Hi! This question has been harassing me since the beginning of my Infinity career(not really lol), so now I ask your kind opinions. When can I check Zoc of my troopers? Here's what I've interpreted: 1. When you and the opponent is deploying, to be sure. 2. If you're Active, you can measure ZoC to see the Coherency of Peripherals or Fireteam members. 3. If you're Active, there are some Special Skills that allow you to affect some things inside the active trooper's ZoC(i.e. Sensor). So according to the ORDER EXPENDITURE SEQUENCE, you get to measure ZoC after you've declared those Special Skills. 4. If you're Reactive, a condition of a valid ARO includes "An enemy Trooper activates within its Zone of Control (ZoC)". So according to the ORDER EXPENDITURE SEQUENCE, whenever the enemy trooper(s) declares first or second short skill of the order, you get to measure if any of your trooper meets this condition. 5. Unless above situations are happening, you don't get to measure ZoC. Please, enlighten me!
1. Yes, but only if the rules say so, for example for Minelayer or a Coherency check. 2. Yes, but only when the Coherency rules say so. Apart from those, you only get to measure ZoC in the Resolution Step of the Order, when it says to measure ranges and ZoC.
Yes, see "Coherency Check". Note that these checks are NOT optional, and occur at specific times. For instance, you're not allowed to check coherency in the middle of the order to see if you're going to end a movement outside of coherency. No. You find out what happens in the Effects step. Like IJW points out, when the resolution step rules say "Check that the declared Skills, Special Skills, and pieces of Equipment meet their respective Requirements, measure all distances and Zones of Control, determine MODs, and make Rolls. If any Skill, Special Skill, or piece of Equipment does not meet its Requirements, the Trooper is considered to have declared an Idle."they mean it. You don't get to do any measurements unless you're told to do so. No. For zone of control based AROs, you declare the ARO at step two or four, and then discover whether the zone of control requirement is met at the "ARO Check" step. (Note that the order expenditure sequence on page 21 supersedes the simplified version on page 9 of the PDF).
Just to clarify, if you say try to place a koala and fuck it up and place it out of ZOC range, do you waste the Koala?
Yes. Page 21, red box. See underline emphasis. IMPORTANT All details and choices related to the execution of a Short Skill, Short Movement Skill, Entire Order Skill or ARO must be specified when it is declared. For instance, if you declare a movement, specify the entire route; if you declare a BS Attack, specify which Weapon will be used, who the targets are, where the Trooper shoots from, how the Burst is divided, etc. If the Player declares a Skill and, during the Resolution step, he realizes the Requirements are not met, then the Skill is cancelled and the Trooper is considered to have performed an Idle, so they still generate AROs, and lose the ammunition or equipment used, if they declared the use of a Disposable weapon or piece of Equipment.
Which ZOC(s) do you measure in the Resolution Step? Just the Active Troopers' (+ the ZOC of any Repeaters if any of the Active Troopers were a Hacker)? Just the ZOC of any Trooper who declared a Skill/ARO (+ the ZOC of any Repeaters if any of the Troopers were a Hacker)? All the ZOCs?
I'm going to propose it is up to any ZoC that is relevant to resolution of the skills/AROs declared as part of the Order, but its an interesting question.
To be fair, the rules tell us to measure "all distances and zones of control", but that's like... soooo much unnecessary measuring. Even my reactive trooper's zone of control isn't interesting when I'm trying to dodge when someone is active outside my LOF, only whether the enemy is inside it.
For the overly “fair”, note that there’s also a note concerning measuring ZOC’s concerning not measuring obvious ones for the sake of time. I don’t have the page number handy, I think it’s one of the Sybell notes.
Yes, but for the one who needs to know if they are 3 or 4 inches from a corner or if the flanking enemy trooper is likely to make it into base contact in an order or more, it might be interesting to measure a particular area of a zone of control a bit more precisely than is strictly relevant for the order at hand. It might even save them time in the long run ;)
Not even something as sketchy as that (where you're talking about measuring discrete distances within a ZOC). You can get a LOT of value about strictly and fairly measuring just ZOC (for the purposes of argument, say with an 8" measuring device that does not have smaller increments marked). For instance: Order 1: I activate my Warcor, they do something. During Step 6 I measure / request you measure your Moran's ZOC. Order 2: I activate my Zencha, and reveal. Helpfully I know I'm outside your Moran's ZOC so I don't need to worry about Hacking. And sure, you can argue that I don't need to measure your Moran's ZOC because it's obvious. But you're not prevented from measuring obvious ones, it's just pointed out that you're not forced to measure (specifically in the context of measuring Coherency, Sybil's advice box on Page 26) unless your opponent asks for it - which in this context, I certainly would. For the record I hate "you can measure all relevant ZOC" because it immediately forces us to ask the question: "well what ZOC's are relevant to resolution of the skills/AROs declared as part of the Order?". I have not been able to find a clear and consistent definition of that that I can't find a loop-hole for abuse (it ends up being extremely verbose and complicated if you try to close all the loop-holes). Which is why I much prefer: "may measure the active Troopers' ZOC(s) and the ZOC of all Repeaters if the active Trooper is a Hacker". That provides sufficient information to determine the validity of all Skill and ARO declarations (if you're inside the active Trooper's ZOC then the active Trooper is inside your ZOC) and is both clear and consistent. Moreover it means that you always know what ZOC you/your opponent is permitted to measure when a particular Trooper is activated.
Aside: I worked out it's better to do it as. "may measure the active Troopers' ZOC(s) and - if they are a Hacker - their Hacking Area(s)". If you measure their ZOC and discover an enemy Repeater is inside their ZOC then you also measure that enemy Repeater, otherwise you only need to measure friendly Repeaters. So this is the least that you need to measure to determine the validity of any orders or AROs. Edit: You can no longer use an enemies Repeater to extend you Hacking Area to include that Repeater's ZOC. So you don't ever need to measure Hostile Repeater's ZOC.
@Mahtamori this just came up in conversation and I can't recall it being separately answered. Someone disagreed with me when I pointed out that the rules support measuring whichever ZOCs you want to at Resolution (in the context of why pre-measuring ZOC wouldn't really be an issue).
Adding it as a priority question, tbfh... in a game that doesn't allow pre-measuring, measuring ALL zones of control seem like a very gross oversight.
Hello, I am sorry to revive this thread but there are still some debates around that question, apparently... IJW explanation in the second message of the thread sounds clear to me but one sentence in particular seem to be poorly understood (by me or others...), on the Zone of Control wiki page: "Players can check the Zone of Control (ZoC). Measurements must always be made from the Active Trooper, checking a maximum of 8 inches from any point along their path. If there are Reactive Troopers or Game Elements within the Zone of Control (ZoC) of the Active Trooper, they can declare an ARO." Quite a lot of players here play it basically as "I can measure my ZoC anytime during my movement" and use it, for example, to avoid entering a hacking zone or a mine trigger area, by stopping 1 millimeter before. Is it allowed? To me, you move your trooper (indicating its final position and the path it took) and then only, you check for ORA, hacking, mines triggering, etc... Thanks for your answer.
That is premeasuring. You declare your movement route, you place your model, you check ZoC along the route.
So that's a clear and definitive "no", and you can't use that rule to adapt your movement to avoid getting into some hacking zone or mine trigger area, right?
