'd about narrating a scene. Neither aspect is better more cool or more important to the game experience.

I see your points regarding GtA, as you expose them, in theory they sound nice. Still I am not sure. In my experience as a GM in EotE scoring a hit is very easy. A normal gunner with Ag 3 and Gunnery 2 will hit almost anything, the same goes for a Tie minion group of 3 - 4 Ties. Under this situation I don't see GtA worth a Fire weapon action, I never use it against my PCs because I hit most of the times when firing. Yet it may be we don't have enough experience running space combats.

I see your points regarding GtA, as you expose them, in theory they sound nice. Still I am not sure. In my experience as a GM in EotE scoring a hit is very easy. A normal gunner with Ag 3 and Gunnery 2 will hit almost anything, the same goes for a Tie minion group of 3 - 4 Ties. Under this situation I don't see GtA worth a Fire weapon action, I never use it against my PCs because I hit most of the times when firing. Yet it may be we don't have enough experience running space combats.

I had an encounter I ran not long ago. In an asteroid field the players were in a heavy fighter with 3 defense points. Allocated in a single direction their opponent (tie aces clones in z-95s) couldn't hit the players fighter with all those setbacks.

As I've said, you arent expected to, nor should you always use GtA. But there are times when it serves an important purpose.

I see your points regarding GtA, as you expose them, in theory they sound nice. Still I am not sure. In my experience as a GM in EotE scoring a hit is very easy. A normal gunner with Ag 3 and Gunnery 2 will hit almost anything, the same goes for a Tie minion group of 3 - 4 Ties. Under this situation I don't see GtA worth a Fire weapon action, I never use it against my PCs because I hit most of the times when firing. Yet it may be we don't have enough experience running space combats.

That's totally valid. I myself don't use GtA all the time. But also keep in mind that GtA doesn't have a range limit, so could reasonably be performed outside of weapons range, before your TIEs close to Close range and are narrated as jockeying for a good position or somesuch.

(I can understand the arguments for relegating GtA to Close range, but really I don't think that's called for in every circumstance)

Thats a common mistake Yepes. GtA does represent jockeying for position, but its not really the "dogfight maneuver." The trick is GtA isn't supposed to be used all the time. That's where TIE fighters actually get their edge, they are so fast and maneuverable there's rarely a good reason to waste an action trying to GtA back from them once they have it.

Mmmmmm, notice that the high speed of a Tie fighter is 5, meaning that a pilot in a modified YT-1300 with speed 4 can counter act the Tie GtA by succeeding on a Hard 3d piloting check plus 1 set back dice from the YT-1300 handling. This is veeeeery easy check even for a just starting pilot character (Ag 3 - 4 Pilot (Space) 2).

Moreover, the description of GtA says:

"Once the advantage has been gained, on the following turn the opponent may attempt to cancel out the advantage by using Gain the Advantage as well. This works as described earlier, but this check is one step more difficult for each time her or his opponent has successfully Gained the Advantage against the other."

Since the pilot on a multi crewed ship has nothing better to do (supposing that the weapons are occupied by the gunners) than GtA, he can GtA each turn, potentially making it very difficult for a starfighter to cancel out the GtA of the bigger ship.

That's totally valid. I myself don't use GtA all the time. But also keep in mind that GtA doesn't have a range limit, so could reasonably be performed outside of weapons range, before your TIEs close to Close range and are narrated as jockeying for a good position or somesuch.

I like it, that is indeed one situation where I would use GtA, when the starfighters are out of range and cannot fire their weapons.

As I said though, we have not a big experience with space combat because my group does not like it too much. This is most probably my fault... may be it is time to listen one of these podcast where they give examples of space combat

Thanks for the discussion.

Yepes

Thats a common mistake Yepes. GtA does represent jockeying for position, but its not really the "dogfight maneuver." The trick is GtA isn't supposed to be used all the time. That's where TIE fighters actually get their edge, they are so fast and maneuverable there's rarely a good reason to waste an action trying to GtA back from them once they have it.

Mmmmmm, notice that the high speed of a Tie fighter is 5, meaning that a pilot in a modified YT-1300 with speed 4 can counter act the Tie GtA by succeeding on a Hard 3d piloting check plus 1 set back dice from the YT-1300 handling. This is veeeeery easy check even for a just starting pilot character (Ag 3 - 4 Pilot (Space) 2).

Correct, but to what end? The TIE's defenses are blarf, so there's no real benefit to picking the zone you want to hit on it. All that GtA will get you is the cancellation of any evasive maneuvers the TIE is taking, which is nice, but it's not as gigantic as taking on shielded craft. Furthermore, the TIE is looking at an easy check to GtA (well to regain the advantage it'd be what.. hard at this point?) which is not hard for the TIE with it's handling of +3 to get.

So even in a multi-crew ship like you present, if the TIE (or at least several members of his flight group) survive long enough, it's likely they'll be the ultimate victors in the GtA-off since their starting difficulty will always be lower and they'll always be throwing more boost dice at it.

And that all goes double for a single-man fighter.

That's where I was going with that. TIEs, from a gameplay and doctrinal perspective, can work exactly as described. They are fast, maneuverable, and (if following imperial doctrine) are deployed in large enough numbers numbers to account for a reasonable amount of attrition. The result is, when dealing with civilian craft and the older fighters in use by pirates and such, the TIEs will typically be able to GtA and usually keep it in the long run, allowing them to ignore evasive maneuvers, make better use of it themselves, and attack the targets unshielded side. Meanwhile the target will have more trouble getting the Advantage back, and will often just want to or have to suck it up and accept the increased difficulty to attack the TIEs. After all, why spend an action rolling to remove an upgraded difficulty when it might make more sense to just man up and shoot and accept you might roll a despair.

Yeah that's another important point, GtA gets harder (+1 Difficulty) every time it switches sides. After 3 or 4 checks, it gets a bit too Daunting for my tastes

So for the YT, gaining that Advantage on that group of TIEs for the first time (second time overall), with both parties at max speed, with we're looking at a 4 Difficulty + Setback check. If the TIE group make their 3 Difficulty + 3 Boost (for handling) check, the YT pilot now has to succeed at a 6 Difficulty + Setback check. So the pilot could try and do that, or maybe he'd want to just do an Opposed Pilot check or some other thing. And he'd definitely want to spread out his defense as much as possible

There can of course be mitigating factors. Threat rolled can be used to slow ships down, the YT pilot could have a few tricks up his sleeve. On the flip side, a squadron of TIEs could be led by a particularly skilled commander who can GtA and then give the benefit to all the fighters in his squadron! That's a talent or something, I think. AFB at the moment.

Anyway, there's any number of factors in the mix. When it comes down to it, there are times when GtA is useful and times when it should not be used. And that is what a good piece of rules does. Not so incredible that everyone-wants-it-all-the-time-no-exceptions, but not so terrible that why-would-you-ever-do-that. It's a solid option for a pilot's action.

I've been searching for an answer to this and just can't find anything. Perhaps I'm overthinking it, but I'd like to know what others think and have used:

1. Is a ship with silhouette 4 and smaller, with a default 1 forward and 1 after defense, exposed on the starboard and port sides?
2. Or, does a shield's forward and aft defensive arc, on a ship with silhouette 4 and smaller, cover the port and starboard sides?
3. If the ship is by default exposed on the starboard and port sides, can they angle shields to the starboard and port sides?

Silhouette under 4 have no port or starboard. They only have 2 facings for shields, attacks or any other rule purpose.

Ships of silhouette <=4 only have Fore and Aft zones. You can tell this as something like a Z-95 has Fore 1, Port/Starboard -, Aft 0. There's a difference between Aft (has arc, no shields) and Port/Starboard (no arc, shields invalid).

Why they didn't make this clear in the stat blocks by removing those zones is a bit baffling.

That's what the "-" is for. If it has a shield generator, but nothing on that arc, it's listed as "0". See the Headhunter. (1/-/-/0)

That's what the "-" is for. If it has a shield generator, but nothing on that arc, it's listed as "0". See the Headhunter. (1/-/-/0)

Uh... that was the exact example I used?

E: For example, why not display arcs like this.

*Shrug* Presumably so they didn't have to have separate templates.

the starship creation sheets i print off the java character creator mentioned in these forums throw me off as i've seen them only have two defense zones for sil 4 and smaller, leading me to believe the arc on the forward and aft covers 180 degrees. You're saying it only covers 90 degrees?

On Sil < 5, each defense zone covers 180 degrees.