Advanced Sensors- Am i missing something?

By jedi moose, in X-Wing

So the newly revealed Advanced Sensors upgrade is confusing me. The card basically allows you to Perform your action immediately before you reveal your maneuver instead of after you complete your maneuver. I can't see a whole lot of situations where this would be helpful on the ships that have the ability to use it.

Both the lambda and B-wing can Focus, doesn't seem like it would ever be beneficial to use advance sensors for a focus.

Both ships can target lock. The only time i can think of that this would be better to do before a maneuver is if after the maneuver you will be out of range to take a target lock on a particular ship. Maybe with the new "support ships" design of the lambda there are a few instances where this could be useful, but i can't think of many that come up on a regular basis.

Finally, the B-wing can barrel roll. So in some circumstances it would be beneficial to do a barrel roll before executing your maneuver to avoid an overlap or bomb or something. This seems like the best use for this card but hard to justify 3 precious points to use it.

Am i missing something? Is there some awesomeness to this card that I'm not seeing? Do you see any way for this card to be really valuable?

For some reason I had the same mental block as you when I saw this card. I started a thread on BoardGameGeek to discuss this, and had a lot of smart answers to this. Consider that you could use it either before you are going to end up overlapping (thus losing your action) or making a red maneuver (thus getting stress and losing your action).

These should probably happen fairly often.

Don't forget the potential for other upgrades to add new actions. Engine Upgrade adding boost, possibly Daredevil if we get a B-wing with an Elite slot. A 1 bank followed by a 3 ahead results in a much different position than a 3 ahead followed by a 1 bank. The 90 degree turn allowed by Daredevil is even more dramatic.

Wow. I hadn't thought of those. It makes a lot more sense in those situations. I guess it could be pretty valuable with enough planning or in an "o darn, i didn't think he was going to move there" instance, especially with the large base of the lambda which is tough to avoid overlaps with. Thanks for the replies

I thought about this right away, what if your manuver is a red manuver? Now you can take your action then do a three or four turn around and be right behind your enemy with a focus!

Or a barrel roll before thus avoinding running into someone and losing your action.

Or a barrel roll before thus avoinding running into someone and losing your action.

or target lock and advanced proton torpedo.

i think the best use of this card (that i can tell) is barrel rolling b4 you move. changing vectors unpredictably before you turn is actually pretty good. Also as already memtioned… taking an action b4 u execute a red manouvre is pretty useful as well.