I am sure this has been asked and answered before. If I have a ship with Advanced Sensors on it and before my dial is revealed another ship with lower PS hits it and of course looses it's action....am I still able to preform my action via Advanced Sensors before I reveal my dial?

I am sure this has been asked and answered before. If I have a ship with Advanced Sensors on it and before my dial is revealed another ship with lower PS hits it and of course looses it's action....am I still able to preform my action via Advanced Sensors before I reveal my dial?

Yes. Overlapping another ship only costs you your Perform Action Step, not the full ability to perform actions. And touching doesn't affect your actions at all - if another ship overlaps yours it doesn't affect your ability to perform actions at all.

Yes. The lower PS ship skipped its Perform Action step because it overlapped your ship with advanced sensors. It does absolutely nothing to stop you from using Advanced Sensors, or using your action as normal as long as you don't end up overlapping them after moving. By the same token, if you start the activation phase overlapping an Obstacle you can use AS to use an action before revealing, in case your template is going to touch the obstacle again.

Think about what the card says and do that.

The card states one condition for it's use - "Before you reveal your maneuver dial" - if you have a maneuver dial and you haven't revealed it yet, you may use Advanced Sensors.

If you have met the condition for using advanced sensors, you may perform a free action.- what are the conditions for performing actions?

is there a condition in the rules that states you cannot perform actions if another ship has overlapped you?

Think about what the card says and do that.

Can we maybe drop this particular mantra?

Even apart from the rather insulting nature of it, it's not even really good advice. Every ability in the game is subject to both the basic rules framework and potentially every other ability in the game. Abilities will very often say to do something that you can't do, or won't end the way the card says it does because of some other ability.

If you're going to insist on using it, at least make it a thoroughly correct "Think about what the card says and do that, but only after you consider how what it says fits in the general rules framework, and you consider any other abilities that might be in play that could possibly affect that outcome."

Think about what the card says and do that.

Can we maybe drop this particular mantra?

Even apart from the rather insulting nature of it, it's not even really good advice. Every ability in the game is subject to both the basic rules framework and potentially every other ability in the game. Abilities will very often say to do something that you can't do, or won't end the way the card says it does because of some other ability.

If you're going to insist on using it, at least make it a thoroughly correct "Think about what the card says and do that, but only after you consider how what it says fits in the general rules framework, and you consider any other abilities that might be in play that could possibly affect that outcome."

I'm not trying to be insulting - I'm offering a simple method for cutting away the chaff from a question.

It seemed like an odd question to me - why would anyone think that a ship overlapping you would have any effect on your ability to perform an action? - particularly as you had not even revealed your dial, let alone attempted a maneuver - where on earth could that have come from?

When questions like this come up it's usually because they - or one of their group has inserted their own rule into the order of play or has a base misunderstanding of some mechanic or other - and that then makes what should be a really simple interaction into something really complicated.

So take it back to basics - look at the conditions on the card, and if you fulfill them then you may proceed - do not add additional conditions that the card does not have.

Give a man a fish.......

. If I have a ship with Advanced Sensors on it and before my dial is revealed another ship with lower PS hits it and of course looses it's action....am I still able to preform my action via Advanced Sensors before I reveal my dial?

Another ship hitting (overlapping) you does not prevent your ship from losing its action, regardless of if you have Advanced Sensors or not (but if you overlap them, then only Advanced Sensors will help).

Give a man a fish.......

Who needs fish when we have bloggers to tell us how to play the game?