Hi All,

I just read the FAQ as well and I can't see if they have answered the grappling question for Journey into Darkness...

Its on Thundercles unanswered questions list which I assumed was sent in to allow this revised FAQ. It states:

"Can a figure enter a square where it cannot normally end its movement if there is a chance (but not a certainty) that it will be unable to leave? For example, can a monster move onto an active glyph that is adjacent to a hero with Grapple, hoping to kill the hero and continue its movement?"

Anyone find it or is this still unanswered?

Thanks

It's there, top right of page 8. The answer is "yes."

Thanks so much missed it, but the detailed answer leaves a lot to be desired. i.e. what happens when they don't kill the monster and are stuck on a glyph? Do they get a free move to an adjacent square? What if all squares are filled?

Any ideas anyone?

Thanks

Bladestorm said:

Unfortunately FFG seem prone to either using unqualified people (they probably simply don't have any qualified people, since their people move onto other games instead of thoroughly exploring the nuances of games they have already published I would guess) to answer the FAQ or deliberately torturing their fans with vague, semi-coherent and often even flat out wrong answers.

It is one of the reasons I strongly advocate not sending every question in to them but instead hashing out answers here and then collectively sending very carefully worded questions that are difficult to screw up the answers for (and in fact sending a selection of pre-written answers for each question that they can save time by choosing, though I seem to be alone in that regard). Only a few people seem to have the capability of wording their questions carefully enough though, largely because a casual question begets a casual answer that only answer exactly that situation - yet we usually want a deeper answer that addresses underlying and/or following issues rather than the exact situation.
Thundercles' list was on the way to being hashed out and tidied up that way but I understand FFG seem to have picked up an unfinished version of the list.

In this case though the answer would be to follow the rules, not make up new ones. If the monster fails to kill the hero it can't leave the glyph. It only has to get off the activated glyph if it can...
FAQ pg6
Q: Can a monster end its movement on or be spawned on to a glyph of transport?
A: Monsters can end their movement on or be spawned on to unactivated glyphs, but cannot end their movement on or be spawned on to activated glyphs. If a monster is on an activated glyph, the overlord must move it off the glyph on his next turn, if possible. Monsters can always move through or attack into spaces containing glyphs.

The new ruling says the monster can go there. If it can't get off the glyph then it doesn't have to. No free moves etc.

Antistone said:

However inflicting Damage and Inflicting wounds are diffferent stages of step 6 in the base rulebook. You must inflict damage first, then apply armour, then covert remaining damage to wounds, then conduct wound prevention (shield etc), then suffer wounds, then die.

DJitD pg11
Example: A beastman inflicts 6 damage to Battlemage Jaes,... (apply armour and wound prevention)... Jaes suffers 4 wounds... (maybe Jaes dies, whereupon DR could activate).

I understand what you are saying, but the example proves that there is a sequence. Damage is inflicted at the beginning of the sequence, dying might be at the end of the sequence. Knockback tells you to do something immediately after inflicting damage. Therefore the sequence seemed (was, until FAQed) to be interrupted. What the FAQ tells us is that this sequence is completed before 'immediately' has an opportunity to occur.

What should really be changed is the 'immediately' on knockback.

As I think I already said, I do agree that it is a good ruling for balance purposes.

Corbon said:

But there's also a precedent in the GLoAQ where it says that if a hero's turn unexpectedly ends in the same space as another figure (due to a Paralyzing Gas trap when opening a door), that the figure should be moved to the closest legal space.

One could argue that you should move to another space if you're on a figure but not if you're on a token, perhaps, on purely logistical grounds (hard to leave two figures in the same space whether the rules call for it or not).

Corbon said:

That proves nothing of the kind. Suppose, hypothetically, that I found an example that said something like this:

Example: A beastman attacks Battlemage Jaes. The overlord rolls a red and a green die. No X (miss result) was rolled, so the attack hits. He counts up all of the damage (heart symbols) on the rolled dice, and adds 1 for the beastman's "+1 damage" ability, resulting in a total of...

Which of the following is described by this example:

1. The beastman made an attack. The example describes the various steps involved in making the attack, including rolling dice, counting up damage, etc.
2. The beastman made an attack. After the beastman's attack was completed, the overlord rolled some dice and started to do some other stuff that was not part of the attack.

I think most people would read that example as #1, don't you?

The question is one of hierarchy. Does "inflicting damage" describe something that happens before you subtract armor, apply wound cancellation, etc. or is it the name given to the entire process of doing those things?

Since all of that is described under the heading "Step 6: Inflict Wounds", and since I'm reasonably sure that if you read a card that told you to "inflict 3 damage" you'd do all of the other stuff even if it wasn't specifically mentioned on the card, I submit that "inflicting damage" is higher in the hierarchy than things like "subtract armor" or "remove wound tokens from character card" and implicitly includes all of those things, just like "making an attack" includes counting range and rolling dice and so forth.

Corbon said:

I believe your exact words were "most incompetent ruling ever". And with Descent's history, I really don't see how it could possibly qualify as that even if the sequence were previously 100% clear. I don't recall you mentioning balance.

Antistone said:

1. I think that precedent in the GLOAQ is an example of a rule that covers a different situation and is made less applicable by the fact that monsters are implicitly not required to get off activated glyphs if they can't.

2. I think your example is a strawman, or at least the second part is.
As far as hierarchy goes, the whole sequence is under 'Step 6: Inflict wounds'. It would not, however, be remotely close to the first time FFG have confused wounds with damage.
3. I submit you are wrong, because we are explicitly told to inflict damage by Trapmaster that does not follow all of this sequence. However, that is a clear example of an FFG error in itself (should be wounds rather than damage).

4. Right. It wasn't in this thread. It might have even been another rule, or another forum, or even deleted during writing. Sorry. What I mean is that I am happy for DR to go off before knockback - it makes thematic and balance sense, and if FFG could sort their terminology out could even come to make rules sense. It does however make a complete mockery of their written rules and action sequencing.

mhmm....i've found two things in the new FAQ that seem to contradict each other:

FAQ page 9:

Q:Timing of "before applying the effects of armor": At
what step of the attack sequence does this occur? This
becomes an important interaction during Guard orders
and in the case of Knockback and Divine Retribution. For
example: If an activated monster is hit with a Guard attack
that gives a Web or Stun token, does it activation end due
to the effects of Web or Stun?
A: Other effects take place after damage is dealt.

and here:

FAQ page 10:

Q: Regarding the Falcon's Claw Copper Item, if a hero
interrupts a monster's activation and hits the monster
with a Web token, is the monster then unable to continue
spending movement points?
A: No.

what do you think?

BigYogi said:

This is tricky use of English. A negative response to a negative question can be ambiguous. Why couldn't the author have said, "No, the monster is unable to spend movement points." Or "No, the monster can complete its move and is then webbed." Either case is a valid interpretation of the answer, and it wouldn't be hard to CLARIFY just a little bit more this response...

-shnar

What bugs me a little is the fact that Word of Vaal has been FAQed to go through doors. I know that I posted the list of effects in question in Thundercles´ list myself, but in the meantime I had discovered that all attacks are blocked by doors as per the basic rules.

It clearly shows that they did not think about the answers too hard.

2a. You quoted an example that you claim "proves" that inflicting wounds is a separate step in the sequence after inflicting damage, which AFAICT is based entirely on the fact that the example says that one of them happens and then, in a separate sentence, says that the other one happens (there's certainly nothing in the example that explicitly says that they're separate events). I posted an example with an equivalent structure in which I showed that the second thing can still be a sub-step of the first thing, thereby demonstrating that your example does not prove what you claimed it proves.

Therefore, you have stated no defensible positive reason for thinking they're separate steps.

I'm not claiming that your example proves my position, just that it doesn't prove yours.

Since this attacks your reasoning and not your conclusion, I don't see how it could possibly be a straw man, unless you mean that the argument you explicitly stated was not your actual argument.

2b-3. And...you think I'm wrong because there are some examples that you think would undermine my arguments if they weren't obviously another case of the writers confusing damage and wounds? I'm supposed to take that seriously as a counter-argument?

I don't even see how Trapmaster would be a counter-argument even if there were no question of damage/wounds confusion. OK, it deals wounds under such-and-such conditions. That's completely consistent with dealing wounds being a substep of inflicting damage; being a substep doesn't mean that it can't ever be done by itself; it just means that the larger step implicitly includes the substep. To continue my example, "inflict damage" is a substep of "make an attack," but there are things besides attacks that inflict damage, and attacks can even skip the damage step IF something explicitly tells you to (e.g. Crushing Blow), but any time that you make an attack, the default behavior is that includes inflicting damage.

Similarly, you can inflict wounds directly without inflicting damage, and substeps of "inflicting damage" can be skipped if a card explicitly tells you to (for example, when it says "ignoring armor"), but anything that tells you to inflict damage by default includes subtracting armor and inflicting wounds, which itself contains the substeps of applying wound cancellation, removing wound tokens, and checking for death (and death contains several substeps...).

Blast (and other AoE abilities) says it "deals its full damage to each figure affected by it." It doesn't mention wounds. Do you normally play that all affected figures receive wounds from the attack, or just damage and no wounds?

The FAQ answers refer to dealing damage as if it were equivalent to dealing wounds; that's a vagueness they need to fix for the "effects of armor" and knockback example to make sense. As it stands, they merely reiterated the original confusing language. Obviously, the two terms are ambiguous enough for Antistone to have a field day equating "dealing damage" with "resolving an attack" and an unsourced reference to something else that might deal damage...like, uh....actually, I don't know of anything that deals "damage" besides an attack (the Trapmaster thing is worded bizarrely, as if damage and wounds are equivalent, so it's not the same), but if anyone could find that reference, it would help this discussion. Anyway, yeah, that'll need to be clarified.

Shnar, if you take the falcon's claw question at face value, the answer is "the monster is able to spend movement points". However, that's not clear and it's a construction that's easy to misinterpret, so you're right, I should stay away from making "negative questions" in the future.

Parathion, Word of Vaal was lumped in with a series of abilities which may go through doors, which was poor planning but I hadn't gotten around to splitting them yet (I think Antistone recommended I do it). Attacks still don't go through doors, but the abilities do (the answer actually says "abilities go through doors" and does not mention attacks); the question was more about how it works ("like the breath example"). That FAQ might need a note that says "Attacks still don't go through doors" or possibly "(except the Word of Vaal)" after the door declaration.

Thundercles said:

The problem with negative questions really compounds itself when you introduce non native English speaking players, as in many languages, you response positively to a negative question to mean the negative answer. Honestly, because I'm a dumb American, when I read that question/answer, "Is the monster then unable to continue spending movment points? No.", to me that means, "No, the monster is unable to spend movement points." I'm not sure though that's what the author means.

Would it have killed them to add 8 or so more words?

-shnar

It never occurred to me that it meant anything other than "the monster may continue to spend movement points", and that *wasn't* the answer I was expecting (I think it's a silly answer: I don't see how you justify it), but I agree "No" is a little unhelpful. Many of the question are answered too tersely, actually.

shnar said:

Um, that's the way it works in English, too...

What I think is worst of all is that after waiting 12 months for an FAQ update the give us a half-baked version that actually presents more questions than it answers. It's even gone so far as to confuse rulings which were already clear.

I think it's time Thundercles got the job. Having donne so much work on it already, the fans here should write their own faq and submit it to Fantasy Flight as the definitive version. It's not as if FFG are putting enough effort into the support to care one way or the other.

mahkra said:

Proper English, yes. Colloquial English, no, as I illustrated.

Take this example: "Are you not going to the movie?" Most people I know would answer, "No, I'm not going to the movie."

-shnar

new new faq posted, updated today. Discuss, again.

Thundercles said:

Good thing too.

Apart from a few head scratcher questions not included in the FAQ on SoB, the update seems to clarify most of the questions raised in this thread. Doesn't it?

Someone at FFG is paying attention to the boards? HOLY CRAP!

From the FAQ:

"The overlord may choose to have a monster affected by any terrain it partially occupies. A monster MUST be affected by any terrain it completely occupies. If the monster is completely occupying multiple terrains, the figure has to be affected by one of the terrains (Overlord's choice)."

I know that most would consider Rubble to not be a terrain. Still I think I will be using this ruling to justify house ruling for the sake of spiders at least.

From the FAQ:

"Q: If a hero with the Divine Retribution Skill is killed by an attack with the Knockback ability, does Divine Retribution take effect before or after the figure is moved by Knockback?
A: Before.

Q: Does Knockback trigger after inflicting damage or after inflicting wounds?
A: Knockback should trigger before wounds are inflicted, i.e. immediately after confirming that an attack is successful and will inflict at least 1 point of damage before counting armor."

WHAT THE HELL?! I do take a LOT of comfort from the fact that someone in FFG is at least paying some attention for once, since a lot of the answers got explained in more detail. Problem is for me these two rulings contradict each other blatantly. The only way to trigger DI is when determining how many wounds the hero took. The second entry blatantly states that Knockback goes off before wounds are dealt. How can you have DI go off before you even know how many wounds were dealt?

From the FAQ:

"Q: Regarding the Knight Skill: Firstly, when you declare a Battle action, do you have to spend the fatigue to gain the extra attack from Knight? Secondly, can you do this multiple times per Battle action (i.e. spend 4 fatigue to make 2 extra
attacks)?
A: No; a player with Knight is not forced to use his ability. Secondly, also no; a player may not use his Knight ability multiple times per battle action."

Ok, I think they got the answer very clear on this. Problem is the question was not do you have to spend the fatigue. The question was when you declare a battle action, do you get the extra attack without spending fatigue to trigger Knight? As in, is the extra attack a passive bonus from having Knight, or is it much like Leadership where the skill is all or nothing?

From the FAQ:

"Q: Can abilities with a radius that don't require Line of Sight (Command, Word of Vaal, Spiritwalker, Kirga's hero ability from Altar of Despair, etc.) go through walls and/or doors? When checking the distance for these abilities, must the target space or figure be reachable by moving a number spaces less than or equal to the radius, or do these abilities work like the Breath example (fly to anywhere within a template, in this case a square of edge length 2xradius + 1 centered on the figure)?
A: Abilities, not attacks, with a radius may go through doors, but not through walls. These abilities work like the Breath example. Note that attacks cannot go through closed doors.

Q:Timing of "before applying the effects of armor": At what step of the attack sequence does this occur? This becomes an important interaction during Guard orders and in the case of Knockback and Divine Retribution. For example: If a linger effect token such as Web is given out during a Guard order and the monster figure survives the attack, does the web token immediately take effect and therefor prevent the monster from spending movement points?
A: Other effects take place after wounds are dealt. In the example given, the lingering effect token wound immediately take effect.

Q: Regarding the Falcon's Claw Copper Item, if a hero interrupts a monster's activation and hits the monster with a Web token, is the monster then able to continue spending movement points?
A: No.

Q: If a hero opens a door from a space diagonal but still adjacent to the door (not the two spaces immediately flush with the door) does the pit placed by the trap card appear underneath the hero (in order to trap her) or can it only be placed in the two spaces directly in front of the door?
A: The pit placed by the trap card is placed directly in front of the door. This means that if the hero opens the door from a diagonal space adjacent to the door, the hero would not be caught in the pit trap. However, most doors in the game are placed in hallways, so a savvy Overlord would only need to wait for the heroes to open a door in a hallway. to play his pit trap.

Q: How do the weapons that allow one die to be re-rolled (Ripper, Bow of the Hawk) work when an attack is aimed or dodged?
A: If a 1-die re-roll is used, then that's the only re-roll the player gets. However, the player may instead aim to upgrade it to a full normal re-roll. A 1-die re-roll, however, will cancel out an opposing re-roll just like normal (as in the case of aim vs. dodge)."

WOOT! Clarity! I like that. Can we get an errata on Truthseeker Kel while we're at it to make her ability only apply to attacks? Sorry for the long post. Kinda got a little too happy that someone at FFG was assigned to actually pay attention in here.

So I feel I should say: Remy and I actually submitted the questions with as much review and editing as we had time for....which usually ended up meaning losing 3-6 hours of sleep per submission. I'm just happy this is a hobby and not a second job or something.

Here's my commentary on what got through and what didn't for a requested FAQ fix. I feel like we've set up a good line of communication for FAQ updates, and I'm pleased we were able to push through as many of Antistone's meticulous questions as we could. This is, I think, a step up from the last FAQ update, and really makes me happy that I started updating the list again a few months back.

Guys, go ahead and pick this FAQ apart: we'll compile and submit as many edit and question requests as it takes...although I'm really proud of what we accomplished.

Large monsters vs terrain is.....I don't know. Apparently, the new idea is from Kevin himself. It doesn't explicitly deny the occupying of movement-terrain, but nothing says you can (sorry munchkin-lords). It does let monsters ignore scything blades and dart field, which I feel was the intent of the original change, but it also doesn't describe when a monster has to make that decision or what happens if you switch the decision mid-turn (under these rules, a large monster can choose to be in a pit or fall into a pit?). One step forward, one step back. The undefined area is probably game-breaking in specific corner cases (large load-bearing monster using a pit to kill himself and trigger a terrible trap or something) but is so rare that we can still play through.

typos.....which are actually my fault. This is another good reason why I should not have the FAQ update job (don't live in MN, am a programmer, various other reasons...). However, knockback and deep water fixed. Yes, that question is my fault. Yes, I know, it's written terribly. I'll alert the proper authorities.

mid-air grapple fixed.

Knockback is confirmed to be before wounds....so the divine retribution question is both wrong and unnecessary. But Big Remy wins, so there is that.

Knight.......can't seem to word the question right, it seems. Not a big deal, this doesn't break anything, just avoids resolving the question.

large monster movement; apparently that question is just hard to ask right. Le sigh.

Word of Vaal: hahahahaha.....man, they added both notes instead of just one. well, there's no escape now, you can't use Word of Vaal through doors.

Web is changed to now take effect immediately. Looks like the double negative thing was actually "no, they can't", and is now fixed. Good catch Big Yogi and Shnar.

Fear Fixed: Fear stacks, always.

forgot to mention the spirit spear. Gotta do that.

Daze now clarified to take effect once, after power potion. Fatigue can be used after the roll, so can be used to overcome daze, RAW.

Welcome mat clarified definitively forever.

Dark relic first part answered.

New Knockback means that the corrupted terrain question is wrong and unnecessary as well.

Leech is now the same source as the attack: the yes answer makes sense.

each token is a separate damage source. CORBIN IS IMMUNE TO BURN. He's basically almost immune to most indirect (non-trap, non-attack) sources of damage.

a couple questions got moved to RtL or from RtL, as they should have been.

I made an honest attempt to re-clarify crushing block. Did not work (ignored), but there's always next time.

Hey, 1-die rerolls are ruled to be as strong as aim and dodge now in terms of cancelling stuff out. Trenloe and Lyssa get boosts!

I think the FFG guys play with a different version of Blocked than we do, but this answers the question.

Lieutenants and parties attacking each other disappeared...huh. Did not expect that.

SoB Lieutenants standins fixed and clearly worded.

Tried to get clarification for Whirpool answer vs Whinnowing Straights and Ship upgrades, but those got ignored. Oh, and Remy whipped up a whole thing about truthseer kel, but it got ignored. Next time, next time.

I just chuckled at the Knockback and Divine Retribution, one question right after the other that seems very contradictory.

Also, what is up with the Knight Skill question? A completely different answer, but still not addressing the original question.

-shnar

There are a LOT of small typos in this too. Was spell check turned off? Page 9 has "ponits" instead of "points".

Speaking of that page, they reworded the question so it wasn't a negative question (yay), but I'm not sure what the answer is. So the creature gets the web token, does he lose all MPs now? I /think/ so, but that contradicts the first Miscellaneous question on the previous page that web tokens only happen at the beginning of the turn.

-shnar

Oh, nevermind, they did clarify the question on pg 10, the monster can spend no more movement points

-shnar

For the sake of thoroughness, and because people are continuing to post as I write this, I'm just going to go through systematically and mention everything I notice, whether someone else has mentioned it or not.

Filename still says v1.3.

New new rules on Large Monsters and Terrain are completely different from the first FAQ ruling and from the extra sentence at the end of the last one, but look like they're probably effectively the same as the original rules for most cases, which I'd say is an improvement. However, they've still got a host of problems:

• It's still not clear what it applies to (the word "terrain" is not defined anywhere that I know of). Some of the issues below may become irrelevant depending on how that's resolved.
• It's not clear how it interacts with things that block movement (e.g. rubble)
• It's not clear how it interacts with things that move into you (e.g. rolling boulders)
• It's not clear how it interacts with things that don't occupy spaces (e.g. crushing walls)
• It fails to distinguish between things that happen when you enter terrain (like rolling for ice), things that happen continuously while you're in it (like gaining Shadowcloak from a tree), and things that happen when you leave terrain (like paying extra movement to get out of a pit). If the overlord is allowed to choose separately for each of those things, you get weird stuff like stepping into pit and lava squares, and choosing to count as being in the pit for entering (since that's less damage than the lava) and as being in the lava for leaving (since that doesn't have a movement penalty).
• It still claims that large monsters originally took more damage than small monsters when moving across lava, which is still a lie.

Page 5:

"Q: Does Knockback trigger after inflicting damage or after inflicting wounds?
A: Knockback should trigger before wounds are inflicted, i.e. immediately after confirming that an attack is succesfl [sic] and will inflict at least 1 point of damage before counting armor."

The directly contradictory answer saying that Divine Retribution triggers before Knockback is still in there, right above this one.

They managed to misunderstand the Knight question again. Here's my suggested wording:

As written, the Knight skill always lets you make 3 attacks when you declare a Battle action, whether you spend fatigue or not. It also gives you the separate option to gain movement points equal to half your speed by spending 2 fatigue. Is that how it is supposed to work?

Page 6:

Still doesn't tell us how non-square monsters move. Maybe we're supposed to take the examples as being exclusive, meaning that neither hellhounds nor dragons can move orthogonally forward OR sideways?

Page 8:

Not new, but I've just noticed that the "only non-area of effect attacks may go through staircases" answer technically says that you can't fire a Blast attack through a staircase, not just that the blast radius won't extend through it. That seems like it might be an error...though if it is an error, then the answer is redundant with another one on the same page.

Question about entering an illegal ending space that you might not be able to leave was not clarified to indicate whether you're forced off or forced to stay.

Page 9:

Spirit Spear wasn't clarified.

Page 10:

Probably not different from before, but I notice there's no clarification on whether Trapmaster applies to the Scything Blades trap card.

Page 16:

Stealth question unrelated to RtL is still in the RtL section.