Tried to search this, but couldn't find anything. "Automatic Special Skills and Automatic Equipment have no effect while Unconscious." For example, Immunity: Possession, Non-hackable and (my personal favorite) Antipode are all Automatic skills. Unconscious Avatar can be possessed? Unconscious non-hackable heavy infantry trooper can be targeted by hacking attacks, but unconscious hacker* can't? Abandoned unconscious Antipode Assault pack member isn't Immobilized-2 and can execute an order normally** if he gets healed? * This depends on the hacker type? Some hacking devices are equipment, other are automatic equipment and some aren't equipment at all... **Let's assume for a moment that the pack isn't in Retreat!, because that stuff gets really convoluted.
Simply possessing a Hacking Device makes you a Hacker. You don't need to be able to use it. So Unc Hackers are still able to be targeted by programs that target Hackers. Antipodes get weird. I have NFI how they work. Most if the others are accurate. Although mostly they're irrelevant. In the rare event that an Avatar goes Unc and then someone manages to Possess it and then repairs it... bully to them.
"Automatic equipment have no effect while Unconscious". I assume that all effects, including being a hacker is part of this. There are also differences between different hacking devices. Hacking Device/Hacking Device Plus = Equipment --> Not Automatic equipment. Unconscious has no effect. Can be targeted by hacking attacks. Defensice Hacking Device = Defensice Hacking Device --> Not Automatic equipment. Unconscious has no effect. Can be targeted by hacking attacks. Assault Hacking Device = Assault Hacking Device --> Not Automatic equipment. Unconscious has no effect. Can be targeted by hacking attacks. EVO Hacking Device/Killer Hacking Device = Automatic equipment --> Unconscious has effect. Can't be targeted by hacking attacks.
It doesn't work like that. From the Hacking rules: "Operatives equipped with a Hacking Device are called simply Hackers." Just because the device doesn't have an effect any more doesn't change that the Trooper was equipped with it.
When unconscious the effects contained within the device are blank; the consequences of having the equipment is not an effect of that equipment. You still have the device or the rule and everything about the device is functional, it is only the stuff that are Effects that are not functional. Note that this does not mean you are immune to what the effects say, it only means that the effects of the device is effectively blank. It is still fully possible that a duplicate device held by another trooper will have an effect on your unconscious trooper. For the most mundane analogy possible; imagine a tin box, the effects are what's contained inside the tin box, and whether or not the tin box is empty does not affect that the box itself is magnetic. Magnets will stick to it even after you've eaten all the cookies. EVO Hacking Device is Automatic because it has passive benefits to your army. If unconscious the trooper still has a device that is an EVO Hacking Device which is identified as a Hacking Device which fulfils the first effect that actually is a requirement in http://infinitythewiki.com/en/Hacker (No one said CB's rules are perfect, but their mechanics are a lot better than what you're trying to achieve) What you're arguing regarding Antipodes doesn't work at all. Unfortunately the pack does not use Coherency Checks for no particular good reason but I can see two things happening here; Either; An unconscious Antipode does not become immobilised if abandoned, but if it already was IMM it will remain so whether or not it enters UNC. If you recover that Antipode from UNC the effects in Antipode will resume and you must place an IMM marker next to at the end of the order in which it became a straggler which is the end of the order in which it recovered. Or; An unconscious Antipode still has the Antipode rule and the conscious Antipodes still have functional Antipode rules which will helpfully supply the UNC Antipode with the status changes that are triggered due to actions of the pack. I can see no possible way to read the rules that allows you to effectively sub-divide a pack during a game.
A Conscious Avatar can become possessed if it wants to be (because it's also Optional). You're just too scared to try reaching out to it. No. As soon as the Antipode cancels Unconscious, all of the Antipode rules apply to it. You might be under the mistaken idea that the bullet point #4 from the end in Antipode (the one that applies IMM-2) only applies that the end of orders performed by the Antipodes or something. That bullet point applies at the end of every order in the game, whichever player spent that order and whoever it got spent on. For example: 1. Three Antipodes declare ARO Dodge. Only one of them succeeds, and then finds out that it just dodged out of ZoC of the other two Antipodes. That Antipode goes IMM-2. 2. Those two non-IMM Antipodes declare ARO Dodge against a later order. One of them succeeds, so that now the Antipode from step 1 has someone in ZoC of it. That IMM-2 state gets cancelled. 3. As part of a bet, a player activates an Antipode pack and has everyone one of them leave coherency. They all go IMM-2. Then each of the Antipodes gets moved using the Casevac rule. As the Antipodes get back into ZoC, that IMM-2 status gets cancelled. Infinity doesn't have any "if multiple things happen at the same time, choose what order they get resolved in" mechanic to cause a sequence where Unconscious is cancelled and that Antipode bullet point doesn't get resolved. -- Bonus: Notice that bullet point #3 from the end includes the condition "has lost ... at least one of its members (i.e.: they are Unconscious or Dead)", you make a roll "for the whole Pack". There are rules in some of the automatic skills that apply to unconscious models. G:Mnemonica is another example. The text says "Automatic Special Skills and Automatic Equipment have no effect while Unconscious." What it means, in actual practice, is "Automatic Special Skills and Automatic Equipment have no effect while Unconscious, unless otherwise specified."
Thanks @solkan . I thought that the revived abandoned Antipode wouldn’t become immobilized because it didn’t have the Antipode skill at the beginning of the order. Apparently my reasoning was flawed. But just to confirm, are unconscious EVO/killer hackers targetable by programs that target hackers? The latest FAQ ruling about Cadmus Killer hackers gave me this idea.
Hacker is an automatic skill. Unconscious hackers don’t have that skill. It would be a different thing if hacker was a type (like REM) or characteristics (like Cube). Perhaps this will get fixed in N4. I know that people like to play Infinity the way they have always played even if it’s clearly against the rules. But I think I have said everything I needed to say in this thread. I’ll try to Overlord that Avatar someday.
