Interact Action/Icon

By wizzykin, in The Lord of the Rings: Journeys in Middle-earth

When you use an Interact Action on an Interact Icon and it plays out the little narrative and then presents you with a new set of choices, each containing the interact icon, you are required to use another action to select those choices, yes?

Yes. Every action cost an action.

I think not. You can choose an interact icon -the arrow- the first time if you have spent an interact action. You do not have to spend one action to interact and another one to click an option with an arrow (at least the first time).

Clicking the token for information is not action, but if you click the action mark, then it is an action.

There’s a bit of an argument on BGG. Some people are under the impression that if a new screen of choices comes up, those actions are free to choose since you already interacted the one time and the rules don’t say one interaction per interact action. Doesn’t make any sense - but worth checking.

There are those of us who think the interaction action continues until you're dropped out of the option tree. I don't see what would be considered "not making any sense" about that; it's an app-driven game, so presumably we should let it drive for multi-step interactions. The rules say that you can't choose a choice with an arrow OUTSIDE of an interaction, not that choosing a choice with an arrow COSTS an action.

Edited by Doug DeMoss

There is now official answer:

Quote:
No, each time you select a button that shows the arrow symbol, you must spend another interact action . The Quick Reference on the back of the Rules Reference and Learn to Play identify that arrow symbol as the interact action symbol. To select something marked with that symbol requires the use of an interact action. The difference you have noticed in token behavior is due to story and thematic reasons, not mechanical reasons.

So what if you started the interact with your second action? Not knowing that it would lead down a path of a second or more interactions required?

do you fail the action? Does the token disappear? Can you come back to the same moment next round?

creating a situation where any interact has the potential of triggering the second use of an action seems counter intuitive to me...

The app should also make this moment completely obvious by providing a message that says something like;

”to continue this part of the interact action requires a second action. If the hero has a second action the spend click proceed. If not click end. The hero may return to this point next round”

it shouldn’t be hard to notice that an action requires a second action to continue

That's a clumsy way to handle things. We ran into one of these run-on interactions the other day and assumed it was all one action.

The app should completely resolve the interact action, say that more action is needed, leave the token in place and then dismiss the window and go back to the main map.

6 hours ago, Majushi said:

So what if you started the interact with your second action? Not knowing that it would lead down a path of a second or more interactions required?

do you fail the action? Does the token disappear? Can you come back to the same moment next round?

creating a situation where any interact has the potential of triggering the second use of an action seems counter intuitive to me...

The app should also make this moment completely obvious by providing a message that says something like;

”to continue this part of the interact action requires a second action. If the hero has a second action the spend click proceed. If not click end. The hero may return to this point next round”

it shouldn’t be hard to notice that an action requires a second action to continue

I think there is some misconception here. The search or threat tokens allow you to pick up where you left off. It's not a matter of wasting actions, it just takes time to do more of them. You can even leave and come back to the same "spot" in your interaction sequence.

Also, there are times when new choices pop up without any interact icons, in which case you do keep going without spending actions.

I've gotten to the last mission twice, and played the last mission itself once. There's some of these interact mechanics towards the end of the campaign and it makes sense and plays pretty fluidly. Yeah, it can make certain things challenging, but only because they're supposed to be.

Edited by Elfik2018

There Are tokens that require 3 to 5 actions. (Most likely more in the future) So it will take several turn to do them! It is no problem, those Are just harder tasks and require more work from the adventurers!

but as it has been said, the app remember where you Are in the action row, so you can come back later. Many time you actually do so! So that you spend action or two. Do something else in somewhere else and come back to make more actions in the same place.

Edited by Hannibal_pjv
Typo

Ok. So long as it’s clear you have an opportunity to “pause” the interaction because you have no more actions that round?

Yep. You can continue later, or some other character can continue!

Think it like making a heist and there is safe box you need to open: one Expert cut down the alarm (x actions), the other drill the safe box (x actions) and third one put on some explosives to drilled holes (x actions) it can take several turns as a whole depending on how long each ”sub” interactions take. But if you have time it is not worrying to end you turn and continue later if needed.

It does result in some truly bizarre things, though, like when Farmer Dugan asks you to recover his animals, it costs an action to say you'll do it, but none to make no promises.

Exactly. That is the "no more actions available" option.

Let's say you start your turn on a space with a search token. You use your first action to interact with the token, but you don't test well and the token stays on the board.

Can you spend your second action to interact with the same search token again in the hopes of testing better?

You absolutely can!

22 hours ago, huxwall said:

Can you spend your second action to interact with the same search token again in the hopes of testing better?

Depends on the token, but if it stayed on board then probably yes. Note that most test without a threshold, i.e. that require you to input the number of succeses, are cumulative, so if you score 3 on the first try and then 2 on the second, you may still pass (if the total required was 4 or more, for example).

If the test has a threshold (like "test Might:2" and then "pass" and "fail" choices), then it would usually stay on board indefinitely until you pass, although I had a case when a token was removed after 3 consecutive failed attempts.