Description
Attack craft can shelter around any other ship (Escort and larger), place their counters or models touching the ships base.
While sheltered in this way, the attack craft cannot be targetted by weapons fire as they are assumed to be inside the
sheltering crafts shields. They may only be attacked by other attack craft (Fighters). Also, any torpedoes fired at the
sheltering ship may be intercepted as normal, without the attck craft leaving the sheltering crafts base (note that if
the player does not wish to intercept the torpedoes then he does not have to, the attack craft are effectively ignored for
the time - although see below when the ship takes damage).
However, when the sheltering craft takes damage, there is a chance that the attack craft will be caught in the explosions.
For every damage point that the shelterng ship takes, treat each attack craft stand as if it had passed through a blast
marker.
The sheltered attack craft move with the host ship, and must therefore move slower than they are normally allowed, and
may only move in their own movement phase, not either of the Ordanance Phases. They may, however, break off from sheltering
in any Ordanance Phase, and move up to half their normal distance away from the host ship. If the host ship moves through
blast markers then the sheltering ships are unaffected, but risk taking damage as normal if the host ship is hit.
If the host ship is attacked by enemy fighters then these cannot be avoided and combat is played out as normal (ie as if
the craft were in open space).
If the host ship is removed from the board for any reason then any attack craft sheltering are removed and counted as
destroyed. If the host ship is destroyed but remains on the board - for example as a Drifting Hulk - then any sheltering
craft are destroyed on a D6 roll of a 4+. If the host ship explodes then treat any sheltering craft as inside the blast
radius automatically.
If enemy bombers or boarding craft are sent against a ship which has sheltering craft, then the effect of the supporting
craft is worked out before any other results - although the controlling player may choose not to engage as noted above.
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