1st turn lock on friendly ship to avoid first jam

[michigun1 112]

1) as far as I understand it's OK to lock on friendly ships?

2) if so, it's always good to do when play against low-initiative jammers - jam will discard this fake TL.

 

do I miss something?

Edited September 20, 2018 by michigun1

[theBitterFig 11,598]

It's worth noting that the player who gives the Jam token decides what token it will discard.  If you had both a TL and a Focus when the opponent Jams you, they get to pick which token.

There is a downside: as long as you have your own ship locked, you won't be able to use it to do anything useful.

Hrm.

I think it's legal.

[Opsmason 121]

1. Yes

2. Let me see if I understand you correctly:

Turn one, your Ship A (initiative 5) locks your Ship B.

Turn two, Enemy Ship Z (initiative 2) jams your Ship A. Ship Z is forced to spend the Jam to break that A->B lock. Ship A is then free to lock/focus/whatever at initiative 5 because there is no longer a jam token.

Seems legit to me!

Edited September 20, 2018 by Opsmason

[Icelom 3,405]

Wrote up something about how it would not work... then realize it would.

 

Edited September 20, 2018 by Icelom

[thespaceinvader 17,568]

Yup, it's legit, and amusing.

[michigun1 112]

Actually, lock on obstacles also OK.

[Opsmason 121]

 

2 hours ago, michigun1 said:

Actually, lock on obstacles also OK.

Nice thing about locking the rock is if your wingman is destroyed, the lock has a better chance of staying around.

Of course you should change that lock to an enemy whenever it makes sense, but this is still kinda cool.

[Magnus Grendel 11,679]

12 hours ago, Opsmason said:

1. Yes

2. Let me see if I understand you correctly:

Turn one, your Ship A (initiative 5) locks your Ship B.

Turn two, Enemy Ship Z (initiative 2) jams your Ship A. Ship Z is forced to spend the Jam to break that A->B lock. Ship A is then free to lock/focus/whatever at initiative 5 because there is no longer a jam token.

Seems legit to me!

Yup. It works if you have a low initiative jammer versus a high initiative pilot, and the latter doesn't actively 'need' their lock.

"When a ship becomes jammed, the player whose effect caused the ship to gain the jam token chooses for the ship to either remove one of its green tokens or break one of its locks."

On a related note, you can force me to break a lock rather than discard a green token, but you cannot specify which lock. Which means that R3 astromech gives you a quite impressive resistance to jamming; lock the target you care about plus a rock, or a friendly, or something, and break the irrelevant lock if jammed.

A nice insurance policy against something like Freelance Slicer.

 

Edited September 21, 2018 by Magnus Grendel

[thespaceinvader 17,568]

That's pretty neat, especially the combo with Freelance Slicer.  I think the only ships that can take both are the ARC and Sheathipede?

[Magnus Grendel 11,679]

45 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

That's pretty neat, especially the combo with Freelance Slicer.  I think the only ships that can take both are the ARC and Sheathipede?

Now that Punishing One removes the crew slot like Havok, I think so.

I actually meant if attacking a slicer-crewed target; using freelance slicer requires you to spend a lock, so you'll only have one if the result comes up jam.

Although, again:

"the player whose effect caused the ship to gain the jam token chooses for the ship to either remove one of its green tokens or break one of its locks"

So if your own Freelance Slicer backfires and jams you as well, it's still your effect so you can force yourself to break your other lock rather than discard a green token (if you've somehow gotten two target locks plus a focus).

Edited September 21, 2018 by Magnus Grendel

[thespaceinvader 17,568]

Yup. That's the goal. But I suspect it's just neat rather than good. The sheathipede isn't really want to be locking and the arc has better uses for the crew slot.