It's because of an email response to a rules question from FFG that states that Autothrusters does not use the range of the attack. It uses the distance between the defender and attacker. In a lot of cases these will be the same distance, but not always.

This.

How hard is for this to understand?

"When attacking with your primary weapon at Range 2-3, treat the range of the attack as Range 1."

All this affects is that the Inquisitor treats HIS primary weapon attack as a range 1 attack. It doesn't modify the range of his defensive roll or the defense modifier of the defender (He still gets his +1 green die at range 3)Autothrusters: "When defending, if you are beyond Range 2, or outside the attacker's firing arc, you may change 1 of your blank results to an [Evade] result." It still work for the DEFENDER as normal because they affect HIS defense dice (not the Inquisitor's primary attack).

Then why didn't they just say inquisitor gets extra attack dice at range 2-3? It would be much clearer. They have been specific with wording and that can only mean they intended for it to have other effects than just extra attack.

For me the wording of AT says "when defending" which is the opposite to INQ "treat attack as range 1". So I can't see how someone can attack at range 1 and the other person defend at range 3. To me the attack and defend are linked together and part of the same action.

How hard is for this to understand?

"When attacking with your primary weapon at Range 2-3, treat the range of the attack as Range 1."

All this affects is that the Inquisitor treats HIS primary weapon attack as a range 1 attack. It doesn't modify the range of his defensive roll or the defense modifier of the defender (He still gets his +1 green die at range 3)Autothrusters: "When defending, if you are beyond Range 2, or outside the attacker's firing arc, you may change 1 of your blank results to an [Evade] result." It still work for the DEFENDER as normal because they affect HIS defense dice (not the Inquisitor's primary attack).

Then why didn't they just say inquisitor gets extra attack dice at range 2-3? It would be much clearer. They have been specific with wording and that can only mean they intended for it to have other effects than just extra attack.

For me the wording of AT says "when defending" which is the opposite to INQ "treat attack as range 1". So I can't see how someone can attack at range 1 and the other person defend at range 3. To me the attack and defend are linked together and part of the same action.

Autothrusters is a special ability of the ship it is equipped to.

Pg. 5 FAQ:

When a player declares a ship’s ability that requires another ship (or ships) to be at a certain range, the player trying to resolve the ability can measure range from their ship to any valid ships before resolving the ability

The attacker measures range when he declares an attack, this measurement is used for ranged combat bonuses.

Ship abilities are measured when they trigger. The defender measures for his own abilities after he declares he is using them.

The defender is not measuring attack range.

*Edit: Unless he's Dengar, but that is a separate attack anyway.

A good argument i've seen is basically the following:

The inquisitor when he makes an attack, has a special range ruler he uses. It is the same length as everyone else's, but it only has one division on it, and it says 'range 1' all the way down.

At no other time in the game is this special range ruler used, than when Inq is determining the range for his attack. This also determines the range for the opponent's defence.

But Autothrusters don't directly reference the range of the attack. They reference the distance between the ships.

SO in the same way that you can be in arc at range 3 for the purposes of defence dice, but if closest point to closest point is out of arc at range 2, Autothrusters don't work, The Inquisitor stops range combat bonus to defence dice if he's at distance 3 from the opponent when he fires (because he determines the range of the attack with his special ruler that says 1 all the way down) but the Autothrusters still work, because his opponent measures the distance for them when they trigger, and finds out 'oh hey, it's 3'.

But either way, it definitely needs an FAQ.

Only because the rules you need to understand why it works the way it does is spread out between 3 separate documents!

By raw it already worked the way it does now, but people had different interpretations of raw. You can have a wrong opinion, after all.

Personally I feel as a mechanic and pilot ability it should cancel AT and range bonus defence die. It would be a much more interesting ability then, rather than simply an extra attack die.

Does any one have a cool list for the Inquisitor?

Mine is Captain Oicunn - Predator

Doom Shuttle

Grand Inquisitor - PTL - AT - Title

Inq/OL/Whisper fits IIRC. As does Inq/Soontir/Vader.

How hard is for this to understand?

"When attacking with your primary weapon at Range 2-3, treat the range of the attack as Range 1."

All this affects is that the Inquisitor treats HIS primary weapon attack as a range 1 attack. It doesn't modify the range of his defensive roll or the defense modifier of the defender (He still gets his +1 green die at range 3)

Autothrusters: "When defending, if you are beyond Range 2, or outside the attacker's firing arc, you may change 1 of your blank results to an [Evade] result." It still work for the DEFENDER as normal because they affect HIS defense dice (not the Inquisitor's primary attack).

Wrong. There can be only ONE range modifier to a given attack.

A red die for the attacker if you are defending at range 1.

A green die for the defender if you attacking at range 3.

Or no dice if the range of the attack is range 2.

Range is only measured once, and it affects both attacker and defender. The Inquisitor automatically converts the range of the attack to 1 for both.

However, due to its wording, it seems that auto-thrusters does not compute the actual range of the attack for its calculation, but the actual position of the ships on the board, and thus is unaffected by the inquisitor's ability .... Unnecessarily complicating things (IMO).

What, again?

Can we have a topic on the Inquisitor that doesn't change to an Autothrusters debate?

The consenus so far is that his ability does NOT cancel AT due to the wording on AT

According to whom?

Until the inevitable Wave release FAQ is out as far as we know defenders don't get an extra dice if they are treated at range 1. Does the ability apply to the defender too?

Imho According to the card itself.

"When defending, if you are beyond Range 2 or outside the attacker's firing arc," It does not care for the range of the attack, but checks instead of attackers ship position. It does not ask for the range of the attack, but for distance of the ships, which is not necessary the same. For the same reason the attack itself should count as a range 1 attack and give the attacker the bonus die and no bonus die for the defender, still ats should proc.

But hey, the faq will be out soon. so yeah, rules discussions are not really needed. Though if you ask the guy you are playing during setup how you want to count the card in that round, it should not be a big deal anyway. And as TO I would ban the card as long as there is no faq (And ffg bans new cards and ships in general for to anyway)

The inquisitor's TIE has had by far, the most amount of confusion and arguing I've ever seen for any expansion. Between this, and all the discussion on the title (X1 and V1), to the Raider title (which resulted from the X1/V1 discussion), and autothrusters... it's just wild.

I think it's a symptom of a game having a ton of content out now. This sort of thing is gonna happen again, surely.

The inquisitor's TIE has had by far, the most amount of confusion and arguing I've ever seen for any expansion.

Omega Leader? He's actually in an expansion that has been released and people are still arguing about him.

I'd say Inq is probably worse. Valen Rudor adds a whole bunch more arguments about TLTs and Cluster Missiles and Tactician and Ruthlessness and Autothrusters..

Lol, I'm primarily Scummy, was just getting hopeful for my friends.

You're not Scummy. I read the full text of cards.

The consenus so far is that his ability does NOT cancel AT due to the wording on AT

Not sure how people are getting to this consensus. The relevant texts:

• The Inquisitor - When attacking with your primary weapon at Range 2-3, treat the range of the attack as Range 1.
• Autothrusters - When defending, if you are beyond Range 2, or outside the attacker's firing arc, you may change 1 of your blank results to an [Evade] result.

If an attack is treated as Range 1, then it can't be beyond Range 2.

Not sure how you are getting to yours. It doesn't say "When defending at range 3 or greater" it says "if you are beyond Range 2." Your physical position never changes, It seems obvious that attacking at range one and physically being at range 3 are different things entirely. I guess we'll wait for the FAQ though.

The defender should get the extra defense die and auto thrusters. So it seems this is basically a dead card until faqed, because im not making a list that brings a rules fight and dont want to start one if someone else flys it. I hope the faq is released next week (what ever the intent). Actually an article would be acceptable too.

This is exactly how I interpreted it as well. It's when attacking, so it seems like you get max red dice for the Inquisitor, but the defender still gets the range bonus. At least it's better than the 2 stinking reds that you get with most other TIEs.

How hard is for this to understand?

"When attacking with your primary weapon at Range 2-3, treat the range of the attack as Range 1."

All this affects is that the Inquisitor treats HIS primary weapon attack as a range 1 attack. It doesn't modify the range of his defensive roll or the defense modifier of the defender (He still gets his +1 green die at range 3)Autothrusters: "When defending, if you are beyond Range 2, or outside the attacker's firing arc, you may change 1 of your blank results to an [Evade] result." It still work for the DEFENDER as normal because they affect HIS defense dice (not the Inquisitor's primary attack).

Then why didn't they just say inquisitor gets extra attack dice at range 2-3? It would be much clearer. They have been specific with wording and that can only mean they intended for it to have other effects than just extra attack.

For me the wording of AT says "when defending" which is the opposite to INQ "treat attack as range 1". So I can't see how someone can attack at range 1 and the other person defend at range 3. To me the attack and defend are linked together and part of the same action.

The wording is so vague, but I feel like this was probably the intent of the Inquisotor's pilot ability. If this did end up canceling range bonus and Autothrusters, he'd be an auto include in most Imp lists probably. I also like the idea of having hard counters for other awesome abilities like AT. Soontir and others probably wouldn't like it so much though.

Apparently, two totally opposite interpretations seem both completely sensible to those who hold them. Now if I were TO (which I am not) and had to rule on this, I'd say the Inquisitor makes it so that the range is treated as 1, and the autothrusters do not activate because they only activate if the defender is beyond range 2 - the bare cards seem to support this. But apparently that is because I look at the text from a certain 'gestalt'-like idea.

This is not the first time such issues have come up. If rules cause this kind of confusion, it is usually a sign of bad writing. Obviously one side is misunderstanding the rules here, but I don't think that side is to blame.

The consenus so far is that his ability does NOT cancel AT due to the wording on AT

False: There is currently no consensus

Apparently, two totally opposite interpretations seem both completely sensible to those who hold them. Now if I were TO (which I am not) and had to rule on this, I'd say the Inquisitor makes it so that the range is treated as 1, and the autothrusters do not activate because they only activate if the defender is beyond range 2 - the bare cards seem to support this. But apparently that is because I look at the text from a certain 'gestalt'-like idea.

This is not the first time such issues have come up. If rules cause this kind of confusion, it is usually a sign of bad writing. Obviously one side is misunderstanding the rules here, but I don't think that side is to blame.

I'd be very interested to see a breakdown of the sides people are taking versus how likely they are to use the Inquisitor.

Personally, I don't think I'm wildly likely to run him, but I know what side I fall on in the rules.

It's not a huge issue for the Autothrusters, but it is important if someone defending against the Inquisitor receives an extra green die if the distance between the two ships is 3. Is it correct that those who believe that Autothrusters activate, also think that the defender should get this extra die?

No.

Because the *range of the attack* is what determines range combat bonuses, which for the Inqusitor is always 1. The distance between the ships determines autothrusters, which is whatever it actually physically is.

Then I'd just go by the card, which does mention range.

It says 'if you are beyond range 2' or out of arc' - it doesn't mention the range of the attack at all. That would be 'when defending, if the range of the attack is 3 or you are out of the attacker's arc'.