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I've been in favor of looking at this for about as long as I have been in the game.  I feel there are actually two solutions to this situation.  Since you have outlined the first very well, I will describe the second.

Protect:  Protected from special abilities on the cards protected from, as well as any ability on cards played by that card.

Immune: Gains protection from the cards immune to.  Additionally, cannot be harmed by the numbers on any cards it is immune to.

So, essentially, Immune stays the same, but Protect loses some potency because it no longer protects from the numbers, just abilities.  You can still have Gideon die, or Foreign Wives, or Thaddeus; they just cannot be targeted by abilities they are protected from.

It would not actually adversely affect any cards printed, and would be surprisingly consistent.  Anything that protects deck or souls or cards that don't deal with numbers is already a protect; only characters can be immune, as far as I know right now, and I believe they can only be immune to other characters (can't think of a counter example).

So, not only would you deal with some of the power creep protect has enjoyed, but you make both abilities much more consistent and straightforward when reading the cards.

As long as it doesn't adversely affect the new set at all, I wouldn't mind that either, as long as the rule was implemented directly following Nats. That said, I would still prefer folding Immune into Protect and calling it a day. This is because I believe that the names of abilities should be as self-evident as possible.  For instance, a new player should reasonably be able to grasp the basic function of discard, remove from the game, underdeck, topdeck, and convert abilities (among others) without having them explained. I think "protection" is fairly self-explanatory, but (and I may be the only one who feels this way) immune requires more explanation. Abolishing immune entirely would be preferable to me.

I've been in favor of looking at this for about as long as I have been in the game.  I feel there are actually two solutions to this situation.  Since you have outlined the first very well, I will describe the second.

Protect:  Protected from special abilities on the cards protected from, as well as any ability on cards played by that card.

Immune: Gains protection from the cards immune to.  Additionally, cannot be harmed by the numbers on any cards it is immune to.

So, essentially, Immune stays the same, but Protect loses some potency because it no longer protects from the numbers, just abilities.  You can still have Gideon die, or Foreign Wives, or Thaddeus; they just cannot be targeted by abilities they are protected from.

It would not actually adversely affect any cards printed, and would be surprisingly consistent.  Anything that protects deck or souls or cards that don't deal with numbers is already a protect; only characters can be immune, as far as I know right now, and I believe they can only be immune to other characters (can't think of a counter example).

So, not only would you deal with some of the power creep protect has enjoyed, but you make both abilities much more consistent and straightforward when reading the cards.

This is how I always thought Protect and Immune should be played, and was surprised back when Thaddeus was ruled to be protected by the numbers.  I would agree with Redoubter's reasoning, but if Protect will not be changed, then Chris' reasoning makes a lot of sense.

Wait, so does 'protect' protect from being discarded by numbers?

Yes, it does.  Currently, Protect and Immune to essentially the same thing, both protect from abilities from that source and both stop from being defeated by the numbers.

Since you have outlined the first very well, I will describe the second.

Protect:  Protected from special abilities on the cards protected from, as well as any ability on cards played by that card.

Immune: Gains protection from the cards immune to.  Additionally, cannot be harmed by the numbers on any cards it is immune to.

So, essentially, Immune stays the same, but Protect loses some potency because it no longer protects from the numbers, just abilities.  You can still have Gideon die, or Foreign Wives, or Thaddeus; they just cannot be targeted by abilities they are protected from.

Protect, as it currently is, is really two separate abilities. It limits what cards can target, and restricts game rules. I think if this is the route that ends up being taken It would be easier and more consistent to just say that protect abilities don't protect from game rules, assuming that dying by the numbers is a game rule. That way immune is still immune and the definition of protect is reduced to limiting targets like it always should have been. This is far easier to explain and gets rid of the looping and confusion caused by game rules that say they are followed regardless of protection, like discarding an occupied Goshen, when the current definition of protect also states that it protects from game rules.

They really aren't different, because both actually limit the targeting.

I believe everyone agrees that both protect and immune limit targeting, but I have a hard time believing that protecting from abilities and protecting from effects is the same thing, if that is what you were implying by "they".

If your immune, you can't be targeted by cards that you are immune to, and you can't be killed by the numbers because that's a specific part of the definition of immunity.

Currently, if your protected from discard abilities, you can't be targeted by cards with the ability that you are protected from, but, if your protected from just discard in general, you can't be killed by the numbers because the definition of protection is that if a card protects from effects in general, it ignores game rules that result in that effect, like dying by the numbers and being discarded if your toughness is < */1.

To say that protecting from abilities and protecting from effects is the same thing (if that is what you meant in what I quoted) doesn't make sense to me since, to my knowledge, game rules don't have targets, but rather define what happens in a given situation.

Thus, protect must actually do two separate things. Protect and immune both limit targets of cards that have the ability your protecting or being immune from, but, when your protected from an "effect", protect ignores game rules that result in that effect. If your only protected from cards, your not protected from game rules. If your protected from "effects", your currently protected from game rules and special abilities resulting in those "effects".

What I'm wondering is this,

With our current definition of protect, why do the following cards "protect" from the numbers?

1) Thaddeus: "Protect [Thaddeus] from Evil Characters . . ." - This to me is a limiting targets kind of protect that clearly targets cards and their abilites, not effects. The only way I could see this protecting from the numbers is if it somehow protects from the "effects" of the character, which I think was the reasoning behind why it was ruled that way, but that doesn't make any sense to me.

2) Angel Under the Oak: "Protect Gideon from opponents" - This is actually worded more like a restrict, so I'm not sure how that translates. I would assume that the card protects from the player and all the special abilities he activates, similar to how Thaddeus is protected from the special abilities of the enhancements that characters he is protected from play. Thus, any special ability of any card that player plays or uses cannot target Gideon. I fail to see why this should ignore game rules and their "effects".

3) Foreign Wives: " . . . Protect Foreign Wives from cards used by opponent." - Again, this card clearly restricts the targets of specific cards and their special abilities, not effects, so I could only see this being protected from dying by the numbers if it somehow protects from the "effect" of the character, which, to me,  seems like trying to read between the lines.

And,

4) How can you say that when a card protects from "effects" it is the same as saying it limits targets when, as far as I know, game rules don't have targets.


All of this is to say this. Saying that a card that is protected from discard is protected from anything and everything that has the "effect" of discard seems like your reading between the lines and adding the word "effects" to every single protect ability that doesn't say "abilities" so that every card that says "protect from discard" actually reads "protect from discard effects", and that protecting from "effects" somehow supersedes game rules, even when, to my knowledge, game rules themselves don't target cards.

I know that the current rules for protect specifically say that if its protected from the "effect" of discard, it is protected from the game rule that would result in that "effect". I don't understand how that somehow applies to cards that don't protect from "effects" but rather cards and their abilities.

By "they" I was referring to protect and immune, which both really do the same thing.  The only difference is how we use it (we don't have cards that say "immune to discard" so that additional component does not matter).

1. It protects from the numbers as well because that is how protect is ruled and works.  Just by using "protect" it refers to all aspects of it.

2. No, a restrict limits a player's available actions, which this does not do.  It means the card is protected from all cards and effects used by the opponent.  Again, the way "protect" works defines what happens, it doesn't matter what is explicit on the card when it refers to an ability that is defined in more detail later.

3. See 2.

4. Not sure what you mean by game rules having targeting...game rules define what happens to a card, and when the game rule says to do something that is protected against, that is where this comes into play.

I propose that game rules themselves don't target cards, but rather force a player to choose the target. This is consistent with redeeming souls and rescuer's choice in T-2, and is also consistent with the current ruling of how AutO works.

I'm not really sure where you're going with that, because we have to have game rules accomplish effects and it really isn't the same as trying to compare to choosing souls to rescue.  Game rules just describe effects that happen that are not on cards controlled by a player, and we need that aspect of the game.

Quote from: Praeceps on July 13, 2015, 02:59:54 PM

Is there any hope of either of the two proposals being implemented any time soon?

I will say that this is a discussion that we have been having ongoing for quite some time, and we have spent a considerable amount of time thinking about, but neither of these proposals will be implemented to start the next season.

Part of the issue is with watering-down both abilities (due to all "regardless of," prevents, and negates working on both), where protection (or immune in some cases) being used as a soft or hard counter will suffer.  Similar issues with making them do different things, where the one that does not protect from numbers (which would probably have to be protection) would cause all cards that are used as counters (such as FW) to become relatively useless on their own.

That's just a couple small aspects, but it is A LOT more complicated than we would have hoped.  And as you can see from earlier posts, I  am a HUGE advocate of making them either the same or actually different, but I concede that it is not something that is possible at this time.  It is not a dead issue, but it is not something we want to introduce as such a drastic change without absolute certainty regarding the impact.

I will also say that looking at immune and protect in the REG will be very much clearer this coming season.

Thanks for this, I appreciate both the update and the daunting task that any change appears to be