When Rieekan's flagship is the last ship remaining on one side and is destroyed, two events are triggered:

General Rieekan: "When a friendly ship or friendly unique squadron is destroyed, it remains in the play area and is treated as if it was not destroyed until the end of the Status Phase."

and

Winning and Losing:

• If all ships in a fleet are destroyed, ignoring squadrons,
the game immediately ends. The player with one or
more ships remaining in the play area is the winner.

The rulebook establishes how "when", "while", "before" and "after" interact with each other, and even how to prioritise events which share the same trigger, but says nothing about "if X, Y immediately happens".

QUESTION 1: Does Rieekan ("when") trigger before, after or at the same time as the endgame condition ("if, immediately") does?

A) before: Rieekan makes the ship "not destroyed" and therefore the W&L effect does not resolve.

B) after: The game ends immediately, before Rieekan has a chance to trigger.

C) at the same time: This is the tricky one. If the destruction happened due to overlapping an obstacle or ship, Rieekan's owner gets to decide the order*, and therefore the ship is not destroyed. If the destruction happened due to enemy shooting, whether Rieekan can save the ship depends entirely on who the first player is**.

If the answer to the above is A or C, i.e. Rieekan saves (or can potentially save) the ship, and that ship or a friendly squadron then goes on to destroy the opponent's last ship, then another doubt arises:

QUESTION 2: If a ship saved by Rieekan as explained above destroys the opponent's last ship, how are victory and margin of victory decided?

A) Rieekan's fleet wins and scores 400 points. Rieekan's ship is counted as destroyed for scoring because Rieekan's ability is no longer active after the game ends.

B) Rieekan's fleet wins and scores 400 points. Rieekan's ship is not counted as destroyed for scoring because the Status Phase never happened.

C) Rieekan's fleet wins and scores 400 points. The opponent also scores 400 points, because they destroyed all of Rieekan's ships.

D) The simultaneous destruction clause*** in the rulebook applies and scores are compared to determine the victor.

*: From Effect Use and Timing :

• If two or more of a player’s effects have the same timing,
that player can resolve those effects in any order.

**: From Effect Use and Timing :

• If both players have effects with the same timing, the first
player resolves all of his effects with that timing first.

***: From Winning and Losing:

• If the last remaining ships in both fleets are destroyed at
the same time, the player with the highest score wins. If
both players have the same score, the second player wins.

I would go with A, then B.

When Riekeen is destroyed, he is treated as not destroyed. That player gets to break ties on timing. The end game is "If all ships are destroyed," which they aren't. (or so we will pretend)

Then I would say B, for exactly the reason you describe. We never reached the Status Phase, so the other player shall have to mine salt.

Following the rules I would agree with JgzMan. A, then B.

I would go with A, then B.

When Riekeen is destroyed, he is treated as not destroyed. That player gets to break ties on timing. The end game is "If all ships are destroyed," which they aren't. (or so we will pretend)

Then I would say B, for exactly the reason you describe. We never reached the Status Phase, so the other player shall have to mine salt.

I lean towards this as well, but I would like to see an official clarification, if for no other reason than I'm completely sure it will come up in tournaments a lot.

I think the ruling would also apply to the question "does Rieekan protect his own ship when it's destroyed?", which is another one that comes up often.

I would go with:

My last ship is destroyed, this triggers two effects with a when condition, Rieeken triggers when the ship is destroyed and my game loss triggers with the destruction of my last ship.

So I have two effects to resolve and the order is my choice. Now I can trigger Rieeken then lose or lose and then trigger Rieeken. My point here is it doesn't matter I lose.

Now, overlapping my opponents last ship would cause:

1. We trigger the overlap and both ships take a card of damage. The important thing here is there is no timing we both take a damage. Then

2. My opponent may have triggered effects that result (Game loss being one)

3. I have triggered effects that result (See above)

4. We both end up with the destroyed condition going off and we both lose. We compare scores, which would be 300/300 or 400/400 as both our fleets were destroyed, so second player wins a 5/5 game with a MOV of 0.

As such I am going to go with CD.

@DiabloAzul: You get my vote for Rules Quandary of the Week.

I sent this exact question to FFG when we first saw Rieekan.

I received an email stating they'd be releasing a blanket ruling, since they've had so many questions RE: Rieekan.

I'm really not surprised. Please keep us posted!

I would go with:

My last ship is destroyed, this triggers two effects with a when condition, Rieeken triggers when the ship is destroyed and my game loss triggers with the destruction of my last ship.

So I have two effects to resolve and the order is my choice. Now I can trigger Rieeken then lose or lose and then trigger Rieeken. My point here is it doesn't matter I lose.

Now, overlapping my opponents last ship would cause:

1. We trigger the overlap and both ships take a card of damage. The important thing here is there is no timing we both take a damage. Then

2. My opponent may have triggered effects that result (Game loss being one)

3. I have triggered effects that result (See above)

4. We both end up with the destroyed condition going off and we both lose. We compare scores, which would be 300/300 or 400/400 as both our fleets were destroyed, so second player wins a 5/5 game with a MOV of 0.

As such I am going to go with CD.

What determines who owns the "end of game" effect? You say the Rieekan player own both the Rieekan effect and the game end effect, but why is that?

OK, can I change my mind: The "IF" is a conditional test and will if the clause is met changed the ship destroyed effect as it were.

So WHEN my ship is destroyed and it is my last ship I get my ship being destroyed and the game ending immediately all as one effect as it were. As the game ends immediately Rieeken will not trigger and I'll remove my ship.

I am also stumped on Rieekan with unique squadrons problem. My unique Wedge Squadron is escorting 5 flights of Y-wings and is jumped by 6 flights of interceptors. Wedge gets killed after 3 interceptors fire as he is the escort, but he is not dead until the end of the status phase. So 6 squadrons of Interceptors even if it only takes 3 to kill him can't target the Y-wings? Essentially the named escort pilot became a black hole for the remaining guns?

Yep.

He is not destroyed. Therefore his Escort special rule is still in play. Engagement is still in play. You have to keep shooting at him until the Status Phase.

Its going to teach people how to Engage properly, that's for sure.

If Wedge is on the tabletop , then his special rules apply. His special rules include Squadron Engagement (common to all squadrons), and Escort, as it is a given rule.

I don't see how there is any argument that could be made that it is not... He is not destroyed until the Status phase.

I'd suggest that spending time trying to deduce what Reikan's ability is going to do in various situations is likely a waste.

At this point it should be clear that his release is going to include a fairly lengthy FAQ detailing exactly how to hand his ability. An upgrade card simply doesn't have the room to properly detail how something like this will function in a number of unique situations. FFG will hand wave this one to work however they want it to irregardless of what the card might say, because again it is simply too complicated an interaction.

I'm with Scottie on this one. We all pretty much know the wording, and the questions. We know that FFG has announced that they'll release an FAQ.

I'm just not sure what else there really is to say, or ask about the subject anymore.

Food for thought: why would Rieekan not work on your last ship? How about the second to last? Does it also disappear before Rieekan can work?

Sounds a bit contrived.

Food for thought: why would Rieekan not work on your last ship? How about the second to last? Does it also disappear before Rieekan can work?

Sounds a bit contrived.

As an Imperial player... I don't want it to work though!

Haha, very funny. As a rebel-turned-loyalist I can sympathize!