The following interaction came up in a Hyperspace tournament I ran on Sunday.

Magva Yarro:
While a friendly ship at range 0-2 defends, the attacker cannot reroll more than 1 attack die.

Han Solo:
After you roll dice, if you are at range 0-1 of an obstacle, you may reroll all of your dice. This does not count as rerolling for the purpose of other effects .

I ruled that because of the 2nd sentence on Han's ability, Magva Yarro's ability would not apply, so Han would still be able to use his ability and would still have to reroll every dice. Curious if anyone else has encountered this interaction in the wild and how it was ruled.

It's been much debated; Han is very poorly written and it's unclear how he is intended to operate with respect to things which block modifications.

there is an example in the FAQ at the end of the rules reference. han solo only gets to reroll one die. magva uses "cannot" - and that's an absolute term. hans ability rerolls as many´ eligible dice as possible, in this case one.

i know some people will disagree.

I think there's a decent case that since Han doesn't count as a reroll, Magva would only have an impact if Han tries to spend a Lock for rerolls. I'm not 100% on that--indeed, it's impossible to be 100% on anything with Han's trash fire of an ability.

//

Beyond this, I have issues with the injustice of Han being able to choose one die and reroll it. Magva--any way you slice it--is intended to make reroll effects worse, not better. I think it's kind of an unjust and unfair situation if Han gets to pick one die of his choice to reroll.

So am I being opportunistic here, saying Han is exempt from Magva, while believing that Han shouldn't be exempt from Midnight? Sure.

I think a fair game where we as a community shut down utter bull glitches is important. More important than trying to parse utter rules disaster Han Solo with some degree of consistency.

Honestly, errata or a half column of clarification is what's needed to fix Han.

His ability is super hard to write though, if you want to keep the 'can reroll all dice even outside attacks' element.

13 minutes ago, meffo said:

there is an example in the FAQ at the end of the rules reference. han solo only gets to reroll one die. magva uses "cannot" - and that's an absolute term. hans ability rerolls as many´ eligible dice as possible, in this case one.

i know some people will disagree.

I will.

But first, both cards, for reference and ease of discussion.

Magva prevents one from rerolling, yet what Han does is explicitly not a reroll by means of any other effect in the game but his own ability. And Magva's ability is not Han's, simple as that.

I agree though that this version of Han has caused a lot of argument already and there are many opinions and analysis waiting for some confirmation/denial by FFG. I made some lengthy explanation of my train of thoughts on Han once upon a time, you may read it here:

2 hours ago, meffo said:

there is an example in the FAQ at the end of the rules reference. han solo only gets to reroll one die. magva uses "cannot" - and that's an absolute term. hans ability rerolls as many´ eligible dice as possible, in this case one.

i know some people will disagree.

So you just ignore this part of Han's text?

Quote

This does not count as rerolling for the purpose of other effects.

The rule you're referring to is in the rules reference:

Quote

If a card ability uses the word “cannot,” that effect is absolute and cannot be overridden by other effects.

But the 2nd part of Han's ability isn't overriding Magva's ability. Magva's ability is never applied in the first place because it only applies to rerolls, and Han's ability is not a reroll.

On 3/5/2019 at 11:50 PM, Tvboy said:

So you just ignore this part of Han's text?

The rule you're referring to is in the rules reference:

But the 2nd part of Han's ability isn't overriding Magva's ability. Magva's ability is never applied in the first place because it only applies to rerolls, and Han's ability is not a reroll.

yes, of course i'm ignoring part of hans pilot alibity. magva states "cannot". cannot is absolute. maybe you only want it to apply to parts of the ability, but it's a golden rule, it always applies.

and yes, hans ability is a reroll, even if it doesn't count as a reroll for other effects, it's still a reroll. a reroll that doesn't count like a reroll. it's pretty much the dumbest rule in the game.

magva still trumps han solo because of the "cannot".

i know more people will disagree.

17 minutes ago, meffo said:

yes, of course i'm ignoring part of hans pilot alibity. magva states "cannot". cannot is absolute. maybe you only want it to apply to parts of the ability, but it's a golden rule, it always applies.

and yes, hans ability is a reroll, even if it doen't count as a reroll for other effects, it's still a reroll. a reroll that doesn't count like a reroll. it's pretty much the dumbest rule in the game.

magva still trumps han solo because of the "cannot".

i know more people will disagree.

Well, Magva does feature the omnipotent word of "cannot", but thankfully, it is tamed by some conditions. It applies to specific thing, the thing being re-rolling attack dice during engagement.

So, you know. There's a whole bunch of things it doesn't apply to and doesn't prevent. Like re-rolling defence dice. Spending focus. Boosting, performing maneouvres, assigning dials. Breathing. #jk

It doesn't apply to anything that's not a reroll and it's made very explicit Han's ability is not one as far as anyone but him is considered.

The wording is poor, give you that, but it gets the job done of letting Han do his thing just once per roll and making whatever he does transparent to all the other effects of the game.

Cheers

14 minutes ago, Ryfterek said:

Well, Magva does feature the omnipotent word of "cannot", but thankfully, it is tamed by some conditions. It applies to specific thing, the thing being re-rolling attack dice during engagement.

So, you know. There's a whole bunch of things it doesn't apply to and doesn't prevent. Like re-rolling defence dice. Spending focus. Boosting, performing maneouvres, assigning dials. Breathing. #jk

It doesn't apply to anything that's not a reroll and it's made very explicit Han's ability is not one as far as anyone but him is considered.

The wording is poor, give you that, but it gets the job done of letting Han do his thing just once per roll and making whatever he does transparent to all the other effects of the game.

Cheers

The problem is that the FAQ entry in the rules reference suggests that there are circumstances that can limit Han's rerolling (and also, for whatever it's worth, makes it clear that Han's ability is in fact a dice modification), which begs the question: how is it possible for anything in the game to affect Han's reroll when nothing in the game is permitted to treat it as a reroll? And if it's not, then why in the world would they even bring it up?

Han's answer: *rerolls the question*

1 hour ago, Maui. said:

The problem is that the FAQ entry in the rules reference suggests that there are circumstances that can limit Han's rerolling (and also, for whatever it's worth, makes it clear that Han's ability is in fact a dice modification), which begs the question: how is it possible for anything in the game to affect Han's reroll when nothing in the game is permitted to treat it as a reroll? And if it's not, then why in the world would they even bring it up?

Han's answer: *rerolls the question*

Han is the only card/effect of the game for which what he's doing is a reroll.

That's what prevents him from rolling indifinetly off from himself, as any dice he has re-rolled he'll now see as already re-rolled and can re-roll them again.

At the same time he's not blind to other game effect so he "sees" the dice being re-rolled outside of the context of his ability and by the rules recognises he cannot re-roll them again if they've already been re-rolled before.

It's only that all other game effects do not recognise the dice he "Haned" as re-rolled. Or being re-rolled by him. They're "Haned", for lack of better word.

Inheritedly, I'd also assume his effect is not a modification anywhere but in the context of itself, because a modification in this game is only defined as being one of four: re-rolling, changing to, adding, and spending dice results. Out of that array Han is none, so he's out of bounds of what's defined as modification and what applies to modifications.

I know it sounds very odd and counterintuitive, but it would be no more ground-rules breaking than Moralo not being destroyed by fleeing the mat or Starvipers using the bank template for barrel rolls.

1 hour ago, meffo said:

yes, of course i'm ignoring part of hans pilot alibity. magva states "cannot". cannot is absolute. maybe you only want it to apply to parts of the ability, but it's a golden rule, it always applies.

and yes, hans ability is a reroll, even if it doen't count as a reroll for other effects, it's still a reroll. a reroll that doesn't count like a reroll. it's pretty much the dumbest rule in the game.

magva still trumps han solo because of the "cannot".

i know more people will disagree.

I get where your coming from, you're looking at this as Han vs Magva, which ability wins. But in my mind that's like asking Ten Numb vs Magva, who wins. It's a conflict that doesn't actually exists because Ten Numb's ability to turn eyeballs into hits is just as much of a reroll as Han's ability is in relation to being affected by Magva Yarro. Magva's ability never sees Han's rerolls as rerolls and therefore never turns on to begin with.

18 hours ago, Tvboy said:

I get where your coming from, you're looking at this as Han vs Magva, which ability wins. But in my mind that's like asking Ten Numb vs Magva, who wins. It's a conflict that doesn't actually exists because Ten Numb's ability to turn eyeballs into hits is just as much of a reroll as Han's ability is in relation to being affected by Magva Yarro. Magva's ability never sees Han's rerolls as rerolls and therefore never turns on to begin with.

well Magva wins even when facing off against Tenn or Tel Truva, since she states "cannot" - and cannot is very clearly described in the rules to be absolute, even when facing no opposition what so ever.

it overrides all other effects, sorry. doesn't matter if the dice are not counted as being rerolled according to Hans effects

Just to throw my hat on the side of Han working still against Magva (and her cannot) because of a lot of the reasons that have already been stated, and those against seem to only be choosing to read part of the cards text and not all of both.

i will agree with you, @xwingMinty , @Tvboy and @Ryfterek

how ever, i'm not just ignoring Hans Solos ability with no basis.

" If a card ability uses the word “cannot,” that effect is absolute and cannot be overridden by other effects."

@meffo , You mention above that " Magva wins even when facing off against Tenn or Tel Truva  , since she states "cannot" - and cannot is very clearly described in the rules to be absolute, even when facing no opposition what so ever. " Ten's ability has nothing to do with rerolling at all, so what does "winning" mean there? Magva has no impact on Ten's ability because Ten's ability isn't a reroll. The argument here is that Han's ability isn't a reroll either, so Magva's absolute authority over rerolls is irrelevant.

25 minutes ago, meffo said:

i will agree with you, @xwingMinty , @Tvboy and @Ryfterek

how ever, i'm not just ignoring Hans Solos ability with no basis.

" If a card ability uses the word “cannot,” that effect is absolute and cannot be overridden by other effects."

Suppose Carnor Jax 2e existed. "Enemy ships at Range 0-1 cannot take focus or evade actions, or spend focus or evade tokens."

Clearly, CJ-2e wouldn't effect Ten Numb spending a stress to use his focus-like ability, because it's not actually a focus. I just think there's enough to Han's text to conclude that it's not actually a reroll.

22 hours ago, Maui. said:

The problem is that the FAQ entry in the rules reference suggests that there are circumstances that can limit Han's rerolling (and also, for whatever it's worth, makes it clear that Han's ability is in fact a dice modification), which begs the question: how is it possible for anything in the game to affect Han's reroll when nothing in the game is permitted to treat it as a reroll? And if it's not, then why in the world would they even bring it up?

Han's answer: *rerolls the question*

My issue with this is that Han 1e clearly needed clarification that he'd reroll as many dice as possible. Since 1e Han happened later (Attacker Modifies Attack Dice) rather than immediately after rolling dice, there were a lot more effects which could get in the way. I can't be sure this isn't some outdated line, based on how the previous edition worked that is generally no longer necessary.

If we start trying to get into intent, FFGs reasons for including a potential Han clarification, there's also that Magva seems clearly intended to make enemy reroll effects worse, and not better. There's no other ability like that. Effects which make enemy attacks worse, but oops in this case, they make enemy attacks better.

//

But I think there's one thing we can all agree on: Han really needs an official clarification, a few paragraphs on what he works with, etc etc.

3 minutes ago, KiAdiMoody said:

@meffo , You mention above that " Magva wins even when facing off against Tenn or Tel Truva  , since she states "cannot" - and cannot is very clearly described in the rules to be absolute, even when facing no opposition what so ever. " Ten's ability has nothing to do with rerolling at all, so what does "winning" mean there? Magva has no impact on Ten's ability because Ten's ability isn't a reroll. The argument here is that Han's ability isn't a reroll either, so Magva's absolute authority over rerolls is irrelevant.

Magvas effect, like all other effects that state "cannot" are absolute. they cannot be overwritten by other effects. it doesn't matter what the effects say, they still cannot overwrite a card stating "cannot". just imagine if there were more effects at play than just Tenn Nunbs or Tel Truvas. effects that do not state "cannot" are not absolute and in this scenario therefore secondary. Magva wins, since she has clear support in the rules.

while i still agree that the intent for Han to override Magva is probably there, that's not how the rules are written at the moment. i agree with @theBitterFig - Han needs a clarification, badly.

i do not agree that there's enough text on Hans card right now to overrule Magva, though. again, Magva states "cannot". according to the rules, that's absolute. i mean, i'm fine with people trying to find a way Han overrules Magva according to the text on their cards, but as of right now it has no support in the rules as written.

What does Magva winning against Ten do, exactly? Nothing, because Ten's ability isn't a reroll. If "winning" has no game impact, then it is irrelevant.

43 minutes ago, KiAdiMoody said:

What does Magva winning against Ten do, exactly? Nothing, because Ten's ability isn't a reroll. If "winning" has no game impact, then it is irrelevant.

i don't agree. we never know what effects will be combined with which in the future. also, all effects that state "cannot" win versus effects that don't. it's in the rules.

So what's the game effect of Magva on Ten?

Just now, KiAdiMoody said:

So what's the game effect of Magva on Ten?

Magva wins! Tenn cannot even use his lock to reroll more than one die. get wrecked, Tenn!

Sorry, I'll be more specific: What's the game effect of Magva on Ten's pilot ability?

2 minutes ago, KiAdiMoody said:

Sorry, I'll be more specific: What's the game effect of Magva on Ten's pilot ability?

isn't that 100% obvious? none, of course. but Magva still wins, since her effect is absolute and Tenns isn't.

Cool, so we agree that "cannot", while absolute, may not have any game effect depending on the ability it is interacting with. Would you agree that the only abilities that Magva interacts with are rerolls?