Just to be clear, are you claiming that there is no LoF inside a Zero Visibility Zone, even in base contact? So, for example, Dodge cannot be declared by either trooper?
No, I'm claiming I can't find anywhere in the rules which would allow LOF while either you or the target are touching a ZVZ that is consistent in both ranged and melee interpretations. Most people argue from their own interpretation of how to draw LOF, never providing foundation in rules and often handling it inconsistently between ranged and melee combat. In the case of Dodge, however, the Engaged rules literally says you can while Engaged, so regardless of which; no I'm not saying Dodge is unavailable.
As an example of this inconsistency let's take @psychoticstorm argument tthat you can draw LOF between two Engaged models inside a ZVZ because LOF doesn't pass through the ZVZ. With this interpretation, it would also be equally true that a model standing partly inside a ZVZ would be able to draw LOF to or from any part that is not inside the zone, but historically I have never seen anyone answer this way because Infinity has "toeing in" with templates.
My issue with this is that this wasn't a bug if you applied a close reading of RAW. It's only a bug because CB made it one. Also, I missed @ijw's clarification. What specifically did he say? Because "Either everybody is using stealth or nobody is" explicitly contradicts the fresh FAQ.
I'm sort of surprised by the number of people who were playing it the other way. I've never actually seen somebody declare a hack against a stealthed target when a non stealthed non hackable target also activated.
Most of the people who were playing it 'the other way' are the sort of people who don't let that happen intentionally. So it comes up with rarely: generally the Crane (for instance) just stays out of the repeater. Playing it 'the other way' closes most of the deliberate exploits. Whereas playing it as per the FAQ creates a range of situations that can be deliberately set up to your advantage. So what I fully expect to see is that the same people who were playing it 'the other way' because they understood how this could be exploited will start exploiting it. I personally will be running less Interventor Lts and more things like the Massacre + Jag + Dak Haris. I will exploit that Haris to force Change Facing vs CC Attack.
@inane.imp : I will definitly exploit it if my opponent insist on using it. But I already have trouble to find a sensible / logical explanation to stealth working against hacking and explaining it to the newer player (and most people I play with nowadays are unexperienced). At the same time I encourage these newer player to come to tournaments and have fun having good gaming experience with nice people, even if they lose their game. I can definitly forsee this kind of tricks, applied to these people with normal / casual experience of the game (knowing the rules, not all the tricks) make them have a very negative play experience. Next time they will be reluctant to come and play the game in tournament. That's why, as a player, and even as a TO, I really wonder if that should be allowed.
Thanks for the clarification. Although it's not 100%, I suggest that the LoF rules should be used to support loF to anyone in base contact, regardless of Visibility Zones: "Figures engaged in CC can draw a 360˚ LoF, but only to whatever they are in base contact with." Which gives consistent handling between ranged and melee combat. That's not what the Engaged state says, though. For this reason, they can only declare CC Attack, Coup de Grâce, Dodge and those Skills which specify that they can be used in CC Combat or in the Engaged state, as Reset. It limits you to declaring those Skills, but doesn't give you permission to override the Requirements for those Skills. Otherwise you'd be able to declare Coup de Grâce even if you didn't fulfil it's usual Requirements, etc. etc. That's why I asked if you're claiming that Dodge can't be declared. Because if you can't draw LoF to an active trooper in base contact, you cannot declare Dodge AROs.
Oh absolutely. Which is why I passionately want it to be the other way. But if I'm forced to build lists assuming the possibility of KHDs using this to defeat my hackers then it's only reasonable that I get to benefit from the upsides in competitive play vs people who understand it. Against people who don't I'm likely to discuss it before doing it.
That's ... not how the English in that sentence works, though. First part of the sentence gives a unit 360 LOF, second limits LOF to base contact. Neither sentence allows you to ignore ZVZ and neither gives you LOF to base contact. It only limits it to base contact. So reading the rules literally, then, apparently you can't Dodge while in melee and either party is in a ZVZ
I would encourage players NOT to play in a way explicitly contradicting official rules/FAQ, regardless of the casual/tournament situation.
Also note that is how everyone (I've never heard of the alternate interpretation being argued at least) has always played that in the past.
I think I might have a solution, but it’s a bit crazy. Move the checking of legality for AROs(and possibly skills in general) from declaration to resolution. Roughly we can divide the “I can’t use the correct ARO” situations into two types: A) The situations discussed in this thread. The reactive player gets forced somehow to declare an ARO but can’t use some specific ARO that they want because it is not legal to declare at the moment the ARO is given. In the examples in this thread because stealth and/or hacking. B) The active unit has two options available to it(for instance hacking and shooting), and the reactive player does not which one the active player will pick so the active player could force a normal roll. I view A) as problem, but not B). So how do we fix A) without changing B) or making a mess out of things? Allow AROs to be declare even if they are not immediately legal, but if they aren’t legal in the resolution part they get changed to idle. Because in most situations in A) there is some ARO that is fairly obvious to declare but it is not available due to some condition. The active player can then of course react to that by not triggering the condition and instead turning the ARO into idle. Potentially you could also change the declarations for the active player in the same way so it’s symmetric but that might cause some odd situations. It would require that an ARO is only given when a declaration turns legal. For instance with the change the active player could declare an BS attack without lof. But since it’s not legal immediately it would not give the reactive unit an ARO before the active unit moves into lof. I’m not sure if it still could create some problems though. The elegant part is that it doesn't need any delaying and it fits fairly well with the idea behind intent. That you can declare whatever, but declaration does not make it a legal resoultion.
I think a much narrower solution to this specific case would just be to loosen up the wording on Reset a little bit to make it easier to declare. For example, the FAQ says "No, you can only ARO against the troop without Stealth. This does not prevent you from declaring Change Facing or Reset.". However, as pointed out in this thread, that's not always true in the case of the repeater area ARO. I would rather they fix one skill than overhaul the entire ARO declaration system.
That works too partially and would make sense. But it's not only reset, defensive hacking has the same problem if I remember correctly? This situation pops up every now and then with various skills involved so a general solution would be nice.
Yes, defensive hacking has it, and I was really annoyed that they "fixed" it by making a White Hacking Device with extra rules (pseudo sixth sense) instead of just altering the program requirements.
Yup. They should have just altered the requirements to include "If anyone declares a skill in your hacking area or zone of control."
I mean melee in general needs as much help as it can get to occur in the game I'm not necessarily against it. The Interventor getting shitblasted by linked hackers is kinda shit though something should be done about that. In the mean time they'll have to make use of cybermask to hide from linked hackers.
