Cactus Game Design Message Boards

Thanks for your patience while we talked this through.

The default for all targets is "in play". That means that if Warrior's Spear is targeted for discard at the end of battle and returned to hand during battle, when the discard ability resolves at the end of battle the spear is no longer a legal target (it's not in play) so it is not discarded from hand.

I understand that cards like Assyrian Survivor, Potpher's Wife, Panic Demon (pale green), War Officer and Recruiting Officer may have caused confusion and even seem inconsistent to some people. To clarify the how and why those cards work as they do we are adding a statement to the entry for Instead in the REG. This may not be the finalized statement but it will be something similar to this:

Abilities that describe an end of battle condition (ex: If defeated, If character defeats, If rescue attempt fails, etc.) followed by instructions about what to do when that condition is met have an implied "instead" causing the described effect to replace other effects when the condition is met.

I do love that we are trying to get a clear, concise rule that is also in the REG, but I am having some trouble seeing what makes Warrior's Spear and Archer's "end of battle" condition different from the rest.

Warrior's Spear
Discard the top card of opponent's deck.  If it is a Lost Soul, put it in play instead, and discard this card after battle.

Assyrian Archer
You may discard a Hero in a territory.  If you do, discard this Evil Character after battle.  May band to an Assyrian.

Assyrian Survivor
Protected from discard abilities on opponent's cards.  If defeated, capture to opponent's Land of Bondage.  Cannot be interrupted.

Each of these has an end of battle condition, also triggered when the card is presented.  When Survivor is presented, there is an ability waiting to go off if the condition is met.  When Archer is presented, there is an ability waiting to go off if the condition is met.  Both are resolved at "end of battle" and meet the qualifications you put in your rules clarification.

To be clear, what is making them different for rules purposes?

Gabe explained that in the last paragraph. Assyrian Survivor is treated as an "instead." The defeat (trigger) is "insteaded."

Whereas, the other two are not "insteaded." They are delayed triggers that have nothing to target.

I know Gabe's post says it may not be the final wording, and that is what I'm focusing on.  I'm understanding the ruling he is putting forth, and I'm not arguing that, I am stating that it needs to be clearer, more than "end of battle condition".  To me, that reads as anything that completes at the end of battle.  That's not what Gabe is getting at, I understand that, which is why I'm saying that the terminology being used may not be the clearest and does not differentiate these abilities to me.  And IMO, if we're going to make a ruling, it should be as clear as possible when it goes into the new REG.

I like "outcome" because that seems to me to be the main difference between Survivor and Warrior's Spear.  Survivor's SA is based on an outcome (defeat) that happens to be calculated at a certain time (after battle).  But Warrior's Spear SA is based on timing (after battle) which makes it seem more like a trigger than an instead.

Of course that does lead to questions about the archer though since he uses the same "after battle" language that sounds more like timing than outcomes.

I like that better, personally, and it makes it clearer Thanks Gabe.

Of course that does lead to questions about the archer though since he uses the same "after battle" language that sounds more like timing than outcomes.

I had thought that Archers and WS were both the "timing" ability, and would not be able to be targeted if they were out of play at the end of battle.  Gabe's ruling post seems to specifically avoid mentioning the Archers when he is mentioning these "outcome" cards, so I was assuming that Archers are not one of them.  By the wording of their abilities, they are more like WS than AS.  Can we get that clarified?

Well done, Elders!  From reading the thread it appears the confusion lies only in the fact that the outcome of determining defeat occurs at a specific time, (sort of like "when a Hobbit eats elevensies").

Abilities that describe an end of battle condition (ex: If defeated, If character defeats, If rescue attempt fails, etc.) followed by instructions about what to do when that condition is met have an implied "instead" causing the described effect to replace other effects when the condition is met.

Alright, so my brother (being the jerk he is) pointed out that there is, technically, a HUGE problem with the rule that they are insteaded.

Let's say I band my Spirit of Temptation to your Assyrian Survivor (very logical and smart play).  Now, I play Suicidal Swine Stampede (Remove all Evil Characters in battle from the game to shuffle all Lost Souls in your territory into owners' deck).  At this point (if no doms are played), battle goes to resolution.  Now, Survivor has an Outcome ability go off that insteads the removal.  It never happened.  And since it never happened, Suicidal Swine Stampede's cost was not paid (because it is that card that caused the defeat, not battle resolution).  As the cost was not paid, the benefit is undone.  Return all of those souls to the LoB (potentially from each deck), and then...does the hero rescue a soul?  I think so?

To solve this (and other problems not yet discovered), perhaps an instead during battle resolution does not affect anything played beforehand?  Or would this just work as I described, and you'd be a sad panda if you made this mistake?  Not sure?  Help

Based on the REG PDF definition of "defeat", Assyrian Survivor is not being defeated in that scenario so his instead wouldn't trigger.

Hmm, it would seem so based off the REGs definition, however the last time this came up, it seemed that being removed from game was considered defeat.

http://www.cactusgamedesign.com/message_boards/ruling-questions/assyrian-survivor-and-suicidal-swine-stampede/

What is the current REG definition of "defeat?" I was under the impression that you could only be "defeated" by an opposing alignment, which would mean AS would not be "insteaded."

The ruling had been that being discarded, captured, RFG, etc. all were instances of "defeat".  And as Drrek pointed out, this exact scenario has been ruled on in the past, which is where the ruling question in my post comes from.

If the ruling has changed, can we get some clarification on that?

There is an on-going discussion on the playtester side regarding the definitions of "defeat" both for Heroes and Evil Characters. We are getting close to announcing it, but there are a couple things we just want to make sure we have ironed out first.