Suppose that I fly my ship in such a way that it is dangerously close to the edge. I plan to take a sharp right turn to avoid the edge. The template fully fits on the board, and the ship - after moving - is fully on the board. But, during the move, if you were to slide your ship along the move path, part of the ship would be off the board. Does the ship get destroyed because it left the battlefield during its move, or does it not get destroyed because its final position was fully on the board?

I'd say as long as it ends on the board it's okay.

Would that also be the case when moving through obstacle?

Though I can't find it mentioned directly in Rules of Play, I always assumed thet the ship moves exactly along the template, so if during that movement any part of the ship's base is found outside the play area or overlaping an obstacle, then the ship fled/moved through an obstacle. The assumption may be wrong, of course (it was based on moving the ship backwards in case of overlapping and just today confirmed by tutorial videos), but that's how I have played it.

With obstacles, the rules specifically mention the movement template or ship base. In other cases, its pretty clear that it only counts where the ship ends up. Basically, you're not actually moving the ship along the template, unless you would have landed on another ship, then you put it back far enough to avoid the collision. Otherwise, you just pick up the ship and put it on the end of the template.

supremespleen said:

Yep.

Shanturin said:

Page 20: Moving into and Through Obstacles

"When a ship executes a maneuver in which either the maneuver template or the ship's base physically overlaps an obstacle token, follow these steps:

1. Execute the maneuver as normal, but skip the "Perform Action" step

2. The player rolls one attack die. The ship then suffers any damage or critical damage rolled (see "Suffering Damage" on page 16)."

Summary:

With ship collisions its only about where you end up.

With obstacles (ie asteroids) you can't fly through, even if your base is not touching the obstacle without suffering the consequences stated above.

Apparently when you fly on top of other ships you are sharing the 3D space, but when you fly through or onto an asteroid, you risk collision. It's an elegant rules mechanic. I like it.

Page 17 says:

Fleeing the Batt lefield
If a ship executes a maneuver that causes any part of its base to go outside the play area (beyond any edge), then that ship has fled the battlefield. Unless specified by a mission overview, ships that flee the
battlefield are immediately destroyed.

I read this as if at any point in time any portion of the base of a ship leaves the field it is destroyed, but that's just how I read it.

But the exact notion that a ship traverses the maneuver piece is a bit off. Sure, it is used in the event of a collision, but normally, you lay the maneuver in front of the model, lift the model off the table, and place the model at the other end of the maneuver piece. As long as the ship is not off the table at the start or end of these steps, I see no issue.

From page 7 of the rules

"Holding the template
firmly in place, grip the side walls of the base
and lift the ship off the play surface. Then place
the ship at the opposite end of the template ,
sliding the rear guides of the ship into the
opposite end of the template."

Emphasis mine. Notice that the nowhere does it say when moving the model that the ship "follows" the maneuver template. It is simply lifted up, and placed at the end of the template. In fact, the wording that says to slide the rear guides in place means they expect people to lift it off the table.

What you have said is true.

I believe I would see if FFG will put this in a FAQ, I'm not sure how to go with it.

The only reason this is coming up as a question is because a player is moving the model along the maneuver piece.

There is no guaranteed way of saying that a ship is properly centered along the maneuver piece.

We do have the locking ridges on either the front of rear of a model though, which are key for checking that the ship is in the "correct" spot. But there is no "track" under the model for ensuring that it is centered on the maneuver piece.

I seriously doubt any FAQ would come out and say its actually considered to have fled, as it would be very difficult to actually enforce, and needlessly slow down play.

Imagine a situation where holding the model even .01mm to one side of the "center" of the maneuver would prevent it from "actually" going off the board. How on earth could you cover that, enforce that? There is nothing locking the model onto the maneuver piece, and no actual points by which you could measure. Its all being held in hand, and thats a horribly ineffective way of checking precise measurements.

As I said, This one is pretty clear cut. The only reason this would be an issue is if people aren't following the rules as they appear in the book.

Even though the rules for moving your playing piece state to pick it up and move it to the end of the template, I think it is pretty obvious thatthe spirit of play is that the ship is following the maneuver template. While I can understand that a micron of space where the ship ends its movement would be hard to judge, i think it is obvious that if you place a hard 3 on the table and the 90' point of the turn is off the table, the ship left the playing surface and is destroyed.

GunslingerSix said:

But thats not what the OP is experiencing. You really almost need to try this yourself to see whats happening. The maneuver template is fully on the table in this example (otherwise, the model would obviously end its turn off table). Its a case where making a 90 degree maneuver near the edge will result in the corners of a model going off the table as its "making" the turn. Its impossible to properly judge, as there is no way to correctly judge if you're moving the "center" of the model along the "center" of the template.

Also, it kind of seems against the spirit of the game itself to say these ships are following these templates perfectly as they fly through space. The movements would be far more fluid and occasionally vary. Not be a perfect 90 degree turn.

Next, it does seem to be against the spirit of the game to be so insanely strict about such a (non-existent) ruling. The game is clearly about watching plastic ships blow each other up, not about watching their movement like a hawk and claiming their ship has outright fled the combat just because they took a corner rather sharply.

The fly off the board get destroyed thing is clearly meant more for preventing the game in spilling outside of the play area, not as some metagame strategy (except maybe that it will result in knowing that your target is going to have to make some sort of turn in any given situation).

Movement IS the game. Stop thinking of this as a simulation. It's an abstraction (as all games are). Going off the table is a failure in judgement. It's not hard to stay on. When you get near an edge your opponent is going to have an advantage because you have narrowed your movement options.

Daveydavedave said:

That's both your opinion and not responsive to the question at hand.

As Kommisar posted above, the rules are QUITE CLEAR on this point:

When you move a model, it is placed at the end of the template. It is not considered to have traveled along it. (with the exception of obstacles - where the template IS considered)

This is why I said it would be best to think of this as an abstraction . Everyone wants to imagine their plastic ships really flying, however, it would be easier to understand the rules if you imagined them as instructions for moving an object, not flight paths for imaginary ace pilots.

Let me interpret the movement rules for you: "Pick up the square plastic thing. Put it at the end of the rectangular cardboard thing. If the square plastic thing is partially or completely out of the play area, it goes back in the box."

radiskull said:

Yep. This is my opinion. How is it not a response to the question? The OP was asking if going off the board "mid template" counts as going off the board (which it doesn't, because there is no such thing as "mid template," there is only point A and point B). But subsequent posts have also discussed how harsh it is that you lose your ship when you move foolishly off the table.

In a tournament setting a ship will get picked up if it goes even slightly out of bounds. If players dont like this rule they have lots of options for casual games: play on a slightly larger space or have a house rule about coming back on the table after moving off. You could even create a table with a "red zone" around the edge that requires an automatic hard turn until you can get back on the board (like the video games that turn you back in when you go out of bounds).

Daveydavedave said:

And the collision rules state that if the maneuver template OR ship base overlap the obstacle token. It never mentions the ship contacting the obstacle as it moves along the maneuver template, because by the rule, the ship DOESN'T move along the template. That's why they specify the maneuver template overlapping as one of the conditions.

By this logic, with the ship NOT moving along the template, only ENDING a movement off the board would result in elimination.