The rules for obstructed line of sight are ... slightly vague.

Our group's been having some issues with it (given some illogical instances happening with it). In comparison, we come from a background playing Imperial Assault, and that line of sight system is crystal clear.

So we're wondering if anyone here has an easier way to determine line of sight obstruction, or if they have an adequate house rule.

Thanks!

Hard to answer precisely without knowing more about what your group is struggling with. Can you describe these illogical instances you mention?

7 hours ago, thinkbomb said:

The rules for obstructed line of sight are ... slightly vague.

What do you mean with "vague"?

You draw the shortest line in arc from the attacking ship to the defender. That shouldn't be that hard.

12 hours ago, thinkbomb said:

The rules for obstructed line of sight are ... slightly vague.

Our group's been having some issues with it (given some illogical instances happening with it). In comparison, we come from a background playing Imperial Assault, and that line of sight system is crystal clear.

So we're wondering if anyone here has an easier way to determine line of sight obstruction, or if they have an adequate house rule.

Thanks!

No. There are not inconsistencies unless you are trying to apply Imperial Assault logic or rules to X-wing. There are no specific line of sight rules in X-wing. Do not bring rules from other games into X-wing.

There is something on the shortest line between the objects you are measuring range to or there isn't something on the shortest line between the objects you are measuring range to.

Rules Reference page 14: https://images-cdn.fantasyflightgames.com/filer_public/67/8a/678a909e-bd3b-4c21-9978-4218a253d07d/b_swzrulesreference_v110_-compressed.pdf

Quote

OBSTRUCTED

An attack is obstructed if the attacker measures range through an object (ships, obstacles, devices.) If a ship or device obstructs an attack, there is no inherent effect. If an obstacle obstructs an attack, there is an additional effect.

• If at least one asteroid, debris cloud, or gas cloud obstructs an attack, the defender rolls one additional defense die during the Roll Defense Dice step.

• If at least one gas cloud obstructs an attack, the defender may change 1 blank result to an 󲁄 result.

• The attacker measures from the closest point of its base to the closest point of the defender’s base that is in the attack arc, therefore the attacker cannot measure range from or to another point in order to avoid measuring through an object.

◊ If multiple points are at equal distance from the attacker (for example, if the attacker and defender are parallel), the attacker chooses one of those lines for measuring range. In the example, the X-wing can choose to make this attack be obstructed or no

Unless there is an obstacle and you are making an attack there needs to be a specific effect on a card for line of sight whether or not any particular line between objects (ships, obstacles, devices) being obstructed matters. For instance an enemy ship equipped with Tactical Scrambler

So I looked up the Imperial Assault rulebook and their line of sight rules. Looks like I've fed a troll here. That rulebook has an entire page of diagrams regarding line of sight.

22 minutes ago, Frimmel said:

So I looked up the Imperial Assault rulebook and their line of sight rules. Looks like I've fed a troll here. That rulebook has an entire page of diagrams regarding line of sight.

I don't believe we have a troll. LoS in Imperial Assault measures from one face of the attacker's space to one face of the defender's space. If it is obstructed, no attack can be made. Two simple rules for LoS.

But if they try to apply either of those rules into X-Wing, they will be doing wrong. Strictly speaking, X-wing doesn't have line of sight, anyway.

29 minutes ago, 5050Saint said:

I don't believe we have a troll. LoS in Imperial Assault measures from one face of the attacker's space to one face of the defender's space. If it is obstructed, no attack can be made. Two simple rules for LoS.

But if they try to apply either of those rules into X-Wing, they will be doing wrong. Strictly speaking, X-wing doesn't have line of sight, anyway.

Your point is solid. If one looks at the IA rules as "you can't shoot through stuff," the X-wing rules are going to seem elaborate. In that framing it would not be trolling.

Took me a while, but I finally remember the exact circumstance now. (it was a week or two prior when this happened, hence me forgetting). I drew up a diagram below...

I had some small base scum ship that favored close range attacks, so I had the ship piloting stupidly close to the Raider at Range 1. My pilot was looking at a huge open firing arc towards the entire front half of the Raider ... SAVE FOR 1 TINY LITTLE EDGE OF A DEBRIS TOKEN.

As per raw rules, that little edge of the debris is obstructing the line from the closest 2 points between the attacker and the defender (I did my best to eyeball-replicate it with a mouse here, just assume it's an accurate illustration).

... we just overturned rules on this instance because it's honestly just silly. While it is the extreme edge case here ... we started seeing other instances where the rules made less sense than before.

IIRC, the next play session (or within 3 sessions) we were flying ace squads against each other (which resulted in a ton of jukes and dumb corner-clips), and I had the exact reverse of this situation happen.

Basically the entire firing-arc is obstructed SAVE FOR THE DIRECT LINE BETWEEN 2 POINTS. And with the amount of "wow, good flying" compliments that both of us were giving to each other that match: this happened a lot.

So there you go. This is what led us to wonder if this really was the best rule for determining if a shot was obstructed or not.

Whether it's the best rule or not is irrelevant to this forum which cares whether it IS the rule or not.

Which it is.

Those examples seems about right, @thinkbomb . Line from the closest point in arc on the attacker, to the closest point in arc on the defender. If that line goes through an obstacle: obstructed. If not? Nope.

Are there some "silly" situations? Eh, depends on your definition of silly.

Try wrapping your head around Armada LoS rules for a while, then talk to me. X-Wing is dead simple.

By the way, my advice? Even if you think they’re silly, DON’T OVERTURN RULES. You’re setting yourselves up for arguments as to what’s silly and what’s not in your own gaming group, and that can be hard to sort out even among friends. And if you ever play people from outside your group, especially in a tournament setting, you’re probably gonna have some feel-bad times, either for you or the outside people.

I referenced Armada LoS struggles earlier, and with games like Armada and X-Wing, where things are not necessarily set up with even geometry or on a grid or hex map, there’s basically two ways to do it: you can either get complex precision (which is sometimes a time-bog, with laser pointers and marking ships and surgical maneuvers of measuring sticks through forests of tiny TIEs and E-Wings), or you can get a quick-and-dirty, more arcade-y, close-enough sort of precision like X-Wing supplies. There are advantages to both, but occasionally you’re gonna get some strange looking situations.

If it makes you feel any better, just imagine that that tiny corner of the debris field that’s causing obstruction in your first pic has some weird magnetic radiation coming from within the field that’s screwing up your ship’s instruments. And imagine that the massive rock field that should be blocking your view in the second example just happens to part perfectly for a moment, and your ace has the opportunity to drill a perfect shot between the asteroids.

3 minutes ago, Cpt ObVus said:

Try wrapping your head around Armada LoS rules for a while, then talk to me. X-Wing is dead simple.

Huh, Armada LoS actually made MORE sense to me. Go fig.

1 minute ago, thinkbomb said:

Huh, Armada LoS actually made MORE sense to me. Go fig.

I honestly LIKE Armada’s LoS rules better than X-Wing’s approach (because I like that kind of precision), but there’s no denying that it sometimes takes a LOT longer to get a ruling on what’s obstructed and what isn’t. X-Wing’s LoS and measurement rules seem to fit the sort of game it is really well. Faster-paced, a bit looser.

@thinkbomb

Loved your diagrams. And hilarious illustration of the problems that can arise.

For me it’s always a Game Mechanic Brain vs. “Real Life” Brain (real life = fictional space universe 😜 ).

Like why does my R2 unit cost more because I’m a better pilot????? Didn’t we both buy it at the same store???

12 hours ago, thinkbomb said:

So there you go. This is what led us to wonder if this really was the best rule for determining if a shot was obstructed or not.

Your examples are great. They instinctively look off, but that's abstraction for you. Ruling the shots differently would get you in the "look, MOST of the shot isn't obstructed, right?" kind of debate. For the rules to work, obstructions need to be binary.

Yeah, if nothing else the current approach is simple and consistent. While it might be more "realistic" I don't think we really want an obstruction rule that's like "Calculate the maximum magnitude of a projection of the obstacle along a line perpendicular to angle of the closest line drawn in-arc between the two ships, and then divide that by the length of the segment of the perpendicular line which lies between the two lines describing the limit of the arc. If it's more than half, the shot is obstructed."

2 hours ago, Ysenhal said:

Yeah, if nothing else the current approach is simple and consistent. While it might be more "realistic" I don't think we really want an obstruction rule that's like "Calculate the maximum magnitude of a projection of the obstacle along a line perpendicular to angle of the closest line drawn in-arc between the two ships, and then divide that by the length of the segment of the perpendicular line which lies between the two lines describing the limit of the arc. If it's more than half, the shot is obstructed."

Nice. Yeah, big difference in fun factor between “X-Wing Miniatures” and “X-Wing Micromanagement!”