Playing IA campaign and the question of whether or not these two cards affect each other came up. Specifically, does the effect of FtC happen in time to allow Ferocity to activate?

My thought is no because...

Ga declares attack > Gi activates FtC

At that point the declare already happened.

For the cause

Exhaust this card when another friendly figure within 3 spaces declares an attack. That figure becomes Focused.

Ferocity

When you declare an attack while you are focused, add 1 red die to your attack pool instead of one green die. This attack also gains cleave 1 *.

Bump

The short answer: yes both can be used on the same attack.

The long answer: they both activate when you declare an attack and under timing resolution rules on page 2 of the RRG (Mission rules, then Attacker abilities, then Defender abilities) they would both qualify as Attacker abilities. Multiple abilities can occur at the same timing instance/trigger. and they would resolve in the order of the attackers choosing.

Abilities with the same trigger are resolved in the timing resolution order. Also, the green die is added by Focused to the attack pool just before rolling the dice.

The long-long answer with rules quotes:

Ability Resolution Order During Attacks

As they both use the same trigger, "When an attack is declared", they are resolved following the timing resolution order.

As they are both attacker abilities, they can be resolved in either order as determined by the attacker.

So For the Cause! can be used first by Gideon to make Gaarkhan Focused, and then Gaarkhan can use Ferocity to turn that Green die into a Red die.

Actually, now that I read the Focused condition card.... it says "when you declare an attack".

Technically Focused is a core/mission rule (like Weakened), so as written it would normally happen first, before any attacker "when declaring attack" abilities can be performed.

However, For the Cause! is clearly intended to affect the attack with the Focused condition. So, either Focused adding the green die should happen later (just before rolling - Focused should for example use "while attacking"), or For the Cause! to be "1 strain : Exhaust this card before another friendly figure..." - there are other "before declaring target" abilities in the game, so it would not be a new trigger.

(Ferocity does not have this problem, because it is explicit about adding a red die instead of green.)

You always seem to find new things...

Anyway, both abilities have the same trigger and can be used to do what you expect them to do.

Huh, that's an interesting development.

I wonder how many games have been misplaying For the Cause! RAW?

I agree its clear the intent is For the Cause! to affect the attack just declared...

Maybe an official clarification in the FAQ is required?

35 minutes ago, Majushi said:

I wonder how many games have been misplaying For the Cause! RAW?

I'm going to guess all of them .

It is an interesting find though. I suppose unforeseen consequences of rule clarifications like this are inevitable.

4 hours ago, Majushi said:

Maybe an official clarification in the FAQ is required?

Nah, the intent is clear even if the wording is a bit off - unintended consequence of the ruling for conditions being a core rule (Weakened + Cunning interaction).

On 2/16/2017 at 3:30 PM, a1bert said:

Abilities with the same trigger are resolved in the timing resolution order. Also, the green die is added by Focused to the attack pool just before rolling the dice.

The long-long answer with rules quotes:

Ability Resolution Order During Attacks

Thank you all for the feedback. Glad I could help spark some conversation too :-)

On 16/02/2017 at 11:43 PM, Majushi said:

As they both use the same trigger, "When an attack is declared", they are resolved following the timing resolution order.

As they are both attacker abilities, they can be resolved in either order as determined by the attacker.

So For the Cause! can be used first by Gideon to make Gaarkhan Focused, and then Gaarkhan can use Ferocity to turn that Green die into a Red die.

I don't buy this.

When you declare the attack, you can trigger For the cause! but you cannot trigger Ferocity because you are not focused.

Once you resolve For the Cause! and become focused, you can't trigger Ferocity because the timing window has passed.

From another perspective, at no point did you declare an attack while ... Focused . You declared an attack, and then you became focused later. Consider they could easily have used while attacking instead .

So, you argue that Ferocity has trigger "when you declare an attack while focused", and For the Cause! has a trigger "when another figure within 3 spaces declares an attack", and that one is a different timing than the other.

The timing for both is when an attack is declared, but you have a point about the additional conditions.

I have wondered about subsets and supersets of triggers in association with Verena and a defeat of a figure triggering Close Quarters and other abilities. From the existing rulings I gather that the game state is fixed at the moment of the trigger. For example, when "an adjacent hostile figure is defeated", that is the superset trigger, but all other subset trigger still happen at the same time, and their order can be chosen. Even if Verena moves while resolving an ability, she returns to the same trigger afterwards, and it is still "an adjacent hostile figure is defeated", and she can choose the next ability with any subset trigger to resolve (including "an adjacent hostile figure is defeated" even when she no longer is adjacent to figure - the figure has been removed from the map due to being defeated). As long as abilities match the trigger, more abilities with the same trigger can be performed. 'You lose the timing window' only if you resolve an ability that does not have the same trigger.

If Ferocity / For the Cause! is interpreted in the same way, after For the Cause! is resolved you would get back to the trigger "declaring the attack" and checking the state. "while focused" wasn't true during the original trigger, so Ferocity would not match the trigger. However, this only applies if and only if "while being focused" is actually part of the trigger and not an additional condition like in most abilities. Any additional conditions are checked at the moment of resolving the ability.

I still think that For the Cause! is intended to affect the attack and its timing should be "before declaring attack".

Also, the operation of Ferocity is clearly intended to add a red die instead of green die while focused. So, if For the Cause! gives focused for the attack, Ferocity adds a red die instead of a green one.

Both abilities are from the core, so it is very understandable that the obvious intent does not quite match the rules as written. (Quite a few have gotten errata by this point.)

Fortunately, in the campaign it's easier to come to consensus between your game group than in skirmish with semi-random opponents.

I agree with Rawlinq, Ferocity is specific in its wording that you have to be focused while, and thus before, you declare your attack to trigger it. How ever it feels like the intent is there for this to be a combo, hopefully it gets FAQd.

Rule request?