2 completely unrelated questions today but though I would only do one post:

1. Dutch Vander’s ability allows a friendly to “acquire” a target lock when he takes a lock, I'm 99% sure this is different from gifting a free target Lock action, as I'm sure you can allow another ship to acquire a lock even if it is stressed whereas if it was a free TL action they could not do it.

1. This question came up at a tournament on the weekend and normally I'm pretty sure of the rules however this one really stumped us. What is the priority of Ion Canon effect and Draw Their Fire? The last damage on a ship from an ION canon was a crit the I used DTF to move to another ship, they both appear to be replacement effects but what happens? I was of the opinion that even though the ship being shot at still gets an Ion token even if there is no damage being dealt as technically there was 1 uncancelled crit, however my opponent (the one shooting the Ion Canon) insisted that it wouldn’t get Ioned because it wasn’t taking any damage. In the end we decided that it did not get the Ion effect but I still wasn’t sure. Is it a case of the active player (i.e. the defending ship) gets to choose which replacement effect takes place?

Also before you ask I am the “unofficial” Rules interpreter as the store manager (and event TO) doesn’t know how to play the game, and everyone is OK with it. So no point in getting a ruling from the TO on this one.

1. You are correct, Dutch gives a TL token, not an action, so it can happen to a stressed ship (and to a ship that has already target locked this turn..... Though the ship may still only have 1 target lock at a time)

2. Short answer: no. Long, more accurate answer: To use draw their fire, a ship must be hit, so regardless of using draw their fire or not you will still suffer the ion effects. There was a 20 page discussion about six months ago and the consensus was we don't know if you can use draw their fire on ion but the discussion is entirely academic anyway as you would never want to.

FAQ, Page 4:

godofcheese has it on both. The ion effect still goes even if DTF pulls the lone crit, because the ship is still hit. So don't do it

Thanks for the quick responses, Good to see my initial assumptions were correct. Sorry that I didn’t spot the other thread discussing the Ion issue, I'm surprised that it wasn’t added in the FAQ if there was so much debate about it, further to that question, I assume you can still DTF the crit even if the ion effect stays (if for example it was the last hull point on the ship to save it)

No, the ion effect cancels all dice results (in this case would cancel hit, with no damage showing) and then deal 1 damage to the ship. That ship takes 1 damage regardless, nthe only difference is that the ship with dtf would ALSO take a damage (a crit damage). There is literally no reason why a player would choose to use dtf on an ion shot.

You can use Draw Their Fire on an ion hit.

But doing so changes literally nothing about how the ion hit resolves, because it's dependent entirely on being "hit", and DTF doesn't change that. The original target still takes the full ion effect, including damage and the ion token. The die results from the ion attack have no other effect - one hit left, one crit left, 382 crits left, it all does one damage and an ion token.

There is some fuzzy timing between DTF and the ion, but it really doesn't matter - since DTF can't stop the hit from happening, it can't alter the ion result. So the two possibilities are:

1. DTF can't move the crit, ion result happens

2. DTF can move the crit, ion result happens, DTF ship takes the crit result

The only thing using DTF can do is create a crit out of thin air for your own ship to take. That's why it doesn't really matter, because nobody should ever do it.

Theoretically, isn't number 2 above redundant, since the DTFed crit result is also cancelled by the ion effect. The ion effect does not care where they are, just that they are cancelled.

As the opponent in question, that was my other interpretation, but I had no problem playing it such that DTF worked as intended (even if we were apparently wrong). Might have helped me kill that cursed Biggs though.

Theoretically, isn't number 2 above redundant, since the DTFed crit result is also cancelled by the ion effect. The ion effect does not care where they are, just that they are cancelled.

Exactly!!! Thank you.

Theoretically, isn't number 2 above redundant, since the DTFed crit result is also cancelled by the ion effect. The ion effect does not care where they are, just that they are cancelled.

Not necessarily. There are some other timing issues that make this not guaranteed, because of the wording on DTF. It says the DTF ship suffers the result. But we don't know for sure if that means you move the crit result and then suffer it in the normal flow, or if you move the crit result and suffer it as part of resolving DTF. It is very possible that DTF moves the crit result and resolves it, with the damage card drawn and resolved, before the ion cannon resolves.

It honestly could go either way - typically, if a card tells a ship to suffer a result it should happen immediately. DTF is worded strangely since the "instead of the target" could be read to put it back in the original flow. It well and truly is an unknown, and we went around quite thoroughly on this rather pointless issue before. It's worth looking up if you're curious, but it really shouldn't ever matter.

... and here comes another 20 pages of circular argument.

Untill there is a pilot that actually benefits from suffering critical damage, the issue is entirely academic as no-one, ever is going to actually use it.

Actually, I can come up with a situation where you might want one of your own ships to take a point of magically appearing damage, but I doubt you could actually manage to set it up even if you tried, much less in live play.

Maybe, just maybe, you have Sontir Fel (or who ever gets to boost after his attack) and he has yet to attack and the ship with DTF is in the spot he wants to boost to. You might then want to use DTF to destroy the guy stupid enough to be in Fels way

There, it's no longer purley academical

Maybe, just maybe, you have Sontir Fel (or who ever gets to boost after his attack) and he has yet to attack and the ship with DTF is in the spot he wants to boost to. You might then want to use DTF to destroy the guy stupid enough to be in Fels way

There, it's no longer purley academical

That's Turr Phenir, not Sontir Fel