New rules Q -- rules priority

By player581756, in Battlestar Galactica

We bumped into an issue last play through that I wanted to submit to the board and get some feedback on.

We had one player playing a cylon leader, Caprica 6. We had made it to the New Caprica phase and the cylon leader had been tossed into detention (still human/infiltrating). A crisis came up, skill cards were added (the maximum 2 cards by Caprica 6). However, after the skill check cards were revealed, Caprica 6 wanted to use her once per game ability to add more cards to the check. Obviously her once per game ability over rides the normal limitation of infiltrating cylon leaders adding only 2 cards to a skill check. However, does Detention stop her from adding more than the initial 2 cards to the check?

A similar situation came up with one player playing Gaias Baltar. Detector Sabotage came out and was failed. Can the failed detector sabotage block Baltar's once per game ability to look at someone's loyalty cards?

My instinct is that both Caprica's abilities (in this case) and Baltar's abilities will be blocked by other game rules, and that in general the most restrictive rule that applies to a particular case is the limiter. Baltar's ability would normally allow him to look at cards, but Detector Sabotage is a special rule preventing it. Caprica 6's ability would normally allow her to add extra cards to a check, but as she's in Detention she has to abide by the rules of Detention. This was however argued quite vehemently by Caprica 6 as she really wanted the check to fail. In the interest of disclosure, I was a human and was wanting the check to pass. I'd like to get some non biased opinions on the matter though :)

I would rule that Six's ability overrides detention, since she's not putting in skill cards through normal means. Baltar's ability, however, is stopped by the crisis card, since his ability is exactly what the card stops.

But putting more than two cards into a skill check is exactly what Detention stops as well, with no caveats about how or when ;)

I would also rule that Six's OPG overrides detention. I tend to think that when something in the game says you CAN'T do something, and something says that you CAN, the CAN always supercedes the CAN'T. Detention doesn't say "You may not use your once per game ability while you are in detention".

I would say she is treated as a Human while infiltrating, so could only add 1 Card to the initial Skill Check. She has a maximum of 2, and Detention decreases that maximum to 1.

Six's ability is already overriding the regular rule, where she can only add 1 or 2. Actually she is adding cards after the total, so it isn't even applying to the same rule. She simply gets to add to it after the fact.

I would say Detector Sabotage prevents any game ability to look at Loyalty Cards. If they wanted to specify certain ways (just Crisis, just President, etc) I think they would have said so. If I remember, it says "for the rest of the game" right? Sounds pretty all-encompassing. Also, Baltar's ability is called Cylon Detector. So the Detector being sabotaged is almost specific just to him.

-A