Card #1: When I Woke: Response: After a challenge resolves, kneel 1 influence to have the losing player choose 1 participating character and put that character on top of its owner's deck.

Card #2: Osha: Challenges: Stand Osha to remove her from the current challenge.

Scenario: My opponent goes on a military challenge with Osha and Theon Greyjoy. I do not oppose. My opponent uses Osha's text to remove her from the challenge. I lose. I then play When I Woke. Is Osha a participating character?

I think the answer depends on the grammar of the word "participating."

Without getting into grammatical terms, there are two definitions of participating I can think of:

1) Participating at this very moment.

2) Participating at one point in the challenge.

Osha definitely participated in this challenge. At the end, she was no longer in the challenge. Is she a valid target for When I Woke?

Although my first inclination was toward 1, as I thought about it, I felt like she had been a participating character, and should be a target. The problem with interpretation 1 is that the challenge has already resolved, so no characters are participating at this very moment. So therefore, we must be looking toward option 2, had participated in the challenge, which Osha did.

Thoughts?

1 is correct. "Particpating" means that the character is currently participating as the effect is being resolved. Sometimes cards refer to characters being "declared as an attacker or defender." Those look at the particular point in time at which attackers/defenders are declared and ask if the character was chosen, but "participating" just looks at the current moment.

By the way, "After a challenge resolves" means "After the challenge winner is determined, claim is settled, and renown and unopposed are awarded." A response with this play restriction must be triggered during the Response window of the challenge resolution framework action window, so the challenge is technically still going on when it is played and there are clearly defined "participating" characters.

FAQ to the rescue!

(3.31) “Participated” and Removal From Challenge
A character is only considered to have participated if they remain in the challenge through its resolution. If they are removed from a challenge, there is no memory of that character having participated in that challenge.

Thanks guys. I still prefer using grammatical interpretation of verb tense, but I'll settle for a clear answer from the FAQ.

jmccarthy said:

Well, it is the grammatical interpretation, really. "Participating" is the present progressive, describing something that is happening at this moment (or something that'll happen in the future), not something that happened before this point in time. Osha is not participating at the time the challenge is being resolved.

What about the Past Progressive verb tense - happened in the past, ends in -ing?

jmccarthy said:

At that point you must use the rest of the sentence to identify words used in past tast. Such as "was" and "were". If the character "was participating" or characters "were participating" it is clearly past tense.

Bomb said:

Nerds, gather here!

Great discussion.