Sunspear Tourney Grounds

By imrahil327, in 2. AGoT Rules Discussion

Response: If you have lost a challenge this phase, kneel Sunspear Tourney Grounds to cancel a triggered character ability. (A character ability or the effects of an event triggered instead if you control more unique characters than each opponent).

Does the parenthetical part allow for the canceling of a non-triggered character ability, such as the text of Newly-Made Lord?

imrahil327 said:

Response: If you have lost a challenge this phase, kneel Sunspear Tourney Grounds to cancel a triggered character ability. (A character ability or the effects of an event triggered instead if you control more unique characters than each opponent).

Does the parenthetical part allow for the canceling of a non-triggered character ability, such as the text of Newly-Made Lord?

I don't have the ODG yet. Is this really the wording on the card? If so, then the way it is worded does not really give you a lot of leeway for exegesis: If you control more unique characters than your opponent, you can kneel Sunspear Tourney Grounds to cancel any character ability, including passives. Personally, I strongly suspect this is unintentional, but my personal opinion does't really count. What counts is the ink on the card, and until they errata it, this will stand.

I think stronger distinctions between Passive and Constant abilities will need to be in order for this. As of now, you must deconstruct the text in order to figure it out.

It may be obvious to many players, but not to all from what I've seen.

Ratatoskr said:

imrahil327 said:

Response: If you have lost a challenge this phase, kneel Sunspear Tourney Grounds to cancel a triggered character ability. (A character ability or the effects of an event triggered instead if you control more unique characters than each opponent).

Does the parenthetical part allow for the canceling of a non-triggered character ability, such as the text of Newly-Made Lord?

I don't have the ODG yet. Is this really the wording on the card? If so, then the way it is worded does not really give you a lot of leeway for exegesis: If you control more unique characters than your opponent, you can kneel Sunspear Tourney Grounds to cancel any character ability, including passives. Personally, I strongly suspect this is unintentional, but my personal opinion does't really count. What counts is the ink on the card, and until they errata it, this will stand.

Exegesis. Nice vocabulary Rat. I had to go look that word up. Anyways:

1. For Newly Made Lord the issue is moot because his passive is done in Marshalling and Sunspear is only in Challenges (unless you can initiate a challenge some other way during marshalling of course, maybe blackwood or something).

2. I believe the wording is very clear, the parenthesis text includes passive abilities.

3. I believe the wording was unintentional, and that the spirit of the text was for passives NOT to be included. Stand by for ERRATA in 3....2....1........

I don't think it includes passives in that wording at all. I think that the triggered applies to both effects of an event AND character ability.

Official ruling from Damon is that you can't cancel passive character abilities.

Staton said:

I don't think it includes passives in that wording at all. I think that the triggered applies to both effects of an event AND character ability.

I really don't see how you can come to this conclusion given the wording on the card, but thanks for asking Damon. IMO it was pretty obvious that this was the designer's intent, and I'm glad we got confirmation. The problem remains that the wording on the card doesn't correspond to the (previously inferred, now stated) designer's intent. The wording is highly ambiguous at the very least, and needs to be errata'ed ASAP IMHO. Luckily the next FAQ update can't be far off.

Ratatoskr said:

I really don't see how you can come to this conclusion given the wording on the card,

ktom said:

Ratatoskr said:

I really don't see how you can come to this conclusion given the wording on the card,

Sure it does. The parenthetical should essentially be read as "a character ability triggered or an event card triggered...". The word "triggered" applies to both types of effects. And we have been around and around the "an effect triggered" wording applies to triggered effect, only. You cannot apply it to a passive effect just because meeting its play restrictions "triggers" the card effect.

Just to nitpick, didn't you mean "a character ability triggered or the effects of an event triggered"? ;)

WWDrakey said:

Just to nitpick, didn't you mean "a character ability triggered or the effects of an event triggered"? ;)
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I was writing it without looking at the exact wording of the card. So yeah, if the card says "effects of an event," go with that.