So...

We have been playing X-Wing for quite some time in our league without issues due to "pre-measuring". The rules were clear, you cannot premeasure before placing your movement dial, but that other things could be measured "before committing". We took that at face value, found premeasuring to be a minor added bonus to using action-moves and was one of the ways high-PS pilots were able to take advantage of their PS.

Since the release of the new FAQ, with the kinda-premeasure-but-not-really, committed-unless-you-aren't tournament rules we have had troubles with premeasuring during target selection for shooting, Navigator/Fett, what precedent is set, etc.

I would respectfully suggest that FFG leave well enough alone, and dump the "new and improved" tournament style totally optional except when they aren't rules. You cannot premeasure when selecting your movement dial, otherwise you can measure away before making decisions. It was much simpler, made for less frustration for new players who are still learning, and didn't call for judgement about when someone was "abusing the rules" and when they weren't. In tournament play you can simply penalize for stalling if the judge feels it is appropriate, and leave well enough alone.

I completely concur with this post. No measure for movement, but when making action / attack decisions measure away.

Imagine the following scenario:

A 3 rebel ship squadron with Rookie, Dutch and Luke. This list goes up against a bounty hunter (BH) and assorted Ties.

Rookie is within R1 of the bounty hunter with 1 hull point remaining and within firing arc of the BH. Dutch moves and is at the edge of R3 but has a proton torpedo which he will shoot at the BH with the target lock he just acquired. Luke hasn't moved yet, but he is within range 1-2 of Dutch. Luke doesn't know if he is within range 3 to get a target lock on the bounty hunter so if Dutch passes his extra target lock to Luke, he may nto be able to get a target lock on the bounty hunter, but may with one of the ties in range 1-3 of Luke.

I bring this up because while Dutch can pass the target lock off to Luke or the Rookie, if you choose to pass the lock off to Luke, and Luke and Dutch destroy the bounty hunter, then the rookie won't have to worry about dying against the BH. HOWEVER, if Luke is not within R1-3 of the BH, then he won't get the extra target lock against the BH and won't be able to TL/Focus against the BH which can potentially change the entire course of the game.

Pre-measuring willy nilly can change the course of decision making for players and games. That is just one example. There is a reason why ships are activated one at a time and have to fully complete their activation phase before moving onto the next ship. Pre-measuring changes that facet of the game to where making decisions doesn't matter as much and having more knowledge (li9ke distance from one target to another) could be a game changer.

Totally agree! FFG got this one wrong!

If you allow free and unlimited range measuring, you're allowing unlimited and free movement measuring as well. If any element of the game functions on limited information, that information must be restricted across other functions of the game as well, to the greatest extent possible. If it's not, then it becomes far too easy to circumvent the limitations that do exist.

There really isn't any complexity in "Only measure when you need to measure something". The Competitive Rules Addendum is confusing, but only because of how it's written, not the inherent concept of "Declare, finish if possible, roll it back if not". Similarly, I find that concerns over how confusing it will be for new players are largely overblown, and/or projecting on the part of someone who prefers open premeasure. Many minis games do not allow premeasuring, or only allow it under certain conditions, and have done just fine.

Like it or not, eyeballing position and distance is a big part of X-wing on the table. It seems perfectly consistent to me that that is consistent across all range measurements, rather than having some (maneuver) being very restricted, while others (range) are very permissive.

Imagine the following scenario:

A 3 rebel ship squadron with Rookie, Dutch and Luke. This list goes up against a bounty hunter (BH) and assorted Ties.

Rookie is within R1 of the bounty hunter with 1 hull point remaining and within firing arc of the BH. Dutch moves and is at the edge of R3 but has a proton torpedo which he will shoot at the BH with the target lock he just acquired. Luke hasn't moved yet, but he is within range 1-2 of Dutch. Luke doesn't know if he is within range 3 to get a target lock on the bounty hunter so if Dutch passes his extra target lock to Luke, he may nto be able to get a target lock on the bounty hunter, but may with one of the ties in range 1-3 of Luke.

I bring this up because while Dutch can pass the target lock off to Luke or the Rookie, if you choose to pass the lock off to Luke, and Luke and Dutch destroy the bounty hunter, then the rookie won't have to worry about dying against the BH. HOWEVER, if Luke is not within R1-3 of the BH, then he won't get the extra target lock against the BH and won't be able to TL/Focus against the BH which can potentially change the entire course of the game.

Pre-measuring willy nilly can change the course of decision making for players and games. That is just one example. There is a reason why ships are activated one at a time and have to fully complete their activation phase before moving onto the next ship. Pre-measuring changes that facet of the game to where making decisions doesn't matter as much and having more knowledge (li9ke distance from one target to another) could be a game changer.

Agreed, you do not get to be omnipotent, you play each pilot the way he would view the field.

As an aside however, these pilots do have radios and they can give each other help so for these higher skilled warriors perhaps per-measuring is a fair way to play in appropriate situations.

It is up to you really, and the only time you have to adhere strictly to the finer points of the rules is when you are in an official tournament.

If Luke was out of range 3 from the BH and another ship was within his range 1-3...have him TL that other ship instead....it just means the BH won't get shot at by Luke, this round. Oh yeah..and the Rook will probably die.

The scenario I pointed out above would directly affect the game. Luke WOULD be able to target lock something in R 1-3 that he knows, but the BH, which is directly threatening the rookie, is unknown. You can't choose to pass the extra target lock off to the Rookie because you don't like the choices that Luke has available because he can't lock the BH. There is a fixed decision point at Luke or Rookie when Dutch makes the decision to pass it off to Luke or the Rookie.

The example is a great analogy of why making a decision without pre measuring is really important, and this happened in a real game, and using that knowledge and unknowns to dictate your decisions. It is the same as not being able to take a barrel roll back because you didn't get in R1 of someone with mauler because you pre measured firing range before the shooting phase and took an evade action instead.

If Luke was out of range 3 from the BH and another ship was within his range 1-3...have him TL that other ship instead....it just means the BH won't get shot at by Luke, this round. Oh yeah..and the Rook will probably die.

Exactly. Dutch with a torp and Luke with TL/Focus could kill a wounded BH fairly easily. BUT, a focused Luke and Dutch with a torp is a less likely scenario, even if slightly. If Dutch passes the TL to the rookie, the rookie may very well be dead and never get to use the target lock.

Personally I love this ruling. I love anything that adds uncertainly (and therefore margin of error) to the game, because I think that is what makes it most interesting and skill-based.

Of course there is an advantage to measuring, like I said it was always a minor advantage the higher PS pilots had. As for eyeballing, I don't miss. That is because I have played a ton of games, and lots of X-Wing games, but it is a source of frustration for newer players.

All I am saying is that measure-decide does not take any longer than decide-measure, and didn't really add anything to the game. A person who wants to stall can still do so, a person who cannot eyeball distances will still run over asteroids. Adding rules that don't actually add anything to the game is a mistake.

Pardon my newbie ness with measuring. I was in a game the other day with Fett, I had the navigator and we were not sure if I could measure after I revealed my dial and then change if I saw it would make me land in an asteroid or not.

The TO said it was okay because with Fett you can change and its like the boost or barrel roll and you'd measure before you commit??

Just don't want to play it wrong.

That doesn't sound right to me. Whatever Fett does, it is still a maneuver, and the rules are clear that you do not ever get to pre-measure maneuvers. Sorry, I would have made you hit that asteroid, Fett or not.

Okay i agree that this situation shows that premeasuring makes a real difference sometimes.

As we played it was that you can not premeasure movement (except barrel rolls or boosts as they are not real movements but actions), but you can premeasure firing distances and arcs.

Lately when the errata came out we started only premeasuring when it was the concerned pilots turn, but then we also allowed it after moving not only precisely when firing, which makes sense especially because ships are allowed to target lock at that moment anyway. Okay this does only give you so much information if you move first but i saw that as an additional advantage of Pilot skill.

Now if we are strict everyone measuring at that moment should have been forced to target lock if it get you right because he only should be allowed to premeasure when "necessary" (when he declares the TL action if the ship is able to at all). But then i have different questions:

Is he forced to declare a target for the lock right away?

Or if he declares a target and it's not eligible, does he have to TL a different target that is eligible (even if it makes no sense to do so perhaps). Or can he then choose a different action?

Same question for barrel rolls and boosts where you declare them, then measure (you have to since you're only allowed to perform them if you don't overlap), then what? Do you need to boost/roll in a different direction (or angle) when you overlap if possible or can you just abort the action and do a different one?

So what i think is that there needs to be clarification about this. If you can't just premeasure everything except movement at any moment then FFG needs to be more precise about when and what you can premeasure and what happens if you can't perform the action. To some this may be 100% clear, but to me it's not.

Pardon my newbie ness with measuring. I was in a game the other day with Fett, I had the navigator and we were not sure if I could measure after I revealed my dial and then change if I saw it would make me land in an asteroid or not.

The TO said it was okay because with Fett you can change and its like the boost or barrel roll and you'd measure before you commit??

Just don't want to play it wrong.

It's 100% clear in the FAQ, which is here: http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/ffg_content/x-wing/support/faq/X-Wing-FAQ.pdf

Page 6, lower right hand corner.

It's 100% clear in the FAQ, which is here: http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/ffg_content/x-wing/support/faq/X-Wing-FAQ.pdf

Page 6, lower right hand corner.

They should just make it mandatory for every tournament instead of just dropping the rules. In that cae it would be like the initiative ruling for tournaments and casual play.