In yesterday's team tournament game against Jarenis, he pointed out that I had a bomber squadron with the distance bands on while I had the distance bands on the ship I was trying to bomb. Basically, that was a violation of the two-tool rule. I had no problem with him pointing that and complied the rest of the game.

But thinking about it, moving squads in Vassal can be harder than real life. In real games, with the ruler I can measure from the squadron to see how far I can go, then quickly measure from the ship to see where I need to be, then line up the ruler more carefully and place the squad. In Vassal, I have to turn on the squad distance bands, then turn them off. Then turn on the ship distance bands, then turn them off. Then turn the squad one on again to make my move. Also since I'm always at varying zoom levels I have trouble getting good at judging distance 1 like in real life, so I found that I was doing several rounds of this procedure.

With the purpose of the two-tool rule being to speed up play, is it a good idea in Vassal? I feel like turning on all the relevant measurements is actually MUCH faster. I know that makes it less like the real game, but if it was supposed to be exactly like the real game we would have a distance ruler. (Which would probably be even slower!)

I know I'm just a Vassal novice and I'll probably get better at it, but what does everyone else think?

Copy the squadron you want to move. Then you can muck about with it until you find the perfect spot and finally delete the original.

Generally speaking I'm not too strict about these things on Vassal.

As long as the game flows smoothly and the other dude doesn't try to gain any advantages from it, I see no problem.

But the moment he starts leaving the range bands on on my ships while fiddling with the maneuver tool I might object.

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Actually too much pre-measuring is a bigger problem in vassal. Since its so much more accurate than real minis on a table, many players will try out all sorts of combinations of range and maneuver tool to maximize their benefits/reduce risk from any move. It's very "unrealistic" if you're looking at it from a tabletop simulation viewpoint - and it takes shitloads of time. Taking more than a few seconds to figure out your maneuver is really bordering on slow play. Same with endless fine-tuning of squads or excessive range measuring. Added up it makes game take waaay longer than necessary.

Its easy to forget on vassal too, because you aren't physically picking up a second tool.

Yeah I've used the copy trick but it's still technically using two rulers at the same time. If everyone's cool with that it definitely helps.

Sometimes I've found that the only way to see if a move is feasible in Vassal is to actually move the squad first, but if it's not feasible do you think it would be slow play to undo the moved squadron and activate something else? For example, maybe I think a good play would be to move Jan Ors into a certain spot if she can be in distance 1 of 3 enemies. The fastest thing would be to copy, move it, then immediately see if the distance 1 bands hit all 3. If not, delete the copy and activate something else instead, perhaps to shoot at that outlier with my Xwing first to see if I can kill it. The alternative would be to turn on distance bands one-by-one, which might be slower.

BTW, not complaining about Vassal--it's awesome--just thinking about if there needs to be a common etiquette for this type of thing. If the etiquette should be let it slide as long as it's done quickly, then that's fine.

And also, I can agree with no ship distance bands while using the movement tool. So in that case I guess stick to the two-tool rule, but for other cases maybe leniency is in order.

In the movement tool case, would you allow switching back and forth? I've done that before too, but maybe I just need to get better at judging distances.

My personal feeling is that i dont object unless its two different types of tools. Dont check attack range and manoiver at once.

I don't really care since you're pretty much just playing for Internet Points anyways

If the opponent doesn't object I sometimes do things like turning on the range bands on the objective tokens while bringing in ships for Hyperspace assault with their range measuring on, but that's really just to speed it up on their behalf. There's nothing to be gained from that which couldn't be found just by turning them on, then off, adjusting the ship, then turning them on, then off, then on, adjust a bit, then off etc. I'd prefer not to force an opponent to wait through that process.

However using range measuring and manouvre guides shouldn't be permitted.

I don't really care since you're pretty much just playing for Internet Points anyways

Which are fully exchangable for Tinymodel Points at the International Bank of Geek.

If the opponent doesn't object I sometimes do things like turning on the range bands on the objective tokens while bringing in ships for Hyperspace assault with their range measuring on, but that's really just to speed it up on their behalf.

Interesting point here. Could you have distance bands AND range measuring from the same ship on at the same time without violating the rule?

After all, you're only using one tool... just both sides at once.

I try not to do it. It is proper game etiquette and getting used to moving, attacking, planning, etc with only 1 tool at a time is not only a way to build your skills as a player but it will also. Teach you good game play habits.

I have no problem with it if its not the two different range rulers being used in or around the same vincinity on the board.

Last night in a game my opponent was moving fighters on the left side of the board whilst i had a quick range check on a ship way out on the right.. totally unconnected and I see no issue with that.

I have no problem with it if its not the two different range rulers being used in or around the same vincinity on the board.

Last night in a game my opponent was moving fighters on the left side of the board whilst i had a quick range check on a ship way out on the right.. totally unconnected and I see no issue with that.

The rule is to prevent a single player from using 2 tools to check for precise movements and such.