1> Am I correct in understanding that when a revealed Cylon activates "Caprica", the crisis he chooses is resolved, but without the printed cylon activation and/or jump prep?

2> Does the free action Lee receives from"Alert Viper Pilot" have to be related to the viper (moving, fighting) or can he do any action, like something printed on his character sheet, "Consolidate Power", etc.?

3> What happens if Lee uses "Alert Viper Pilot" during a cylon attack crisis card? Does he still get an action? Does his jumping into a viper and then using an action happen the moment the viper is placed, or after everything on the card is resolved (including the special conditions at the end)?

4> Does a player piloting a viper still have to discard a card to go to Colonial One? What about going to the Galactica?

I had another question or two but I forgot for the moment. Thank you for any help you can provide

1> Am I correct in understanding that when a revealed Cylon activates "Caprica", the crisis he chooses is resolved, but without the printed cylon activation and/or jump prep?

Correct. Remember, anything refering to the current player is ignored. (The revealed cylon can't go to the brig, sickbay, or be forced to discard cards.)

2> Does the free action Lee receives from"Alert Viper Pilot" have to be related to the viper (moving, fighting) or can he do any action, like something printed on his character sheet, "Consolidate Power", etc.?

An action is an action. He can do whatever. Move the viper, attack, CAG, or use a Maximum Firepower, Consildate Power, or Launch Scout card. He could also launch a nuke or play a quroum card if he is the Admiral or President respectively.

3> What happens if Lee uses "Alert Viper Pilot" during a cylon attack crisis card? Does he still get an action? Does his jumping into a viper and then using an action happen the moment the viper is placed, or after everything on the card is resolved (including the special conditions at the end)?

Not certain, but I believe it's after the setup phase of the card is over.

4> Does a player piloting a viper still have to discard a card to go to Colonial One? What about going to the Galactica?

You must discard a card to go from a viper to any location on either Colonial One or Galactica.

3) Yes, at the moment you put the viper down. Remember what the card says, usually something activates first, then you put ships out, then the special part of the card activates. I guess this also means if you have no more vipers to put out than Apollo can't do this (but why isn't he already out there!).

4) Yes for both. Except when you jump and the ships go back into the reserves and you get put on the hangar deck (I believe that's where).

Just so I'm clear: his ability works any time he's on Galactica (but not in the brig) and an unmanned viper is placed on the board, even during someone else's turn, and he gets a free action no matter what, even if he's already done an action that turn via his action phase?

Amante said:

Looks correct to me.

Yea, Lee's ability is powerful. However, Lee's drawback sucks...doubly so if he ever becomes President.

****, Lee's ability is powerful. Thanks for the clarifications. One more question, although I probably know the answer:

Does the action printed on Hangar Bay work similar to Lee's ability? i.e., launch yourself and get one free (legal) action? Yes?

Er, Hangar Deck, sorry.

The hanger deck works exactly the same way as Lee's ability, except that you must spend an action in the Hanger deck, rather than Lee's triggered response.

Ha - shows what a bit of lateral thinking does , it had never occured to us to use his 'Alert Viper' ability during a Cylon Fleet Crisis card. And of course then he can take a shot (or four if he plays a 'Max Firepower') if in a sector with cylon ships. A good way to de-power those cards.

TomH said:

I believe there's only one deployment card where they set up vipers in the same zone as raiders.

Gaius Frakkin Baltar said:

That is correct. However, a lot of attack cards activate raiders before the new ones are set up. WHich means that previously placed raiders may now be moved into sectors where vipers are now going. So it is more useful than the card distribution would suggest.

The alert viper pilot ability also means that it is almost always better for Lee to activate command than it is for him to activate the hanger deck. It allows him to activate an unmanned viper, then launch one, jump into and take another action.

Gaius Frakkin Baltar said:

Lee's drawback is one of the mildest there is, unless he's president.

TomH said:

Frankly, shooting stuff is one of the least exciting things you can do with Lee's free action during a Cylon Attack. Launching a scout can be fun, but the best depends on whether someone has already played an XO that turn. He could, for example, XO someone to jump the fleet. We once even had a cylon refrain to play his Massive Assault super crisis because it would directly win the game for the humans (no XO's during a normal cylon turn). For the record, we play that Apollo's action takes place during the setup phase, before the special rules take effect. I have yet to see that definitively answered (to my memory).

Amante said:

If I may, I've done alot of looking at Apollo's power:

Following the flavor of the rules and parsing the language:

"When a viper is placed in a space area from the 'Reserves', you may choose to pilot it and take 1 action." So, at any time when a viper is placed, Apollo may jump in and take an action. This means you would interrupt the setup, Apollo takes his action and then you finish the setup. In addition, if it mattered the setup of new vipers is in an order determined by the current player. For example, if there is only one viper available in the reserves, the current player decides which space it goes in and Apollo wouldn't (unless he were the current player).

This leads to what I think is a technically valid '****' move: The humans are surrounded by raiders and Starbuck moves to the hanger deck to launch herself. The procedure is she (1)"launches a viper as normal", (2) places her token under it, and ... 'Normal' is "Launch a viper: The player takes a viper from the "Reserves" and places it in one of the two space areas." So when she activates the Hanger Deck and puts the viper on the board, the unrevealed cylon Apollo can say "Wait!", interrupting the completion of the action and jump in the viper instead of Starbuck. Then as his action, he can declare himself as a Cylon effectively denying Starbuck the ability to launch a viper, and the viper she did launch is put into the Reserves (per the FAQ). It can even be argued as realistic, that is, Starbuck is in the Hangar Deck ready to launch when Apollo, as the CAG, says "sit this one out, I've got it."

Berinor said:

I don't get this. Sure you can XO during a normal cylon turn. If it's a basestar crisis card and setup has a viper in it, then Apollo could take it over, and then play an XO on someone else. Perhaps I'm missing something somewhere, please let me know.

radmod said:

Yeah, and we were far enough on the jump prep that the XO'd person could jump the fleet and end the game. What made it exciting was the fact that it was the Massive Assault super crisis, the one I think of as being probably the best one in the game in almost every circumstance. He had to do Caprica in the hopes that it would kill us otherwise since anything that would launch a viper would let the humans end the game.

radmod said:

I think what he's getting at is that usually the humans don't get a chance to play an XO on their turn. This would have been one of the rare cases where they could have.

Massive Assault would push the jump track back 2 spaces so they then could NOT jump. So if Lee interrupts in the middle of the crisis card he can play XO, that person then moves to FTL and jumps. All before the last part of the card is resolved....

The Cylon attack card that involves setting up 4 raiders in the same location as some Vipers then the special text is to activate the Raiders. Lee can use his ability to get into one of the Vipers and play maximum firepower. This prevents those 4 Raiders from being activated since they are no longer there when it reaches the "special text" of the crisis card.

Also note that if Lee wants to Launch himself in a Viper the normal way, he is better off using Command to do so since he also launch an extra Viper, and can still take an extra action because he can leap into one of the just placed Vipers.

Lee is also great as a Cylon as you can reveal before your turn with the free action =)