If you're concerned with the prototype being destroyed you wouldn't fly it into combat.

Wait, 3 unique prototypes without an escort? Sounds fishy to me!

I don't think there was anything the OP did technically wrong, the error is that they're playing the NPCs like pieces in a tactical mini game and not a narrative RPG. Good tactics in a mini game says that's the way to use the movement and game rules to counter the PCs actions. Playing the game like how actual pilots would behave when their comrades are in mortal danger, and how fighter pilots actually work is completely different imo. The fault isn't one of rules it's divesting the NPCs actions from any sort of 'human' element and treating the encounter like a math equation.

Don't tell anyone I said this, but the pirate's right. It was a tactical move that didn't have a real narrative reason. I could maybe see a pilot moving off after one or two futile attacks; moving off to assess the situation. In the times I've had Brilliant Evasion come up, there was usually another PC ship to pick on, but I would usually have the NPC "lose" at least one action "trying" to shoot the Evasive ship.

Something else you could have done. After seeing how the YT pilot is evading him, the TIE pilot might switch to just firing shots to corral the freighter into a better line of site for the other TIEs. (essentially, an assist maneuver to give another Rival a boost) Also, Brilliant Evasion prevents the NPC from making attacks, but does not prevent other actions. The TIE could actually use Evasive Manuever and attempt to Gain the Advantage (which is not an attack) Sure, he won't be able to use the advantage until the Evasion expires, but it might add pressure, especially if he gains in the last round of Evasion. Narrating this also gives the player a sense that the Talent was a good investment. "The TIE swoops in on your freighter's weak side, raining blaster fire, but your erratic pattern confused him and all of the bolts fly uselessly into space."

Given the type of NPC this was, a fairly minor, low threat although very focused character, I probably would have said "he is out of the fight for the next 4 rounds".

The problem is this NPC is not capable of much else. If it was a more rounded NPC then they may have had talents etc to fall back upon. What I would therefore suggest is when preparing encounters try to remember the abilities of your PC's, you could have dangled a bit of a carrot here for the Pilot PC to get more reward from the use of their SigAb. A Squadron Leader for example could have done things to help their comrades,

But in this particular situation you could have perhaps had the Tie Ace perform a "Scan the Enemy" action, they have a decent enough Cunning that they could pull it off, plus equipment that grants an automatic boost to Perception checks... Then they do have a reason to flee, probably after informing their comrades of the level of danger they are in. It would take a turn or 2 longer, but you can narrate it out nicely to be this pilot saying "Dam that ship agile, can't even get a trace on it... what's the scanner say?"

I agree with your decision to let the TIE retreat, but like others have said, it should have served a purpose within the story. Perhaps he took a glancing shot that temporarily disabled his weapons systems and all the test pilots were ordered to break off pursuit and save the prototypes while the Empire sent in a Gozanti carrying a TIE squadron to cover their escape.

Personnally, I would have make the NPC wastes his turns trying to shoot a target he couldn't hit but I like the narrative of the OP.

Okay, I'm gonna disagree with a couple of points people have raised, the "a good pilot wouldn't abandon his comrades" and the "TIE fighters are suicidal" ones. First off, as he is not only a good pilot but good enough to be a test pilot he would NOT be suicidal, these guys are better than the standard TIE pilot, and are flying prototypes that require them to be cautious enough to deal with the kinks in the system, so no these guys are not the suicide ones, in my mind anyway. Them being good, they would also know when they are not able to provide anything useful to the situation and I can easily see a pilot pulling out because they find themselves in an awkward position where they cannot do much in order to approach from a different vector, and in fact would probably be the narrative explanation for how the ability worked in this case. Abandoning your comrades? In war sometimes you got to cut your losses, experience and skill is the ability to know when that is. I would actually argue the real 'issue' would be why the squadron as a whole didn't run once it became clear they were gonna lose and were outmatched, good pilots would recognise this and pull out to get reinforcements rather than throw their lives away.

The player has still gotten good use out of his ability, he has managed to take an enemy out of the fight entirely for those rounds, and since the fight was still going when it ran out then they obviously were still focusing on the others that could still fight so it didn't matter that the one guy who couldn't shoot didn't hang around since they probably would have ignored him until they got rid of the others anyway.

In my experience: as long as you develop a good and realistic "decision making AI" for your enemies and can justify their behavior with narrative when asked, you should be fine. To default to fantasy: wolves shouldn't focus a cleric, but experienced mercenaries sure might. Ask yourself "if this were a movie, would the behavior of the bad guys make sense to me, watching it?". If the answer is "yes", you're probably in the right - you've told a good, consistent story, and that's what this is about. If the answer is "no", you need to figure out if you're just trying to beat your players. That's no fun.

In this case? Well, see above comments. It's a bit up in the air whether the pilot would leave; from your OP, I can't see either side really justifying with narrative, save the "as an experienced pilot, he would see that he's outclassed" part - which I agree with, by the way. A novice pilot might be screaming in frustration as their shots keep missing the dancing ship in front of them, but this guy would be like "this vector is useless".

Given the type of NPC this was, a fairly minor, low threat although very focused character, I probably would have said "he is out of the fight for the next 4 rounds".

The problem is this NPC is not capable of much else. If it was a more rounded NPC then they may have had talents etc to fall back upon. What I would therefore suggest is when preparing encounters try to remember the abilities of your PC's, you could have dangled a bit of a carrot here for the Pilot PC to get more reward from the use of their SigAb. A Squadron Leader for example could have done things to help their comrades,

But in this particular situation you could have perhaps had the Tie Ace perform a "Scan the Enemy" action, they have a decent enough Cunning that they could pull it off, plus equipment that grants an automatic boost to Perception checks... Then they do have a reason to flee, probably after informing their comrades of the level of danger they are in. It would take a turn or 2 longer, but you can narrate it out nicely to be this pilot saying "Dam that ship agile, can't even get a trace on it... what's the scanner say?"

I see what you are saying, though I hesitate to call a Rival level NPC "fairly minor." Maybe they weren't Aces, but I wouldn't say that test pilots are nobodies. (Hal Jordan, anyone?)

But to your point, I don't see any reason that an NPC has to be effective when under the effect of the Brilliant Evasion talent. Nor does he have to be safe while he waits it out. Having the TIE remain in range of the freighter's weapons while completely unable to land a shot is perfectly within reason for a 25 point talent.

As GM, I would probably welcome the opportunity to have one less NPC to worry about for the time being, and with multiple fighters, that should be the players' concern as well. When there are multiple fighters and 1 is not attacking, taking potshots at the useless opponent doesn't make sense. But, just to keep it interesting, if they decide to shoot the guy who can't shoot back, after 1 round the pilot might realize that he's been given the slip, and switch to Evasive maneuvers, but keep after the ship. Meanwhile, his buddies Stay on Target, taking advantage of the fact that their ally has them on the chase.

Given the type of NPC this was, a fairly minor, low threat although very focused character, I probably would have said "he is out of the fight for the next 4 rounds".

The problem is this NPC is not capable of much else. If it was a more rounded NPC then they may have had talents etc to fall back upon. What I would therefore suggest is when preparing encounters try to remember the abilities of your PC's, you could have dangled a bit of a carrot here for the Pilot PC to get more reward from the use of their SigAb. A Squadron Leader for example could have done things to help their comrades,

But in this particular situation you could have perhaps had the Tie Ace perform a "Scan the Enemy" action, they have a decent enough Cunning that they could pull it off, plus equipment that grants an automatic boost to Perception checks... Then they do have a reason to flee, probably after informing their comrades of the level of danger they are in. It would take a turn or 2 longer, but you can narrate it out nicely to be this pilot saying "Dam that ship agile, can't even get a trace on it... what's the scanner say?"

I see what you are saying, though I hesitate to call a Rival level NPC "fairly minor." Maybe they weren't Aces, but I wouldn't say that test pilots are nobodies. (Hal Jordan, anyone?)

But to your point, I don't see any reason that an NPC has to be effective when under the effect of the Brilliant Evasion talent. Nor does he have to be safe while he waits it out. Having the TIE remain in range of the freighter's weapons while completely unable to land a shot is perfectly within reason for a 25 point talent.

As GM, I would probably welcome the opportunity to have one less NPC to worry about for the time being, and with multiple fighters, that should be the players' concern as well. When there are multiple fighters and 1 is not attacking, taking potshots at the useless opponent doesn't make sense. But, just to keep it interesting, if they decide to shoot the guy who can't shoot back, after 1 round the pilot might realize that he's been given the slip, and switch to Evasive maneuvers, but keep after the ship. Meanwhile, his buddies Stay on Target, taking advantage of the fact that their ally has them on the chase.

These NPC's are definitely low level Rivals though, these are not Hal, he would be IMHO a Nemesis, or at least a much more broadly skilled and talented rival.

The point of the Scan Enemy example was to give a reason for the NPC to run like the OP did.

All very interesting but the simple fact of the matter is the Chase rules were not used . Moving a target out of range and parking it somewhere where the PCs can't attack it for five rounds is simply not using the rules correctly , or just plain cheating . The PCs should have been able to chase down the fleeing target if they wanted to. Since the PC pilot was pretty good , at least enough to have brilliant evasion and some good stats , not only should they have been given an opportunity to catch the fleeing target , depending on the area where the fight is occurring they very well may have outrun the other two fighters and positioned themselves to engage the fleeing target while not suffering any attacks from the other two for possibly a round . So as far as I'm concerned the PCs weren't treated right .

All very interesting but the simple fact of the matter is the Chase rules were not used . Moving a target out of range and parking it somewhere where the PCs can't attack it for five rounds is simply not using the rules correctly , or just plain cheating . The PCs should have been able to chase down the fleeing target if they wanted to. Since the PC pilot was pretty good , at least enough to have brilliant evasion and some good stats , not only should they have been given an opportunity to catch the fleeing target , depending on the area where the fight is occurring they very well may have outrun the other two fighters and positioned themselves to engage the fleeing target while not suffering any attacks from the other two for possibly a round . So as far as I'm concerned the PCs weren't treated right .

Did I miss a post where it was said the PCs moved to engage or chase the TIE that fled? It takes two to chase, and if the players didn't make an attempt to chase the TIE, then that's on them too.

I believe they said it was wrong to the GM and were given a tfb narrative answer so no, it's not on them, it's on the GM because they're running the table.

Just to review even though this NPC failed their Brilliant Evasion counter roll, they were magically gifted with the ability to move out of range of the PCs weapons, maintain that distance automatically and not be threatened, and then magically know precisely when Brilliant Evasion was no longer effecting them and move back to engage. Even though they failed the Brilliant Evasion counter roll, all through their superior narratively gifted analysis abilities which apparently weren't good enough to win the roll but were good enough to move into an automatic 'you can't hurt me' position. Shudder to think what NPCs could do at that table if they win their rolls. Sure, no cheating there, uh huh.

I believe they said it was wrong to the GM and were given a tfb narrative answer so no, it's not on them, it's on the GM because they're running the table.

From the original description, one player objected to the NPC retreating out of range. No mention is made of the player(s) attempting to give chase. Back to requiring two to tango.

Well, the player's objection was:

[... In his mind, the enemy pilot could not have known that he was facing a better pilot, and should have remained in the dogfight to TRY to (futilely) attack the freighter. Essentially: surrendering his action every round to commit "suicide by PC."

And, with all due respect, above is a ridiculous assumption.

Chasing their helpless foe, apparently, never crossed their mind. Who am I, as a GM, to point out that option. As far as I can deduce from the OP: No chase initiated, no chase rules applied.

When you're putting a fish in a bucket to shoot it, don't be indignant, if it tries and hops out of it.

That's lame as hell, as the GM you know there's a rule the PCs aren't thinking of and you deliberately don't point it out, that's such weak sauce.

It only proves my point of treating it like a competitive tabletop tactical mini game and not a narrative RPG. The GM is supposed to be facilitating narrative RRG play, not taking advantage of PCs oversights to get a tactical leg up.

That's lame as hell, as the GM you know there's a rule the PCs aren't thinking of and you deliberately don't point it out, that's such weak sauce.

It only proves my point of treating it like a competitive tabletop tactical mini game and not a narrative RPG. The GM is supposed to be facilitating narrative RRG play, not taking advantage of PCs oversights to get a tactical leg up.

I'd agree with you in general, I just don't see that as being the case here (though I could be mistaken).

That's lame as hell, as the GM you know there's a rule the PCs aren't thinking of and you deliberately don't point it out, that's such weak sauce.

It only proves my point of treating it like a competitive tabletop tactical mini game and not a narrative RPG. The GM is supposed to be facilitating narrative RRG play, not taking advantage of PCs oversights to get a tactical leg up.

I would respectfully disagree.

I wouldn't say the players being able to pursue the fleeing enemy is a "rule" that must be pointed out to them, but rather an option that they either didn't consider or opted not to take. Player agency is a concept that gets a tremendous amount of support on these boards. I would think that feeding the players with all options available at every turn would take that away.

Allow me to illustrate: in a game this weekend, our group was escaping with liberated prisoners aboard a stolen bus equivalent. We were pulled over by authorities. We got out of that, including another squad car that came by in response to a distress call. As we got back underway, I had another PC disable the GPS system so we couldn't be located again. Had we not done so, I would not expect the GM to ask us if we were going to do that...we'd just be subject to more stops and potentially worse outcomes to them.

That's lame as hell, as the GM you know there's a rule the PCs aren't thinking of and you deliberately don't point it out, that's such weak sauce.

It only proves my point of treating it like a competitive tabletop tactical mini game and not a narrative RPG. The GM is supposed to be facilitating narrative RRG play, not taking advantage of PCs oversights to get a tactical leg up.

Where actually did I imply, the Players would have had to invoke "The Chase" (EotE CRB, p. 241)? The option, I was talking about, simply was: To chase or not to chase? They could've just said something like: " We're gonna follow him." Et voilà: The Chase! It is not the GM's job to suggest certain actions to the players but in the direst narrative logjam.

From your first post on, I conjecture, you implied the GM had the NPC flee, the PCs wanting to chase him and being denied. Well, it's nowhere in the OP, as far as I remember.

So this NPC fails his Brilliant Evasion roll, which means he/she actually sucks at analyzing the PCs that's why they can't hit them. So in response to them being sucky at analyzing the PCs the GM narratively gifts him the knowledge to withdraw to a range they can't be engaged at, and with a failed Brilliant Evasion roll they still magically know how many rounds precisely when they can move back into range and have an opportunity to the roll the dice and attack again. That is straight up meta gaming cheating BS.

So this NPC fails his Brilliant Evasion roll, which means he/she actually sucks at analyzing the PCs that's why they can't hit them. So in response to them being sucky at analyzing the PCs the GM narratively gifts him the knowledge to withdraw to a range they can't be engaged at, and with a failed Brilliant Evasion roll they still magically know how many rounds precisely when they can move back into range and have an opportunity to the roll the dice and attack again. That is straight up meta gaming cheating BS.

But, that's not what happened. What really happened was:

The PC Pilot did an incredible loop-barrel roll-spiralling shift and was suddenly out of sight. When the TIE determined their relative positions, he immediately (being the bad ass test pilot he was) figured out that it would be impossible to get an attack vector without some complex manoeuvring. So he hit these new experimental afterburners they were testing to gain a little distance, assess the situation, and get in position for a new attack run.

Now that I think of it, what truly happened was:

The TIE realised that he was outclassed and outgunned by the PC. So his first and foremost duty to the Emperor was saving at least that one of those invaluable test crafts, he had the honour to fly.

So this NPC fails his Brilliant Evasion roll, which means he/she actually sucks at analyzing the PCs that's why they can't hit them. So in response to them being sucky at analyzing the PCs the GM narratively gifts him the knowledge to withdraw to a range they can't be engaged at, and with a failed Brilliant Evasion roll they still magically know how many rounds precisely when they can move back into range and have an opportunity to the roll the dice and attack again. That is straight up meta gaming cheating BS.

That first part jives with what the OP said: the NPC pilot knew he was outclassed at the moment, and withdrew to gather his wits/observe his opponent better/however you want to describe it.

But the "meta gaming cheating BS" charge could, as easily, be flipped. The PC's, during those rounds that the NPC can't do anything to them, focus on the other NPC's who can. Why? Because they know nothing's coming from that one. How do the PC's know he's not a threat for a certain number of rounds? It's an unavoidable side effect of player knowledge that there are artificial mechanics involved.

In this case, the GM elected to narrate the NPC's actions as withdrawing to better assess the situation. Sounds reasonable. At that point, the PC's could choose to pursue (doesn't sound like they even thought of that; they complained about him being out of range, but did nothing to close that distance) or focus on the immediate threats. They opted to do the latter. Also fair and reasonable.

If the guy was a test pilot flying an experimental craft he might very naturally have reasoned that his primary task was to keep the prototype from being destroyed.

While his team in identical fighters are left to rot? Now, I may not be Sun Tzu, but that just doesn't sound like military training to me, even Imperial military training.

"Sorry, Commander - Gray 2 and 3 were good pilots, but not good enough to handle the prototype. However, it looks like the field from whom to choose that promotion from just shrank to a candidate of one. . . "

If there's only one survivor, there's only one version of the After Action report.

If the guy was a test pilot flying an experimental craft he might very naturally have reasoned that his primary task was to keep the prototype from being destroyed.

While his team in identical fighters are left to rot? Now, I may not be Sun Tzu, but that just doesn't sound like military training to me, even Imperial military training.

"Sorry, Commander - Gray 2 and 3 were good pilots, but not good enough to handle the prototype. However, it looks like the field from whom to choose that promotion from just shrank to a candidate of one. . . "

If there's only one survivor, there's only one version of the After Action report.

Then there are telemetry and flight recording; nothing a formidable Computers check can't fix.

That first part jives with what the OP said: the NPC pilot knew he was outclassed at the moment, and withdrew to gather his wits/observe his opponent better/however you want to describe it.

Although that reasonably only ought to happen once the NPC pilot actually knows this - the talent itself doesn't throw up a giant status effect symbol, so unless/until the pilot actually takes a few shots, they won't be any the wiser.

That first part jives with what the OP said: the NPC pilot knew he was outclassed at the moment, and withdrew to gather his wits/observe his opponent better/however you want to describe it.

Although that reasonably only ought to happen once the NPC pilot actually knows this - the talent itself doesn't throw up a giant status effect symbol, so unless/until the pilot actually takes a few shots, they won't be any the wiser.

Going back to the original description (emphasis mine)--

The crew's YT-1300 was jumped by three experimental TIE fighters flown by Imperial test pilots - I used the Rival TIE pilot card from the Adversary deck (Agility 4, Pilot 2, Gunnery 2).

After a couple of exchanges of fire, the crew's pilot (Agility 5, Pilot 3) used his 25xp "Brilliant Evasion" talent which calls for an Opposed Check against 1 opponent to "stop [the] opponent from attacking [the] character" for a number of rounds equal to the PC's Agility.

If we take "a couple of exchanges of fire" to mean 2 or more rounds of combat, the NPC pilot did take a few shots, Brilliant Evasion takes effect, narratively described as the NPC recognizing that his opponent has him outclassed, or at least needs to be reevaluated by the NPC.