Level One - Lesson 8
Comprehensive Rules: Section 6 - Action Timing and Clarification
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Hello there and welcome back to the Judge Program for Star Wars™: Unlimited - Level One certification track lessons.
As always, I’m your host Jonah, and today we’ll be covering the comprehensive rules, section six - Action Timing and Clarifications. This deals with the three major actions a player can take during a turn: Play a Card, Attack with a Unit, and Use an Action Ability.
Two quick notes about how we are going to be approaching this lesson. First, we’re going to cover 6.2 and 6.4 simultaneously - there’s a ton of overlap in what you do when playing a card and using an action ability, so rather than just repeat myself, I’ll point out differences when they come up.
The other is that this section uses the sub-section zero for general rules, so that the subsection numbers line up with the steps of the action, so 6.2.1 can be referred to as “step one of playing a card” and it numerically lines up.
Play A Card and Use an Action Ability
Diving right in, 6.2.0 and 6.4.0, the general overview of these two actions is where they have the most differences. Of course, they’re coming from different sources, which explains these differences.
A player follows the associated steps when they choose to take the action to play a card or use an ability, or when they are resolving an ability that lets them do the same.
In order to play a card, a player must have a card in hand or be resolving an ability that lets them play a card from a zone other than their hand. You’re My Only Hope lets a player play a card from the deck, Dryden Voss lets you play a card from an Arena, Second Chance lets you play a card from your discard, and the whole smuggle mechanic lets you play cards from your resources.
Each time a player plays a card, that card enters play or resolves as a new copy of that card. That is to say, if you played a unit at a reduced cost, it was defeated, and you’re now replaying it with the resolution of Home One’s When Played trigger, it won’t have its initial cost reduction, only the cost reduction from Home One.
In order to use an action ability, there first must be an action ability on a card, indicated by the bold word Action or Epic Action followed by a cost (albeit sometimes no cost), a colon, and an ability after the colon. Furthermore, to use an action ability, its activation or resolution must change the game state.
Action abilities that have a condition as seen in the leader Iden Versio or an action ability that references a particular type of unit, as seen in the leader Grand Inquisitor can be used, as long as paying the costs or resolving the ability changes the game state, even if that condition or unit isn’t available.
Epic Actions are a special type of action ability that can be used only once per game. A player can use an Epic Action, even if paying it’s costs and resolving it’s effect doesn’t change the game state because changing the status of the Epic Action to “used” does change the game state.
To play a card or to activate an ability, you must be able to pay all associated costs, including modifiers and additional costs.
Players may play cards or use action abilities where the resolution has no effect on the game state, so long as paying costs and playing the card changes the game state. You can play Medal Ceremony with no units in play, and that counts as your turn!
If you’re uncertain about whether something will affect the game state, hop on back to Level One, Lesson Three real quick and check in on section 1.15 of the comprehensive rules. I’ll wait (as long as you press pause, or don’t keep reading this...).
Finally, to play a card or use an action ability, a player takes the following five steps in order:
- Declare intent
- Check restrictions
- Determine costs
- Pay Costs
- Resolve
Declare Intent
This one is the most straightforward one! All you do is reveal the card you’re playing or indicate the ability you’re activating!
If you’re playing a card, the card is still in the player’s hand - it hasn’t changed zones yet. Any abilities that become active “while playing” or “while activating” become active.
Check Restrictions
After you say that you’re going to do a thing, you need to make sure that you’re able to do it. For actions, the primary restriction is that activating or resolving it will change the game state. For cards, there are some other restrictions - first, Regional Governor can flatly prevent a card from being played. Second, upgrades always need a valid unit to attach to, and some upgrades specify traits or other attributes of the unit that they are attaching to.
If the declared action can’t be completed because of these restrictions, the player must choose a new action.
Determine Costs
Before we can pay costs, we need to know exactly what costs we’re paying. Most of the time, for cards, it’s going to be the printed cost value, in the upper left corner of the card. Most of the time for actions, it’ll be whatever is in the brackets following Action and before the colon.
However, costs can be modified. You begin by taking the printed cost in the upper left corner, then any cost increases, such as Del Meeko, then any cost reducers, like Jabba the Hutt, Cunning Daimyo or Bib Fortuna, Jabba’s Majordomo. These cost modifications do stack additively, but the cost of a card can’t be modified below zero.
After totaling the resource costs, you must also calculate additional costs, such as the one from Saw Guerrera. Notably, when an ability instructs you to play something “for free” it ignores all increases or reductions in cost, including aspect penalties, but does not ignore additional costs.
Let’s do a quick walk-through.
You activate Bib Fortuna to play Waylay. You control a Jabba the Hutt, and your opponent controls Del Meeko.
We start by looking at the base cost of three. Then, we add any cost increases, which brings us to a total of four, then any cost reduction - we have two, and we get to apply both of them, bringing the cost down to two.
For actions, if the cost includes the ⮣ icon, it means that the card with the ability must become exhausted in order to use the ability. If the cost does not include the ⮣ icon, that means the ability can be used whether the card is ready or exhausted. Actions may also include multiple parts to the cost - resources, exhausting a card, or more. All parts of the cost must be paid in order to use the ability.
Pay Costs
At this point, the player has to pay the price for their actions, literally! They must exhaust resources equal to the card's total cost, as well as pay any other parts of the cost.
Players can not pay resources in excess of the card or ability’s cost.
Resolve
Finally, the player resolves the card or ability - and this is where things diverge a bit. If an ability would trigger based on the card or ability being played or used, it triggers now but does not resolve yet.
For an event, the card is placed in the discard pile, and then the event ability resolves. This means that events (and again we’ll call up Restock to take a starring role) that affect cards in the discard pile see themselves.
For a unit, it is put into play, and for an action ability, as much of the effect as possible is resolved.
After the event or action ability has resolved, or once the unit is in play, then any triggers that were triggered while playing the card or using the action ability begin to resolve. The details on how they resolve will be covered in our next lesson, Abilities and Effects.
If, in step two, the action can’t be completed because of a restriction, in step four the cost can’t be paid or in step five, resolving the ability combined with paying costs doesn’t result in the game state being changed, the process is immediately stopped and rewound to before step one, and the player must choose a different action to take for their turn.
Attacking with a Unit
This brings us to attacking - the way to win the game! You can only attack with ready units and only with one unit per action unless an ability instructs you otherwise. If you attack with an exhausted unit (say, due to Frontline Shuttle) you don’t further exhaust the attacking unit. If you’re instructed to attack with multiple units, the attacks occur sequentially, and resolve fully, including all triggers, before proceeding to the next.
If an ability calls for a player to attack, that player must make an attack if able, even if strategically disadvantageous.
Like playing a card, attacking a unit is broken down into a few smaller steps - but only three of them this time.
Declare the Attack
First, the player declares the attack - this involves choosing the unit to attack with, exhausting it, and then choosing what they are attacking. An attacking unit must attack an enemy unit in the same arena as it, or an enemy base unless otherwise restricted. Similarly, it must attack a unit with Sentinel if one exists in its arena. If a declared attack is illegal because of these restrictions or there are no bases or units the attacking unit can attack, reset entirely to before this step of the attack, including readying the attacking unit.
If the attack was an independent action, the player must choose a new action - although it can be attacking with the same unit; as long it attacks a unit or base that doesn’t break any restrictions. If the attack was a part of the resolution of an ability, the player must choose a new, legal attack. If there is no legal attack, the unit is not exhausted, the attack immediately ends, and the ability continues to resolve.
Presuming everything is legal, the active player becomes the attacking player and the player who controls the unit or base they’re attacking becomes the defending player for the turn. Similarly, units become attackers and defenders as appropriate, and “while attacking” and “for this attack” abilities become active. After all of that, On Attack triggers occur, including Saboteur, Restore, and “When this unit is attacked” abilities. Again, we’ll cover these abilities in our next lesson.
Combat Damage
The second step is combat damage. The attacker deals damage equal to its power to the defender, and the defender deals damage equal to its power. This damage is “Combat damage” - all other damage is not considered combat damage, even if it is a unit dealing damage to another unit or happens during an attack action.
If the attacker was defeated before this step, no damage is dealt. If the defender was defeated before this step, no damage is dealt, unless the attacker had overwhelm - like an AT-ST, in which case it deals its damage directly to the defending player’s base. Damage is marked on units and bases, and units are defeated appropriately.
Finally “When defeated” and “when this unit deals combat damage” abilities trigger and resolve in this step. Abilities such as Rukh’s or Jango Fett’s will still trigger and resolve, even if he is defeated.
Ending the Attack
The third and final step is ending the attack.
Players cease to be attacking and defending players, units cease to be attacker and defender, and “while attacking” or “while defending” abilities end.
Furthermore, “When this unit completes an attack” abilities trigger, like the one on Zeb Orrelios. These require that the attacking unit is still in play after the damage has resolved. These are distinct from “When this unit attacks and defeats” triggers, even if they check to see if the attacking unit has defeated an enemy unit.
Combat Examples
Let’s walk through a few examples. I’m going to share the scenario, and then recommend you pause to think it over before continuing!
Alex has a Strafing Gunship upgraded with Devotion, and attacks their opponent’s Tarfful. What happens?
First, the “While attacking” clause of Strafing Gunship activates, and Tarfful gets -2/-0 for the duration of the attack. Then, Restore triggers and Alex heals their base for 2.
After that combat damage occurs - the Gunship deals four damage (three printed power, plus one from Devotion) and Tarfful deals one damage (three printed power minus two from the Gunship’s lasting effect). Furthermore, in this step, Tarfful’s ability triggers and deals four damage to a ground unit controlled by Alex. Then the attack is completed.
Let’s try another, with even more moving parts. Alex’s Fifth Brother, upgraded with Ruthlessness attacks Nico’s General’s Guardian. What happens?
In the first step, both Fifth Brother and General’s Guardian trigger. Because Alex is the active player, they get to choose the order in which players resolve those triggers (and we’ll go into more detail regarding this next lesson!). In this scenario, let’s say Alex chooses to have Nico resolve their General’s Guardian trigger first.
The trigger resolves and Nico puts a Battle Droid token into play. Then, Fifth’s Brother’s trigger resolves, and Alex can choose whether or not to deal damage. Because General Guardian’s trigger has resolved, Alex can choose to deal one damage to Fifth Brother and one damage to the newly created Battle Droid token, defeating it. This is not combat damage.
Fifth Brother now has one damage marked on it, and consequently now has Raid 1. Raid isn’t a triggered ability, but a lasting effect, and Fifth Brother is still meeting the condition for it to be active, so Fifth Brother’s power is increased by one from the Raid ability.
Then combat damage happens. Fifth Brother deals five damage - two from printed power, plus one from raid, plus two from Ruthlessness and General’s Guardian deals four damage back. Both units are defeated! Because Fifth Brother attacked and defeated a unit, Ruthlessness triggers, and will deal two damage to Nico’s base, even though Fifth Brother also was defeated.
That brings us to the end of this lesson! In this lesson I said “action” or “activate” over fifty times... in our next lesson, I’ll probably say the word trigger even more, as we’ll be covering section seven of the Comprehensive Rules: Abilities and Effects. As always, if you have any questions, comments, or insights, be sure to join the Judge Community Discord and make your voice heard. Until next time, good luck and have fun!