After a play-through of Flight from Moria tonight with my Noldor deck, I want to make sure I'm interpreting the Sailor of Lune's "cannot take damage" clause correctly.

If my Sailor of Lune is committed to the quest and I have an Event card in my discard pile, he gains: "+1 Willpower and cannot be damaged while committed to the quest". If I get hit with a card like Undisturbed Bones (When Revealed: Each player must deal X damage to an ally he controls. X is the number of allies he controls.), can I assign the damage to the Sailor of Lune and in turn have the Sailor take no damage? Or am I simply not allowed to assign the damage to the Sailor and thus forced to assign it to another ally?

The general rule is that when faced with a choice of that nature you must resolve it as fully as possible; meaning that you would have to chose an ally eligible to take damage, if possible.

It´s in the FAQ somewhere.

The general rule is that when faced with a choice of that nature you must resolve it as fully as possible; meaning that you would have to chose an ally eligible to take damage, if possible.

It´s in the FAQ somewhere.

While this may be what the developers decide, it's certainly not clear. I've asked the developers a question regarding several damage effects and their respective resolutions with respect to Sailor of Lune.

Some damage effects say "Player MUST deal X damage" (like in the Undisturbed Bones example) which is notably different than "Player must assign X damage". There are also effects with two separate sentences like "Choose a character. Then, deal X damage to that character".

There are a few other types I included in my email that I can't remember off the top of my head, but these types of damaging effects all have subtle differences and could likely have different rulings when applied to Sailor of Lune. Hopefully I'll hear back soon so we can have a definitive answer.

I'll be interested to hear what response you receive, cmabr002. I used the more player-friendly interpretation when dealing with Undisturbed Bones, which was that I could assign the damage to the Sailor and then reduce it to 0. Otherwise that ability is of little use; it would really only apply if a treachery hit during the Quest phase that did damage to all characters or allies. Or possibly to defend against an immediate attack made by an enemy during questing, assuming the Sailor was ready via something like hero Galadriel or Grim Resolve. Sure, you could argue that's all it does, but allocating text space on a card for such a corner case ability seems like a waste.

Nerdmeister's comment brings up an interesting point too, which is that it's unclear to me whether the Sailor's text makes it ineligible target for damage assignment. The text just says "cannot take damage". To me, that doesn't necessarily mean the Sailor is an ineligible target.

I'll be interested to hear what response you receive, cmabr002. I used the more player-friendly interpretation when dealing with Undisturbed Bones, which was that I could assign the damage to the Sailor and then reduce it to 0. Otherwise that ability is of little use; it would really only apply if a treachery hit during the Quest phase that did damage to all characters or allies. Or possibly to defend against an immediate attack made by an enemy during questing, assuming the Sailor was ready via something like hero Galadriel or Grim Resolve. Sure, you could argue that's all it does, but allocating text space on a card for such a corner case ability seems like a waste.

Nerdmeister's comment brings up an interesting point too, which is that it's unclear to me whether the Sailor's text makes it ineligible target for damage assignment. The text just says "cannot take damage". To me, that doesn't necessarily mean the Sailor is an ineligible target.

Well, it gets a little messy, to me.

I think if a card says "must deal damage" you won't be able to target Sailor of Lune with it because it says "must", but you could also argue, that you must first assign damage to the target, and Sailor of Lune doesn't say it can't be "assigned" damage...

Then there are cards like Dol Guldur Orcs. "Choose a questing character." Okay, so you choose Sailor of Lune. "Deal 2 damage to that character", but you clearly can't. Is she ineligible to be "chosen"? I think you can choose her...but can't damage her

We also have treacheries that say "Assign X damage to characters committed to the quest where X is number of characters". Clearly it is completely broken if Sailor of Lune can be assigned 40 damage and then "cannot take it". Perhaps that means you cannot assign any damage to Sailor of Lune...or maybe it just means you can only assign as much damage to Sailor of Lune as her remaining hit points...so she could soak up 2 of that damage if she was at full health...

So yeah...I'm looking forward to getting a response on these matters

If it's possible to assign damage to the Saiilor of Lune at all I'm pretty sure you can't assign more damage to him than his remaining hit points, that's been the ruling with regards to archery (which as I recall is assigned point by point then dealt all at once, so if you could assign beyond hit points you could take any mount of archery by just nuking a single chump ally).

If it's possible to assign damage to the Saiilor of Lune at all I'm pretty sure you can't assign more damage to him than his remaining hit points, that's been the ruling with regards to archery (which as I recall is assigned point by point then dealt all at once, so if you could assign beyond hit points you could take any mount of archery by just nuking a single chump ally).

Yeah, that's how it should be if you can assign it to her. On a side note, is there a reason you can assign more damage to Frodo than his remaining hit points, or can you not? If there is Archery 5, can Frodo eat it all, or can I only have him eat 2 of it? Him being attacked is a little different than having damage assigned to him.

You can only assign Frodo 2 points of archery, as I recall, that's where the ruling I was talking about came from. Well, specifically it was getting more complicated by introducing Song of Mocking as well (So you can assign 2 to Frodo then you have to stop, but then you can assign 5 to a different hero and use Song of Mocking to redirect to Frodo, and since after assigning the damage is all dealt simultaneously it doesn't violate Frodo's once per phase limit. Assuming I'm remembering correctly)

You can only assign Frodo 2 points of archery, as I recall, that's where the ruling I was talking about came from. Well, specifically it was getting more complicated by introducing Song of Mocking as well (So you can assign 2 to Frodo then you have to stop, but then you can assign 5 to a different hero and use Song of Mocking to redirect to Frodo, and since after assigning the damage is all dealt simultaneously it doesn't violate Frodo's once per phase limit. Assuming I'm remembering correctly)

Here it is.

Caleb's answer from way back :

Q: Can a character have more damage than hit point? Can we deal more Archery damage on a character that it has hit points? If there is two Silvan Refugees, can we assign 1 archery damage to both?

A: Damage from Archery keyword cannot be over-assigned to characters you control. It must be divided among characters you control until either there is no damage left to assign or no characters left to assign it to. The damage is applied simultaneously, so you can assign damage to more than 1 Silvan Refugee because their Forced effect will not trigger until after all the damage has been assigned.

So it is not done 1 by 1.

I received a response from Caleb regarding various damage questions:

If Sailor of Lune's effect is currently active due to the top card of your discard pile being an event can she be the target of the following effects while committed to the quest:

1) Dol Guldur Beastmaster

2) Low on Provisions (just says "assigns")

3) Dunland Raider (says "must deal")

4) Goblin Taskmaster (says "deals", but does not say "must deal")

5) If Take Cover! is revealed while Sailor of Lune cannot be damaged and is exhausted, must you choose the second option on Take Cover!?

Hi Chris,
The word ‘cannot’ is an absolute, so you cannot choose to assign or deal damage to Sailor of Lune while the top card of your discard pile is an event.
Cheers,
Caleb

I asked for clarification on his initial response, especially regarding examples 1) and 5) as I thought it still wasn't clear and I received the following response