Because collateral damage is resolved immediately during the skirmish in which it was revealed (if the unit survives) then you can have the effect of destroying their base (if you so choose) early on in the battle and possibly prevent effective use of cards by your enemy like Bunker, Sunken Colony, and Shield Battery in the remaining skirmishes of the battle since their eligibility is only checked once they are revealed during the later skirmishes.

The attacker determines which battle goes first, and as I read the rules the base can be destroyed at the end of the battle with collateral damage. So indeed you can mess up the enemy's defences, because of the destroyed base.

That is super sweet.

I understand that with the rules as provided it makes sense to resolve collateral damage dealing skirmishes first.

For less hassle and a more straight forward game I would have liked it more if the collateral damage has no effect on the battle at hand but is resolved at the end of battle. Just my feeling about this.

It actually looks like collateral damage doesn't happen until ALL the skirmishes have been resolved so I don't think this trick works.

page 20 of broodwar rule book

collateral damage:
If a unit with this ability is not destroyed during the
Resolve Skirmishes step of a battle, the owning player may
immediately choose to do one of the following:

It is a bit ambiguous but I think it means that you do it immediately after the Resolve Skirmishes step not after the individual skirmish.

I submitted a rules request on this one we will see what they say.

Normally I would agree with you that it should wait till all the skirmishes were finnished.

But the text on the P.6-7 relating to collateral damage was what gave me pause:

(Most of collateral damage is described on P.6 but there is 2 more lines to it on p.7 of the broodwar rules).

"Note that this ability is triggered immediately, even if the
unit is later forced to retreat or withdraw from the area."

Retreats happen later than resolve skirmishes in the steps of a battle, so no problem there. But because of when the withdraw happens (during a skirmish is when cloaking / withdraw is triggered), I interpreted this to mean that collateral damage would happen before the point at which a unit could withdraw during a skirmish since they said "... even if the unit is later forced to retreat or withdraw...", and that is at the end of step C (destroy units and discard cards) of the current skirmish being resolved.

I think it's rather clear: you destroy an enemy FLU with a unit with Collateral Damage ability, the enemy base is destroyed. Bang.

Technicly, your unit with the collateral damage card only needs to survive the skirmish for it to take effect. It doesn't need to kill any enemy units.

If I were to guess as to why, it would most likely be because in the video game, all these units with collateral damge (in the board game) have very long range of attack and could destroy the base from outside the normal attack ranges of other units. So as long as you did your attack and lived to get away, you had very likely cleared that area with the base.

While the troops could hide until you're off...makes sense. OK, then let's take the following result?

After resolving the skirmish, if the surviving unit has "Colleteral Damage", said is triggered.

Stefan said:

Exactly! That is the way that I think the rules read.

Now, it just occured to me that there could be a different way to interpret the rules. Perhaps the "Note that this ability is triggered immediately, even if the unit is later forced to retreat or withdraw from the area." means that the Collateral Damage (hereafter refered to as CD) is resolved immediately after all skirmishes have been resolved for that mobilize order and that any subsequent mobilize orders that result in the CD causing unit being removed from the area (by retreat or withdrawl) would not be able to stop the triggered effect of CD.

It would be like having the steps of a battle being like this:

(See page 29 of basic rules)

...

7. Resolve skirmishes.

7.5 (Basically add this as a step) Resolve collateral damage.

8. Resolve Splash damage.

9. Resolve Retreats.

I think that this would be a question well worth having answered.

If it is indeed like having a step 7.5 in the steps of resolving a battle, then obviously the original strategy of resolving the CD battle first won't have any relevance to subsequent skirmishes in that same mobilize order.

No, you misunderstood me. It's:

- Resolve Skirmish A with unit with CD

- Trigger CD

- Resolve Skirmish B

and so forth

I believe I did understand you as what you described was what I based the strategy in the original post on. And I think that is how the rules read.

I then went on to describe a situation that I think they might have meant for the rule to be like which would make the strategy invalid.

The key is in the wording that they used in the manual on Page 7. "Note that this ability is triggered immediately, even if the unit is later forced to retreat or withdraw from the area."

If they had not put in that wording, without question the resolution of collateral damage would have happened between step 7 (resolve skirmishes) and step 8 (resolve splash damage) in the resolution of a battle and the effects would have taken effect immediately at that time, with no means of stopping/changing the outcome. Something would be destroyed by the collateral damage that could not be undone from that point on.

What I was now wondering is if the wording on page 7 is just meant to reiterate the fact that it is immediate (but still between steps 7 and 8 of the resolution of a battle), and unchangable by later mobilize orders.

This seems redundant and not necessary. In fact, the choice of wording they did use is what lead me to think that the collateral damage effect is triggered at A) The time within the skirmish that it is revealed in AND B) the time at which it is known that the unit causing collateral damage will not be destroyed, because withdrawls would happen during the skirmish in which they would be triggered, and not after all skirmishes had been resolved.

That is the logic that lead to the idea behind the strategy.

If they had intended for collateral damage to be resolved between steps 7 and 8 of the resolution of a battle, then by adding the wording on page 7, they actually made it less clear than if they had not added those 2 lines.

If they did intend for collateral damage to be resolved during the skirmish in which it was triggered by, then the wording on Page 7 supports that outcome, which is also how I have been interpretting it.

Anyway, I'm very thankful for pointing it out and opening this really, really nasty tactic Makes Battle Tanks and Guardians even more efficient.

You didn't get an answer to the rules request yet, right blarknob?

I haven't either but I will definately post it when I get it.

Yeah no answer so far.

Sweet!

The strategy holds!

Got a responce to this question back today:

"Is collateral damage meant to be resolved kind of like a step in the resolution of a battle that would take place after step 7 (resolve skirmishes) and before step 8 (resolve splash damage)?

Or is is meant to be resolved right at the end of the skirmish in which it is played, and therefor other skirmishes which rely on a base being present due to such things as an Air defence module or base dependent reinforcement cards such as bunker/sunken colony/shield battery may not take effect?"

Corey's Responce:

Collateral damage is resolve after each skirmish is resolved. More specifically, it happens during step 7 of combat "Resolve Skirmishes", at the end of step C "Destroy units and discard cards".

Thanks so much Corey!

I asked this question

question: Does collateral damage happen after ALL skirmishes in a battle have been resolve or after each skirmish involving a unit with collateral damage?

got this response from corey

Collateral damage is resolve after each skirmish is resolved. More

specifically, it happens during step 7 of combat "Resolve Skirmishes",

after step C. "Destroy units and discard cards".

I hope that this answers your question!

-Corey Konieczka

Fantasy Flight Games

Design and Development

I asked for some clarification but it apears that collateral damage doesn't happen until after all your skirmishes have been resolved.

blarknob said:

Hm, playing devil's advocate - isn't that interpretation quite the opposite of Corey's answer?

I asked for clarification. And now that I look at the book and read his answer again it does seem like you get collateral damage in each individual skirmish.

EMELT said:

So it doesn't matter when you reveal card with collateral damage during combat, and, as a result - the suggested strategy doesn't work ( you need to compare attack and health values in step B, including modules and reinforcement cards).

cyb3k said:

The strategy indeed does work, because skirmishes are resolved one at a time.

If you as the attacker choose to resolve the skirmish involving collateral damage as the first skirmish, say skirmish 1, then by the end of step 7C of skirmish 1, you have triggerd collateral damage (and if you so chose the base destruction from the collateral damage options) destroyed the enemy base.

You then choose skirmish 2 (or just any others that happen after the collateral damage has been resolved), and when you get to step 7A of that skirmish where you reveal cards for that particular skirmish and check their eligibility, the base is no longer present to permit the valid use of any abilities provided by an Air Defence Module (Detector, +1 Attack vs enemy front line air units) or those cards that require a Base to be eligible (sunken colony / bunker / shield battery).

That is the workings behind the effective use of this strategy.

A second sentence of the response supports your presumption, but first denies it entirely. So I can say we both have right :-D

IMO, if so many people say that Coll. Damage is too powerfull, there is no point to improve it with such rules. On the other hand, it is quite natural that Coll. Damage should ignore effects of defensive structures (like bunker / photon cannon etc.). But (IMO) only in skirmish in which a unit with this card is present.

Perhaps you misunderstood. I never claimed that the collateral damage would prevent the usage of base dependent abilities in the first skirmish that the collateral damage was used in. I only claimed that it would prevent base dependent abilities in remaining unresolved skirmishes that took place after the one with collateral damage in it was resolved.

By resolving the skirmish involving collateral damage first, you minimize the usage of the defender's base dependent abilities in remaining skirmishes, thus maximizing your effectiveness.

If you were to wait until later skirmishes to use the collateral damage ability, then any skirmishes resolved before the collateral damage took effect (including the one in which it is played) can have the benefit of any Base dependent abilities.

The skirmish in which collateral damage is played will always have access to any Base dependent abilities because the collateral damage takes effect at the end of that skirmish. But that is why the strategy claimed that the denial of Base dependent abilities would only affect skirmishes that happened later.

Which is why it makes sence to consider resolving the collateral damage first.

I understand well what is the aim of this strategy, I'm not only sure what was the mind of Corey when he was writing those two sentences:

"Collateral damage is resolve after each skirmish is resolved.

More specifically, it happens during step 7 of combat "Resolve Skirmishes", at the end of step C "Destroy units and discard cards"."

So I think I will wait for a clarification, but even with it I would rather execute CD after ALL skirmishes (IMO each = all in quote above)