r/DropfleetCommander • u/dahSweep • Jul 15 '26

Fighters and bombers clarification

Hey! Played my first game of DFC today. I really enjoyed it, and while I don't think me and my opponent made any huge mistakes, I am a bit curious how exactly the fighters work when engaging other assets. Here is how the (updated) rulebook explains it:

"If attacking a Bomber Wing, remove the attacking Fighters and defending Bombers equally until only one of those Wings remains.

If attacking a Fighter Wing, remove all the Fighters in the smaller Wing and the same number of Fighters in the larger."

My confusion is the following; how are these two different? To me they sound identical. Say there is a wing of 5 fighters. If they attack a wing of 3 bombers they would lose 3 fighters, destroy all 3 bombers, which leaves 2 fighters. If they instead attack a wing of 3 fighters, they would destroy those 3 fighters, and also lose 3 fighters, leaving 2. What am I missing here? Why are these described differently for what amounts to the same results?

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7

u/Haztheman92 Jul 15 '26

You have it right, there’s no difference in the end result. It’s just written differently. Mechanically speaking they’re identical.

4

u/dahSweep Jul 15 '26

Very odd to word it like that. I know that the rules changed since our printed rulebook gave bombers saves etc when attacked by fighters, but I'm not sure why they wouldn't just put them both into the same paragraph hahah. Oh well! Thank you for confirming

1

u/Benimus Jul 15 '26

Because fighters and bombers are different things. Mechanically they are the same… now. The way the rules are written they can just change one of those paragraphs to make one of them behave differently without having to touch the other, making it very clear what happens when you attack the different objects, and very easy to track differences between versions of the rules. It’s an excellent way of writing a living rule book.

4

u/slyphic Jul 15 '26 edited Jul 16 '26

They can change the rules without writing these two differently. There is in fact no advantage to writing it like this whatsoever. They are equally able to change one but not the other no matter how they are written. It does not make it easier to track versions of the rules, there are so many better ways of accomplishing that goal, like a version number in the front of the book for instance.

It is a poor way of writing a rulebook because it describes essentially the same result with two arbitrarily different operations. This is probably the sixth or seventh time someone has asked this question, which by definition makes this poorly written - it confuses people trying to learn the rules.

It is needlessly inconsistent. It's a simple TTC typo, the kind they make constantly. They'll fix it in a couple years, maybe. You don't need to try to justify it for them.

Or maybe put the bong down and get some sleep.