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I have a (hopefully) quick question about RBD.  When does it target the card being drawn for discard, is it when it is part of deck, when it is a part of hand or an area in between?

Rain Becomes Dust (Pi)

Type: Curse • Brigade: Gray • Ability: 1 / 5 • Class: None • Special Ability: All cards that an opponent draws because of a special ability used by that opponent are revealed instead. Place all revealed Lost Souls in opponent’s territory. Discard the rest. • Play As: If an opponent activates a draw ability, reveal the cards instead. Place all revealed Lost Souls in opponent’s territory and discard the rest. • Identifiers: None • Verse: Deuteronomy 28:24 • Availability: Priests booster packs (Uncommon)

When it is part of deck.

good to know, thanks.

Quote from: Professoralstad on February 22, 2012, 09:09:48 PM

When it is part of deck.

So Simon the Zealot can stop RBD then.

Yup.  4DC will stop the discard, but not the reveal.

That's strange, I asked the same question at a tourney here and they said neither, its not in Deck or Hand, so it goes around Simon the Zealot.

RBD is an instead ability, so it targets the draw, not the deck.  That's why it can't get Fishing Boat.

SK is correct. Instead abilities always target the ability they are insteading, nothing else. Draws may target deck, sure, but that doesn't affect RBD in the slightest.

Simon cannot stop RBD because RBD isn't affecting your deck. RBD is insteading whatever ability you played that draws (Reach of Desperation, for example) and causing the ability of that card to change from "Draw X" to "Reveal X, put Souls in play, discard the rest."

If you had an ongoing ability that said "Protect your good enhancements from evil cards" THAT would stop RBD because then RBD couldn't target Reach for insteading.

Hopefully this explains it better.

I am 100% certain that the cards are still revealed if Simon's ability is active.

I am 85% certain that RBD carries out completely even if Simon's ability is active. Since RBD is changing the effect of the draw ability, not actually affecting the cards from deck itself, Simon's ability does nothing as it is your own ability (albeit a changed ability) that is doing the reveal/discard.

Your number 2 is incorrect, which is what I've been trying to say. RBD is not doing the revealing, it is changing the ability of the draw card you played. That's all it does. Think of instead abilities as rewriting the ability you're trying to use.

Example: I have RBD up, you play Reach of Desperation. RBD targets Reach, and what it does is change Reach's ability from "You may interrupt the battle, [draw 3], and play next" to "You may interrupt the battle, [reveal the top 3 cards of deck, put Souls in play, discard the rest], and play next." RBD is now finished and does nothing else. Reach then resolves with its newly changed special ability. Since Reach is the card now revealing/discarding from your deck, Simon doesn't protect against it (because it's your card).

I may be wrong, but that's how it has always been demonstrated/explained to me, and that's how I've seen it ruled.

In your scenario you are assuming the instead effect is not being sourced by the original card but by the insteaded card, correct? So then wouldn't simon still protect from rbd because the instead (RBD) is the source (and an opponent's card) as opposed to Simon not getting around RBD if the origional card (Reach) is the source (your card)?

Instead

Cards that use the word "instead" replace an effect with a different effect.  When a card has a new effect applied to it "instead", it is not considered to have the original effect applied to it in any way. As such, "instead" implies a "would be" condition for the original effect (e.g. "if your character [would be] discarded...")

Sometimes a card selects a different target(s) and applies an effect to that instead.  If this is not the case, the new effect is applied to the same card(s) targeted by the old effect.  Also, the ability may have conditions that indicate only some of the cards have the new effect applied.

Example: if a card says "… blue Heroes that would be discarded are returned to territory instead" and a mixture of Heroes are discarded from battle, the blue Heroes have the withdraw effect applied, while other Heroes have the discard effect applied.

If a card is immune or otherwise protected from the new effect, the original effect is still applied. If a card is immune or otherwise protected from the original effect, the card is not affected at all.

Example: "… blue Heroes that would be discarded are returned to territory instead", with two other active effects: "N.T. Heroes are protected from withdraw abilities" and "O.T. Heroes are protected from discard abilities".  Because the blue N.T. Heroes are protected from withdraw, they are discarded as normal.  Because the blue O.T. Heroes are protected from discard, they are unaffected.

If a single card uses "instead" to apply two or more effects to the same group of cards, the combination of applied effects resolves the special ability for that card.

Example: if Herod's Temple would discard more than one card from draw pile, and at least one is a Lost Soul put in play "instead", the combined total of discarded cards and Lost Souls put in play count toward the total required by Herod's Temple.  However, if the card discarded from hand has a different effect applied "instead" by a different card, the ability is not properly resolved.

Nothing in here leads me to believe that "instead" is in and of itself an ability, or that it has to target other cards/other abilities. It is merely a definition, the only ability associated with "instead" cards is the triggered ability that is triggered by the ability being insteaded. It is a specialized triggered ability, in that it replaces the trigger with the new ability, but I see no reason why "instead" is restricted to targeting abilities/cards in play by default, etc. The ability that follows instead only targets the card(s) that the follow up ability applies to. I.e. Herod's Temple targets hand, deck, and the character being saved, by it doesn't target the discarding card. RBD only targets the top X cards of a deck, where X is the number of cards that would be drawn; it doesn't target the actual drawing cards. Chamber/D&A only targets the Angel/Job being discarded/defeated, it doesn't target the card doing the discarding/defeating.

There is no entry in the REG for an instead ability, only a definition of what happens when a card uses the word instead. I know that many are probably confused, and I hope some other elders can confirm this (or at least bring this up for discussion) but the above is how I've always understood, played, and ruled on instead.

In summary,
1. RBD will reveal and discard cards that would be drawn by Fishing Boat.
2. Simon will stop RBD from doing anything. Cards are drawn as normal.
3. RBD does not change the ability of Reach in the slightest; it just changes the outcome of Reach having been played.

So apparently a month ago I had exactly the opposite opinion that I've been expressing in this thread so far. I'm not exactly sure what changed in the last month that I'm suddenly thinking reverse.... *scratches head and walks away confused*

EDIT: It was this thread and it doesn't seem like the issue (regarding what exactly Instead abilities target, and how that affects the "defaults to play" rule) was ever fully resolved.