Question about Direct Hit action card

By PCichigo, in Twilight Imperium 3rd Edition

Yesterday, I play TI3 with my friends.

We have one problem about Direct Card.
Let say that this is the space battle of Mr.A and Mr.B.

While Mr.B taking 3 hits from Mr.A and Mr.A get 0 hit.
Mr.B is taking first hit on Dreadnought and will taking second hit on the same Dreadnought again.

Then suddenly, Mr.A use Direct Hit card to that Dreadnought.

Dose this mean Mr.B need to take 2 more hit or just 1 more hit because Direct Hit card can not be use?

Thank for all answer!

As soon as he plays Direct Hit, the dreadnought is destroyed. That means that he can't take any more damage on it, and he must take two more hits on the rest of his fleet.

Hope that's clear!

But, if a player plays an Emergency Repairs Action Card before the oponent plays the Direct Hit, then the oponent cannot play Direct Hit. But if the oponent plays Direct Hit before the other player plays Emergency Repairs, then the other player cannot play his Emergency Repairs Action Card. Anyways, I thought I might say that.

Cory Mackenson said:

But, if a player plays an Emergency Repairs Action Card before the oponent plays the Direct Hit, then the oponent cannot play Direct Hit. But if the oponent plays Direct Hit before the other player plays Emergency Repairs, then the other player cannot play his Emergency Repairs Action Card. Anyways, I thought I might say that.

Note that the "before" goes off of Initiative order, not actual "who announced it first", at least as far as the official way to do it :)

That is strange... "Initiative order" as on the Strategy cards or attacker/defender order? So in practice you can sabotage a Direct hit with a Emergency Repairs and the other way around depending ininitativ order?

Imnos said:

That is strange... "Initiative order" as on the Strategy cards or attacker/defender order? So in practice you can sabotage a Direct hit with a Emergency Repairs and the other way around depending ininitativ order?

Initiative order as on the SCs. Combat is a question of micro-seconds - whoever's faster on the trigger wins the day, and initiative is a clean, simple way to determine who's fastest on the trigger during this conflict.

After a little digging I fount the ruling on the aciton cards in the rules.

How to Play an Action Card (Page 23)
If a player wishes to play an Action Card, he must
publicly announce that he wishes to play an Action
Card. Then other players, at that time, may announce
that they also wish to play an Action Card. After all
players have been given the opportunity to announce
that they are playing Action Cards, all the Action
Cards are revealed and resolved in order of play.

If Action Cards are about to played at a time where
players do not have Strategy Cards, then resolve them
in clockwise order starting with the Speaker.

Looks like neither players will know what the action cards are until they reaveal them in order of play. So the person playing the Emergency Repairs action card would ultimately be guessing that his opponant was playing a direct hit and would have to be higher in the initiative order to be successful in protecting the dreadnought.

Nargnarfer said:

Looks like neither players will know what the action cards are until they reaveal them in order of play. So the person playing the Emergency Repairs action card would ultimately be guessing that his opponant was playing a direct hit and would have to be higher in the initiative order to be successful in protecting the dreadnought.

That doesnt work all the time. If someone announces they are going to play an action card and you have a sabotage, you don't have to reveal/say you want to play it until after the other card has been revealed.

The way we play is that we allow someone to reveal "emergency repairs" while assigning hits, basically stopping "direct hit" from being played.

Our reasoning is that "emergency repairs" has a more immediate timing "at any time" than "direct hit" "immediately after a ship is damaged".

I always thought Defender had the ability to determine which order the action cards go in?

Tarnis Phoenix said:

I always thought Defender had the ability to determine which order the action cards go in?

No, the defender only gets to choose the order that pre-combat abilities are resolved in. When it comes to playing action cards, it's done (officially, at least) in initiative order.

DavidG55311 said:

DavidG55311 said:

That doesnt work all the time. If someone announces they are going to play an action card and you have a sabotage, you don't have to reveal/say you want to play it until after the other card has been revealed.

The way we play is that we allow someone to reveal "emergency repairs" while assigning hits, basically stopping "direct hit" from being played.

Our reasoning is that "emergency repairs" has a more immediate timing "at any time" than "direct hit" "immediately after a ship is damaged".

I definately agree with you on this one. According to the structure stated in the rules for playing action cards, the sabotage card would not be playable. I'll have to look at the card itself, but the "Play" part of the card that states when the card can be played probably trumps the structure. The card text should be worded such that it is allowed to be played and resolved out of initiative order so that the card text can override the game rules in order for its effect to actually work.

Otherwise, yes, following the rule structure will make some cards unusable and some house timing rules would definately be needed.

Nargnarfer said:

According to the structure stated in the rules for playing action cards, the sabotage card would not be playable. I'll have to look at the card itself, but the "Play" part of the card that states when the card can be played probably trumps the structure.

Actually, the rules discuss the Sabotage specifically, saying it does not follow the regular play rules, and is a special exception :)

There are no cards other than Sabotage that "trump" the announce-than-play structure. The "Play" part simply says when it's legal to play it, but by the book, you must still announce first. (The only other exception could be Touch of Genius used AS a Sabotage, but then it follows the rules for "when do you play Sabotage" exception)