I've heard people interpret it to mean that if the hacker using HTA and the drop troop tie their rolls, the drop succeeds - but that can't be right, because if you tie a FtF roll, you fail. What's up with that?
I don't understand how you can read a statement that says the hacking program has no effect as anything other than that the jump succeeds.
As the FAQ explicitly states, the program says you have to win the FtF for it to have an effect, so a tie means no effect at all.
And no effect, assuming that the combat jumper rolled less than or equal to their (modified) PH value means that the jump succeeded.
To be clear, this is not the ruling I wanted; if you go back and look in old threads from 2014/2015 (which I just did) you'll see me arguing for "normal" FtF resolution which would mean on a tie the jumper disperses.
That's true for everything though - everything has no effect on a tie. It's just the opponent fails too because of the basic FtF mechanic. If someone was trying to hack the fundamental die rolling mechanic, they failed.
Corvus Belli has a long history of cleaving too closely to Rules As Written when issuing FAQs. http://infinitythewiki.com/en/Hack_Transport_Aircraft By using this program, the Hacker may make a Face to Face Roll with his WIP-6 versus the PH Roll of the enemy making a Combat Jump. If the Hacker wins, the enemy making a Combat Jump suffers the effects of a Dispersion. If the Hacker does not win the Face to Face Roll, the Combat Jump proceeds as normal, but the Hacker suffers no further ill effects. The most literal possible reading says that the hacking program only has any effect if the hacker wins; otherwise we default back to the AD: Combat Jump rules which treat the action as a normal roll.
That's what I thought, too, but then they issued the FAQ which said to disregard the hacking program entirely if it did not win.
That's fine, the hacking program is disregarded entirely. I read the FAQ. But tying a face to face roll means you fail - your thrown smoke isn't placed, you don't get to move in a dodge, etc.
Yeah that doesn't check out. Whoever wrote the FAQ failed at their understanding of the basic FtF mechanics if they claim it means that.
I don't know what to say, man. You're clearly already quite convinced that you understand the game better than its authors, so there's really not a lot I can say here. I've told you what the FAQ is conventionally understood to mean, and it's up to you to either accept or reject that.
No, they modified it, just as they modified it within the program. The program itself states it must win to have an effect, with anything less than a clear win making as if there was no ARO declared at all.
'If the Hacker does not win the Face to Face Roll, the Combat Jump proceeds as normal, but the Hacker suffers no further ill effects.' If the FtF Roll is a tie, then the Hacker has not won the FtF Roll, therefore 'the Combat Jump proceeds as normal'.
The sentence that the FAQ refers to in the actual rules text is clearly saying that nothing bad happens to the Hacker if they fail their roll... nothing of the sort. Someone just misread the rules. There are plenty of people at CB who don't play much Infinity, if any, and I have no idea why they handed the FAQ off to them... Or they were just clarifying a trivial point and everyone else ran away with it. Face to Face Rolls can result in a tie. In the event of a tie (Criticals or not), both rolls cancel each other, no effects are applied and the Order is spent. This right here still applies.
Of course they haven't won the FtF roll. But neither has the drop troop; it was a tie. That's basic, basic Infinity.