Escape pod and damage to Lando's Falcon

[Saeris 1]

Help me, Hive Mind!

Scenario:

I have the Customized YT-1300 with [Lando's Millennium Falcon] title, and an Escape Pod docked. The Falcon lost its shields, the Pod has shields. After the Falcon defends, it should take a hit and a crit. 

Q: Can I take the hit to hull and shield the crit?

Justification: In the rules set, it is stated you take each damage card one by one, in a separate instance. I would think I get to decide to use the Pod's shield or not, for each separate damage card.

My google-fu failed me on this question.

Thank you! 

Edited October 13, 2018 by Saeris

[thespaceinvader 17,568]

Yup, you can do exactly that.  You may treat the shields as if assigned to the falcon, which means you can choose whethe or not to on a per-damage-instance basis, and therefore, save them for crits, or for that last point of damage that would kill you.

[meffo 1,401]

was there an errata on this? i'm pretty sure the landos millenium falcon title states that you can spend the escape shafts shields as though they were your own, not that you can lose them as though they were your own. loosing and spending are very different things.

when you take damage, you do not spend shields, you loose them. you can, however, spend shields for other effects, such as generating a charge on bomblet generator or using intertal dampeners.

in other words, you cannot use the escape crafts shields to negate either hits or crits that you ships takes, no.


page eight of the rules reference:

DAMAGE
Damage represents the amount of structural damage a ship can take.

Damage is tracked by damage cards. A ship is destroyed when the number of damage cards it has is equal to or greater than its hull value.

There are two types of damage: (hit) (regular) damage and (crit) (critical) damage. When a ship suffers damage, that damage is suffered one at a time. For each damage a ship suffers, it loses a shield by flipping the shield to its inactive side. If it does not have an active shield remaining, it is dealt a damage card instead. For (hit) damage, the card is dealt facedown; for (crit) damage, the card is dealt faceup and its text is resolved. All (hit) damage is suffered before (crit) damage.

 

and page 16, under shields:

When an effect instructs a ship to lose a shield, a shield assigned to the ship card is flipped to its inactive side.

When an effect instructs a ship to spend a shield, a card loses a shield. A ship cannot spend a shield if all of its shields are inactive.

[Icelom 3,405]

@meffo I think you are right by RAW, I can't find anything to argue against that.

I think you are wrong by RAI, wish ffg would watch there wording more closely.

They clearly defined spend and loose as per page 16, and taking damage is loosing not spending as per page 8.

Ughh. That sucks.

[thespaceinvader 17,568]

Given that there are literally no effects that spend shields to which the falcon has access, this hair splitting is clearly that.

[meffo 1,401]

6 hours ago, thespaceinvader said:

Given that there are literally no effects that spend shields to which the falcon has access, this hair splitting is clearly that.

inertail dampeners. the rules make a clear distinction between loosing and spending shields. you do no spend shields when getting hit by an attack, you loose them.

if this is not rules as intended it needs to be written as intended. as of right now, there is no question on how it's written.

[thespaceinvader 17,568]

OK, so there's exactly one.  For the two shields available.

I don't disagree that more rules precision would be appreciated, but how this is meant to work is very obvious.

[meffo 1,401]

19 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

OK, so there's exactly one.  For the two shields available.

I don't disagree that more rules precision would be appreciated, but how this is meant to work is very obvious.

while i agree that it would be fair (to say the least, since the ship kind of sucks) if you could use the escape crafts shields as you liked, you can't just rule after you perceived intention of a rule. we have to play by the rules as the rules are written.

the card could simply have said: "While you have an escape shuttle docked, you may USE its shields as if they were on your ship card."

but since it says on the card that you can spend them, i'm going with the ability as stated.

there is no point arguing what the intention is, since the intention is not ours, it's the game designers. if we would rule by our perception of what the intention of an ability is rather than how it's written, everyone would follow their own rules. this would be kind of disastrous for the game and it would be very difficult to play indeed.

the intention is probably that you can use the shields as you like, but that has no bearing on the rules what so ever.

[theBitterFig 11,598]

This is where RAI/RAW struggles.

In truth, however, all rules are RAC.  Rules-As-Community.  Games aren't played by written words.  Games aren't played by intentions.  Game are played between people--necessarily a community.  It's totally reasonable and just for a community of judges and TOs to say, "This is an obvious and unworkable error: we will fix it."

[meffo 1,401]

8 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

This is where RAI/RAW struggles.

In truth, however, all rules are RAC.  Rules-As-Community.  Games aren't played by written words.  Games aren't played by intentions.  Game are played between people--necessarily a community.  It's totally reasonable and just for a community of judges and TOs to say, "This is an obvious and unworkable error: we will fix it."

wait, what? so as long as there is a majority not liking how an effect works or doesn't work, we just overrule the game designers decisions and use it as we agree fits?

it's not that simple. the rules works perfectly as written for this ability. it's not obvious that it's an error. i'd say it's probable and likely that it's an error, but that's still pretty far from obvious.

i would totally agree if someone at my local gaming club asked me if they could use the shields how they liked, but in a tournament setting, i would probably object if the TO or judge said that this ability works any other way than stated, unless they announced it in advance of the tournament starting.

with that being said, of course i would love to be able to use the escape crafts shields how ever i please and i would love it if FFG changed how the ability worked, but i don't believe the community should fix it. if i was going to a tournament i would be glad to see a post from the TO well in advance stating that the carrier can use the shuttles shields when taking damage. it shouldn't be necessary for every tournament for the rest of time, though. FFG should fix it.

if they don't fix it, i'll continue to use it as written and consider other iterations house rules. if they release a rules update and don't adress it, i will regard the ability as it is written as their intention.

it may also be worth noting that i've played this ship myself in a (somewhat casual and tiny) tournament. i didn't do very well (knocked out after 1-2), but still, i'd never dream of asking my opponent to play the games by other any rules than what FFGs provided us with, even in a limited setting like that.

[Maui. 2,815]

Normally I am very much on the side of Rules As Written, but in this particular case the intent is so obviously clear that it just seems foolhardy to ignore it. The Falcon title is meant to allow the Falcon to use the Escape Craft's shields defensively, because otherwise that part of the title has so little utility as to be laughable, because it makes more sense both in-universe and within the mechanics of the game, because the preview article states as much... none of which are authoritative, but when taken together make a compelling case for intent.

To me this appears to be a clear-cut case of the language simply not being applied carefully enough by the devs. If going by an absolute inflexible interpretation of the rules as written, then no the shields can't be used defensively. But I can't imagine actually playing with someone and telling them they can't use the EC shields to defend the Falcon, even in a tournament setting, because of how painfully obvious the intent of this interaction is.

[meffo 1,401]

On 10/14/2018 at 5:50 PM, nexttwelveexits said:

Normally I am very much on the side of Rules As Written, but in this particular case the intent is so obviously clear that it just seems foolhardy to ignore it. The Falcon title is meant to allow the Falcon to use the Escape Craft's shields defensively, because otherwise that part of the title has so little utility as to be laughable, because it makes more sense both in-universe and within the mechanics of the game, because the preview article states as much... none of which are authoritative, but when taken together make a compelling case for intent.

To me this appears to be a clear-cut case of the language simply not being applied carefully enough by the devs. If going by an absolute inflexible interpretation of the rules as written, then no the shields can't be used defensively. But I can't imagine actually playing with someone and telling them they can't use the EC shields to defend the Falcon, even in a tournament setting, because of how painfully obvious the intent of this interaction is.

if it's that obvious, i will go ahead and read the article right now. the title does more than let it use shields - and i don't agree that it's laughable to get another pilot ability and the ability to roll an additional die when attacking a stressed ship.

Edited October 15, 2018 by meffo

[meffo 1,401]

"In addition to sharing pilot abilities, a docked Escape Craft gives you two extra shields to spend as if they were on the Millennium Falcon’s ship card. This extra layer of defense is nice, but you might want to save the Escape Craft’s shields for when it’s flying on its own, especially if it’s being operated by an Autopilot Drone and carrying a load of rigged energy cells. This ship is set to blow and do massive damage to any nearby ship after three rounds, but it’ll need all of its shields if it’s going to survive that long."

certainly sounds like they intended you to be able to use the shields, yes. unfortunately, they used the same wording on the card as they're using in the article.

so in effect, it changes nothing. they have made the effort to differentiate spending and losing shields, so if their intention is indeed what i'm expecting (and most of you are apparently sure as **** of), they need to state it.

[Ryfterek 1,009]

On the main note, @meffo is right - while the RAI is painfully obvious, the devs have bamboozled themselves with RAW clauses. And so, we are doomed to hotfix it tournament-by-tournament, or keep having gentleman' agreements until, one day, an errata fix what they've done. 

On the side note, I'm sooo showing this thread to this one fella insisting there's no such thing as RAI taking place in X-Wing...

[jftanner 150]

For the sake of argument, let's ignore the obvious inconsistency between lose/spend and assume that the card allows you to use the pod's shields as if they were your own.

My question, then, is when do you get to make this decision? Let's say I have no shields left on the falcon, but the pod still has one. I then get shot for one damage and one crit. Can I opt _not_ to spend the pod's shield for the hit, and then opt to spend it for the crit?

Since damage cards are dealt and resolved one at a time, I'd argue that each damage card is a separate opportunity. Therefore, the once-per-opportunity rule would let me choose to use the ability individually for each damage card. But, I can also see someone arguing that you only should be able to chose for the whole attack. Is there perhaps something i'm missing that makes it very clear one way or the other?

(Again, ignoring the spend/lose issue that we've already established.)

[meffo 1,401]

damage is suffered one at a time. since you may use the shields on the shuttle, you can choose to loose, or not to, for every damage, one at a time.

at least i haven't seen anything that would indicate it would work any other way.

[jftanner 150]

1 minute ago, meffo said:

damage is suffered one at a time. since you may use the shields on the shuttle, you can choose to loose, or not to, for every damage, one at a time.

at least i haven't seen anything that would indicate it would work any other way.

That's my reading of it as well. But it seems so counter to how crits usually work, that it feels wrong. So that just makes me wonder if I missed something. But it sounds like I haven't, and that just makes escape pods even more amazing.

[Ryfterek 1,009]

6 minutes ago, jftanner said:

That's my reading of it as well. But it seems so counter to how crits usually work, that it feels wrong. So that just makes me wonder if I missed something. But it sounds like I haven't, and that just makes escape pods even more amazing.

What you're missing mate is that with your own shields, you never get to make a decision about using them. While they're there, they absorb incoming damage. 

The value (assumingly) added by the shuttle is that now you get to be asked a question any time a shield is needed. Sir, do you want to use the shuttle's shield? To which you are free to say yes or no. 

So, in a way L3-37 did her bloody job, bringing a fresh air of liberation and self-determination to the game. Good job, robo-girl. 

Edited October 14, 2018 by ryfterek
Haha, you censor daimn but not bloody. You colonial plonkers.

[MockingBird ME 61]

20 hours ago, meffo said:

unfortunately, they used the same wording on the card as they're using in the article.

This is so disappointing. A buddy of mine has been playing a decent amount of scum falcon lately and I keep thinking it's just to expensive for what the title + pod do. If it wasn't for this title it would be way stronger than we've been playing it but with the wording it's actually even less powerful.

[jftanner 150]

I think this is one of those incredibly rare cases where RAW is quite clearly just wrong. Usually, I'm against judging intent, but the context of that article is pretty clear.  I hope/imagine that FFG will correct this soon or, if we're wrong, at least put out a statement saying "nope, RAW is correct: no lose, only spend".

In the meantime, Falcon w/ Pod is moderately hosed. The extra pilot ability is nice, but the 8 points worth of virtual shield upgrades (but better!) was a big part of that cost.

[MockingBird ME 61]

I'm a proponent of RAW are the only rules that matter but I do truly hope that they errata Lando's Falcon soon because the RAW make it both crazy over priced and and just feel bad.

[jftanner 150]

Looking at the difference between Spend and Lose in the rules reference, for shields:

It strikes me that it's not the Falcon card that's worded incorrectly. When you take damage, you're effectively spending a shield. Since the only difference between those two terms is whether or not you can do it without having a shield available. You can lose a shield you don't have, but you can't spend one.

The rules on damage solve this, of course, by adding that restriction separately: 

 

It uses the word lose, but with the caveat of a spend. So, I would suggest that the way to fix it is not by changing the Falcon, but by re-wording the rules on damage. Instead of "For each damage a ship suffers, it loses a shield by flipping the shield to its inactive side. If it does not have an active shield remaining, it is dealt a damage card instead", use "For each damage a ship suffers, it must spend one shield. If it cannot, it is dealt a damage card instead."

Voila, consistent word usage.

... now, to wait and see if FFG actually does this.

[Slade 14]

Sorry read the comment multiple times but I lost track.

Back to the original question from Saeris. Based on RAW and example in FFG article Saeris is correct? ... untill FFG clarifies otherwise that is. Thx.

[sharrrp 444]

If we go on the assumption that the shields can be used to block damage then I would say yes you can choose which individual damage to block since it says "may". This would be consistent with 1e Chewbacca crew. You could save him until a bad crit came through (like Blinded or Direct) and only choose to use him after seeing the crit. In the shuttle case you would have to decide before seeing the crit card of course but same idea. "I'm going to use my optional damage mitigation on THIS damage."

On the RAW vs RAI point when there is any doubt you have to go with RAW because RAI can get kind of insane with what some people think "intended" is.  There are times where RAI is SO obvious though that you have to go with that. The go to 1e example would be Jabba who granted Illicit tokens to other ships but then, I assume due to poor planning, said "you" on his card describing what they did. A number of people staunchly claimed only the ship carrying Jabba could actually use the tokens since "you" always refers to the ship not the player.  RAW they were correct, but the idea that this extremely expensive card just distributed decorative functionless cards across a whole squad was so ludicrous I have no problem saying they were being stupid. That was a stupid position to take.  Also it turned out if you actually read the rules insert that came with the ship it specified that Jabba's text described the rules for the Illicit tokens not Jabba himself. To be fair it was still poorly done on FFG's part and if I were a betting man probably an ad hoc solution applied after they realized they'd already printed cards with improper wording but again, ABSURDLY obvious how it should work.

This escape craft is probably the most exactly borderline case I've ever seen though. If you could only use the craft shields to proc Inertial Dampeners that would be a pretty hilariously bad ability. It also would hardly be the first time there was an unplayably bad ability/ship in X-Wing though.

Having said that I would probably still land on the side of "Yeah you can block damage with the shields because of course" unless and until we get an official ruling otherwise. That's a very narrow and specific combination of two disparate sections of RR coming together to imply that the shuttle can't stop damage. That combined with the nonsensical nature of using that interpretation just from a design standpoint makes an oversight much more likely and logical in this case for me.

Edited October 16, 2018 by sharrrp

[jftanner 150]

2 minutes ago, sharrrp said:

Having said that I would probably still land on the side of "Yeah you can block damage with the shields because of course" unless and until we get an official ruling otherwise. That's a very narrow and specific combination of two disparate sections of RR coming together to imply that the shuttle can't stop damage. That combined with the nonsensical nature of using that interpretation just from a design standpoint makes an oversight much more likely and logical in this case for me.

In games with friends, I have no doubt that we'll play it this way. The Millenium Falcon is fun, after all, and it seems like it's supposed to use shields for damage.

But, until we get an official "whoopsie" from FFG, I won't be bringing any Falcon lists to the local game store. Better safe than disqualified.