Rules Explained:Ruthlessness

After having a discussion this week I wanted to try writing a few articles that help illustrate slight quirks of the game to help players understand them properly.
In this article I will start with the Elite Pilot Talent (EPT) Ruthlessness.

First lets take a look at the card:

Here we see an Imperial Officer, let's call her Ruth, confronting an unknown agent held before her by a pair of Trandoshans (presumably bounty hunters). This art demosntrates the willingness of the empire to go to any lengths to defeat their enemy, including the use of unlawfal agents such as the unscrupulous bounty hunters.

After you perform an attack that hits, you must choose 1 other ship at Range 1 of the defender (other than yourself). That ship suffers 1 damage.

This is the X-Wing equivalent to the "Spray and Pray" tactic of firing all weapons in the general vicinity of the target without considering the posibility of collaterol damage.

Example One:
The card text indicates that you must choose one other ship which implies that you cannot choose the ship that has already been hit by the attack. The card text also states (other than yourself) which also excludes the ship that executed the attack in the first place.
In this example Darth Vader attacks Emon Azzameen, succesfully damaging him. However as there are no other ships within range one of the Firespray no further damage is caused by the Rutlessness talent.

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Example Two:
This time Emon is accompanied by to Z-95 Binayre Pirates. The card text states that after having damaged Emon, Vader may choose 1 other ship to suffer damage. The only restiction applied by the card text is that the chosen ship be at range 1 of Emon. In this example Vader chooses the Z-95 which is left on one hull point to destroy him despite the ship being out of Vader's firing arc and there being another (fully healthy) Z-95  directly between Vader and Emon.

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Example Three:
The card text doesn't specify which faction a ship should belong to and as such in the absence of any enemy ships being within range one of Emon, Vader must apply one point of damage to his Academy Pilot wingman. Even though this would result in the death of the Academy Pilot due to only having one hull point remaining, Vader has no choice but to do so.

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Example Four:
The Card text gives you freedom to choose who should receive the damage. In the example below Emon is accompanied by a Binayre Pirate with a Z-95 fitted with the Illicit "Dead Man's Switch" upgrade. Despite the Z-95 being at range one, only having one hull point means that should Vader choose to assign one damage point to him he would be destroyed and the dead man's switch will activate damaging all three Imperial pilots and killing both Howlrunner and the Academy Pilot. So once again Darth Vader chooses to execute his Academy Pilot wingman.

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So as we can see the Ruthlessness talent can be a double edged sword. As it is a Imperial only upgrade it is most recommended to take this upgrade when playing Elite squads of three ships or less to minimise colaterol damage to your own ships. It is also worth considering the type of ships you may be playing against. Using Ruthlessness against swarms of five ships or more will result in a much higher return on your point investment than if you are likely to play against only elite lists of three ships or less.