Quick question regarding the way Stalkers work..

The Set Trap text reads:

"If a monster enters a space adjacent to a trap token, discard the trap token from the map and the monster suffers 1 heart."

Lets say its the Overlord's turn, and he has a monster adjacent to a trap token. Is he able to move directly onto the trap token and not set it off? I don't see anywhere that trap tokens prevent movement into the space. I figure they are like hero tokens and other sorts of tokens and don't block anything.

I'd argue that a space is not adjacent to itself, so does the trap remain untriggered? Seems illogical, but I'd definitely appreciate some input on this.

Thanks

Yea it can't be set off like that. Think of it as the monster carefully stepping over it since he is practically on top of it already.

If you have a big enough monster you could actually shrink down, move onto the trap, then expand out and attack and still not set it off as long as you did it right. Sneaky ettins.

I haven't played with the stalker class yet, but personally I would very likely be in favor of a house rule that traps were set off when entering a space "adjacent to or containing" a trap token.

Yea it can't be set off like that. Think of it as the monster carefully stepping over it since he is practically on top of it already.

Yea it can't be set off like that. Think of it as the monster carefully stepping over it since he is practically on top of it already.

If you have a big enough monster you could actually shrink down, move onto the trap, then expand out and attack and still not set it off as long as you did it right. Sneaky ettins.

Of course, leaving that square would then set it off, as you'd land on a square adjacent to the trap. And I'm not sure large monsters can squeeze and unsqueeze at will, unless they are interrupting their move to perform another action, so I wouldn't go around using large monsters just to avoid stepping on traps.

They only expand when they're interrupting/ending a move action, and if they're interrupting, and they have to be declaring the action from their shrunken space. Otherwise, a shadow dragon could sort of shrink/expand/jump over the trap. It would be really horrible.

I'm in favor of house-ruling traps so they are set off whenever a monster enters their space or an adjacent space. Otherwise you end up with really derpy situations where a goblin steps ONTO the trap to avoid setting it off...

I'm in favor of house-ruling traps so they are set off whenever a monster enters their space or an adjacent space. Otherwise you end up with really derpy situations where a goblin steps ONTO the trap to avoid setting it off...

My thoughts exactly- especially when there are skills like "Easy Prey" that place traps adjacent to monsters. Honestly, though, I'd need to see the stalker in action to make this call for sure. It's just my opinion thinking about it right now.

Then again, the disciple's "Prayer of Healing" is also adjacent-only, meaning a disciple can't stand on a hero token and pick it up with the prayer- that caused a little disagreement in my last campaign as to the why .

Yea there are a few house rules that seem like they don't hurt the game much, and others that LOOK like they don't affect the game but do.

I would say hunter traps easily fall in the "OK everyone this is kind of silly lets agree that the monster sets off the trap" category.

Also I feel like small house rules such as this help to really calm the entire group down. If the overlord can very calmly accept this house rule then it's a good show of "we all want to win, but we really all want to have fun."

I'm in favor of house-ruling traps so they are set off whenever a monster enters their space or an adjacent space. Otherwise you end up with really derpy situations where a goblin steps ONTO the trap to avoid setting it off...

My thoughts exactly- especially when there are skills like "Easy Prey" that place traps adjacent to monsters. Honestly, though, I'd need to see the stalker in action to make this call for sure. It's just my opinion thinking about it right now.

Then again, the disciple's "Prayer of Healing" is also adjacent-only, meaning a disciple can't stand on a hero token and pick it up with the prayer- that caused a little disagreement in my last campaign as to the why .

Huh? Are you referring to reviving knocked out players? The answer is simple really, the knocked out player isn't on the map at all. The token simply marks where he went down so you can know where he shows up when he is revived. Prayer of Healing can't be used on someone off the map.

Then again, the disciple's "Prayer of Healing" is also adjacent-only, meaning a disciple can't stand on a hero token and pick it up with the prayer- that caused a little disagreement in my last campaign as to the why .

Huh? Are you referring to reviving knocked out players? The answer is simple really, the knocked out player isn't on the map at all. The token simply marks where he went down so you can know where he shows up when he is revived. Prayer of Healing can't be used on someone off the map.

It's my understanding that Prayer of Healing, being a healing ability, could indeed target a knocked out hero's token (see the box about knocked out heroes on the top right of pg15 of the base rules.) Unlike The prophet's insight token (which has been ruled ineligible for this exception,) I definitely think prayer of healing is primarily a healing ability that would allow the knocked out hero to recover some (small) amount of damage.

Then again, the disciple's "Prayer of Healing" is also adjacent-only, meaning a disciple can't stand on a hero token and pick it up with the prayer- that caused a little disagreement in my last campaign as to the why .

Huh? Are you referring to reviving knocked out players? The answer is simple really, the knocked out player isn't on the map at all. The token simply marks where he went down so you can know where he shows up when he is revived. Prayer of Healing can't be used on someone off the map.

It's my understanding that Prayer of Healing, being a healing ability, could indeed target a knocked out hero's token (see the box about knocked out heroes on the top right of pg15 of the base rules.) Unlike The prophet's insight token (which has been ruled ineligible for this exception,) I definitely think prayer of healing is primarily a healing ability that would allow the knocked out hero to recover some (small) amount of damage.

Hrm, I guess I'm wrong on this one, interesting.

They only expand when they're interrupting/ending a move action, and if they're interrupting, and they have to be declaring the action from their shrunken space. Otherwise, a shadow dragon could sort of shrink/expand/jump over the trap. It would be really horrible.

Right, although the shadow dragon could "interrupt" his first Move Action to declare a second Move Action and accomplish precisely this. That can be done from anywhere, assuming there's no other legal action the SD can perform from the trap's space.

I'm not saying I like it, but it's legal. =P

Then again, keep in mind that all of this nonsense goes away if the Stalker just avoids dropping traps adjacent to monsters whenever possible. Put the trap one space further away and now the monster will have to move adjacent to it before it can move into the space. I'm sure there will be corner cases where its unavoidable, but I imagine they'd be few and far between.

They only expand when they're interrupting/ending a move action, and if they're interrupting, and they have to be declaring the action from their shrunken space. Otherwise, a shadow dragon could sort of shrink/expand/jump over the trap. It would be really horrible.

Right, although the shadow dragon could "interrupt" his first Move Action to declare a second Move Action and accomplish precisely this. That can be done from anywhere, assuming there's no other legal action the SD can perform from the trap's space.

I'm not saying I like it, but it's legal. =P

Then again, keep in mind that all of this nonsense goes away if the Stalker just avoids dropping traps adjacent to monsters whenever possible. Put the trap one space further away and now the monster will have to move adjacent to it before it can move into the space. I'm sure there will be corner cases where its unavoidable, but I imagine they'd be few and far between.

Oooo, I didn't consider that- I love despise how crafty shadow dragons are. I agree with you Steve-o, it's inadvisable for the Stalker to drop traps adjacent to monsters. However, there is a skill, Easy Prey , which instructs the player to do exactly that. The skill is rather annoying. It grants a benefit (while exhausted) to attacks targeting monsters adjacent to traps- but the only way monsters will be adjacent to traps is if the traps were placed adjacent, or if a large monster expanded next to a trap.

Easy prey is a different kind of thing though, basically you are still getting your standard attack, and get the bonus of placing a trap down. Even if the monster could step on the trap to avoid it, he still couldn't jump off it. Also that is assuming the monster lives.

The card kind of assumes the pierce one bonus goes to that monster but remember that if you don't kill the monster all the other heroes get this pierce 1 benefit as well(tear down a shadow dragon). And you can also place the trap in positions where multiple monsters are going to be adjacent to it. If the stalker goes first among the heroes, this is a lot of pierce 1 bonuses for the other 3.

Also this could be cool with Tethrys'(sp) ability. Multi-pierce!

If you have the crossbow, the whip, or the relic "True Shot" you could move the monsters adjacent to the trap too, so they can get affected.

The skill definitely has its benefits- perhaps the lack of in space trap effect isn't so bad.

The whole question of a space being adjacent to itself (what would be required for a trap to trigger when stepping on it, as opposed to next to it), had prompted me to write to FFG a while ago. I received a response from Nathan Hajek at the time which stated the following:

There are a lot of rules that use the concept of adjacency. Some were written while accounting for that a space is not adjacent to itself, and some, unfortunately, were not. As such, the execution of the mechanics is not always thematically sound. I could call each of these out, creating exceptions in the cases where it doesn’t make sense, but then players would have to wonder each time adjacency is used, is this per the rules, or an exception? So, unfortunately, I believe it is best to apply the blanket rule found on page 10 of the rulebook, that a space is not adjacent to itself. If players would like to make their own exceptions in the name of theme, I think they should, but I find it best to stick to RAW as much as I can.

Thanks,

Nathan Hajek
Creative Content Developer
Fantasy Flight Games
[email protected]

I understand his point, and it is one of the reasons why I don't like home rules ... I happen to be a fan of abiding by RAW. Having said that, I think it would be nice, if and only if it wouldn't break something else, if a FAQ ruling was made that any space is adjacent to itself.

I understand his point, and it is one of the reasons why I don't like home rules ... I happen to be a fan of abiding by RAW. Having said that, I think it would be nice, if and only if it wouldn't break something else, if a FAQ ruling was made that any space is adjacent to itself.

If only to save the text for all the times "in a space containing or adjacent to..." comes up.

He makes a good point, and it does make sense to stick with RAW usually. The traps (having not played extensively with them) seem to me to be a case where the theme suggests that stepping on it should set it off. However, as we've seen time and time again, theme is not necessarily the most important thing.