Q: Can a crippled ship be placed in the formation bonus position during a pursuit battle? I want to protect it!
      A: Yes, a retreat battle force is formed as per (307.3) and (307.41) allows one ship to be in the formation bonus position.
      Q: During combat of a non-phasing player turn, a carrier group consisting of SAV, AD5, and F5E is damaged. Due to the tactical situation, the Klingon player decides to kill the SAV and cripple the AD5. Are the crippled AD5 and/or the uncrippled F5E allowed to perform CEDS retrograde?
      The argument that they "might not" assumes that once the SAV is dead the group falls apart. The argument that "maybe they can" rests on the thinking that the group participated in combat and was damaged. Rule (308.131) is confusing because it only mentions "carrier groups". The rule was written before (515.0) allowed players to build their own groups, and assumes fixed carrier-group counters, which could not really exist in Basic F&E (which also lacks auxiliary carriers).
      A: The good news is that the consistent intepretation has been that (308.131) should be deemed to have included flexible (515.0) groups, and as such, the AD5 and F5E were part of a group at the time of damage and can be retrograded out of the area; at least, it could have been on 21 Feb 2010. The bad news is the F&E2KX rulebook eliminates CEDS retrograde entirely, so as of 22 Feb 2010, the entire question is moot as there is no longer any such thing as CEDS retrograde.
      Q: The F&E rules offer a trade-off between a base's EW and attack factor due to "blinding", but SFB rule (G24.135) says that bases are immune to sensor blinding. Are the F&E rules wrong?
      A: Not wrong, but they reflect different things. SFB has energy allocation rules; F&E does not. It's the power consumed by the systems, more than "blinding", that causes the difference. See (441.53) which allows you to use full power for both.
      Q: I am confused by the wording of the direct-damage rules. Just exactly how many points does it take to destroy an enemy PDU?
      A: PDUs (also known as defense battalions) take ten points of damage to destroy by normal damage and five points if using a mauler per (508.122). In either case, the six fighter factors remain and could be used to absorb further damage or (if there is no other base for them) they are treated as involuntary minus points. If you give up your own PDU to resolve damage, it resolves only three points of damage, but you could (and should) have first given up the fighters, since if you do not give them up before the PDU, and they have no other base, they would be lost without resolving any damage.
      Q: I am confused by the wording of the direct-damage rules. Just exactly how many points does it take to devastate an enemy planet?
      A: A planet is devastated by ten points of damage (508.21). If it is your planet, then you can resolve ten points of damage by voluntarily devastating it. If it is your opponent's and you want to devastate it with directed damage (302.52), then it will cost twice the normal damage, which is twenty points, unless you use a mauler, which could cut the cost by seven or ten points, depending on the size of the mauler.