Ok this came up in a game today and I hope we interpreted the rules right.

In a game with Airen and a imitative 4 Z-95 3 E-wing vs Carnor and Empire holding the initiative.

Carnor did not attack because no ship was in his firing arc. Airen attacks and gives the initiative 4 Z-95 3 E-wing an action which he uses to barrel roll in front of Carnor. Since Carnor would attack before Airen and no one was in his arc at the moment he could attack we did not let him attack the low initiative Z-95 E-wing.

Did we do this the right way?

Yes - apart from the fact that generic Z95s can't barrel roll

Once the opportunity for an attack has passed, you cannot retrospectively give a ship an attack if another ship is able to move into its arc

Yes sorry it was an E-wing not a Z-95.

On the other hand, if rebels had the initiative in the same case then Carnor would be able to attack, right?

Correct - Airen's pilot ability triggers immediately after his attack so it resolves before the next pilot takes his turn to shoot

Ok this came up in a game today and I hope we interpreted the rules right.

In a game with Airen and a imitative 4 Z-95 3 E-wing vs Carnor and Empire holding the initiative.

Carnor did not attack because no ship was in his firing arc. Airen attacks and gives the initiative 4 Z-95 3 E-wing an action which he uses to barrel roll in front of Carnor. Since Carnor would attack before Airen and no one was in his arc at the moment he could attack we did not let him attack the low initiative Z-95 E-wing.

Did we do this the right way?

I think so.

As I understand things:

1. Empire has initiative and thus moves first and shoots first.

2. PS 8 comes up in the order.

3. Carnor gets to go first but there is no ship in arc so no shot.

4. Cracken gets to go and shoots passing an action to an E-Wing which then BRs in front of Carnor.

5. Carnor's opportunity to shoot has already passed so no shoots for him even though a target just moved into his sights.

The first time I read that I missed the "NOT attack" part so I was thinking a mistake was made but then I double checked things. If the Rebels have initiative the Jax would be getting to shoot as the E-Wing rolls after Cracken attacks but before Jax does. Note that if the E-Wing was in Jax's sights and a BR could get it out of those sighs the situation would work the other way; Jax gets the shot if he has initiative otherwise if Cracken has initiative he could let the E-Wing roll away before Jax can shoot at it.