A ship is Ionized while it has a number of ion tokens relative to its size: at least one for a small ship, at least two for a medium ship, and at least three for a large ship. Ion tokens are red tokens.
During the Planning Phase an ionized ship is not assigned a dial.
During the Activation Phase, an Ionized ship that did not have a dial assigned to it during the Planning Phase activates as follows:
- The ship skips its Reveal Dial step.
- During the Execute Maneuver step, the ionized ship executes the Ion Maneuver. The ion maneuver is a blue 1 maneuver. The bearing, difficulty, and speed of this maneuver cannot be changed unless an ability explicitly affects the ion maneuver.
- During the Perform Action step, the ship can perform only the action.
- After the ship finishes this activation, it removes all of its ion tokens.
Additionally:
- An ionized ship cannot perform any action except the action.
- Some special weapons inflict ion tokens instead of dealing damage.
- If a ship becomes ionized after the Planning Phase (and therefore has been assigned a dial) but before it has activated during the Activation Phase, it activates as normal. During the next Planning Phase, if the ship is still ionized, it is not assigned a dial and proceeds with the ion maneuver during the Activation Phase.
- Since an ionized ship does not have a dial assigned to it and does not reveal its dial, it cannot resolve any effects that trigger after it reveals its dial.