When a character encounters the Tinker Imp he tried to use Stinker

Tinker Imp-before you engage the Tinker Imp in psychic combat, one of your objects, chosen at random, is teleprompter to a smack 1 die roll clockwise around the board. The Tinker imp will remain here until it is killed.

Stinker-Instead of attacking an enemy, you may place it in the next space clockwise or counterclockwise. You may only do this once per turn.

Would the character loose an item before they could use the Stinker ability because it says "before" psychic combat and Stinker says "instead"

We stopped a 6 player game last night due to this.

I believe you can use stinker before imp's ability kicks in.

I'm not sure IIRC, but if there's a timing conflict, active player decides the order. (I could be wrong though)

Good chance I'm wrong but I would think when you "encounter" the imp, it teleports your object, and then you could use stinker before the combat part of the encounter, encounter is not the same as attacking.

If you use Stinker, you are not engaging in psychic combat but the attack is avoided instead.

For this reason, the Tinker Imp ability is not activated, because it is triggered "before you engage in psychic combat".

If you were to cast Soul Shatter on the Tinker Imp, you would be using an effect with the same timing condition (before you engage in psychic combat); in that case the Simultaneous Effects rule from the FAQ can be applied, not to the OP's example.

You are correct, always helps to read the cards word for word.lol