If I repeat the draw phase with Den of the wolf, do the two cards i will draw again count in the draw cap or not ?

No. The Draw Cap limits the number of cards you can draw outside of the Draw Phase framework to 3. Repeating the Draw Phase runs you through the Draw Phase framework 2 times, but neither one of them count toward the Cap.

ok, thanks very much Ktom. Always fast and efficient !

And talking of draw cap, does the card I draw with the King of Summer agenda count in the draw cap ? I suppose yes, but someone on the french forum says a ruling was made saying it doesnt count.

Oh, so with the Kings of Summer agenda, whenever you draw an extra card in the draw phase, that doesn't count towards your draw cap?

I'm pretty sure that the standard 2 cards you draw during the draw phase is what Ktom meant...the extra card from the Kings of Summer agenda does count toward the draw cap, as far as I know. In other words, anything above the normal 2 cards is considered extra.

To confirm, I think this means that if my opponent runs Kings of Winter and it is winter, my draw cap would effectively be 4 if I run Kings of Summer, since I would draw only 1 card as normal during the draw phase and up to 3 more in addition to that.

As far as I know, the +1 card during the draw phase from the summer agenda is just an enhancement of the framework draw action, and so it should not count against the cap (I beleive the same goes for the Maester of Laws Title in melee), but I could be completely wrong.

Help us Obi-ktom-Kenobi. You're our only hope!

Deathjester26 said:

I'm going to leave the Kings of Summer one to ktom (my impression was that it did count against the draw cap), but I can least quote the Core Set rules regarding Master of Laws:

"This additional
card does not count towards
your draw cap for the round."

It has been hinted at, but let's be clear:

The Draw Cap limits you to 3 cards drawn through card effects outside of the framework draw in the Draw Phase.

Many people seem to read this as "you cannot draw more than 5 cards per round." That's not what it says (even if that's how it works out most of the time). What it really says it that you get your framework draw, plus 3 more cards. There is a big difference.

That difference being: if a card effect modifies what you do during your standard framework draw, it has nothing to do with the 3-card Draw Cap!

So to be very specific on this point:

- Kings of Summer Agenda + Summer: Your standard framework draw is modified to 3 cards; and you still have up to 3 cards to draw through card effects. The extra card does not count against your Draw Cap of 3 in the "framework draw, plus 3 more cards."

- Kings of Summer Agenda + Winter: Your standard framework draw is modified to 1 card; and you still only have up to 3 cards to draw through card effects. You cannot "make up" the lost card with card effect (essentially increasing your Draw Cap to 4) in the "framework draw, plus 3 more cards."

Moral of the Story (and a very repetitive ktom, I know): The Draw Cap does not say "you can draw a total of 5 cards each round;" it says "you get your framework draw in the Draw Phase, plus 3 more cards. "

ktom said:

thats the way we always played it too, then at last years GenCon I had a game against a summer deck and we had different opinions on it so we asked Nate to be sure and he said that it does count against the draw cap. I wasn't sure if i remembered right or not so I just double checked via e-mail and this is what Nate said (he also included the Title and why it works the way it does):

Hi Mike,

Yes, the draw in Summer agenda does count towards the draw cap. The only draw effect in the game that does not is the title, and that is only because it specifically says in the rule book that it does not.

Also, reveal effects that do not use the word draw (Like House Messenger) do not count against a player's draw cap.

Nate

In that case, Nate needs to explain why the +1 for Summer counts against the Draw Cap, but the -1 for Winter cannot be made up by Draw effects with the Agenda.

here is his answer, i think if you disagree with him still you should talk to him directly.

from Nate [bold his]:

It's because the draw cap is written as a cap on the number of additional cards you can draw each round, not on the total number of cards that can be drawn each round. A lot of players add their draw phase and the draw cap together and get to the 5 cards per round thing, but really it is only interacting with additional cards you draw through card effects.

If you look at the wording of the draw cap below, this should be clear.

So even if your "2 cards in the draw phase" is reduced, there is nothing going on that is going to raise your "3 additional cards per round" restriction.

However, if your "2 cards in the draw phase" is increased, chances are good it is going to be via a card effect, which is going to count against your "3 additional cards per round."

The Draw Cap

No player may draw more than three additional cards per round, regardless of card effects. Thus, each player draws two cards during the draw phase, and through card effects may draw up to a maximum of three additional cards in the course of a single round.

Lars said:

Yeah, I will take it up with him. The original "framework draw (regardless of modifications) + 3 cards" was his ruling. I'll need to see what part of his reasoning changed.

Lars said:

This is actually my point of contention and where his pre-GenCon 2009 reasoning differs from what is here. Modifying the framework draw through a card effect is not really the same thing as drawing a card through a card effect. It is the resolving framework event that puts the card in your hand. The card effect only draws a card indirectly. It would be like saying a character is killed through a card effect when an event is used to increase your claim number during a military challenge.

I don't see the problem here. You are only allowed to draw 3 additional cards during the turn and Kings of Summer lets you draw 1 additional card, thus leaving you to draw up to a maximum of 2 more additional cards. You can draw up to 5 cards during the turn.

Kings of Winter, however, lowers the number of cards you draw during the Draw phase by one, thus leaving you to draw 3 more additional cards during the turn. You can draw up to 4 cards during the turn.

eloooooooi said:

I think you mean Kings of Summer during Winter rather than Kings of Winter (doesn't use draw - just discard).

The problem ktom has is that "additional" is supposed to be in addition to the normal framework event of drawing cards and it seems more like Kings of Summer is affecting that event itself (your normal framework event of drawing for the turn is now 3 cards) rather than letting draw another card on its own.

schrecklich said:

Right, I meant Kings of Summer during Winter.

And right, I understand what ktom is explaining but the word additional in the Kings of Summer agenda and the ruling for additional cards are very clear: 3 additional cards per round. Kings of Summer counts toward that limit.

Players cannot draw, by any card effect, more than 3 additional cards in addition to the 2 cards drawn during the draw phase. Thus, each player draws 2 cards during the draw phase as normal, and through card effects may draw up to a maximum of 3 additional cards in the course of a single round . Note that only effects that contain the word “draw” are considered under this restriction.

eloooooooi said:

As written, the rule says "you draw 2 for the Draw Phase, then up to 3 additional cards through card effects." If you're going to be literal and say "3 additional means 3 additional regardless of the type of effect," then why can't someone be just as literal and say "the rule says I get 2 for the Draw Phase, so the effect taking me below 2 doesn't apply"? The fact that the "2 for the Draw Phase" can be modified separately of actually drawing cards, makes it very easy to read this rule - as it has been read by a good chunk of the community for a long time - as "you draw X for the Draw Phase, then up to 3 additional cards through card effects."

Nate will be revising the wording in a future FAQ to make it clearer.

Because in Summer you get 1 additional card, which doesn't cause a conflict with the rules, whereas in Winter there is a conflict and the golden rule applies.

Seems pretty clear to me but any clarification will be welcome.

eloooooooi said:

~ Which Golden Rule is that?

(Most people seem to have missed that the "Golden Rule" was taken out of the LCG rule book. Also, the FAQ almost always over-rides the Golden Rule by explaining how cards, effects and interactions are supposed to be interpreted - ie, how the Golden Rule is supposed to be applied.)

But yeah, it seems clear to you, but to someone else, the other interpretation is clear.

ktom said:

Doesn't the text on the card take precedence over te rules anymore?

eloooooooi said:

That's virtually a philosophical discussion.

The text on the cards never actually took precedence over the rules of the game. When the text on a card comes into direct conflict with the basic rules of the game, you follow what is on the card. For example, the basic rules say that when a character is declared as an attacker, you kneel it. But there are characters that have text saying they do not kneel to attack. This is a direct conflict, so you follow the card. But is the card contradicting a single rule really that card taking precedence over the "rules," or is it that card working within the larger context of the game?

Because what about this example: The rules of the game say that I cannot draw more than 3 cards during a round. After drawing 3 card in a round, I have another effect that says to draw a card. Now, that card is in direct conflict with the rules, isn't it? It says I can draw a card, but the rules say I cannot. Why doesn't the card take precedence over the rules here?

Then there are other dynamic situations. The rules say that immune cards "ignore the effects" of card types to which they are immune. So if I'm attacking with an event immune character and you defend with a character that you then use an event to increase its STR. Does the immune character "ignore the effects" of the event? No, it doesn't, because the event is not acting on the immune card directly. But how do we know that's the correct interpretation of card text with the rules? Because the FAQ tells us how to interpret "immunity" as card text. So the card text obviously does not take precedence over the FAQ rules that tell us how to interpret it.

So you see, "card text always takes precedence over the rules" is obviously true in some situations, a bit misleading in others, and just wrong in still others. That's because card text is not outside of the rules - it essentially represents "temporary rules" for each situation.

ktom said:

Well, I see a big difference there. Let me try to express myself:

The rules say a character has to kneel in order to be declared as an attacker but the card says it doesn't kneel to attack. The card takes precedence.

The rules say you can't draw more than 3 additional cards per round. This agenda asks you to draw 1 additional card. The rules take precedence.

I think prohibition is stronger than permission and that's why some cards take precedence some times, while other times the rules forbid cards to do things described in their text. It's not written anywere, I know, but i find it similar to the "cannot" wording. That's why I say it seems clear to me, I'm not saying I have the right of it.

Anyway, you're right when you say that people can understand this situation in multiple ways. I agree that a clarification would be welcome.

eloooooooi said:

That's as good a way of classifying it as anything, and it makes sense to me as a rule of thumb. The general templating of this game is "unless a card/rule allows it, you can't," which confuses a lot of people who come from games that say "unless a card/rules prohibits it, you can."

When someone makes a blanket statement like "card text takes precedence over rules text," there would technically be no ability to pick-and-choose, saying that the rules prohibition is stronger than a card text permission. The card text would have to be followed. That's all I was trying to get at in that earlier post; saying "card text takes precedence over rules" is probably too general - and is probably not always true.

ktom said:

My problem is that I'm not a native English speaker and I have some problems when trying to explain my reasons/arguments. When I wrote "card text takes precedence over rules text" I didn't mean it as a general rule. I was thinking about this scenario where the rules say you can't do something and the card says you can/have to, which is why I see it pretty clear. My common sense tells me that cannot is stronger that have to , may or can . This is how real laws work, at least in my country: you can do everything unless the law says you can't. I see it as a rule of thumb.

eloooooooi said:

That may have been the issue i the past, though. When the "Golden Rule" was written in the rules, "card text before rules text" was a general rule, which could have confused a lot of people when the FAQ contradicted the cards (and in a couple of cases, did).

Then, what do I do now? Do I do what the cards tell me to do unless the rules forbid it? That's what I've always done but just to be sure.

Will Nate explain the correct procedure in the next FAQ?