1 minute ago, Tramp Graphics said:

No, that’s not what I’m implying. My point is that Advantages aren’t cancelled out by a Despair.

In the standard roll they are not, but when spent they act that way. 1 despair equals up to 3 threat. Again I am not saying that autofire does not trigger, I am saying, as per the rules listed above the weapon runs out of ammo before the damage for the autofire happens. Lets look at the rules again shall we?

6 minutes ago, Tramp Graphics said:

The effects of the Advantages/Threats take effect before Triumphs and Despairs are calculated.  As such, the additional hits granted by Autofire weapons from Advantages must take effect before you a  pply any “out of ammo” from   a Despair. 

You have mixed up the order of operations, advantages and triumphs are spent before threats and despair. this distinction is important.

Page 211 implies this order is primarily less technical, and more procedural, because 2 individual people are applying the checks.

"In the same fashion in which the controlling player determines how to spend advantages and triumphs in his combat check, the GM then determines how to spend any threat or despair generated in the check. Much as fortune might favor the player, bad luck and circumstances can conspire against him."


Step 1 - Declare an Attack and Select Targets
Step 2 - Assemble the Dice Pool
Step 3 - Pool Results and Deal Damage
Step 4 - Resolve Advantage and Triumph
Step 5 - Resolve Threat and Despair
Step 6 - Reduce Damage, Apply to Wound Threshold, and Apply Critical Injuries  

Step 3 is for the initial damage. Step 4 allows him to activate weapon qualities. Now why is the next step to resolve threat and despair BEFORE damage is actually applied in step 6. If you were not meant to use despair and threat to screw with the activation and damage then step 5 and 6 should be reversed.

In addition, going by the rules as you interpret them can cause unexpected consequences, as if the damage id dealt before threat and despair kicks in, that means the damage is dealt before damage reduction kicks in, meaning those hits bypass soak.

In addition this is very consistent with other parts of the spending despairs/threat in combat, as you can use it to cause the active character to lose the benefits of their prior maneuver, including any rolls they needed to use for that maneuver, and that costs less to do than to cause them to run out of ammo.

I understand that you folks seem to be focused on the enjoyment for the players, and that is all and good otherwise there would not be a game, but I dont think you are focusing on the bad side it can do to the players in NPC hands. And maybe y'all will modify it on that side, but I would not, I feel the rules should be consistent on both sides, so if an autofire can be used by PCs then the can also be used by NPCs, and autofire can kill any pc in one shot, and in a lot of cases kill more than one.

Resolving damage is not the same thing as resolving the hits resulting from the dice rolls, so no, I’m not getting the order of operations wrong. You resolve the Advantages before you resolve the Despair. The result of the Advantages is additional hits. The result of the Despair is running out of ammo. As such, the additional hits from Autofire come before you run out of ammo. Thus, when resolving damage, you resolve all damage from each and every hit you got as a result of Autofire, because, by RAW, they all occurred before you ran out of ammo.

On 10/19/2018 at 7:06 AM, Smoothjedi said:

So iterations of this question have been asked before, but parsing through search results didn't find what I was looking for.

Assume an autofire attack is rolled against an Inquisitor with improved reflect and enough advantage is present to trigger three shots. If a singe despair is rolled on this attack, is that all that's necessary to allow the Inquisitor to reflect all three shots back at targets of his choice if he spends 9 (3x3) strain to do so?

As clarified by the Devs;

Each Autofire shot must be directed at a new target.

So the Inquisitor would only ever be hit by one shot.

6 hours ago, DesTheDestroyer said:

As clarified by the Devs;

Each Autofire shot must be directed at a new target.

So the Inquisitor would only ever be hit by one shot.

This is a house rule that I use, but I'm pretty sure it is not the RAW on Auto-fire. Under the RAW, if you get multiple hits, all can be directed at one target.

3 hours ago, HappyDaze said:

This is a house rule that I use, but I'm pretty sure it is not the RAW on Auto-fire. Under the RAW, if you get multiple hits, all can be directed at one target.

Yeah I've never seen this RAW; could you link the clarification?

I wonder if Des is referring to a clarification on the Gunslinger talent that mimics autofire? That one's pretty unclear in how it's written (especially the short version).

I know that Sarlacc Sweep (Shii-Cho Knight) has text that says it pretty much uses the autofire rules but with the caveat that each hit from Sarlacc Sweep has to affect a different target.

But with autofire itself, far as I know the default is that you can assign multiple hits to the same target if the attacker so chooses. Which is a large part of why it's such a powerful weapon ability.

Just now, Donovan Morningfire said:

I wonder if Des is referring to a clarification on the Gunslinger talent that mimics autofire? That one's pretty unclear in how it's written (especially the short version).

I know that Sarlacc Sweep (Shii-Cho Knight) has text that says it pretty much uses the autofire rules but with the caveat that each hit from Sarlacc Sweep has to affect a different target.

But with autofire itself, far as I know the default is that you can assign multiple hits to the same target if the attacker so chooses. Which is a large part of why it's such a powerful weapon ability.

Yeah in fact, I'm pretty sure it says in the rules that you have to specifically choose before you roll whether you want to shoot at one or multiple targets, thus implying that a single target is legal.

Autofire specifically says you need to declare who you want to include in potential Autofire hits (since it takes the highest possible difficulty), and also says that yes, you CAN hit the same target multiple times.

It was from one of their podcasts years ago. I would be very careful about taking it a red that RAW are always right in the FFG books, as loads of glaring mistakes have made it through to print.

I'd say, see what feels right in your game and run with that. Most issues don't surface until the topic, like above is approached.

Always remember Rule Zero!