[doctorjoya]

From the rulebook: "Simply announce that you are beginning a mission attempt with your ship or Away Team. Mission attempts are a single action, so, once the attempt has started, you will not be able to do anything else (except as a valid response or by suspending play) until the entire mission attempt is completed."

My recent opponent wasn't sure if a mission attempt ended if all of the matching affiliations for that mission were killed. I said prolly not but they are far more experienced than I am. Whats the official word?

[FranklinKenter]

This is no longer a rule. If it is a rule, then it should be listed here:
https://www.trekcc.org/op/1e_rulebook/i ... on-failure

The rules used to say:

To begin or continue a mission attempt, or to complete the mission, at least one crew or Away Team member must match one of the mission’s affiliation icons (if any); other (non- matching) personnel in the crew or Away Team can assist in the attempt. (Dual-icon missions require a matching personnel in both the crew and the Away Team. Also, to attempt a space mission, at least one crew member must match the ship’s affiliation.

[Armus]

From the rulebook: "Simply announce that you are beginning a mission attempt with your ship or Away Team. Mission attempts are a single action, so, once the attempt has started, you will not be able to do anything else (except as a valid response or by suspending play) until the entire mission attempt is completed."

My recent opponent wasn't sure if a mission attempt ended if all of the matching affiliations for that mission were killed. I said prolly not but they are far more experienced than I am. Whats the official word?

It used to, but not anymore. So he was right at a certain point in time and that's probably why he was asking.

However, the way it currently works is, you need a personnel in a given crew or away team to match at least one affiliation icon on the mission in order to attempt the mission and solve the mission. So if you pass the check to initiate the attempt, you don't check again until it's time to solve, and if at that point you don't have a personnel matching an icon, you don't solve.

[Rancour@gmx.de]

Sorry about that and thank you for the clarification.

[BCSWowbagger]

All answers are correct. Here is the the history:

From 1994-2000, the rule was that you needed a matching personnel to begin a mission attempt, but, once the attempt started, you were golden.

In August 2000, Decipher added two more rules: you needed a matching personnel to solve the mission at the end, and you needed a matching personnel to continue the attempt from dilemma to dilemma. (They clarified in November that you always resolve the current dilemma.) I don't know the background on this.

This ended up causing some inconsistency and confusion when it came to external cards like Homefront and Quantum Torpedo, which can prevent mission attempts. It was not clear whether a mission attempt ended immediately when a card like Quantum Torpedo hit your ship. This problem became serious after Disgraceful Assault came out, since a tactics pile of Quantum Torpedo could, in theory, create an infinite loop, making it impossible to ever pass the dilemma.

Initially, in February 2018, the Rules Committee ruled that cards setting conditions for attempting like Homefront and Quantum Torpedo only checked at the start of mission attempts, but that rules setting conditions for attempting (like "you must have matching personnel") were checked constantly throughout the attempt.

This turned out to be confusing and generated lots of questions, so, in August 2019, the Rules Committee split the difference: ALL conditions for attempting a mission are now checked at start of attempt and at solve time, but NOT in between while facing dilemmas. If you get hit with Quantum Torpedo and/or all your matching personnel die, you continue to face dilemmas, but, if you clear all the dilemmas, you are going to fail the attempt, because you must be allowed to attempt the mission in order to solve it.

In 2018-19, the R.C. was not publishing many long articles explaining changes, so this one (like several others during that time period) was overlooked by many players. It's perfectly understandable that there are still players discovering that change today.

That's the circuitous story of how we got here, and why the "need matching personnel to continue attempt" rule, which stood for almost 19 years, ended up repealed.

Some links here: https://www.trekcc.org/1e/ruleChanges.p ... vel=2#6790