Target Lock question from new player

By angrymike, in X-Wing Rules Questions

In the Action phase, the ships that have this ability can use the Target Lock on any ship within 3 range on a 360 degree arc for all ships within range.

Question 1: Can you use the target lock in the same round you placed it on a targeted ship?

Question 2: Can you use target lock over and over in subsequent rounds/turns?

1) Yes you can.

2) You can perform the TL action each end every round if you so desire.

If you use the TL tokens to reroll your attack dice, you have to discard the tokens.

Edited by dvor

By discard the TL tokens you mean that once I have used(spent) the Target Lock to re-roll dice then you do not have that action available in subsequent rounds to put another TL on another round on another or the same ship? It is use it once type of action once it is spent?

thanks.

Discard means you remove the tokens from the playing surface. They are no longer assigned to ships. Next round, you may perform a TL action and place those two TL tokens (or other two TL tokens).

Every action on your action bar and every action granted by other means is available each and every round. (1) You can only perform one action per round. (2) So you have to make a choice. But you have all your action available to choose from.

Using/spending tokens is not an action! You perform the action once, you receive the benefit once. (3) Perform the action again, receive the benefit again.

(1) Minor exceptions are not relevant for this discussion.

(2) Some not so minor exceptions are not relevant for this discussion.

(3) Again, minor exceptions ...

ok, thanks for the clarification on TL usage.. I just got the game as a gift and we had thought the TL to be over powered if you can re-use it to Re-roll attacks dice more than once per game per ship. I tried searching the board for a clarification but did not see one. thanks.

Just one more question, its clear you can re-roll a blank(miss), but can you also re-roll focus(assuming you did not take focus action) too?

Yes you can, using the TL you can reroll as many dice as you wish, bit only once per round. So of you had another ability to reroll dice, the ones you rerolled with the TL are not able to be rerolled.

Just to make sure because it's a common mistake new players make.

Actions are different from tokens. You can gain a target lock or focus token without taking the relevant actions. Likewise, you normally spend those tokens during the combat phase, which has nothing to do with taking actions. Under normal circumstances performing an action involves gaining some kind of token while spending the token occurs totally separate from the actions.

Here's an example. So basically when you activate your ship:

  1. You do your maneuver,
  2. You decide on your action for this round, and decide it will be a target lock on an enemy ship
  3. Place a blue token on your ship, and matching red one on the target ship (providing it is at range 3 or less)
  4. When it comes to the Combat phase, you take your shot and roll [blank] [focus] [boom]
  5. Decide to use you target lock, spend (remove) the tokens then reroll the [blank] and [focus] getting two [boom] results
  6. the defender now rolls his defense dice to try and evade the three [booms]
  7. Next round, you can do the same again if you want.

A ship can normally perform one action per round, and it can normally hold only one target lock at a time. If that ship moves out of range 3, the target lock stays on it (if you haven't used it). They just have to be at range 3 to get the target lock to start with. If you decide you want to target lock a different ship, then when it's your turn to activate your ship you can perform the target lock action and choose a different ship and then move the red TL token.

Remember also that once you have a target lock on a ship, it stays on that ship until it is spent or you target lock a different ship or that ship is destroyed. It isn't removed at the end of the round like focus and evade tokens.

The other use for the target lock is to fire some weapons, like proton torpedoes. If you use it to fire these, it's now been spent this round and can't be used for a reroll on that attack. This is a common mistake for newbies.

You will find that the game has specific timings and once you get used to them, things start to fall into place.

Edited by Parravon

Just one more question, its clear you can re-roll a blank(miss), but can you also re-roll focus(assuming you did not take focus action) too?

Not only can you reroll blank or White-Attack02.png reults, you are allowed to reroll White-Attack03.png and White-Attack01.png results if you really want to. No reason to do so, but it is legal.

Edit:

If you gain a TL and not use it this round, the tokens remain assigned to the ships. If you perform a focus action next round, you can use both benefits during the same attack.

Edited by dvor

In the Action phase, the ships that have this ability can use the Target Lock on any ship within 3 range on a 360 degree arc for all ships within range.

Question 1: Can you use the target lock in the same round you placed it on a targeted ship?

Question 2: Can you use target lock over and over in subsequent rounds/turns?

1. Yes.

2. Maybe. You can NOT Target Lock a ship you already have a lock on. This is important because it means someone like Dutch could get a TL on a ship and hand a TL to someone else but if he wants to do that again next turn he needs to have spent his TL first or choose a different ship to get a new TL on.