Does the defending team have access to the Location’s Base Defense for a Conquest Pivotal Battle?

My RitR group has been debating this. (Pages of relevance 26-27 in RitR)

One is saying the campaign additions (such as Base defenses) don’t go away because it’s in addition to any thing Conquest gives, and it says the battle is treated as a base location under Determine Battle Effects. In addition, under the Evacuation Objective’s Setup it says “This Objective uses the following special setup rules in addition to those on that Location’s “Base Defense” Objective, saying that by default any Base Location gets it’s Base Defense.

Another is saying it doesn’t because Pivotal Battle Objectives are the objective and overwrite a Location’s Objectives including Base Defenses, which is why they have to clarify PB Objectives are campaign Objectives(pg 24 Determine Battle Effect), and that the Determine Battle Effects under Conquest only applies to the Management Phase on page 17. In addition, they cite that the Evacuation Objective’s Setup section is giving the Base Defense in addition to the ship/obstacle deployment bullet points directly under it, and is not the “default” because both battles take place at Bases but only Evacuation points out you get the benefit of a Base Defense.

Would appreciate multiple responses even if its quoting someone else and saying this^ as I have to convince 5 other people.

Thanks in advance

2 hours ago, PathfinderJNW said:

and that the Determine Battle Effects under Conquest only applies to the Management Phase on page 17.

They are correct on that part, but the battle is played on a location with a base and there is nothing on the Conquest rules that supersedes that (it doesn't even specify any setup or special rules as all objectives do), so the base defense objective is used as normal.

3 hours ago, Lemmiwinks86 said:

the battle is played on a location with a base and there is nothing on the Conquest rules that supersedes that (it doesn't even specify any setup or special rules as all objectives do), so the base defense objective is used as normal.

Just trying to be thorough...

Member made the point that top of page 24 “These battles are team games that follow the rules described below (which supersede the team play rules of on pg 14 of Armada Rules Reference) With the Setup in Determine Initiative of the Pivotal Battle section it says says you’re picking the Pivotal Battle Objective and you follow its directions (he points out that’s the supersede).

Main argument comes down to are the PB Objectives like normal Card Objectives like Opening Salvo, Contested Outpost, etc.? Because you cannot have 2 Objectives for a battle, the exception being Evacuation because it specifically says it. The reason they’re not physical cards like the Base Defenses is because they’re only for this campaign.

At page 27 of the booklet the description of "Evacuation" clearly Staates: "This objective uses ... that locations " Base Defense" objective."

"Conquest" only mentions "base location" for determine battle effects.

I think it is meant to be played without base defense objective to give the assaulting team a way to catch up. It will make the campaign less static and help to avoid snowballing. But it's casual. Discuss this point with your friends and find a consensus to play it. That way all have a good time together.

6 hours ago, Triangular said:

At page 27 of the booklet the description of "Evacuation" clearly Staates: "This objective uses ... that locations " Base Defense" objective."

"Conquest" only mentions "base location" for determine battle effects.

That is because "Evacuation" makes you not only play with the base defense objective but with additional rules, that's why it specifies it.

In "Conquest", if you don't play with the base objective then you don't play with any objective at all. To me it doesn't make sense, although I do admit that the rules could be much more clear.

We actually had this same debate in our two player campaign. We could see an argument both ways. On the one hand it states that the PB rules are the objective and Conquest doesn't say to use the base defense, the only time it comes into play is after the battle. On the other hand, why have a base if the base defense is not going to be used.

I our campaign we played conquest without the base defense and it actually allowed both sides to come back from being behind PB Act 1 for the Rebels and PB Act 2 for the imperials. So in a way it worked really well as a way to catch up from behind. If we had off played with the base defense, the rebels would have been behind and we would have ended it at Act 2, instead we were able to go all they way to the Act 3 battle which was great.

Base defenses are not useless if Conquest doesn't use them as there are really only two opportunities to do conquest where the base really matters. Then for the rest of the campaign if you want to take on a base, then you play with the defense. To me it kind of makes conquest and interesting part of a PB making it more of a slug fest.

I find the rules a bit ambiguous around conquest, I mean if they meant for the Base Defense objective to be used couldn't they have just said Setup: Use base defense card selected for that location. Or something like that. There was plenty of room on the page to fit one line.

I can see the argument for using the Base Defense as well and it does make sense. If you don't use it, I was just thinking of it that the combined fleets jumping in at the base caught them off guard and their base defenses weren't ready.

At the end of the day, I think the best way to deal with it is as a group, before you start the campaign, decide how conquest will be played (And any other ambiguous rules) so that way everyone agrees. For me personally, I think we will try using the base defenses next time.

Also, as we were only two players, the dynamic may be different for six players.