Microscop, the shield dial does count for all overlaps.

Overlapping occurs when a ship overlaps an obstacle, squadron or another ship.

What is a ship you may be asking yourself? Well the Rules Reference on page 10 bottom right under Ships says:

"A ship consists of a ship base, a ship model, a ship token, and a ship card. All components must match the ship’s type, and the name on the ship card must match the name on the ship token."

Under obstacles on page 8 bottom left:

"•A ship or squadron or squadron overlaps an obstacle if part of its base is on top of the obstacle token after moving (excluding activation sliders). Ships and squadrons can move through obstacles without issue."

The only time I don't think the shield dials count is for moving off the board.

Don't forget this part: (also under obstacles)

A ship’s shield dials and the plastic portions that frame

them count as part of the ship’s base for the purposes

of overlapping, but squadrons’ activation sliders are

ignored.

More on topic, I too had a great time. Thanks to everyone for organizing, playing, and for the Vassal module, and the tourney software! Looking forward to the next one.....is that the 400 point one?

Microscop, the shield dial does count for all overlaps.

Overlapping occurs when a ship overlaps an obstacle, squadron or another ship.

What is a ship you may be asking yourself? Well the Rules Reference on page 10 bottom right under Ships says:

"A ship consists of a ship base, a ship model, a ship token, and a ship card. All components must match the ship’s type, and the name on the ship card must match the name on the ship token."

Under obstacles on page 8 bottom left:

"•A ship or squadron or squadron overlaps an obstacle if part of its base is on top of the obstacle token after moving (excluding activation sliders). Ships and squadrons can move through obstacles without issue."

The only time I don't think the shield dials count is for moving off the board.

Don't forget this part: (also under obstacles)

A ship’s shield dials and the plastic portions that frame

them count as part of the ship’s base for the purposes

of overlapping, but squadrons’ activation sliders are

ignored.

More on topic, I too had a great time. Thanks to everyone for organizing, playing, and for the Vassal module, and the tourney software! Looking forward to the next one.....is that the 400 point one?

I dunno, I just threw it up to see who all was interested like me, and so far am getting positive feedback. Still need to work out all the details, so if you have any suggestions, speak up!

Something has been bugging me about my last game. Particularly my opponents turn two decision to bank away from my swinging "loaded fist" maneuver, shown in these images:

(sorry they are big)

My main question was: why? It initially SEEMS like the wrong move to do, with forfeiting your forward primary arc attack and exposing your rearward to the enemy.

However, I think I understand now, both why he did it and what effect it had on our game. It would of caused him to lose with the lowest possible margin, and almost caused him a win if not for a few things.

So, first thing: Turning away presented a nice juicy target. Mottie and the other ship were going to be busy trying to kill the wounded guppy with the Projector Misaligned crit that it got on turn one. If I turned a tad sharper and followed up with that turn three broadside of Mottie, that would of been disastrous.

It created an area of denial. It would of been suicide to try to take the inside path on that VSD. That would of exposed me to all 3 ships fire, and quickly killed me. Luckily for me, even though I didn't consciously realize it then, I didn't fall into the trap partly to my own doctrine of "Bring as much force as you can muster down on one pillar, and it shall fall", and I was thinking that the trailing victory was going to bank inwards and try to gut me, so I was going to use his own ship to obstruct the attacks.

It prevented me from flanking the whole formation. By making the wide outside turn, it protected his back by exposing.. his back. It makes more sense when you factor in all the pieces. I could not race around fast and strike at the other vickies butt. It was because he was using the physical ship model taking a wide turn as a maneuver blocker, AND he had his front sticking out to where if I tried to pass him, I would start losing bits of me. In the end, the CR90 did fly too close to the sun, or in this case the mini-sun that is bottled up in the VSD's reactor, and ended up getting burned by it, or the manifestation of it that are the outputs of energy that sit in the VSD's front arc.

It also bought his other ships time. Time to, unfortunately for them, fail to chase down the early game crippled assault frigate, and bought him time to see how the turns would play out, and decide if he wanted to commit the other VSD trailing behind to dislodge the other rebel units.

In short, I think he did everything right.

He created a pocket in the middle of the board where he would of been able to use the two other ships to kill my one whale, he bought his other ships time, and prevented me from swiftly flanking his entire formation.

All in all, well played, well played sir.