So there is a section in the 1.2 faq that states something about 8 inch ZoC measurement and the repeater. Specifically the section is: Players can check the Hacking Area. Measurements must always be made from the Active Trooper and their Repeaters, checking a maximum of 8 inches from any point along their path. If the Active Trooper is within the Hacking Area of the Reactive Trooper, they can declare an ARO (See Order Expenditure Sequence, page 21). Does this allow the active trooper to measure 8" from the repeater after first short skill but before aros to better know if targets are within hackable range. If not, what is this section trying to convey that is/isn't allowed than from before?
stupid question perhaps, but why does the active trooper have to be a hacker to be able to check? I assume only hackers have hacking areas?
Then there are Holomasks which flips that on its end, meaning it doesn't matter if the opponent seem to be a hacker or not.
Does the opponent being a hacker matter? I thought it was just dependent on the active trooper actually being a hacker. So, if active trooper was a holomasked hacker into a non hacker and they measure ZoC from one of their repeaters, it would be a red flag that the active trooper is not what it appears.
Definitely only matters whether the active trooper is a hacker, not the reactive troopers. I don't think any questions have been resolved around what actions you can take with a holomask trooper. I.e. can a fake hacker measure from repeaters? Can a fake non- hacker decline to measure from repeaters? There are similar unanswered questions about pretending to be impetuous or pretending to be a bike. And, I suppose, pretending to be a repeater though I don't know if that one has a thread.
The active trooper being a hacker or not is irrelevant. It is the reactive trooper's hacking area that is relevant. I would point out that the rules do not tell you to measure a Hacker's repeaters, but generically the active player's repeaters. You also need to remember that the active player isn't forced to measure their zone of control - neither is the reactive player - though it is in above all else in the reactive player's interest to do so. It is even not as explicit as it could be whether the active player is even allowed to initiate measuring (though I firmly belive they may) Holomask is the bane of a neat solution to this problem. Ultimately if the reactive trooper is a hacker it will be back to guessing if the active trooper is a holomasked hacker or vice versa. Arguably that's kind of the entire point of Holomasking.
You're right, I suppose that as long as the reactive player has a hacker on the table, we can measure from all the active player's repeaters, even if the active trooper isn't a hacker. That's a lot broader than I'd realized. It follows that you can also do it if the reactive player has a camo marker since that could be a hacker. Or if they have a gap in their list that could be a hidden deployed hacker.
How do you figure that “I could have a model with a hacking area, but I don’t” allows measuring of hacking area?
No, for the active player. "I want to measure your hacking area. Can I measure from my repeaters?" Reveals whether the reactive player has a camo hacker, unless you allow the measurement on the basis that the camo might be a hacker.
By the way, the FAQ entry kinginyellow quotes also has a first paragraph on the previous page. And I'd probably need to append that to measure a hacking area as the reactive player you'd need to have a trooper that has a hacking area realistically. Regardless how you read it Holomask messes stuff up.
Sorry, can you expand on this? The Active Trooper's ZoC and hacking area can be measured, that's as far as the rule goes. The opponent will know if they get any hacking AROs as they have to either be within the Active Trooper's hacking area, or have a repeater within the Active Trooper's ZoC. I don't see why the Reactive player would need to measure from their Repeaters
So, @Mahtamori argues above that you don't measure the active troopers hacking area. You measure whether the active trooper is inside reactive troopers' hacking areas, by measuring from the active player's repeaters. Consequently, you can measure from the active player's repeaters if the reactive player has a hacker, even if the active trooper isn't a hacker. If that's true, it follows that if the reactive player has no visible hackers, the active player can find out whether the reactive player has any hidden hackers, by asking to measure from his own repeaters, which he would only be allowed to do if the reactive player has a hacking area.
I feel people are over thinking this. If the Active Trooper is a Hacker you can measure from the Active Trooper or any of the Active Trooper's repeaters. This tells you: 1) What enemies are valid targets for the Active Trooper 2) Whether enemy hackers can target the Active Trooper, possibly through it's own Repeaters. If the Active Trooper is not a hacker then friendly repeaters are irrelevant, you only need to check ZoC to see if there are any enemy hackers or repeaters are in range. The Holomask question is a fair one, though I'd argue that it is treated as the original profile with the consequence that this can give away the fact that the trooper is Holomasked, as that is the most consistent with other similar situations.
I do not think that is a very good solution to this situation. You effectively make holomask pointless for hackers (and pointless to pretend to be hackers) by forcing an implicit reveal of explicitly private information any time an order is spent on the trooper and regardless of board state. I'd much rather see the rules pursue minimal negative impact which would mean that the reactive hacker simply has to guess if the opponent's trooper is a hacker or not (similar to N4 FAQ 1.0). After all the situations where this is relevant are typically quite rare as you don't often want to place your hackers inside the ZoC of enemy repeaters - and you'll typically also know as the reactive player even before the order is spent if your hacker(s) are inside enemy repeaters.
I expect that you can always measure all hacking areas from the active players repeaters. The use case would be if I have a hacker with hidden deployment. How could I know if they have a valid ARO otherwise?
Correct, but this would still only matter if the Active Trooper was a hacker as you can only use enemy Repeaters to target Hackers.