Can free city mercenaries stand after a 3 STR character has been burned (STR reduced to 0) by the tower?

I'm no authority on the matter, but based on the wording I'd say "no", but I'd feel a lot better about that answer if the FCM response said "printed strength 2 or lower".

A good question. I'm sure ktom or someone else will provide their input as well.

Remember that the text on Flaming-Pitch Tower says that the target character gets -4 STR and is killed if its STR is 0.

Free Cities Mercenaries says that if a character w/ STR 2 or lower is killed, the character can stand.

The wording on the Tower makes it pretty clear that a character w/ STR 0 is killed. (In fact, the character is killed because its STR is 0.) STR 0 is less than STR 2, so the Mercenaries stand.

Moral of the story: the Free Cities Mercenaries work with burn. They're actually pretty good.

Thanks, Ktom. That was my feeling (and it fits with Targ's strengths). In most cases, it seems like burn will involve killing a character that is less than 2 STR to begin with, but there may be times when the tower or the shadows event raise this question.

Very good then. That makes FCM better than I thought. Thanks for the enlightenment once again.