How does Shadowcloak interact with the Breath-Template?
There are two Shadowcloaked monsters under the Breath-Template, the first is
adjacent to the origin of the attack, the second is not.
Take both monsters the damage of the attack?

The one who is not adjacent to the attack will take no damage. The one who is adjacent will take full damage.

+1 to James. Shadowcloak is an ability that is granted to the target based on certain conditions. Whether or not it activates depends on where the attacker is positioned relative to this figure, so the one adjacent will not get the benefit of Shadowcloak, the one further away will.

Note that this is a subtle but important difference from an ability being granted to the attacker , such as the whole Andira Runehand debate that's surfaced a couple of times recently.

Steve-O said:

The OP's question is somewhat similar to that Sorcery vs Ironskin FAQ ruling, though. You know the one: "Sorcery may not add damage to any attack that includes a figure with Ironskin. It may add range to the attack, but not damage... The damage immunity granted by Ironskin does extend to all figures affected by an attack that includes a model with Ironskin." In that case, Ironskin is an ability granted to the target but it does extend to all other targets.

On the other hand, that FAQ ruling seems totally wrong to me, and I doubt I'm alone in that. I'm reluctant to extrapolate from a rule that feels so completely incorrect.

mahkra said:

It isn't really similar at all. Ironskin vs Sorcery kind of affects the attack itself, as the Sorcery is part of the attack.
Shadowcloak has no interaction with any part of the attack and purely operates on the defender (or reduces the attack after it has 'reached' the defender in its completeness, not before).
They are apples and oranges and trying to extrapolate from the one to the other would be illogical as well as utterly wrong.

Without the FAQ ruling, is there any reason to think Ironskin would affect the attack, rather than purely operating on the defender?

mahkra said:

Not IMO. I see no logical nor game balance reason that one target being incredibly tough should make the rest of the targets equally resilient.

James McMurray said:

Ironskin is immune to sorcery. Sorcery is a 'component' of the attack that is part of the core attack (damage/range) not just a 'patch effect' added to the attack (like Bleed, Burn).

Hence the FAQ ruling. KISS. Ironskin is messing with something that goes to the core attack effect, so to keep it simple they ruled that it affects everyone. Stealth dice aside, the same attack always affects everyone, its just that with things like shadowcloak, immune to Bleed, etc, when that core attack actually does it's affect to the individual target it might have it's damage to that target reduced to zero, or the bleed 'fall off' etc.

Ironskin only operates on owner leads to 'the attack does 4 damage, 2 of which are sorcery , so its actually 4 damage to this figure and 2 damage to this figure'. That is a lot more complex than "the attack does 2 damage, period."

For Shadowcloak etc we have "the attack does 4 damage, period. This figure can reduce the damage to zero, period." That is still simple enough...

It still isn't a good ruling, but there are 'reasonable' reasons why they did it. There wouldn't be any such for a similar ruling for shadowcloak etc.

Hence the FAQ ruling. KISS. Ironskin is messing with something that goes to the core attack effect, so to keep it simple they ruled that it affects everyone. Stealth dice aside, the same attack always affects everyone, its just that with things like shadowcloak, immune to Bleed, etc, when that core attack actually does it's affect to the individual target it might have it's damage to that target reduced to zero, or the bleed 'fall off' etc.

It seems to me that KISS, if taken to the extremes you're advocating, would mean that there's no such thing as stuff that only affects the target and other stuff that only affects the attack. It'd be all or nothing. there's no added complexity in deciding that Ironskin only protects one figure when you already have immunity to bleed affecting one figure and shadowcloak affecting one figure. KISS falls apart when the effort to keep it simple results in illogical scenarios (golems being so beefy they protect kobolds by virtue of their hard shells).

Ironskin only operates on owner leads to 'the attack does 4 damage, 2 of which are sorcery , so its actually 4 damage to this figure and 2 damage to this figure'. That is a lot more complex than "the attack does 2 damage, period."

Are you saying that FFG believes their customers to be incapable of simple math? Or that they're allergic to complexity even in its simplest

For Shadowcloak etc we have "the attack does 4 damage, period. This figure can reduce the damage to zero, period." That is still simple enough...

How is "I take 0, you take 4" simple but "I take 2, you take 4" is overly complex?

It still isn't a good ruling, but there are 'reasonable' reasons why they did it. There wouldn't be any such for a similar ruling for shadowcloak etc.

We obviously have different ideas of what "reasonable" means. If they can say that really thick skin protects people 3 squares away from you there's absolutely nothing stopping them from saying that being in a tree also protects people 3 squares away. The rulings on shadowcloak and stealth point towards more reasonableness IMO, and it seems to me that it's only an unwillingness to change what kinda works that prevents them from making this a blanket ruling.

I understand that you work with these people, and thus have to agree with them, or at least excuse their failings, if only to maintain a relationship that will hopefully get us a good FAQ some day. But if we continually tell them that a half-assed job with rules is good enough, we'll never get better than a half-assed job. Descent is a great game despite its rules. It could be a great game because of them if FFG didn't have such a devoted group of fans that they'll pay good money for crap like Sea of Blood, or stand by as foolish rulings are made under the banner of false simplicity.

James McMurray said:

You miss the point. When you do an attack you usually check it has range etc, work out the damage and then apply that damage to all affected figures. Some of them might reduce the damage to zero when you actually apply it to them )as you check their armour and other abilities), but you only have to remember one base damage number for all figures.
Without this ruling, every time you do an attack you effectively have to split the 'damage' into 'normal damage' and 'sorcery' damage and remember two base damage numbers (althoough without sorcery one of the numbers is zero and can be ignored). Because some figures will reduce part of the damage, and you have to know how big that part is - that is something you don't need to know if you are reducing all the damage.

James McMurray said:

You obviously can't differentiate between talking about mechanics and thematics... No wonder they believe their customers unable to do simple math!

James McMurray said:

No, I have no relationship with FFG at all. I've never communicated with any FFG employee that I am aware of. I've never said that this is a good ruling, in fact I've repeatedly said its a bad one. But I can at least understand the reasoning behind it...

Corbon said:

Is "4 damage, 2 of which are sorcery" really any more complicated than "4 damage, 2 of which are poison"? Or "4 damage, plus 2 pierce, and targets all have different armor values"? KISS indeed. (I do believe that could have been the 'logic' behind the ruling, but if so I think that reasoning is totally misguided.)

The only actual reason I can think of for the FAQ rule is that they wanted Laurel's ability to convert range into damage to work with Sorcery. If 'sorcery-range' is not 'core' range, then I'm not sure Laurel would be able to convert it to damage. But this only actually matters vs Ironskin, because otherwise sorcery could have just been used as sorcery-damage in the first place! But in creating a tiny loophole for Laurel, they've made the ability function in a completely illogical manner. (And by illogical, I mean it's inconsistent with the way other attack effects work. Not talking about thematic issues here.)

Corbon said:

There may be shortsighted reasons, but I'm not convinced there are any good, reasonable, or even defensible reasons for it. I agree that there should not be any such ruling for Shadowcloak, but Ironskin sets a dangerous precedent.

I see how Sorcery could be part of the 'core', rather than a 'patch effect', but I don't think there's any indication it should actually work that way except in the FAQ.

Corbon said:

Under original rules, I'm comparing tangerines and oranges. It's just the FAQ that tells us the tangerine is actually an apple. If the tangerine's an apple, might the orange actually be a pomegranate?

Corbon said:

Isn't this a pretty apt description of an attack with Pierce? You have to remember two numbers, some figures reduce part of the damage*, and how big that part is will vary from figure to figure. (*Actually, with Pierce, some figures effectively suffer extra damage because their armor is reduced by pierce. But it's the same amount of math and the same number of steps.)

It's a mechanic that already exists in the game. Why is it "simpler" to avoid a mechanic we already know and use?

Without this ruling, every time you do an attack you effectively have to split the 'damage' into 'normal damage' and 'sorcery' damage and remember two base damage numbers (althoough without sorcery one of the numbers is zero and can be ignored). Because some figures will reduce part of the damage, and you have to know how big that part is - that is something you don't need to know if you are reducing all the damage.

A) I already do that with Pierce and

B) I assume by "every time you make an attack you actually meant to say "every time to make a multispace attack against figures, some of which have Ironskin and some of which do not."? Granted, it's more complex, but it's insanely rare and not so complex as to be unusable, especially since we already have that effect in the game via Pierce.

You obviously can't differentiate between talking about mechanics and thematics... No wonder they believe their customers unable to do simple math!

If a game's rules don't uphold its thematics, either the rule or the thematic should give. There's is 0 reason for Descent to be warring with itself over this issue.

It's a shame FFG thinks we're stupid.

No, I have no relationship with FFG at all. I've never communicated with any FFG employee that I am aware of. I've never said that this is a good ruling, in fact I've repeatedly said its a bad one. But I can at least understand the reasoning behind it...

Sorry, I thought you were working with them as part of the Google group to create the new FAQ. I'm not part of that group though, so perhaps my idea of "partnership between FFG and customers to move the game forward" is completely off base and there's no FFG interaction there at all.

I can also understand the reasoning behind it. But being able to understand something doesn't make it defensible, and defending the indefensible only sends the message that shoddy work is acceptable.