During our last game, my group came upon a disagreement about wether we could play the evade feat against an attack using the breath template. The whole argument revolved around the fact that the card says to ''play after a monster has made a successful magic or ranged attack against you'', leading to the question : what constitutes ''a successful attack against you''? Can anyone under the breath template play evade and thus make the attack miss everyone affected by the attack? What about blast or sweep? Is evade only useful against single target, non-area attacks, or can it be used against any successful magic or ranged attack which includes the hero playing it?

This is just one of the problems we've had with the wording of the feat cards. The disarm feat has a similar wording : ''Play when the overlord plays a trap card on you or any friendly figure within 3 spaces of you.'' Does this mean that it is only effective against traps that affect only the hero playing the feat, or only one hero within 3 spaces of the one playing the card? Can it cancel traps triggered by opening a chest or a door? Can it cancel scything blades or drugged darts, dance of the monkey gods and animate weapons?

Would we be wrong in assuming that ''playing a trap against you'' or ''a successful attack against you'' simply means a trap and/or attack which affects you? What about ''declaring an attack against you''? Does a breath/blast/sweep which includes you count as an attack declared against you, or does it have to be an attack which specifically targets you and only you?

Any help would be appreciated.

_Loki_ said:

Evade
Play after a monster has made a successful ranged or magic attack against you (a ranged or magic attack that doesn't miss).
You must roll a power die. If the result is a surge, there is no effect.
If the result is not a surge, that monster's attack becomes a miss.

FAQ pg 17
Q: Blocked: Does the attack miss all of its targets, or only the hero who played the card (the card says the "attack against you becomes a miss")?
A: Because you are changing a die to a miss result, all heroes targeted by the attack would evade the attack.

Blocked is identical to evade except it works on melee attacks instead of ranged attacks. But the FAQ answer will still hold true for Evade.

You play it as written. The attack against you becomes a miss, therefore it misses all heroes. This doesn't necessarily seem 'realistic' but is one of those occasional sacrifices a boardgame has to make that favours simplicity and playability over realism.

A successful attack against you is not a game term as such, but can only mean an attack that affects you (your space).

Similarly for traps. Playing a trap card 'on you' is not an accurate game term - no traps are played 'on heroes'. They are played 'when' their trigger occurs and not 'on' any particular hero/space/thing. Some traps affect figures, some affect spaces, some affect treasures, but none are actually played 'on' what they effect.
Therefore, the meaning of 'playing a trap against you' could mean 'playing a trap triggered by an action of yours' or 'playing a trap that affects you directly', or both.
I think both is the most reasonable solution, since either could equally be claimed to being played 'on you' if anything is. Its difficult to claim that a spiked pit played on the space your hero entered isn't played 'on you', even though it is technically played on teh space you entered. It is equally difficult to claim that a DotMG trap that turns you (and your mates) into a Monkey isn't played 'on you'.

In summary, I think any attack that affects your space is an attack 'against you'. This includes Blast and Breath attacks.
Any trap triggered by you (space, chest, door traps) or that directly affects you (eg DotMG) is a trap 'played on you'.

Thanks. That's pretty much how I saw it, but there isn't much in the rules/f.a.q. to back my point, which is why I turned to the forums for a second opinion.