I see your point which is why I brought up Rulebook pg 10 Combat phase steps 1-7. I understand steps 1-7 as a discrete attack and Vader number 1 is absolutely intimately tied to part of that attack- of course the "after" part. So, I don't see how it is unreasonable to interpret resolving Vader with this attack is a prerequisite to starting a new attack with "declare target".

It's not "unreasonable", and it is what was intended - as the e-mails have now confirmed.

However, as Buhalin, others and I have been explaining for 4 pages now, there is nothing in the rules as written that requires "resolving Vader with this attack [before] starting a new attack".

Buhalin put it nicely:

But Gunner making a full attack as one of those effects leads to a lot of head-scratching weirdness that people either don't like or feel doesn't make sense.

You're just one of the people that was left scratching their head and feeling it doesn't make sens.

Why do I get the feeling that gunner's "Immediately" will be erased in a future printing?

We have a ruling and I'll play by it. But I don't understand the resoning behind it.

Surley, having a single set of rules you have to learn would be "simpler" and "less complex" then having to learn that same set of rules plus a set of exceptions to thouse rules?

Why do I get the feeling that gunner's "Immediately" will be erased in a future printing?

Meh. As far as I know, we all gave up on "immediately" meaning anything a long time ago.

And doing so wouldn't actually affect this situation. Take away the "immediately" and Gunner and Vader have the same trigger, and resolve in the order you want them to. Which is pretty much what everyone's been saying here anyway.

They should errata Gunner so it reads: "After after performing an attack that does not hit, ..."

No.

That answer applies to both:

• PtL shenanigans being disallowed
• You going back to Magic

Don't worry; I couldn't afford the twice-yearly rotation anymore.

It just frustrates me how arbitrary these rulings are. Attack-Gunner-[something]-[something] is not allowed because they don't want to have a "complex stack", but something like this scenario is perfectly okay:

• Tycho performs a Focus Action, triggering Experimental Interface.
  • Resolve Experimental Interface, performing Squad Leader.
    • Jake receives the action from Squad Leader, performs a Boost.
      • Boost triggers Jake's Push the Limit; he uses it to Focus.
        • Focus Action triggers Jake's ability; he uses it to Barrel Roll; his ability finishes resolving.
      • Jake receives Stress from Push the Limit; it finishes resolving.
  • Squad Leader finishes resolving; Tycho now uses it to trigger Push the Limit.
    • Push the Limit allows Tycho to Boost.
    • Tycho receives stress from Push the Limit; it finishes resolving.
• Tycho receives stress from Experimental Interface; it finishes resolving.

That's 4 upgrade cards and 1 pilot ability triggered, and 5 actions performed, all before the first upgrade card finished resolving. This is supposed to be keeping the game simple?

No.

That answer applies to both:

• PtL shenanigans being disallowed
• You going back to Magic

Don't worry; I couldn't afford the twice-yearly rotation anymore.

It just frustrates me how arbitrary these rulings are. Attack-Gunner-[something]-[something] is not allowed because they don't want to have a "complex stack", but something like this scenario is perfectly okay:

• Tycho performs a Focus Action, triggering Experimental Interface.
  • Resolve Experimental Interface, performing Squad Leader.
    • Jake receives the action from Squad Leader, performs a Boost.
      • Boost triggers Jake's Push the Limit; he uses it to Focus.
        • Focus Action triggers Jake's ability; he uses it to Barrel Roll; his ability finishes resolving.
      • Jake receives Stress from Push the Limit; it finishes resolving.
  • Squad Leader finishes resolving; Tycho now uses it to trigger Push the Limit.
    • Push the Limit allows Tycho to Boost.
    • Tycho receives stress from Push the Limit; it finishes resolving.
• Tycho receives stress from Experimental Interface; it finishes resolving.

That's 4 upgrade cards and 1 pilot ability triggered, and 5 actions performed, all before the first upgrade card finished resolving. This is supposed to be keeping the game simple?

Well yeah it's not a physics simulator essentially everything is arbitrary to an extent. I mean does rolling to see who wins initiative not arbitrary? Why does lower pilot skill value move first? Does such a situational ruling you understood incorrectly really get you all twisted up and frustrated? Just roll with it. Finish the effects of the attack before moving to the next attack. Easy.

Of note, the above example is fair and I think everyone can agree and follow easily that you did that correctly.

In the combat phase, I would add the flow of the game (With respect to time) can be essentially represented by the order of which ships attack. So, I think it helps to think of attacks on a linear line that is clearly defined with pre-set order at the start of combat. A->B->C->D. Actions or abilities that are triggered before, with or after an attack (Such as Vader, Turr, etc) still cannot advance the flow and have to be resolved before time (Or the next attack) can advance. Note: some abilities such as Corran or Gunner, damage cards (Blinded pilot) or destroying ships will 'edit' this order- for instance A->B->C->D became A->A->B->D with a gunner destroying ship C. So you can set out writing a predicted attack order but then you can document or record the actual attack order. The attack order is basically the advancing time component in the combat round and would help explain why you must finish resolving the post effects of an attack.

If you do this you can easily write out a describable log where an observer can follow what happened in the game fairly quickly without actually seeing a second of action... perhaps a sort of "box score" of each game. e.g.

Round 1 A->B->C->D

Round 2 A->A->B->C->D (A Gunner example)

Round 3 A->B->C->D->C (C= Corran double tap)

Round 4 A->D (B was destroyed)

Round 5 A->C->D

I would say this is attempt at mechanistically describing the game.

I think it helps to think of attacks on a linear line that is clearly defined with pre-set order at the start of combat.

Except that this falls apart as soon as you have pilots of the same PS. Or a Damaged Cockpit. Or Swarm Tactics. Or any of a dozen other effects. Honestly, it doesn't even hold for Gunner, since it's conditional - you can't know at the start of combat if Gunner will trigger an attack or not.

The attack order is basically the advancing time component in the combat round and would help explain why you must finish resolving the post effects of an attack.

...

I would say this is attempt at mechanistically describing the game.

It's really not though. The system you describe doesn't really bear any relation to the actual rules of X-wing, and sadly doesn't explain anything.

Well yeah it's not a physics simulator essentially everything is arbitrary to an extent. I mean does rolling to see who wins initiative not arbitrary? Why does lower pilot skill value move first? Does such a situational ruling you understood incorrectly really get you all twisted up and frustrated? Just roll with it. Finish the effects of the attack before moving to the next attack. Easy.

Of note, the above example is fair and I think everyone can agree and follow easily that you did that correctly.

You misunderstand me. I mean arbitrary as in "based on personal whim, rather than reason", which I believe is a perfectly reasonable accusation to level at Alex's ruling. He has no rules he can cite to show why it should work the way he wants it to. He doesn't even have balance concerns. He just doesn't like it, so he decides that no, the rules don't apply in this instance. The one reason he does offer is completely bogus, as I was trying to show with my example. We have far more complicated "stack" situations than those Gunner was creating, so why are they okay while this is not? If a player came in here and tried to use Alex's line, he'd be rightly told to go away and come back when he had an answer that was actually based on the rules.

So what frustrates me isn't that I and the others were wrong (in fact, I still maintain that we are right, yet have lost the debate anyway), it's the very existence of these "because I say so" rulings. They are simply poor game design and rules management. Worse, these rulings are so often unnecessary. This interaction was weird, but it worked and could be explained in less than a minute. The interaction between 88A and Dead Man's Switch that Buhallin mentioned earlier should have been even easier to sort out, but the designers decided that no, the rules didn't apply there, either. And yet in other situations, such as Isard and Damaged Sensor Array, they decided to suddenly trust the rules and let the cards sort themselves out. It's maddeningly inconsistent and has lead to us having to turn to the designers to hold our hands every time something more complex than a generic X-wing hits the table.

But at the end of the day, we have a ruling and I'll play it. Doesn't change the fact that the ruling is wrong.

Well yeah it's not a physics simulator essentially everything is arbitrary to an extent. I mean does rolling to see who wins initiative not arbitrary? Why does lower pilot skill value move first? Does such a situational ruling you understood incorrectly really get you all twisted up and frustrated? Just roll with it. Finish the effects of the attack before moving to the next attack. Easy.

Of course, everything is arbitrary... it's a made up game. We'd just want it to be internally consistent.

Also, this isnt a case of us having "understood incorrectly", it's a case of the designer deciding these cards don't interact according to the rules as written. There is absolutely nothing in the written rules that supports this ruling.

And yes, of course we'll play by this ruling that Alex Davy came up with, but we'll also have another 5 page rule discussion next time there's a slightly weird rules interaction and someone will probably cite this ruling to try and justify some incorrect interpretation of the rules.

Well yeah it's not a physics simulator essentially everything is arbitrary to an extent. I mean does rolling to see who wins initiative not arbitrary? Why does lower pilot skill value move first? Does such a situational ruling you understood incorrectly really get you all twisted up and frustrated? Just roll with it. Finish the effects of the attack before moving to the next attack. Easy.

That's exactly the problem: Vader and Gunner are both "effects of the attack", or neither is. Nothing differentiates the structure of the two cards except the ruling from Alex.

Of note, the above example is fair and I think everyone can agree and follow easily that you did that correctly.

His example is far more complex than the logic behind Attack/Gunner/Vader/Vader.

In the combat phase, I would add the flow of the game (With respect to time) can be essentially represented by the order of which ships attack. So, I think it helps to think of attacks on a linear line that is clearly defined with pre-set order at the start of combat. A->B->C->D. Actions or abilities that are triggered before, with or after an attack (Such as Vader, Turr, etc) still cannot advance the flow and have to be resolved before time (Or the next attack) can advance. Note: some abilities such as Corran or Gunner, damage cards (Blinded pilot) or destroying ships will 'edit' this order- for instance A->B->C->D became A->A->B->D with a gunner destroying ship C. So you can set out writing a predicted attack order but then you can document or record the actual attack order. The attack order is basically the advancing time component in the combat round and would help explain why you must finish resolving the post effects of an attack.

But there is no such rule. What are the "post effects of an attack"? Where are they defined? And what makes an effect like Vader, which is triggered "after an attack", different from Gunner, which is also triggered "after an attack"?

I think it helps to think of attacks on a linear line that is clearly defined with pre-set order at the start of combat.

Except that this falls apart as soon as you have pilots of the same PS. Or a Damaged Cockpit. Or Swarm Tactics. Or any of a dozen other effects. Honestly, it doesn't even hold for Gunner, since it's conditional - you can't know at the start of combat if Gunner will trigger an attack or not.

The attack order is basically the advancing time component in the combat round and would help explain why you must finish resolving the post effects of an attack.

...

I would say this is attempt at mechanistically describing the game.

It's really not though. The system you describe doesn't really bear any relation to the actual rules of X-wing, and sadly doesn't explain anything.

Doesn't matter your points are irrelevant you ALWAYS have a record-able and defined order that occurred with respect to time. Let's say we play the round expecting A-B-C-D-E; B decides to swarm tactics E at the start of combat and E has Gunner. A and B are same PS but A won initiative. Solves A shooting before B order. Damaged cockpit on C the round before? Ok Now it shoots last in the order. In this round D was destroyed. So the expected "A-B-C-D-E" can be recorded for lets say round 4 as "A->B->-E->E->C."

But, here is the key, as you can see time "flows" with the attacks. This is where you can essential record a super simple 'box score' for each round and people can easily follow what happened in the game with just a few texts (Of course more description on what "A" is, when a ship is destroyed etc).

If you think of the game like this it become clear you cant go 'back' and Vader a prior attack and this should help some here understand the 'why' part. I asked several Xwingers tonight what they though about the Attack->Gunner->Vader-> Vader and EVERYONE thought that was clearly incorrect and would not allowed it. (Well at least in a Denver area in gaming group.) So ask around your gaming group for the 'why' and see what they say if you dont accept or get frustrated with the "because Alex said so" answer.

And now you're just making stuff up out of thin air. Find me some text from the rulebook, FAQ, anything that supports this nonsense. You will find nothing.

You, good sir, lucked into the answer that Alex wanted through a thoroughly flawed understanding of the game's rules, and I suspect that your initial reason was the same as his (ie. you felt it too complex or otherwise just didn't like it). The difference between you and him is that he at least comes out and says that he's ruling it this way because that's the way he wants it to work, whereas you keep making stuff up to try and prove yourself right.

And now you're just making stuff up out of thin air. Find me some text from the rulebook, FAQ, anything that supports this nonsense. You will find nothing.

You, good sir, lucked into the answer that Alex wanted through a thoroughly flawed understanding of the game's rules, and I suspect that your initial reason was the same as his (ie. you felt it too complex or otherwise just didn't like it). The difference between you and him is that he at least comes out and says that he's ruling it this way because that's the way he wants it to work, whereas you keep making stuff up to try and prove yourself right.

Yeah, sure bud, I lucked into it. You got me there. I really dont care that much if you care to understand or not. I am actually sincerely trying to help any reasonable people to gain insight to a possible underlying mechanism but I literally could not care less about what you think. But, your not worth my time so cool, your right, you win, I'm out.

Doesn't matter your points are irrelevant you ALWAYS have a record-able and defined order that occurred with respect to time. Let's say we play the round expecting A-B-C-D-E; B decides to swarm tactics E at the start of combat and E has Gunner. A and B are same PS but A won initiative. Solves A shooting before B order. Damaged cockpit on C the round before? Ok Now it shoots last in the order. In this round D was destroyed. So the expected "A-B-C-D-E" can be recorded for lets say round 4 as "A->B->-E->E->C."

Well, sure. This is kind of a "Duh" sort of statement. You can indeed record the order attacks in, and the fact that you can is so obvious I'm not entirely sure why you need to make it.

What you can't do - but you claimed - is determine at the start of combat what that order will be. Ignoring every other effect in the game,if I have both Luke and Tycho in my squad, Tycho might shoot first this round, and Luke may shoot first the next. That's determined when it's my turn to shoot at PS 8, and not before. So that rather solidly disproves your "fixed order" theory.

But to get back to this, I'm really not sure what you think that proves? Ignoring the perfectly valid point that your interpretation isn't actually supported anywhere in the rules, how exactly does being able to record the order you attack in have anything to do with the timing on Vader?

You have a made up rule - that all effects from an attack must resolve before moving to another attack - and you've invented a made up system to justify that... but your made up system doesn't actually even do anything to prove the point you're trying to claim.

Why do I get the feeling that gunner's "Immediately" will be erased in a future printing?

It costs 5 I think. Maybe it should have been an 8 point card.

And now you're just making stuff up out of thin air. Find me some text from the rulebook, FAQ, anything that supports this nonsense. You will find nothing.

You, good sir, lucked into the answer that Alex wanted through a thoroughly flawed understanding of the game's rules, and I suspect that your initial reason was the same as his (ie. you felt it too complex or otherwise just didn't like it). The difference between you and him is that he at least comes out and says that he's ruling it this way because that's the way he wants it to work, whereas you keep making stuff up to try and prove yourself right.

Yeah, sure bud, I lucked into it. You got me there. I really dont care that much if you care to understand or not. I am actually sincerely trying to help any reasonable people to gain insight to a possible underlying mechanism...

There isn't an underlying mechanism. Even Alex Davy isn't saying there is one; he's saying he doesn't think it should work that way, so it doesn't.

And the problem (at least for me) isn't this ruling. It's that there's a risk of you carrying your invented justification for this outcome over to some other rules issue, where it will mislead you (and possibly the rest of your gaming group) again.

To clarify: the reason Vader doesn't bypass shields is that he says the target "suffer 1 critical damage." That's specific language you can trace all the way back to the core rulebook, and it means his damage works exactly the same way as damage from any other source.

I want to load out the Oicunn Decimator with Vader and Gunner to do the following: Turret Attack (miss) -> Vader effect - > Gunner re-attack or new attack (hit or miss) -> Vader attack.

You could do it this way, but you don't have to. Because Vader and Gunner are both triggered "After you perform an attack", you can decide to resolve them in any order. So although it's perfectly legal to use the attack-Vader-attack-Vader sequence you outlined, you can choose instead to resolve the second attack before dealing with Vader:

• Miss with an attack. Vader and Gunner are both triggered, and you choose to resolve Gunner first; Vader waits a moment.
• Make your second attack. Vader is triggered again.
• Resolve Vader #1, dealing damage.
• Resolve Vader #2, dealing damage.

It's important because you may deal damage in Step 2, which means you may get to skip one or both Vader activations (and save yourself some damage).

Yes, it's been clarified that it doesn't work that way. There's a paragraph on it in the entry for Vader on p.10 of the FAQ:

If a ship equipped with Darth Vader can attack twice in one round (such as a ship equipped with Gunner or Cluster Missiles), it can use Darth Vader after the first attack and after the second attack. If Darth Vader destroys the ship to which he is equipped, it can still perform its second attack. If Vader is used twice, it must be in this order: Attack, Vader, Attack, Vader.