I realize this is from the old CCG format; but hopefully someone can help me here. (It seems the old CCG forum here is no longer functional)

from the Valerian edition, the Night's Watch Agenda says:

"Night's Watch characters you control may be declared as attackers or defenders during military and power challenges"

I can see how that might be useful in a multiplayer game -- you can basically send your characters in as "third party" allies when two other players are involved in a challenge, right?

But I'm not so sure I understand how it would be useful in a two-player game. So my questions are...

1. If I'm playing Night's Watch, and my opponent targets me with a challenge, can I essentially be part of the "attack" against myself?

1.a. If that is the case, then if the character I send to "attack myself" becomes part of the winning side of the challenge ... and that character has reknown ... then the character gains 1 power?

1.b. ... if the character I send to "attack myself" becomes part of the winning side of the challenge ... Am I considered a "winner" of the challenge?

2. If I'm playing Night's Watch, and I target my opponent with a challenge, can I essentially be part of the "defense" against my own attack?

2.a. Again, it would then be possible to send my character with reknown on defense, so the challenge can be a win/win situation for me?

2.b. If it were a military challenge, would the character I sent for defense be a candidate for satisfying the military claim?

2.c. If deadly is involved (and my opponent lost the deadly count), would the character I sent for defense be a candidate for resolving deadly?

Stormtower said:

Ooh. I don't think you are interpreting the agenda incorrectly. It allows Night's Watch characters to be declared as attackers or defenders. The agenda is changing the eligibility of certain characters to participate in certain challenges. It is not changing the way declaring attackers/defenders works though. When attackers/defenders are declared, the player attacking/defending chooses any number of standing characters he/she controls and kneels them as the attackers/defenders. So this agenda is allowing you to do that with a Night's Watch character whether it has a M or P or not. It is not allowing you to declare attackers/defenders in other players' attacks or defenses. One theme of Night's Watch characters is that many of them have only one or no icons. So usually Night's Watch characters show up in decks either to fill niche role (ie Maester Aemon) or in conjunction with an agenda (or multiple in the case of the new agendas).

(I do have one uncertainty about the agenda. It does not say they may be declared "as though they had M and P icons" which leaves open to what extent their eligibility for the challenge has been broadened. It might be that they can be declared for military and power challenges even if they are knelt, but I'm probably taking things too literally here.)

schrecklich said:

Wow. That is certainly different from what I interpreted it to be.

I'm still very new to the game, so I expected that I'd have problems with interpreting the intent of the cards.

schrecklich said:

Well, kneeling is usually a cost to participation; and I usually treat costs as being different to eligibility. (And if you can't pay the cost, then you can't gain the benefit either).

So in this case, it sounds like the Night's Watch Agenda would eliminate the eligibility requirements that would normally restrict the Night's Watch characters from participation. However, it doesn't eliminate any costs that they would have to pay.

Which means that you can use the Night's Watch Agenda to overcome other eligibility restrictions to a challenge (like, "Unique characters only" (Balon Greyjoy, I think)). But you'd still need to pay costs like kneeling, or if there's an effect that requires you to pay gold or influence to participate.

Stormtower said:

I should point out that I am speculating on that interpretation.

Perhaps all this Agenda really does is allow the Night's Watch to participate in Military and Power challenges despite what icons they have ... and that is all that it does.

I wasn't playing during Valyrian so I am also just giving my best interpretation of the text. Hopefully, a veteran from that time can post what the actual intent of the card was soon. The reason I added the parenthetical about knelt characters is that there is a card in the LCG called The Fox's Teeth with the text: "While the Fox's Teeth is attacking, knelt characters may be declared as defenders," which is very similar in form to the text of the agenda. Now that I think about it though, you can NOT defend against The Fox's Teeth with characters lacking the appropriate icon, so I think you have to take what the card is saying in context. The intent of The Fox's Teeth is clearly to allow knelt characters to be declared as though they were standing (ie all other restrictions still apply). The intent of the agenda is clearly (okay not so clearly since you interpreted it differently) to allow characters without M or P icons to be declared as attackers/defenders in military and power challenges, so all other restriction (including starting out standing) should still apply. (Though honestly I think both cards would be much clearer if they had clarifying phrases like "as though they had M and P icons" and "as though they were standing").

Stormtower said:

This is the correct interpretation of the Agenda. Night's Watch characters you control are eligible to participate in Military and Power challenges regardless of icon status.

Cards only change rules the specifically address. The Night's Watch Agenda specifically addresses character eligibility related to icon status. It does NOT address or contradict the basic rules that "characters you control can only be declared as attackers in challenges you initiate" and "characters you control can only be declared as defenders in challenges initiated against you."

If you are going to go for an interpretation that says they can be "declared" whenever any player is "declaring" an attacker or defender, what is stopping me from declaring YOUR characters as attackers against you (note the Agenda does not say anything about the Night's Watch characters being declared by YOU). "Kneeling" a character is not a "cost" of declaring them as an attacker or defender. It is simply part of the game mechanic related to challenge participation. If it were a "cost," then all those characters that "do not kneel to attack or defend" could never attack or defend because they have not paid the appropriate cost. ("Does not kneel to attack..." is a far cry from "Reduce the cost to attack...".)

I edited my last post because I accidentally left a key "NOT" out of it. Just posting now because the board gets unhappy when you edit old posts.... (Also, thanks, ktom, for clearing that up for us).

Thanks for all the clarifications, ktom! As a newbie, I appreciate it.