Multiple friendly troopers activate using an coordinated order. Some of them might be hackers, others are just troopers pretending to be hackers using holostate. All of them are over 8” away from enemy troopers. Somewhere far away is a deployed friendly repeater. Some of the enemy troopers near the repeater might be within 8” of it. Some of the troopers near the repeater might be hackers or just pretending to be hackers using holostate. At least one of the enemy hackers is using hidden deployment but isn’t necessarily within 8” of repeater. If legal (according to rules/faq/forum post) both players want to selectively measure if a particular trooper is in hacking area so that they have the right information but also confuse their opponent to make suboptimal choices. What hacking area measurements active and reactive player can do prior to ARO declaration and in resolution step? What hacking area measurements they can voluntarily not perform?
After every skill declared by the active player, both players are allowed to measure 8" from any point that the active models were and 8" from any of their repeaters. Order Expenditure Sequence Step 2.1 and 4.1 "ARO Check. The Reactive Player checks if they are allowed to declare AROs with their Troopers. Players can check from the Active Trooper if any Trooper or Game Element is inside the Zone of Control (ZoC) of the Active Trooper." FAQ 1.2 page 10 "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)." https://downloads.corvusbelli.com/infinity/faq/n4-faq-en-v1-2.pdf There is no distinction about whether or not a model is a hacker and/or hackable at the steps 2.1 and 4.1. This is something that you will check at the resolution step to determine if the skill is valid or cancelled.
So activating non-hackers, you can check if any friendly or enemy troopers are within your repeaters ZoC! Cool! Totally not going to use this info on anything else besides hacking ;) What about holostate troopers that are pretending to be repeaters, but aren’t? They are immediately revealed to be fakes, because mandatory repeater measurement can’t be fooled? Also can you immediately after placing some sweet pitchers recheck your hacking area?
I like @Diphoration 's interpretation. It avoids breaking the Tian Gou KHD. Otherwise any time you have a repeater on the board (e.g. minelayed by a Guilang), whenever you activate a trooper I get to say "I'd like to measure the active trooper's hacking area, may I measure from this repeater?" and based on your answer, I know whether the trooper is secretly a Tia Gou KHD. As far as I know, the only example of this currently would be a Hafza pretending to be Saladin - which, to be fair, is a common tactic. My preferred interpretation would be that you can measure from the fake repeater - otherwise the tactic is invalidated. As soon as you activate your Barid for the first time, I can ask to measure his hacking area and thereby find out which Saladin is real. Still, absent a definitive answer it's probably best to check with the TO before you show up to a tournament with a Saladin body double list! This one is easy, anyway. You can measure the active trooper's hacking area immediately after declaring his first and second short skills. At that point, the repeater isn't on the table yet. It only lands in Resolution, at which point it's too late to check the hacking area for that order.
I’m not 100% sure about the interpretation. The faq says that “If the Active Trooper is within the Hacking Area of the Reactive Trooper, they can declare anARO (See Order Expenditure Sequence, page 21).". Clearly non-hacker activating while enemy hackers are in repeater range doesn’t give an ARO to the enemy hackers. -> Activating trooper hacker status is public info in this situation? @QueensGambit actually the real Saladin would get revealed when first non-hacker activated, because opponent would immediately say: “Let me check the activated troopers hacking area” and started measuring Saladin ZoCs. You would have to stop him when he tries to measure fake Saladin ZoC which gives away the real Saladin.
I think that just like any other piece of fake gear, be it Impetuous, repeater, or Albedo, if you pretend to be one of these troopers then be prepared to have the tactic invalidated almost immediately.
I'm not 100% sure which is correct either. @Diphoration's interpretation would protect the active trooper's hacking status, but if he's wrong, then yeah, as long as the active player has a repeater on the board, any trooper that activates reveals whether or not it's a hacker. Hmm, yup you're right, if @Diphoration is correct. Unless you can measure from the fake repeater. Certainly possible, yeah. It would be weird that it largely invalidates the Tian Gou KHD. I suppose you could still use one in a defensive fireteam that you never planned to activate. And I guess if you activate the whole fireteam, when you measure from your repeaters it tells your opponent there's a KHD somewhere in the fireteam, but not which unit. That hardly matters, though, the important thing for the opponent is probably that the KHD is somewhere in the team. It would be a shame about Hafza/Saladin, but such is life.
Well, I agree with Diaphoration that the only sane way to do it is to assume there always is a hacking area, so with that the Tian Gou KHD (or anything pretending to be a hacker that is not) would be "safe". If not, well... then it'd certainly make Holomask less valuable. Not to say almost no value at all outside specific uses such as hiding an LT or the "budget hidden deployment" Hafza HRL
