I was at a tournament and a player asked: if IG-88A kills the last enemy ship while at half health, does IG-88A gain the shield back before the game ends?

The question never came up in a game but either the TO or Judges knew the answer. I could not find a form post answering it. Is there an answer and if it is the forms please share the link?

The game does not end until the end of the round in which all of one player's ships are destroyed (Rules Reference, p.20 "Winning the Game" and Tournament Rules p.3 "End of Match"), so 88A would have time to get his shield back and potentially deny the opponent half points.

Interestingly, though, the match ends immediately if a player chooses to concede, so an opponent could concede just before 88A made the final shot and thus deny him the chance to recover that shield.

Interestingly, though, the match ends immediately if a player chooses to concede, so an opponent could concede just before 88A made the final shot and thus deny him the chance to recover that shield.

True. Although it would take a certain type of person to be that much of a ****....

It gets worse; there's no stipulation on precisely when you can or can not concede, so theoretically a particularly ruthless opponent could wait until he sees the result of his own defence roll for that final attack, calculate if he can survive via tokens and abilities, and if he cannot then he could concede on the spot. The game would end immediately and 88A's ability wouldn't have a chance to go off.

I would hope there's no one willing to go to quite that kind of length to get an extra ~25 MoV, but they could if they really wanted to.

Interestingly, though, the match ends immediately if a player chooses to concede, so an opponent could concede just before 88A made the final shot and thus deny him the chance to recover that shield.

True. Although it would take a certain type of person to be that much of a ****....

But conceding player gets 5-0 result in most tournaments.

so bantahole or not, IG88 player is still good

Interestingly, though, the match ends immediately if a player chooses to concede, so an opponent could concede just before 88A made the final shot and thus deny him the chance to recover that shield.

True. Although it would take a certain type of person to be that much of a ****....

But conceding player gets 5-0 result in most tournaments.

so bantahole or not, IG88 player is still good

Only if coming at the top of the ladder in a game of toy spaceships is your measure of good.

Me? I'd still go with the guy (or girl) being something that rhymes with 'thirty punt'...

But conceding player gets 5-0 result in most tournaments.

so bantahole or not, IG88 player is still good

Only if coming at the top of the ladder in a game of toy spaceships is your measure of good.

Me? I'd still go with the guy (or girl) being something that rhymes with 'thirty punt'...

The IG88 player who is "good" isn't the player conceding.

That said, conceding rather than giving back 25 points of BroBot can't affect the tournament points, only the MOV. Does MOV really matter that much?

Interestingly, though, the match ends immediately if a player chooses to concede, so an opponent could concede just before 88A made the final shot and thus deny him the chance to recover that shield.

True. Although it would take a certain type of person to be that much of a ****....

But conceding player gets 5-0 result in most tournaments.

so bantahole or not, IG88 player is still good

Only if coming at the top of the ladder in a game of toy spaceships is your measure of good.

Me? I'd still go with the guy (or girl) being something that rhymes with 'thirty punt'...

when a player gets his dice in his face and has his Fel gets blown to bits in the first exchange, he will most likely surrender

because he has no chance for a good game, and will only get more negative emotions.

So there's nothing bad about conceding (although I like Surrender word)

Interestingly, though, the match ends immediately if a player chooses to concede, so an opponent could concede just before 88A made the final shot and thus deny him the chance to recover that shield.

True. Although it would take a certain type of person to be that much of a ****....

But conceding player gets 5-0 result in most tournaments.

so bantahole or not, IG88 player is still good

Only if coming at the top of the ladder in a game of toy spaceships is your measure of good.

Me? I'd still go with the guy (or girl) being something that rhymes with 'thirty punt'...

when a player gets his dice in his face and has his Fel gets blown to bits in the first exchange, he will most likely surrender

because he has no chance for a good game, and will only get more negative emotions.

So there's nothing bad about conceding (although I like Surrender word)

I lost a 50 point Guri once before it got a shot off - and I played through. In the end it was an ion HWK (Torkil) versus the other player's Whisper - I was able to use Sycks (before I realized their drawbacks) to kill his TIE swarm and got Whisper down to one hull before he got me off the board. It was a great game, and if I'd just given up after losing Guri I would not have learned anything from the game.

It gets worse; there's no stipulation on precisely when you can or can not concede, so theoretically a particularly ruthless opponent could wait until he sees the result of his own defence roll for that final attack, calculate if he can survive via tokens and abilities, and if he cannot then he could concede on the spot. The game would end immediately and 88A's ability wouldn't have a chance to go off.

I would hope there's no one willing to go to quite that kind of length to get an extra ~25 MoV, but they could if they really wanted to.

That's when the TO gets called over and has the situation explained to him. Conceding in the middle of resolving an attack (or even a round) to earn a higher score for yourself and a lower one for your opponent has to fall under the Unsportsmanlike Conduct section of the rules.

It might be a little different if one player has a Z-95 at 1 health and the other has a Jumpmaster with Gonk that he's going to take several rounds charging up so that he can end the game at half health.

It gets worse; there's no stipulation on precisely when you can or can not concede, so theoretically a particularly ruthless opponent could wait until he sees the result of his own defence roll for that final attack, calculate if he can survive via tokens and abilities, and if he cannot then he could concede on the spot. The game would end immediately and 88A's ability wouldn't have a chance to go off.

I would hope there's no one willing to go to quite that kind of length to get an extra ~25 MoV, but they could if they really wanted to.

That's when the TO gets called over and has the situation explained to him. Conceding in the middle of resolving an attack (or even a round) to earn a higher score for yourself and a lower one for your opponent has to fall under the Unsportsmanlike Conduct section of the rules.

It might be a little different if one player has a Z-95 at 1 health and the other has a Jumpmaster with Gonk that he's going to take several rounds charging up so that he can end the game at half health.

Out of curiosity, what is the difference between those two hypotheticals that makes one instance of doing something that is within the rules unquestionably unacceptable while the other is, at least, arguably acceptable?

While I would agree that the rules for conceding should probably let the opponent choose to continue the game, I do not think that it is ever appropriate or reasonable for a TO to tell someone that they are not allowed to do something that is clearly permitted by the rules.

As something else to consider, nothing stops an opponent from flying their limping last ship off the edge to prevent an enemy large ship from pulling itself back up to half health.

It gets worse; there's no stipulation on precisely when you can or can not concede, so theoretically a particularly ruthless opponent could wait until he sees the result of his own defence roll for that final attack, calculate if he can survive via tokens and abilities, and if he cannot then he could concede on the spot. The game would end immediately and 88A's ability wouldn't have a chance to go off.

I would hope there's no one willing to go to quite that kind of length to get an extra ~25 MoV, but they could if they really wanted to.

That's when the TO gets called over and has the situation explained to him. Conceding in the middle of resolving an attack (or even a round) to earn a higher score for yourself and a lower one for your opponent has to fall under the Unsportsmanlike Conduct section of the rules.

It might be a little different if one player has a Z-95 at 1 health and the other has a Jumpmaster with Gonk that he's going to take several rounds charging up so that he can end the game at half health.

Out of curiosity, what is the difference between those two hypotheticals that makes one instance of doing something that is within the rules unquestionably unacceptable while the other is, at least, arguably acceptable?

While I would agree that the rules for conceding should probably let the opponent choose to continue the game, I do not think that it is ever appropriate or reasonable for a TO to tell someone that they are not allowed to do something that is clearly permitted by the rules.

As something else to consider, nothing stops an opponent from flying their limping last ship off the edge to prevent an enemy large ship from pulling itself back up to half health.

It's not about wether the opponent has to accept the concession, it's about the timing of the concession. The rules don't have a lot to say about conceding. This is totally the sort of thing that a TO should be involved in. A TO saying that a player needs to finish resolving the current attack, and if that attack would lead to the end of the game, allowing the game to conclude normally isn't the same as telling a player with a single TLT Thug that he has to keep chasing Fat Han around until time is up.

The difference between the case of a player conceding before allowing IG88A to regen his shield token and someone running off for a few rounds to heal up his Jumpmaster is that one has a player abusing the timing of when the concession is made and the other one is just cutting short the inevitable and saving some time before the next round. In the Jumpmaster example, if anyone i being unsporting it is not the player doing the concession.

But wouldn't the result be the same in either case? If a player concedes and stops IG-88a from regenerating a shield or if a player concedes and stops Dengar from taking his next action to regenerate a shield, both of the conceding players utalized a rule to volutarily and immediately stop the game. As a result, each ended the game with a higher MoV then they would have had they not conceded.

Is the Dengar example, and the harm that would potentially occur to that player based on their MoV reduction, really easier to swallow because that conceding player is cutting the game short by 5 minutes instead of five seconds?

But wouldn't the result be the same in either case? If a player concedes and stops IG-88a from regenerating a shield or if a player concedes and stops Dengar from taking his next action to regenerate a shield, both of the conceding players utalized a rule to volutarily and immediately stop the game. As a result, each ended the game with a higher MoV then they would have had they not conceded.

Is the Dengar example, and the harm that would potentially occur to that player based on their MoV reduction, really easier to swallow because that conceding player is cutting the game short by 5 minutes instead of five seconds?

The difference is that the player that concedes between rolling dice and dealing damage cards that would end the game is clearly abusing the concession rules and not behaving in a sporting manner.

Extending the game to run off for a few rounds to heal up so that you get a higher score instead of just destroying a ship that has obviously lost is also a bit unsporting. You should almost expect your opponent to concede in that situation.

I think it's best that we don't have detailed rules over this sort of thing. It's best to leave it to a TOs judgement.

I don't think that it is best left to the TO's judgement. Sure, conceding to prevent an attack from happening smells bad, but what about conceding to stop an inevitable attack during the next turn from happening? How about an attack that won't happen for two turns?

Regarding running to regenerate, I don't see what basis you have to call that unsporting. The regenerating player paid for the ability to regenerate and is using it to get a better MoV. Since when is forgoing an attack to set yourself up for a better long-term result unsporting? If that is unsporting, the what about killing off one of your opponents ships and then avoiding the rest until time is called? The rules do not dictate how aggressive players should be.

Ever if you do have good responses to these questions, the rules are still clear regarding conceding. Encouraging TOs to punish players for following the rules is pretty serious and should only be done is cases where the detriment to the game is unambiguous and obviously unintended. Otherwise, the appropriate action is to request that the rule be changes. FFG is receptive to strong opinions of rules that are voiced by the majority of the community.

Of course, if the IG-88A player had instead flown IG-88C, he or she would likely not even be in the position of needing to regen a shield to avoid losing half-MoV.

Flying IG-88A instead of IG-88C is just odd.

If you are conceding it should be considered a full loss forfeiting any mov. Awarding the Victor 5 points and 200 mov.

Of course, if the IG-88A player had instead flown IG-88C, he or she would likely not even be in the position of needing to regen a shield to avoid losing half-MoV.

Flying IG-88A instead of IG-88C is just odd.

In a world of Stresshogs and Tactical K-wings, [iG-88A] does make some sense. 88C is a very unhappy bot if he gets on the wrong end of them; 88A just shrugs and carries on his business.

I agree there are corner cases, but in the big majority of match-ups, C is pretty clearly superior. I tracked it for a while and saved 5.25 damage per game with evades gained from boosting. That's obviously far more damage saved that anybody can expect to regen with IG-88A. Even against Tactician, Boost+Evade will help you avoid the stress-band and mitigate the incoming damage. I mean, in most cases when you're not getting actions because of stress, you're also not killing ships. (Stressers is also one of the very few reasons to go with FCS over AdvS on 'Bots, but AdvS really helps stay out of the arcs of the most powerful Stressers, so ... )

The point of conceding is to end a game that is clearly over without forcing both players to waste their time on it. Making it a full loss defeats the purpose, as no one would ever do it.

Exactly. And not just time. Sometimes a game is simply so one-sided (for whatever reason) that it actually stops being fun for the loser (speaking personally) ... and (again speaking personally) quite often for the winner as well.

I have played many games in which I was absolutely relieved when the other player conceded. Not because I was in a hurry, or because I thought he or she had any chance at all, but because I know how agonizing it can be to realize that you simply do not have any chance to succeed in the current game, on any level. I empathize, and it's painful. (I also never ask anybody if they want to concede, however, because there really are people who can get value out of playing to the bitter end, and I don't want even the appearance of pressuring someone to quit if they don't want to.)

But effectively forcing someone to finish a game that is torturously un-fun ... I can't see why anybody would advocate that.

I don't think that it is best left to the TO's judgement. Sure, conceding to prevent an attack from happening smells bad, but what about conceding to stop an inevitable attack during the next turn from happening? How about an attack that won't happen for two turns?

Regarding running to regenerate, I don't see what basis you have to call that unsporting. The regenerating player paid for the ability to regenerate and is using it to get a better MoV. Since when is forgoing an attack to set yourself up for a better long-term result unsporting? If that is unsporting, the what about killing off one of your opponents ships and then avoiding the rest until time is called? The rules do not dictate how aggressive players should be.

Ever if you do have good responses to these questions, the rules are still clear regarding conceding. Encouraging TOs to punish players for following the rules is pretty serious and should only be done is cases where the detriment to the game is unambiguous and obviously unintended. Otherwise, the appropriate action is to request that the rule be changes. FFG is receptive to strong opinions of rules that are voiced by the majority of the community.

If you run off to regen or just run off after scoring enough points to win (and you opponent doesn't feel they have a reasonable chance to change the outcome) then you shouldn't be surprised when your opponents concede. You don't have to attack your opponent, but they also don't have to keep playing. In a lot of sports, running up the score in a game that has already been won isn't against the rules but it's generally not considered sporting.

If you can't see how there is a difference between someone conceding mid-attack and some conceding at the end of a round, the this isn't going to be a productive conversation.

There is a single line in the tournament rules that covers concessions. It simply says that if a player concedes all of their ships are destroyed and their opponent gets credit for destroying everything. The same rules also have a full paragraph that gives the TO the ability to make judgement calls on things that they feel are an abuse of rules. We don't need 5 pages of rules to dictate exactly how concessions should be handled. If it smells fishy, a TO should able to intervene and make a call.

That said, conceding rather than giving back 25 points of BroBot can't affect the tournament points, only the MOV. Does MOV really matter that much?

At the Phoenix Store Championship on January 2nd, a friend of mine was facing IG-88 A & B. With only one ship remaining and one of the bots at exactly half health, he flew his ship off the map rather than allowing a shield regen. The 25-point difference in MoV was enough to make him 4th place at the cut instead of 6th. Had it been a top 4 cut, that would have been a huge difference! As it turned out, it was just a convenient difference, because I was in the 3 spot, so if he'd been 6th we would have had to eliminate each other in the first elimination game.

And this is why we have TOs/Judges so someone can use their judgement and make a call that the rules can't really cover effectively.

If the TO is abusing their power then the players can refuse to play there again, and the store will likely take care of the issue.

Ultimately TO trumps the rules so even if there was detailed rules about when you can or can't concede the TO still has the final say.