Hello all, this is my first post on the forum, and I am hoping for a clarification with regards to the standard critical effect.

I am new to Armada, and think it is a great game, so will probably have a few more questions in the future.....

Here is the point of contention (will try to be concise)....

Ship....

Front shields

(3)

Left shields (0) (0) Right shields

Rear shields

(Not an issue to this question)

Front hull zone is the targeted hull zone. Let us assume that no defensive tokens are available to use.

The attacker rolls 2 hits and 1 critical.

The way I read the rule on standard critical hits is that there will be no standard critical effect resolved, as the shields will absorb all 3 damage.

However, I am told that in this case the critical result will go through the shields, resulting in a critical effect before damage is resolved.

Can someone please clarify.

Personally, I think that if 5 damage were dealt, including 1 critical (4 hits and 1 crit) , then 1 hit and 1 crit would go through, with the first damage card being dealt face up.

I do think that my understanding is correct that if a card critical effect is chosen then that bypasses shields and resolve immediately, before damage or potential damage is dealt.

Clarification greatly appreciated.

Your understanding is correct. In this specific case, your 2 hits and 1 critical are added together to get 3 damage with a critical effect. The standard critical effect ONLY applies if damage cards are dealt. If no damage cards are dealt, then you don't get to use the standard critical.

Your understanding of the 5 damage scenario is also correct.

If you use a card critical effect you may perform that effect rather than dealing the first card faceup. Some of those translate into direct hull damage (Assault Proton Torpedoes, Dodonna's Pride) others might do things like discard defense tokens, splash damage etc. Not all of them bypass shields for their effect.

As you stated the critical is selected AND resolved BEFORE any damage is applied. This means that some cards that bypass shields with face-up cards have the potential to bring down shields or discard tokens or any other problematic things.

The general case for damage and crits :

1) Sum up the total number of hits and crits on the dice. This is not X hits and Y crits, it is X+Y damage with a critical effect. (assuming 1+ crits)

2) Select and resolve a critical effect from the options available.

3) Apply damage.

Just a reminder that spending defensive tokens take place after #1 and before #2 in that list. (RRG pg2)

Just a reminder that spending defensive tokens take place after #1 and before #2 in that list. (RRG pg2)

Not quite

Spending Defence tokens happens before you tally up Damage...

Attacks are broken down into these steps:

1) Gather the dice at range, Roll them (Form the attack pool)

2) Modify them. (Adding Dice, Rerolling, changing, spending ACCs to lock down Defense tokens).

3) Defender Spends Defence Tokens. They resolve at different times.

- EVADE and SCATTER resolve immediately. In fact, you can see the result of an Evade Reroll before you elect to spend other defense tokens.

4) Resolve a CRITICAL EFFECT if one or more die faces show "CRIT".

- Note, at this point, you are not SPENDING the crit face, and you have not tallied up your damage...

- If a CONTAIN defense token was spent in Step 3, it resolves here.

5) Tally up the Damage. The damage is 'HIT' vs Squadrons, and 'HIT' and 'CRIT' vs Ships.

- If a BRACE defense token was spent in step 3, it resolves here. It resolves by HALVING THE DAMAGE NUMBER, NOT by halving the Dice!

6) Apply Damage One point at a time.

- If a REDIRECT defense token was spent in step 3, it resolves here, by letting you assign damage, as it is given to you, one point at a time, to a single adjacent hull zone.

Some silly people here have made videos on how attacks and crits work. They are horrible for some of them bit decent otherwise

Horrible quality video on Critical Effects. He really needs to redo the dang thing.

He also needs to redo his attack video. Can you believe the gall of this guy. He did it on a cell phone and has not updated it. . . The nerve.

To clarify the OP statement as well:


The only "Trigger" for a Critical Effect, including the default, to be activated - is the presence of a 'CRIT' symbol after defense tokens have been spent....

You can activate the default critical effect at that point.

The default critical effect simply says: "IF damage cards are dealt by this attack, the first one is dealt face up.".

Now, at that point, that is where you tally up the damage... In this case, HIT, HIT, CRIT is 3 Damage...

You then assign that damage 1 point of a time, and if the attack was on the front, it would go SHIELD, SHIELD, SHIELD....

now, the Critical effect was active, but it was never triggered...

If you two still feel like being helpful, https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/225951-simple-rules-guide/ this thread is in need. Not sure whether we can help that much.

Thank you all for the replies. Greatly appreciated.

Thank you all for the replies. Greatly appreciated.

Enjoy the game and ask lots of questions!

During an attack, do I only resolve one critical effect? This is something that has confused me as a new player

4 minutes ago, Kelsier16 said:

During an attack, do I only resolve one critical effect? This is something that has confused me as a new player

Only One. Regardless of how many Critical Symbols you are showing, you resolve one .

You also resolve it before calculating and dealing damage... Which means, for those coming over from X-Wing, you resolve Critical effects even if the opponent has shields. (The Standard Effect being, paraphrased: "If you were to deal Damage cards this attack, the first one is face up...")

The "Fire Control Team" Upgrade allows you resolve a second, with some caveats.

If APT triggers and the crit is injured crew how does this work with defense tokens that have already been spent in that attack? E.g. A ship has one ready brace token which is exhausted. Does the effect of the crit mean the brace token is discarded before it's effect is realised or after?

Same case for NK-7s.

1 hour ago, Zamalekite said:

If APT triggers and the crit is injured crew how does this work with defense tokens that have already been spent in that attack?

Defense Tokens are spent during the "Spend Defense Tokens" step of the attack (Step 4).

Critical effects are resolved at the beginning of the "Resolve Damage" step of the attack (Step 5).

So a critical effect cannot prevent you from spending a Defense Token during the attack when that critical effect is resolved.

Quote

Injured Crew - Choose and discard 1 of your defense tokens. Then flip this card facedown

If you get this crit, even with APTs, you still discard your Defense Token after you have spent it, so you still get to resolve the effect of that token. If the token is an evade or scatter (or Contain with a DCO) it has its effect before the APT gets to trigger. If it is a brace or redirect it has its effect after the APT triggers, so after you have discarded that defense token. But you still spent the token during the Spend Defense Tokens step, so you still get to apply its effect.

Same with Faulty Countermeasures - which stops you from spending exhausted Defense Tokens. But by the time you suffer the crit effect, you've already spent the Tokens for that attack.

The ordering of APTs and Defense Tokens is particularly important with Redirects and Capacitor Failure, Projector Misaligned, and Shield Failure.

Capacitor Failure prevents you from spending redirects if a shieldless hull zone is being attacked. But that doesn't matter as you've already spent the Redirect by that point. However, both Projector Misaligned and Shield Failure apply before the normal damage from an attack comes in. So if you've declared to use a Redirect to a particular hull zone during Step 4 (you have to specify the hull zone then), you then suffer an APT that takes away all the shields on that hull zone, you can't Redirect to a different hull zone or "unspend" the Redirect.