Rules question sent to FFG, I'll reply when I get an answer.

When people ask me "What does pedantic mean?" I'm just going to start linking them to threads like this.

Not helpful. If you want to participate, participate. If you want to insult, find some other bridge to hide under.

Participate in circular parsing of terms to justify a preconceived conclusion?

No, thanks. I've been around here enough to know better.

I have an idea, though. Why don't you email FFG and, ya know... ask?

Wild thought, I know.

Yeah... I emailed them yesterday about this. No response, so I thought I'd bring it up here. I'm fully expecting a response saying that the intent is to allow the ability to work at three shields followed by an Errata or FAQ in the next update.

As it stands, the rules create a weird interaction where characters who are at 3 shields can't gain more. That has the side effect that Qui-Gon's ability can't be triggered if he's already at 3. Based on the comments I'm reading, it seems that most people think his ability triggers off TRYING to give him a shield. NOPE. It triggers off of him actually gaining that shield. The fact that it's a before ability doesn't matter. You still need to fulfill the trigger condition. With a before ability, you'd just pause and resolve the ability before finishing resolving the trigger condition.

Arguing intent is a fool's game.

As someone who has followed rules arguments followed by FAQs and Errata across multiple games: DO NOT ATTEMPT to guess FFG's RAI. Agree on an interpretation with your opponent before the situation arises, and wait for FFG to respond.

Your "NOPE" is wholly unqualified based on a very particular interpretation of one single word, that word being "ignored". This is generally why FFG is very good about printing a glossary of terms. They'll *probably* address this at some point in an FAQ, assuming more players than you struggle with it, but for now, literally *ALL* of our arguments are meaningless.

MOST people aren't going to have any problem with Qui Gon's ability activating with three shields, because frankly, the rules support it until such time as "ignored" is defined more precisely. I'll give you that it *could* be intentional, but I highly doubt it, as does pretty much everyone else.

Email FFG. Wait for a response. Post it when you get it.

These threads are a dime a dozen and they all go the same way, ending with a copy/pasted email from FFG support.

So... let me see if i understand this correctly:

QGJ has 3 Shields.

I resolve a "1 shield" die on QGJ.

QGJ loses a shield and does a damage.

QGJ gains a shield.

QGJ has 3 shields.

Yay or nay?

I don't see permission to resolve his ability as you have to slot that in right before he gains 1 or more shields and at no point in resolving a shield die when he's already at 3 is he going to gain 1 or more shields.

I think the question we need an answer to is as follows...

Does a shield that is ignored due to a character already having three shields still count as being gained for the purpose of abilities that trigger off of gaining shields?

The rules as written don't answer this question.

If the answer is yes, Qui-Gon's ability can be used when he has three shields.

If the answer is no, Qui-Gon's ability cannot be used when he has three shields.

This is not the correct order of operations nor is it how the rules define this situation!

Refer to page 16 if the RRG. It will teach you about Triggered Abilities and what the word BEFORE means in this game and how it enters the queue.

This is not even an issue, as the rules CLEARLY define how this works.

1) You decide to resolve a shield dice

2) BEFORE your resolve the shield dice (it is now waiting in the queue and has not resolved) QGJ's ability is triggered

3) QGJ ability is sitting in the queue and resolves BEFORE the resolve dice action

4) The resolve dice action now takes place and QGJ is declared the target.

Yup yup!

Curious to see what you guys make of this.

Let's say I have a First Order Stormtrooper in play. He has 3 shields. It's my turn to perform an action. I choose to Resolve Dice and choose the shield icon. I resolve a single shield die, choosing my Stormtrooper. Given that the Stormtrooper is already a 3 shields, the extra shield is ignored.

Did the Stormtrooper gain a shield? Yes or no.

Yes he did.... though it went right back to the token pile.

Look at it from this case....

Echo Base is your Battlefield. Every character on the board has 3 shields... and you both are all out of dice and cards. What happens when you claim the battlefield? Does the universe implode???? Or do you simply give a character a shield and it slides right off and goes back to the pile of tokens?

So... let me see if i understand this correctly:

QGJ has 3 Shields.

I resolve a "1 shield" die on QGJ.

QGJ loses a shield and does a damage.

QGJ gains a shield.

QGJ has 3 shields.

Yay or nay?

I don't see permission to resolve his ability as you have to slot that in right before he gains 1 or more shields and at no point in resolving a shield die when he's already at 3 is he going to gain 1 or more shields.

I think the question we need an answer to is as follows...

Does a shield that is ignored due to a character already having three shields still count as being gained for the purpose of abilities that trigger off of gaining shields?

The rules as written don't answer this question.

If the answer is yes, Qui-Gon's ability can be used when he has three shields.

If the answer is no, Qui-Gon's ability cannot be used when he has three shields.

This is not the correct order of operations nor is it how the rules define this situation!

Refer to page 16 if the RRG. It will teach you about Triggered Abilities and what the word BEFORE means in this game and how it enters the queue.

This is not even an issue, as the rules CLEARLY define how this works.

1) You decide to resolve a shield dice

2) BEFORE your resolve the shield dice (it is now waiting in the queue and has not resolved) QGJ's ability is triggered

3) QGJ ability is sitting in the queue and resolves BEFORE the resolve dice action

4) The resolve dice action now takes place and QGJ is declared the target.

Yup yup!

Curious to see what you guys make of this.

Let's say I have a First Order Stormtrooper in play. He has 3 shields. It's my turn to perform an action. I choose to Resolve Dice and choose the shield icon. I resolve a single shield die, choosing my Stormtrooper. Given that the Stormtrooper is already a 3 shields, the extra shield is ignored.

Did the Stormtrooper gain a shield? Yes or no.

Yes he did.... though it went right back to the token pile.

Look at it from this case....

Echo Base is your Battlefield. Every character on the board has 3 shields... and you both are all out of dice and cards. What happens when you claim the battlefield? Does the universe implode???? Or do you simply give a character a shield and it slides right off and goes back to the pile of tokens?

The rules are clear. You pick a character and then ignore the shield as he's already at 3. I'm not sure why anyone would interpret that as gaining a shield. The character gained nothing. A shield token was ignored. That is all.

Come on, Crabbock.

You know as well as I do that no matter how well crafted your argument is, it's going to be rejected based on the single solitary tenuous fingerhold of "Ignored isn't defined".

I mean, you're pretty obviously correct, but that's not the point of this thread.

Just let FFG handle it, like they always do, and we'll have a solid precedent for definition of the word "ignore" in the future.

Come on, Crabbock.

You know as well as I do that no matter how well crafted your argument is, it's going to be rejected based on the single solitary tenuous fingerhold of "Ignored isn't defined".

I mean, you're pretty obviously correct, but that's not the point of this thread.

Just let FFG handle it, like they always do, and we'll have a solid precedent for definition of the word "ignore" in the future.

Gained also isn't defined, so I'm relying on basic English. If I start at 3 and I end at 3, I've gained nothing. The ability triggers off of gaining something. So... I have yet to see a compelling argument to count going from 3 to 3 as gaining a shield.

Come on, Crabbock.

You know as well as I do that no matter how well crafted your argument is, it's going to be rejected based on the single solitary tenuous fingerhold of "Ignored isn't defined".

I mean, you're pretty obviously correct, but that's not the point of this thread.

Just let FFG handle it, like they always do, and we'll have a solid precedent for definition of the word "ignore" in the future.

Gained also isn't defined, so I'm relying on basic English. If I start at 3 and I end at 3, I've gained nothing. The ability triggers off of gaining something. So... I have yet to see a compelling argument to count going from 3 to 3 as gaining a shield.

Shuffle isn't defined either.

Guess we can't play.

Come on, Crabbock.

You know as well as I do that no matter how well crafted your argument is, it's going to be rejected based on the single solitary tenuous fingerhold of "Ignored isn't defined".

I mean, you're pretty obviously correct, but that's not the point of this thread.

Just let FFG handle it, like they always do, and we'll have a solid precedent for definition of the word "ignore" in the future.

Gained also isn't defined, so I'm relying on basic English. If I start at 3 and I end at 3, I've gained nothing. The ability triggers off of gaining something. So... I have yet to see a compelling argument to count going from 3 to 3 as gaining a shield.

Shuffle isn't defined either.

Guess we can't play.

Shuffle has a normal English definition we can fall back on. So does Gain. I wouldn't normally say that going from 3 to 3 counted as gaining one or more. I'm not sure why you do.

Curious to see what you guys make of this.

Let's say I have a First Order Stormtrooper in play. He has 3 shields. It's my turn to perform an action. I choose to Resolve Dice and choose the shield icon. I resolve a single shield die, choosing my Stormtrooper. Given that the Stormtrooper is already a 3 shields, the extra shield is ignored.

Did the Stormtrooper gain a shield? Yes or no.

No, but before the die is fully resolved, it was about to, which per the Rules Reference is when Qui-Gon's ability triggers.

Your example would have it check the status AFTER the shield is gained or not. His ability is BEFORE.

Ok, so you acknowledge that in a situation where a character already has 3 shields, that assigning him another one does NOT cause him to gain a shield. Qui-Gon's ability triggers off gaining a shield. It does NOT trigger off of being assigned a shield. You'd need to resolve the shield die and as you're about to put the shield token on his card, stop and resolve his ability as you've triggered its before condition.

How are you triggering his before condition (gains 1 or more shields) when you've acknowledged that he's not gaining 1 or more shields?

But he's about to, which is what I said, which is also what the example of his ability in the rules reference says...

Yeah, but if he's already at 3, he's NOT about to. If he's at 0 or 1 or 2, then he's about to. If he's at 3, he's not about to. He's about to stay at 3.

I guess that comes down to when the check on the number of shields he already has happens. If it's after the action resolves, then the game state is that he's about to gain a shield. Triggering his ability.

Come on, Crabbock.

You know as well as I do that no matter how well crafted your argument is, it's going to be rejected based on the single solitary tenuous fingerhold of "Ignored isn't defined".

I mean, you're pretty obviously correct, but that's not the point of this thread.

Just let FFG handle it, like they always do, and we'll have a solid precedent for definition of the word "ignore" in the future.

Gained also isn't defined, so I'm relying on basic English. If I start at 3 and I end at 3, I've gained nothing. The ability triggers off of gaining something. So... I have yet to see a compelling argument to count going from 3 to 3 as gaining a shield.

Shuffle isn't defined either.

Guess we can't play.

Shuffle has a normal English definition we can fall back on. So does Gain. I wouldn't normally say that going from 3 to 3 counted as gaining one or more. I'm not sure why you do.

I'll take "making my point for me" for 500 Republic Credits.

When people ask me "What does pedantic mean?" I'm just going to start linking them to threads like this.

Not helpful. If you want to participate, participate. If you want to insult, find some other bridge to hide under.

Participate in circular parsing of terms to justify a preconceived conclusion?

No, thanks. I've been around here enough to know better.

I have an idea, though. Why don't you email FFG and, ya know... ask?

Wild thought, I know.

Yeah... I emailed them yesterday about this. No response, so I thought I'd bring it up here. I'm fully expecting a response saying that the intent is to allow the ability to work at three shields followed by an Errata or FAQ in the next update.

As it stands, the rules create a weird interaction where characters who are at 3 shields can't gain more. That has the side effect that Qui-Gon's ability can't be triggered if he's already at 3. Based on the comments I'm reading, it seems that most people think his ability triggers off TRYING to give him a shield. NOPE. It triggers off of him actually gaining that shield. The fact that it's a before ability doesn't matter. You still need to fulfill the trigger condition. With a before ability, you'd just pause and resolve the ability before finishing resolving the trigger condition.

To be fair, I think you just want to read it your way. While I understand your points, but they are no more or less valid than any of the other opinions.

The word "gains" seems to be the main point of contention, but from my initial scans, I am not seeing any term in the rules that qualifies what the mechanical definition of "gains" is.

The Rulebook and Reference use the words Give, Given, Place, and Have. I did not find the word gains used except on Qui-Gon Jinn's card (and local garrison).

I'll agree that there is some grey area here, but when that happens I revert back to the Golden Rule.

Kriswell, consider this. I choose to resolve a die and hit for 5 damage. Han has 1 hp left, I resolve the 5 damage on han. Do I do 1 damage or 5, because the excess is "ignored"?

Come on, Crabbock.

You know as well as I do that no matter how well crafted your argument is, it's going to be rejected based on the single solitary tenuous fingerhold of "Ignored isn't defined".

I mean, you're pretty obviously correct, but that's not the point of this thread.

Just let FFG handle it, like they always do, and we'll have a solid precedent for definition of the word "ignore" in the future.

Gained also isn't defined, so I'm relying on basic English. If I start at 3 and I end at 3, I've gained nothing. The ability triggers off of gaining something. So... I have yet to see a compelling argument to count going from 3 to 3 as gaining a shield.

Shuffle isn't defined either.

Guess we can't play.

Shuffle has a normal English definition we can fall back on. So does Gain. I wouldn't normally say that going from 3 to 3 counted as gaining one or more. I'm not sure why you do.

"Example: Qui-Gon Jinn (r37) is about to gain a shield, which is the trigger condition for his ability that says “Before this character gains 1 or more shields, you may remove 1 of his shields to deal 1 damage to a character.”

While I have been accused of using English poorly in the past, I am pretty sure that the normal English interpretation of "is about" means that they have yet to gain the shield.

This argument can't be resolved until we get an answer to the following question.

Do shields that are ignored due to a character already having three shields still count as being gained?

The answer is super important and isn't in the rules, so far as I can tell.

So let's review how this game is played...

1) The player has 1 or more dice with the shield symbol

2) BEFORE the player takes the Action to Resolve shield dice, QGJ's ability is triggered

3) QGJ's ability sits first in the Queue. He currently has 3 shields and removes one to bring his total down to 2 and deals one damage to an opponent's character

4) The Dice showing Shield symbols are now resolved. QGJ is a legal target because he only has 2 shields.

Look at it from this case....

Echo Base is your Battlefield. Every character on the board has 3 shields... and you both are all out of dice and cards. What happens when you claim the battlefield? Does the universe implode???? Or do you simply give a character a shield and it slides right off and goes back to the pile of tokens?

The rules are clear. You pick a character and then ignore the shield as he's already at 3. I'm not sure why anyone would interpret that as gaining a shield. The character gained nothing. A shield token was ignored. That is all.

I highlighted the part in red because that's what I'm going to talk about here...

The Battlefield above doesn't say:

Claim: Choose a character. Determine how many shields that character has. If that number is 3 or more, then grant them the "Ignore Shield" ability. If they have 2 or less shields, give them a shield.

My point is, the only way to arrive at the "Ignore" part, is for someone to GAIN, when they already have 3.

Think about that for a minute.

...

You don't ignore a gained shield when you only had 1 shield.... So you follow steps when determining if a character must ignore it's shield or not. Suppose you resolve a 2 shield die on a character with 2 shields.... Do you simply ignore BOTH shields because that would make 4? NO... they gain 2, as per the die... but when you are doing the assigning of tokens, the 4th cannot be applied.

In other words, you cannot possibly IGNORE any shields, without FIRST having GAINED a shield in excess of 3 in the first place.

This argument can't be resolved until we get an answer to the following question.

Do shields that are ignored due to a character already having three shields still count as being gained?

The answer is super important and isn't in the rules, so far as I can tell.

So let's review how this game is played...

1) The player has 1 or more dice with the shield symbol

2) BEFORE the player takes the Action to Resolve shield dice, QGJ's ability is triggered

3) QGJ's ability sits first in the Queue. He currently has 3 shields and removes one to bring his total down to 2 and deals one damage to an opponent's character

4) The Dice showing Shield symbols are now resolved. QGJ is a legal target because he only has 2 shields.

Thing is, he's a legal target even if he has three shields. He gains a shield, and the shield is "ignored" i.e. the token is not placed on the card.

This is explained fairly clearly in the RRG. Our intrepid OP is stuck on what "ignored" means in this context.

This argument can't be resolved until we get an answer to the following question.

Do shields that are ignored due to a character already having three shields still count as being gained?

The answer is super important and isn't in the rules, so far as I can tell.

So let's review how this game is played...

1) The player has 1 or more dice with the shield symbol

2) BEFORE the player takes the Action to Resolve shield dice, QGJ's ability is triggered

3) QGJ's ability sits first in the Queue. He currently has 3 shields and removes one to bring his total down to 2 and deals one damage to an opponent's character

4) The Dice showing Shield symbols are now resolved. QGJ is a legal target because he only has 2 shields.

Thing is, he's a legal target even if he has three shields. He gains a shield, and the shield is "ignored" i.e. the token is not placed on the card.

This is explained fairly clearly in the RRG. Our intrepid OP is stuck on what "ignored" means in this context.

He gains a shield and the result of gaining that shield is ignored because when you try to resolve it... (IE place a shield token on Qui Gon), you then have to check his limit and determine if you can place it on him or not.

This argument can't be resolved until we get an answer to the following question.

Do shields that are ignored due to a character already having three shields still count as being gained?

The answer is super important and isn't in the rules, so far as I can tell.

So let's review how this game is played...

1) The player has 1 or more dice with the shield symbol

2) BEFORE the player takes the Action to Resolve shield dice, QGJ's ability is triggered

3) QGJ's ability sits first in the Queue. He currently has 3 shields and removes one to bring his total down to 2 and deals one damage to an opponent's character

4) The Dice showing Shield symbols are now resolved. QGJ is a legal target because he only has 2 shields.

Thing is, he's a legal target even if he has three shields. He gains a shield, and the shield is "ignored" i.e. the token is not placed on the card.

This is explained fairly clearly in the RRG. Our intrepid OP is stuck on what "ignored" means in this context.

He gains a shield and the result of gaining that shield is ignored because when you try to resolve it... (IE place a shield token on Qui Gon), you then have to check his limit and determine if you can place it on him or not.

Yep, and before that check ever happens, his ability resolves, leaving him with two, and not having to ignore anything.

Preaching to the choir.

Kriswell, consider this. I choose to resolve a die and hit for 5 damage. Han has 1 hp left, I resolve the 5 damage on han. Do I do 1 damage or 5, because the excess is "ignored"?

The rules clearly cover this. You DEALT 5 damage and Han TAKES 1 damage. The rule book differentiates dealing damage and taking damage.

Kriswell, consider this. I choose to resolve a die and hit for 5 damage. Han has 1 hp left, I resolve the 5 damage on han. Do I do 1 damage or 5, because the excess is "ignored"?

The rules clearly cover this. You DEALT 5 damage and Han TAKES 1 damage. The rule book differentiates dealing damage and taking damage.

Then wouldnt he only be dealt 1 damage? the rest of the dealt damaged is ignored.

I'm reading lots of comments saying that when a character with 3 shields gains a shield that you ignore it... therefore requiring the character to gain the shield before it can be ignored. This isn't what the rules actually say, though.

This is what the rules actually say... "A character cannot have more than 3 shields. Any excess shields that WOULD BE GIVEN to the character are ignored."

The emphasis is mine. In other words, if you would give a character a 4th shield, you ignore that shield and don't give it to the character. I think it's very reasonable to say a character didn't gain a shield that it wasn't given.

Kriswell, consider this. I choose to resolve a die and hit for 5 damage. Han has 1 hp left, I resolve the 5 damage on han. Do I do 1 damage or 5, because the excess is "ignored"?

The rules clearly cover this. You DEALT 5 damage and Han TAKES 1 damage. The rule book differentiates dealing damage and taking damage.

Then wouldnt he only be dealt 1 damage? the rest of the dealt damaged is ignored.

Nope. Again, clearly covered in the rules. You DEALT 5 damage to Han. He TAKES 1 damage and then dies. The remaining 4 don't have a practical effect as Han is dead at that point. You might want to re-read the rules about dealing versus taking damage.

So now we're at "give" vs "gain"

Nope. This isn't a waste of time at all.

Kriswell, consider this. I choose to resolve a die and hit for 5 damage. Han has 1 hp left, I resolve the 5 damage on han. Do I do 1 damage or 5, because the excess is "ignored"?

The rules clearly cover this. You DEALT 5 damage and Han TAKES 1 damage. The rule book differentiates dealing damage and taking damage.

Then wouldnt he only be dealt 1 damage? the rest of the dealt damaged is ignored.

Nope. Again, clearly covered in the rules. You DEALT 5 damage to Han. He TAKES 1 damage and then dies. The remaining 4 don't have a practical effect as Han is dead at that point. You might want to re-read the rules about dealing versus taking damage.

This actually proves my point. Just because something is ignored doesnt mean it has a value of 0. So back to the question am I dealing 1 damage or 5 damage? If I can deal more damage to a target than health, why cant I gain more than 3 shields?

1. Any excess damage dealt to a character from a source that defeats the character is ignored. A player can deal more damage to a character than they have health, even when distributing the damage as they wish (e.g., from the special on the F-11D Rifle).

So now we're at "give" vs "gain"

Nope. This isn't a waste of time at all.

Sarcasm noted. We all know what Dostoyevsky had to say about it.

Would you care to explain your point? My stance is that a character who is not given a shield doesn't gain that shield. Everyone else in the thread seems to think that a character who is not given a shield due to it being ignored has still gained that shield. I have yet to see an explanation that reconciles that discrepancy.