I bit baffled by a ruling I found in the FAQ.

"I have an Ethereal Envoy (Planetfall Cycle 046)
that has a Gun Drones (Core Set 158) attached to
it. When it uses the Area Effect ability granted by
the Gun Drones does its Forced Reaction trigger?

No, because the Ethereal Envoy never resolves an
attack when it uses the Area Effect ability. When a
unit uses an Area Effect ability it first is declared
as an attacker as per the rules on page 26 of the
Rules Reference Guide. The second step of an attack
the “Declare defender step” is then replaced by
the Area Effect ability as outlined on page 3 of the
Rules Reference Guide. After this ability is resolved
the attack is ended. This means that the 3rd step of
attacking “Resolve attack” is never completed (and
it could never be completed since you never declared
a defender!) The Ethereal Envoy’s ability triggers off
this third step, and since the trigger never happens the
ability does not initiate."


This doesn't make any sense to me. It's clearly an attack, but it misses the resolve attack window? What? Why in the world wouldn't they just add a resolve attack window at the end. This is very gamey, and clearly not the intent of the AOE rules.

None of these cards would work.

If Snake Bite Thug gets aoe somehow, it no longer takes damage when exhausting. Doesn't seem to be the intent behind is negative ability.

Rok Bombardment doesn't effect someone using AOE. How does a giant rock miss them thematically?

Ravening Psychopath gets an aoe attack, somehow he is calm cool and collected?

Prodigal Sons Disciple gets an aoe attack, his ability does nothing.

I think they should really consider changing this ruling. It's only gonna impact the game negatively as more cards come out.

It's worth noting the original ruling was that AoE on an Etheral DID trigger its forced reaction, but when people started asking if Rok Bombardment hit AoE units, they said "no," then went back and changed the Ethereal ruling to be consistent.

To reiterate the REASONING behind it, you are looking at a strict terminology adherence to language in the RRG. There, it says that the three steps to making an attack are:

1. Declare attacker

2. Declare defender

3. Resolve attack

While the rules for AoE say that when attacking with an AoE unit, instead of declaring a defender, you deal the AoE damage, then "end" (not "resolve") the attack. So FFG has decided that since you never reach the "resolve attack" step with an AoE attack, anything keying off an AoE attack doesn't have a triggering condition.

This is their reasoning. It depends on strictly following the technical wording of the rules instead of assuming that an attack that "ends" must also "resolve." Whether or not such strict, technical application of the words is a good thing overall is not my call. I doubt FFG is going to change it any time soon, though, since they consciously threw out the "ending an attack is the same as resolving it" reasoning that prevailed until Rok Bombardment was released.