v 2.0
Hunting and hiding is the most confusing aspect of the game. Read the rules for hunting and hiding first of course, but then come here to learn what they mean.
The first and most important thing to know about hunting and hiding is that all your officer's must have "standby" in their officer action boxes. They can still cast spells, but cannot do any major actions. If even one of your officers does something, your hunt or hide will not succeed.
Before we go any further, let me define some terms and dispell some myths about hunting and hiding.
With that out of the way, the second most important thing to know about hunting and hiding is the descision of where to hunt or hide.
This is an example of a hunt/hide action box. Note that there are three locations here, space, coronasphere, and a gas giant. The percentages listed in the box indicate the risk to your ship if you should hide or hunt in any of those locations. If you hide in the coronasphere, the risk is that there is a 38 percent chance PER MODULE of breakage as a result of hiding.
Ok, say you are going to fight a ship that has the same percentages as you but different weapons. Let's pretend that you can pummle him and he can't fight back. Naturally, he will want to hide from you, meaning that you will have to hunt for him. The question is where exactly to hunt? If you hunt in the same location as he hid, you will always find him. However, the rules state that "The decision to hunt in a location implies willingness to hunt in other locations of the same or lesser danger*, which the prey might hide in." So, what this means exactly, is that if you decide to hunt in coronasphere who's risk is 38 percent, you will find him no matter where he hides, as all the other locations are lesser risk than the coronasphere. So, by hunting in coronasphere, you have him bagged, but you will also take lots of damage from the adverse environment. The descision on where to hunt or hide necessarily has to weigh how much damage you are willing to take versus how much you want to find or hide from the other ship.
* danger, as used here in the rules, means risk. Most of the confusion about hunting and hiding stems from the contradictory usage of these terms in the rules.
Now here is where things get even more complicated. Chances are, the ship you are facing does not have the same percentages as you. This means that HIS hunt/hide box may look more like this:
Naturally you won't be able to see his hunt/hide box. To figure out what his box says is fairly simple. Take his factor (percentage) that is relevant to the location (gas giant = impulse, coronasphere = shields, minefield = cloaks This is stated clearly in the rules) and subtract it from the danger percentage given in the location:
| Id | Description |
|---|---|
| 3 | Weaponry Academy |
| 85 | Ant Colony buying Chocolate for $102 (204%), 1 Engineering vote (Neutral) |
| 129 | Elf Colony buying Beards for $115 (115%), 1 Medical vote (Neutral) |
| 132 | Fish Colony buying Videos for $118 (94%), 1 Engineering vote (Neutral) |
| 155 | Kangaroo Colony buying Mittens for $153 (204%), 1 Medical vote (Neutral) |
| 285 | Hamster Colony buying Ninja Beer for $80 (80%), 1 Weaponry vote (Neutral) |
| 311 | Goblin Colony buying Hankies for $54 (108%), 1 Weaponry vote (Neutral) |
| 373 | Comet Cloud |
| 441 | Stellar Coronasphere, danger |
| 441 | Gas Giant, danger |
| 508 | Deep Space |
| 531 | Deep Space |
| 572 | Deep Space |
| 575 | Deep Space |
| 605 | Factory selling Ninja Beer for $100 each |
| 911 | Weasel Homeworld, 8 Weaponry votes (Neutral) |
| 912 | Engineering School |
| 913 | Science School |
| 914 | Medical School |
| 915 | Weaponry School |
| 966 | Moon |
| 1033 | Moon |
| 1081 | Near Space |
| 1176 | Prison |
| 1282 | Ancient Ruins |
| 1323 | Stargate to Star #36 (Key 7) |
| 1386 | Stargate to Mizar (Key 0) |
| 1394 | Stargate to Pollux (Key 4) |
In this example, your opponent must have a shield percentage of 69 percent for his risk to be 10 percent. I did the math backwards to see what his shield factor IS, you would do it forwards to find out his coronasphere risk percentage.
Follow so far? The reason why it gets complicated now is because the statement "The decision to hunt in a location implies willingness to hunt in other locations of the same or lesser danger, which the prey might hide in" is referring to the HUNTER's risk percentage's, not the HIDER'S. Therefore, if the hunter's risk for any location is 1 percent due to high factors, he will find you no matter where you hide, even if he hunts in space. To sum up: success of a hunt depends solely on the hunters risk percentage's, and nothing to do with the hider's.
Finally, damage to each mod due to hunting or hiding is calculated AFTER combat, so if you hunt in a gas giant and your prey shoots off all your impulses, you can be sure you'll be left with a pile of (U) garbage after the battle. Favoring has no effect on the odds of each mod taking damage, but blessing does (if you bless, remember to refigure your risk percentage, as the percentage in the pull-down box reflects the risk before the bless).