Mutant has a power to take cards from opponents' hands to bring the Mutant's total hand size up to 8 cards.

Mutant has 3 cards and Player-B has 4 cards. Player-B has at least one encounter card, and draws the destiny to attack the Mutant. However, during the appropriate phase (alliances IIRC), the Mutant steals all 4 of Player-B's cards (and draws one additional one from the deck) to bring his hand size to 8. Now, Player-B has 0 cards. What the heck happens since these cards are stolen before the planning stage, Player-B no longer has an encounter card.

Is the encounter cancelled since it is no longer valid as Player-B has no encounter cards?

I've scoured the rules and cannot find an answer to this scenario.

Regards,

j2klbs

If the offense ever has to play an encounter card during his or her turn and cannot, the encounter is immediately over. Thus, my understanding would be that such a use of the Mutant's power would indeed end the encounter.

Yeah. If the offense runs out of cards in mid-turn, the turn is over. This doesn't happen with the defense, however.

You could actually use this fact to your advantage at times, like the example you gave of Mutant taking the offense's cards. Or maybe you're Philantrophist attacking Virus and all you have is a 4; give Virus the 4 and your turn ends without a problem.

Thanks guys! That makes sense!

Cheers!

Jason (PS Merry X-mas)

Just to Recap:

From Rules:

Drawing

New Cards

If the offense has no encounter cards (attacks, negotiates, or

morphs) at the start of his or her turn, the offense must play (if

possible) or discard any non-encounter cards, draw eight new

cards, and continue his or her turn.

If the offense runs out of encounter cards later during his or

her turn and needs to play one, the offense’s turn ends immediately.

(This might happen for several reasons, including

paying compensation after an encounter, an alien power, or a

card effect.) If this happens, the offense returns any of his or

her ships on the hyperspace gate to his or her colonies. Allies

also return their ships to any of their colonies.

If the defense has no encounter cards when he or she is

required to play a card in an encounter (normally during the

Planning Phase), the defense must play (if possible) or discard

any non-encounter cards, draw eight new cards, and play

one of them in the encounter. If the defense doesn’t draw any

encounter cards in the new hand, this process is repeated as

many times as necessary.

I had an interesting thing happen while playing in a game with Mutant and Mite. Mite was offense and demanded a colony; it would have given them a win. So Mutant said no to the colony, was taken down from nine cards to three. BUT Mutant maintains an eight card hand and preceded to draw five more cards from the deck, obviously giving her an advantage over Mite. Needless to say, Mutant whooped Mite's booty and therefore kept Mite from winning the game. It was a tense moment. Did we play that right?

Yes, you played it right... especially because you crushed that creepy Mite.

You played it right. We see this all the time at CE Online, and it's a classic "take that!" Cosmic moment.