It seems clear that, for the ruling to make sense, it must be the case that Quick Ears must necessarily resolve before Wingfoot. But I see no point within the framework to do this. I think this is because "revealed" is doing too much work. If there was a "preparing to be revealed" step, then Quick Ears could leap in at that point. We already sort-of have this in Thalin's passive step, which I guess was early warning that the framework was too fragile.

Nice rule loophole, everybody.

As DukeWellington says, another good way to word Quick Ears would begin something like "When an enemy card would be revealed from the encounter deck..."

Caleb wrote:

"When a player card, such as The Door is Closed or Quick Ears, cancels an encounter card, play should proceed as if the canceled card were never revealed. That means if you cancel a Sorcery card with The Door is Closed, Thaurdir’s ability will not trigger. It also means that if you cancel an enemy card with Quick Ears, Wingfoot cannot trigger off of that enemy.

Cheers,

Caleb"

Seems pretty clear to me.

But, as with many things, this is a cooperative game, so if you don't like the official ruling, you are allowed to say 'stick it' and house rule differently.

So if you cancel an enemy card with Quick Ears, then Counter-Spell cancels your event card, how many layers of time travel do you go through? It feels like an Inception-Interstellar crossover so we may need to call in Christopher Nolan on this one.

I wonder why the haven't done Disrupt like in the Call of Cthulhu LCG, or Interrupt like in the Game of Thrones LCG. That would have solved all the issues.

So if you cancel an enemy card with Quick Ears, then Counter-Spell cancels your event card, how many layers of time travel do you go through? It feels like an Inception-Interstellar crossover so we may need to call in Christopher Nolan on this one.

A good one. A fan here, though not so much of the latest one.

I really do think it is poor wording and that cancellation cards are meant to trigger before the card being revealed does anything. Unfortunately, all the cancellation cards say after it was "just revealed" making it really strange. A Test of Will came out in the Core set before they really had a system for wording things so we could just chock it up to saying that they didn't realize the consequences of saying "just revealed" and instead meant it to resolve before it has a chance to be revealed. Perhaps a FAQ update is in order because based on Caleb's ruling it really seems the card is supposed to be canceled before it does anything.

The awkward thing is that I still see no problem with Wingfoot resolving after you cancel a treachery's When Revealed effect with A Test of Will even if we accept that A Test of Will cancels the effects of a treachery before it is revealed. Cancelling the effects of a treachery before it reveals does not stop it from being revealed right? It seems that it does, though if you are not allowed to trigger Wingfoot. But we also know that it doesn't...because keywords like Doomed and Surge would still affect you even if you had cancelled the When Revealed effects and the card must be revealed for those to happen.

I would think the resolution would be:

1. Cancel the When Revealed effects of the treachery with A Test of Will (before it is actually revealed)

2. Reveal the treachery and Wingfoot readies the attached hero since you named Treachery and its passive effect comes before any Forced effects (such as keywords)

3. Apply any relevant keywords such as Doomed/Surge

Edit: Apparently I misread Caleb's ruling. It seems he is only referring to the entire card being cancelled and not other cancellation effects like A Test of Will. Let me re-read some things...

Another issue. The ruling also seems to equivocate the two phrases:

The Door is Closed: "After an encounter card is revealed from the encounter deck, cancel its effects "

Quick Ears: " cancel an enemy card just revealed from the encounter deck"

Why can I not use Wingfoot with The Door is Closed? I am only cancelling the effects of the card, not the card itself.

So it seems based on Caleb's ruling the resolution of Quick Ears / The Door is Closed! is as follows (despite the text saying after it was revealed):

1. Look at the top card before you reveal it

2. Cancel the effects/card with Quick Ears / The Door is Closed! before it is actually revealed

3. Never reveal it and do not trigger any such effects that would trigger off it being revealed since the card itself was discarded or shuffled back into the encounter deck

I suppose they really just need to release something in the FAQ that indicates that cards that cancel effects should all have the text "as it is being revealed/played" or something to that effect...

This solves the problems the ruling makes. It also solves the second issue you mentioned, Seastan. Since in the case of The Door is Closed! the card is not yet revealed, and you discard it before it is revealed. Granted, all of this assumes we change the wording on Quick Ears, The Door is Closed, Minas Tirith Lampwright, and A Test of Will (among others I think).

However, this interpretation would muddy the waters a bit with Counter-Spell. I am not sure how that would work.

Edit: I suppose this interpretation also causes some problems. If you never reveal the card, then shouldn't you still have to reveal one as required by the number of players in the game...lol. They really should let us trigger responses first.

I think I will recommend to my partners the following structure for "revealing" encounter cards. If the card is cancelled or killed in 1), you stop immediately. Otherwise you follow all revelant steps. Once a card reaches 2), it cannot be cancelled in its entirity, only specific effects can then be cancelled.

1) Encounter card is looked at and moves to the "About to be revealed" zone.

a) Passive effects such as Thalin are triggered.

b) Forced effects are triggered (can't think of any relevant one right now).

c) Responses such as Quick Ears or Frodo Baggins [TBR] are triggered.

The card has now reached the stage of being revealed. Thus:

2) The card is revealed.

a) Keywords such as Doomed trigger.

b)Passive effects such as Wingfoot's ongoing effect are resolved.

c) The "When Revealed" effect triggers. Cards without such an effect implicitly have "When Revealed: Nothing". All other Forced: When an encounter card is revealed... effects trigger simultaneously.

c.1) When the "When Revealed" effect is about to be resolved, this can be interrupted by cards such as Test of Will. Since only the effect, not the fact of being revealed, is being cancelled, the sequence does not stop here.

d) Responses to cards being revealed trigger [e.g. Ally Gimli].

3) The card enters the Staging Area

a) Passive effects such as Ranger Spikes trigger.

b) Forced effects trigger.

c) Responses trigger.

I think I will also recommend errata of The Door Is Closed to "When an encounter card is about to be revealed from the encounter deck, cancel it."

I am fairly certain keywords such as Doomed/Surge should be included in your step 3 and Wingfoot's passive effect should be step 2. They both trigger on the card being "revealed" and since Wingfoot is a passive effect it should definitely come before Forced effects like Doomed/Surge.

The other problem is your statement about stopping if the card is killed or otherwise removed. If this is true, then the card is removed before it is revealed and you have not satisfied the requirement that the players must "reveal" X cards during the staging step.

I edited the sequence as you were replying! I'm not sure where Doomed and so on live in the framework. They don't seem to be Forced effects to me. I think it's easier to resolve them first, but I don't have a strong opinion on this.

For your second point, I recommend changing "reveal" X cards to "add X cards to the 'preparing to be revealed' zone, and resolve the sequence for them".

You're right. I was thinking of When Revealed effects being Forced effects and incorrectly applied that to keywords. I am also not exactly sure where keywords fall in timing structure.

2) The card is revealed.

a) Keywords such as Doomed trigger.

3) The card enters the Staging Area

a) Passive effects such as Ranger Spikes trigger.

FAQ:

Q: If there is an unattached Ranger Spikes (HoN17) in the staging area when an enemy with the ambush keyword is revealed from the deck, what happens? A: The Ranger Spikes will attach to that enemy, preventing the players from making the engagement checks for the ambush keyword.

A couple years ago we were promised a clarified timing sheet. Obviously we haven't received it. I think that as the designers started to work on it they realized it was a rat's nest and decided to handle things case by case. This is one of the reasons I say that the core set feels rushed.

I wouldn't say it's rushed. It's just not far-thought-over, or something, not sure I can present a proper term. To describe it in simple words: they haven't put much thought into what might happen in the future when they were designing core set.

I went ahead and submitted this question to Caleb finally. His reply is below, followed by the question that I submitted:

Caleb wrote:

"When a player card, such as The Door is Closed or Quick Ears, cancels an encounter card, play should proceed as if the canceled card were never revealed. That means if you cancel a Sorcery card with The Door is Closed, Thaurdir’s ability will not trigger. It also means that if you cancel an enemy card with Quick Ears, Wingfoot cannot trigger off of that enemy.

Cheers,

Caleb"

My question was:

"Hi, Recently there have been a couple of Lore events that cancel cards, and they have some differences in wording compared to other cards. I'm adding emphasis below: The Door is Closed says "After an encounter card is revealed from the encounter deck, cancel ITS EFFECTS..." Quick Ears says "Exhaust a Dúnedain or Ranger hero to CANCEL AN ENEMY CARD JUST REVEALED from the encounter deck..." What gets canceled with these? Quick Ears has you cancel the "enemy card." If you play Quick Ears, can you still trigger the Response on Wingfoot (which requires an enemy to have been revealed, if you chose enemy)? Same question for The Door is Closed. This might interact with a previous ruling about canceling damage that was "just dealt" (previously ruled that if damage is canceled you can't trigger a response that keys off of damage being dealt). How about in a case like this: in The Battle of Carn Dum, Thaurdir has some nasty effects if a Sorcery-traited treachery card is revealed. If you use The Door is Closed, will they still occur? Or if you have a Goblin Archer from Khazad-dum in the staging area (deal 1 damage when an enemy is revealed), but you use Quick Ears? Sorry for the many examples, but thank you very much for your help!"

Surely cancellation does not also perform time travel to negate a previous response which as already resolved?

I believe this is where you are misunderstanding. It does indeed perform time travel so I don't know why it wouldn't negate any passive, forced effects, or responses that could have triggered as a result of the event if it were not cancelled. This is consistent with other rulings, I think.

1. If you aren't allowed to time travel, then cancelling one point of damage that was dealt to a character would not "revive" it if were to cause the character to be defeated. They have ruled that you in effect negate the damage as if it never happened.

2. If you aren't allowed to time travel, then cancelling treacheries with A Test of Will would do very little if their effect was first applied.

I am sure there are a number of other examples of this as well. However, perhaps there are examples of the opposing view point (not sure). I do think that Caleb's ruling could cause some issues though. Say you have a card eventually that allows you to trigger an effect when a character is dealt damage. Let's say this effect allows you to search your deck, then shuffle, and that you already knew the top 5 cards of your deck (due to Imladris or something). Then you play Gondorian Discipline to cancel that damage. Well now, in order to roll everything back you have to find those same 5 cards or whatever and place them back on top of your deck to negate the first card you played. While my example is possible to revert, I am sure there are other situations that would cause you to not know how to legally resolve the circumstance.

You are misunderstanding my point. There is no need for A Test of Will to "time travel" as it cancels the effect. I am not disputing that canceling an effect is treated like the effect never happened. My point was that the timing is muddled because the passive effect from Wingfoot should apply immediately (readying the hero), but that you still have a response window to play Quick Ears. If you do then choose to play Quick Ears it seems very weird that a passive effect which has already been resolved as a side effect of the original effect would also magically "unresolve" itself (e.g. you have to exhaust the hero you just readied). I understand why Caleb is ruling it this way, because in LCGs cancelation has always been absolute - but this creates a messy set of response rules. This means that Quick Ears not only cancels the revealed enemy (which is intuitive), but it also requires you to "unwind" any passive effects which also triggered from the enemy being revealed (e.g. Thalin, Ithilien Tracker, Wingfoot, etc.), which is decidedly less intuitive.

I am not even saying that this is the wrong ruling - but it concerns me that this game seems to become vastly more complex with time. Just to be clear, game complexity is not a purely hypothetical or pedantic argument. When I tried modeling the game rules in software, I quickly realized just how complex this game is. Looked at another way, this complexity is a blessing as it all but guarantees that this game will only exist in physical form.

Dan, I think your signature is very fitting for this thread.

Where does The-One-Ring go (Black Riders -> Shadow of the Past)?, in step 4?

Yes, The One Ring works like a combination of The Door Is Closed and Eleanor (but the card shuffles into the deck and is replaced). The Silver Rule also applies here as once you shuffle the canceled card back into the encounter deck, you skip the remaining steps of that card's resolution.

Thanks, Seastan. This is an excellent summary of the rules around revealing encounter cards. The way that Quick Ears and The Door Is Closed interact with the rules is at the heart of my point about the game's escalating complexity.

Life would be simpler if it was well.. simplified!

Cancelling SHOULD be what Caleb said: "behave as if it was never there in the first place".

If the cards had only been of two types:

a) Cards that just pretend you never saw the card. NO CARD CAN EVER TRIGGER ON THE CARD THAT GOT CANCELLED. The end. Easy to explain - you never ever even saw it!

b) Cards that cancel clearly ONLY the When Revealed effect, and everything ELSE happens.

Oh well.

I think your structure looks good Seastan. Here are some more keywords to keep in mind when resolving them through this structure. I also note below, there might be a necessity to add a bit more detail to the structure (I can't believe I just said that ).

1. Guarded - I think this resolves identically to Ambush in your structure. It specifies you resolve the guarded effect when it "enters the staging area".

2. Hide X (This one is particularly noteworthy because I think you would still have to make the Hide test even if you ended up discarding it with The Door is Closed!). The rules on Hide tests explicitly state that the Hide test comes before any when revealed effects or forced effects on the same card, BUT it still happens "When an encounter card is revealed". I think there is room for debate that The Door is Closed could cancel or not cancel the Hide test as well...

3. Prowl X - When does the actual effect of prowl happen? If you only had 1 Lore resource, could you use it to negate the entire card with The Door is Closed!? Or would you lose that resource first. Prowl uses the same structure as Hide "When an encounter card with Prowl X is revealed..." but unlike Hide tests, it does not explicitly state that it must come before When Revealed or Forced effects on the same card.

4. Underworld X - Underworld X triggers when a location "enters play". It says nothing about "when it is revealed". I believe there was a ruling about when a card enters play during the staging step due to that enemy that makes an attack when it "enters play" in Into Ithilien. I think we need to include in the timing structure for when something "enters play" as it seems distinctly different than "revealed" and "enters staging area". If I recall the ruling about that enemy in Into Ithilien, I believe the enemy was considered to be "in play" before it entered the staging area. I cannot remember if it came before or after it was "revealed". I think it happens immediately before after your Step 1 (so that Thalin and Expecting mischief can damage it first)...but I think that makes things awkward and more complicated...

5. Villagers X - This follows the same structure as Underworld X. "When it enters play".

Regarding the Underworld example. Keep in mind that there is the card "Sewers" which has Underworld 1 and also has a When Revealed effect. This means that if you resolve Underworld 1 before you have a chance to cancel the card with The Door is Closed, the rules on Underworld X say when a location with Underworld X leaves play then you reveal each card underneath it. This might mean that if you indeed place the 1 card underneath Sewers when it "enters play" for Underworld, that even if you cancelled it, it would not cancel the Underworld part...and you would still have to reveal the card that was placed underneath it since it has now "left play".