I'm looking for clarification on a rules interaction between grappling struts and ion moves.

Situation is this:- a Vulture Droid is currently occupying an asteroid and draws the crit that assigns an ion token next time he engaged. He subsequently engages and gets the ion token.

Next turn, he is not assigned a dial and performs his 1 straight ion move which unfortunately fails to clear the asteroid. Upon completion of this move I flip the struts card to closed.

Both the flipping of the card and the asteroid effects (roll for damage etc) occur "after executing a maneuver".

Seeing as these 2 effects happen at the same time, I'm assuming they join the ability queue and I can resolve them in an order of my choosing. I can choose to have the effect of asteroid first (whilst struts are still open) and then flip the card to closed in order to avoid the effects of the asteroid.

Is this the correct way of handling this situation or would the asteroid effects need to be applied after you flip the card to closed so you roll for damage etc?

Clear as mud? 😀

7 minutes ago, Sovoth said:

Seeing  as these 2 effects happen at the same time, I'm assuming they join the ability queue and I can resolve them in an order of my choosing     . 

Sort of. Game effects first (ie the effects from overlapping or moving through an asteroid) then abilities in player order with abilities from the same player being resolved as you outlined. You ended up with the correct resolution sequence anyways though.

Unofficial Online Rules Reference ( @J1mBob is good at keeping it up to date with what is in the current pdf): http://infinitearenas.com/xw2rules/index.php

For reference (the little bullet point at the bottom is important):

Ability Queue

The ABILITY QUEUE is used to resolve the timing of multiple abilities that trigger during the same timing window. Abilities are resolved from the front of the queue to the back of the queue. These abilities are added to the back of the ability queue using the following rules:

1. If both players have abilities that triggered from the same event, the abilities are added to the ability queue in player order.
2. If a player has multiple abilities that triggered from the same event, that player chooses the order that those abilities are added to the ability queue.
3. If resolving an effect from the ability queue triggers additional effects, they are added to the front of the ability queue using the above rules.

See Appendix for 2 examples of the ability queue.

• If there are game effects that share the same timing window as a player's ability, the game effect is resolved first.
  • For example, if a ship performs a red barrel roll and the ship has an ability that triggers after it performs a barrel roll, the ship gains a stress token before the other ability is resolved.

Thank you.

Game effects come first. I didn't see that part.

It doesn't really matter. While you were crossing it you were still ignoring it. So you don't suffer it's effects.

On 8/10/2019 at 2:07 AM, Sovoth said:

I'm looking for clarification on a rules interaction between grappling struts and ion moves.

Situation is this:- a Vulture Droid is currently occupying an asteroid and draws the crit that assigns an ion token next time he engaged. He subsequently engages and gets the ion token.

Next turn, he is not assigned a dial and performs his 1 straight ion move which unfortunately fails to clear the asteroid. Upon completion of this move I flip the struts card to closed.

Why would you do that? You didn't perform the 2-straight needed for that.

2 minutes ago, Vector Strike said:

Why would you do that? You didn't perform the 2-straight needed for that.

Closing struts is triggered by executing any maneuver (as specified by "After you execute a maneuver, flip this card."), not just the 2 straight.

Ion Maneuvers do not reveal a dial so the "After you reveal a maneuver" portion does not trigger meaning the Ionized droid still executes the blue 1 straight Ion Maneuver. So it flips after the maneuver is executed and any game effects with that timing are finished.

The rules for Ion from the Rules Reference.

Ion

A ship is IONIZED while it has a number of ion tokens relative to its size : at least one for a small ship, at least two for a medium ship, and at least three for a large ship. Ion tokens are red tokens .

During the Planning Phase an ionized ship is not assigned a dial.

During the Activation Phase , an ionized ship that did not have a dial assigned to it during the Planning Phase activates as follows:

1. The ship skips its Reveal Dial step.
2. During the Execute Maneuver step, the ionized ship executes the ion maneuver. The ion maneuver is a blue [1 straight] maneuver . The bearing , difficulty , and speed of this maneuver cannot be changed unless an ability explicitly affects the ion maneuver.
3. During the Perform Action step, the ship can perform only the <Focus> action.
4. After the ship finishes this activation, it removes all of its ion tokens.

Additionally:

• Some special weapons inflict ion tokens instead of dealing damage.
• If a ship becomes ionized after the Planning Phase (and therefore has been assigned a dial) but before it has activated during the Activation Phase, it activates as normal. During the next Planning Phase, if the ship is still ionized, it is not assigned a dial and proceeds with the ion maneuver during the Activation Phase.
• Since an ionized ship does not have a dial assigned to it and does not reveal its dial, it cannot resolve any effects that trigger after it reveals its dial.

God I wish they had made landing on and leaving rocks a keyword rather than trying to cram incredibly complex and detailed rules onto cards.

It could have made things so much clearer.

4 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

God I wish they had made landing on and leaving rocks a keyword rather than trying to cram incredibly complex and detailed rules onto cards.

It could have made things so much clearer.

That would have been nice. Not sure how much it would have helped though. Too many assume how something works based on the previous version, even in the case of abilities that don't have a simile in 1.0...

3 hours ago, Hiemfire said:

That would have been nice. Not sure how much it would have helped though. Too many assume how something works based on the previous version, even in the case of abilities that don't have a simile in 1.0...

When the rules are as loose as FFG often makes them we have to fill in the gaps with something. 😥

9 hours ago, Hiemfire said:

That would have been nice. Not sure how much it would have helped though. Too many assume how something works based on the previous version, even in the case of abilities that don't have a simile in 1.0...

More space to write the rules out in full, and the capacity to alter them with starting cards if they are unclear.

Plus the ability to use that keyword elsewhere.