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Defensive Armament - Whenever this unit is attacked by an enemy Fighter in the Air Defense phase, this unit gets +2 armor this turn.

1. Does the +2 also apply to vital armor?

2. Clarify - if the Emily is attacked by a Fighter (during Air Defense), it receives the +2 armor for the duration of the entire turn. Does the new, increased armor value also in effect against Air Defense attacks from ships. It would appear better to attack this unit with a ship (if possible) first rather than granting the +2 armor by a Fighter.

3. Does the Fencer SA (Fighter Cover 5) count as an attack from a "Fighter".

loopy6900 wrote:

1. IMO, I believe the card would say add the bonus to armor [i]and[i] vital armor. There are several instances where SA text or the rules references armor and vital armor i.e. the strafing with fighters or crippled ships. You should add the bonus to the armor rating only.

I'll give you that.

loopy6900 wrote:

2. The card says the +2 bonus applies to the antiair attacks of fighters only.

Not really - it says whenever an enemy Fighter attacks, the unit gains the SA for the entire turn (cause and effect). So you should attack with a ship first to prevent the Emily from gaining +2 armor. You should attack from an aircraft last since the increased armor would then take effect for the rest of the turn. Kind of like Press the Attack but in reverse - aircraft first and then ships.

loopy6900 wrote:

3. The Fencer SA says that escort ability works against the fighter cover, but says nothing else otherwise. I don't believe you use an actual fighter figure, so any other SA against fighters shouldn't apply to fighter cover.

The SA actually represents an enemy fighter unit (a solution to Rich Baker's quandary over a CVE's complement, which had a mix of fighters and strike aircraft but only have a basing of 1 for game purposes - an ingenius solution). Especially since the Escort ability impacts the Fencer's SA. But, on the opposite side, your could not use Press the Attack after the Fencer uses this SA - its not Antiair from a Ship - its Antiair from Fighter Cover.

Fighter Cover 5 - Once per turn during the Antiair phase, you may make a 5-dice Antiair attack against enemy Aircraft within range 3. This attack is in addition to your normal Antiair attack. The Escort ability works against this attack.

AH_ericjohn wrote:

I agree with your interpretation of the text, but I sure wonder why they did it that way. How would using defensive weapons against fighters make you less vulnerable to AA fire?? Also it leads to an odd ordering of air defense (where the AA fires first and then the fighters) which is contrary to how things would "really happen" in battle (whereas Press the Attack does encourage the natural sequence of defensive measures - first fighters then AA)

Seems it would have been very easy to simply word it "this unit gets +2 armor when attacked by an enemy Fighter during the air defense phase"

I think the easy explanation is that WotC doesn't playtest this stuff, they depend on the people who pay them money for their product to fix their mistakes for them. I enjoy the game but WotC isn't paying my salary and I'm becoming increasingly disenchanted with the idea that what is being marketed as a finished product is actually the beta version.

I suspect this one will be errata'd - as opposed to things like the impenetrable American smoke screen - but given the time it took to produce this set there shouldn't be any errata to begin with.

And you'll notice that not one Task Force rules query posted since the set was released has been answered yet.

AH_ericjohn wrote:

You may be right that it's just an out-and-out mistake, but I'd be a bit surprised if it was errata'd -- I think they only fix game-breaking things, and while odd and confusing this doesn't fundamentally screw up the game...

Anyway, it may seem to you and me that it took a long time to prepare the set, but I have the distinct impression that WotC was in D&D4e (or whatever it is) timewarp for the last 12 months or so, and that in the A&A time continuum only a couple of weeks actually passed

Maybe so, but having worked as an editor under much tighter deadlines than that (and occasionally as a game designer/playtester), I don't see that as an excuse. An typo or two is one thing; rules that obviously have never been tried out on the table is another. They'll need to do a whole lot better than this if they want to see my money for Set III.