3 questions to FFG and official responses

By guciomir, in The Lord of the Rings: The Card Game

I sent a few questions to FFG and just got reply from Nate. Thank you Nate! Anyway, those were 3 topics that were not clear to me and I think that some people may find the below useful.

1. In Hills Of Emyn Muil quest, treacheries can gain extra surge effect if there are no locations in play. What if I draw a treachery like impassable chasm which has its own surge effect? Does surge stack so I have to resolve 2x surge and draw 2 more cards from encounter deck? I suspect that this may be a case because as per FAQ, some effects like Caught in the web are stackable (and this situation looks similar to me). Can you please confirm?

Response (quote)

Yes,

If a card has multiple instances of the surge keyword, each instance should be resolved.

2. The impassable bog reads: when revelead, add 1 token to gollum for every location in the staging area. When this text is triggered, is the just-revealed Bog considered in the staging area? In other words, does the Bog count itself as a location in the staging area?

Response (quote)

Encounter cards are revealed from the encounter deck, their "When Revealed" effects are resolved, and the card is then placed in the staging area. So the Bog has not yet entered the staging area when its effects resolve.

3. Is active location considered in the staging area?

Response (quote)

An active location is not considered in the staging area.

Edit: I asked question number 3 because in Khazad Dum there are some location that grant +1 attack to all enemies when the location is in the staging area. I was not sure if this effect still works after we travel to such location.


I played #2 wrong when I played Dead Marshes, but didn't change the results, still won all my games.

Thanks for getting some answers for us!

Yep, thanks for getting those answers!

Particularly #1 is utterly surprising to me. Imho, they'd be better off to retroactively define 'Surge' as 'Surge X'. As it is it's quite an odd ruling that sets a precedent that may result in complications when considering the duplication of other keywords.

1) With the Encounter card "Wargs" there is an effect that says "If Wargs is dealt a shadow card with no effect, return Wargs to the staging area after it attacks." So how dose "Dawn Take you All" effect it? As the shadow card is discarded before it is revealed dose this count as "no shadow effect", or is the fact that the card is discarded before reveal mean that the entire "check to see if it attacks wit ha shadow card" is ignored?

Basicly what I am asking is if you use "Dawn Take you All" to discard a shadow card on a "Warg" enemy.. dose it stay in the combat zone after it attacks?

2) Dose the effect on "Elfhelm" remove a 1 threat gain from the "Gollum" card in Return to Mirkwood? Is "Gollum" part of the encounter deck, as it is not ever IN the deck, or revealed from it? Elfhe lm's ting is "Response: After your threat is raised as the result of questing unsuccessfully, or by an encounter or quest card effect, reduce your threat by 1."... but is Gollum a "encounter" card?

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1) Because "Dawn Take You All" discards the card before it is revealed, the attempt to check whether or not that card has an effect does not trigger. (When the card would be revealed in combat, there is no card there.)

2) Objective cards are considered encounter cards, whether they actually get shuffled into the encounter deck or not.

booored said:

1) With the Encounter card "Wargs" there is an effect that says "If Wargs is dealt a shadow card with no effect, return Wargs to the staging area after it attacks." So how dose "Dawn Take you All" effect it? As the shadow card is discarded before it is revealed dose this count as "no shadow effect", or is the fact that the card is discarded before reveal mean that the entire "check to see if it attacks wit ha shadow card" is ignored?

Basicly what I am asking is if you use "Dawn Take you All" to discard a shadow card on a "Warg" enemy.. dose it stay in the combat zone after it attacks?

2) Dose the effect on "Elfhelm" remove a 1 threat gain from the "Gollum" card in Return to Mirkwood? Is "Gollum" part of the encounter deck, as it is not ever IN the deck, or revealed from it? Elfhe lm's ting is "Response: After your threat is raised as the result of questing unsuccessfully, or by an encounter or quest card effect, reduce your threat by 1."... but is Gollum a "encounter" card?

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1) Because "Dawn Take You All" discards the card before it is revealed, the attempt to check whether or not that card has an effect does not trigger. (When the card would be revealed in combat, there is no card there.)

2) Objective cards are considered encounter cards, whether they actually get shuffled into the encounter deck or not.

man im shocked about number 2........

Booored, are those oofficial responses you got? (I am just asking kuz your post didn't say so, but I assumed they were.). This means elf helm can lower that 4 threat raise down to three at the end of each turn when guarding gollum then, correct? And since the wars action doesnt trigger, then he stays down, correct?

Q - Dose the new Cave-Troll card that spills dmg from one card to the next only do this once? Or dose the dmg spill over to a new character until the dmg runs out?

So, can this effect spill over so the Cave-Troll dmg hits 3 cards for example?

A - The "overflow" damage is assigned point by point. If it kills off a character, there is still overflow from the attack that needs to be assigned.

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Q:- Landroval's ability, is it limited once a game per player? Or is it limited to once a game per-card? As in if you run 3 cards, can you use that ability 3 times, one for each card.

Also, if 2 players use Landroval, then can both players can activate their Landroval cards separately? I know you can only have 1 on the table at a time, but dose the "once per game" thing cover ALL players or only the player that controls the card.

Lastly, we know that going into your hand dose not reset the "once per game" rule, but dose playing the card form your gravyard also not reset the ability?

Thanks as always for giving us a defiant answer.

A - Limits are player specific, each player can reach the limit.

"Per game" limits are not card specific, they refer to any copy of the effect under that player's control. If you have reached the "per game" limit, you cannot trigger that effect again, with another copy of the card in your deck, a copy of the card you gained control of from another player, or from the same card that has left play and re-entered the game.

Wow, the Landroval ruling is confusing.

Yep. It should be a rule that applies to all Landroval. He's unique anyway. They just have to limit this kind of restriction ("once per game") to unique cards.

Would make sense thematicaly as well.

It would imply there is a single Landroval in the game universe, whether or not he's present in the player's deck. Landroval's ability is usable once per game, period.

SiCK_Boy said:

Yep. It should be a rule that applies to all Landroval. He's unique anyway. They just have to limit this kind of restriction ("once per game") to unique cards.

Would make sense thematicaly as well.

It would imply there is a single Landroval in the game universe, whether or not he's present in the player's deck. Landroval's ability is usable once per game, period.

Indeed. Nice interpretation.

I must agree.

If he 'dies' and then come back again later, it was just a 'flesh wound' (or whatever), but he already did his mojo once, thus cannot do it again!

That is (almost) what the ruling says. Landroval can be triggered once per game, per player.

I still don't fully understand the cave troll answer. If there is 2 damage left, does the two damage goe on the next character, or does 1 damage each go on 2 different characters, or does it not matter and you can do it either way?

Zjb12 said:

I still don't fully understand the cave troll answer. If there is 2 damage left, does the two damage goe on the next character, or does 1 damage each go on 2 different characters, or does it not matter and you can do it either way?

You assign everything to one dude, than, if he dies, assign to another, and so on.

It is kind of a confusing text, but it is cleared by an official answer!

cordeirooo said:

Zjb12 said:

I still don't fully understand the cave troll answer. If there is 2 damage left, does the two damage goe on the next character, or does 1 damage each go on 2 different characters, or does it not matter and you can do it either way?

You assign everything to one dude, than, if he dies, assign to another, and so on.

It is kind of a confusing text, but it is cleared by an official answer!

I'm not sure the official answer does clear it up. If anything, I'm even less certain how it works now.

"The "overflow" damage is assigned point by point. If it kills off a character, there is still overflow from the attack that needs to be assigned."

What does "assigned point by point" mean? To me, that reads like you distribute all the excess damage in whatever proportions you want. You have 3 excess damage. You can't say it all goes to a 1 HP ally, but you can give one damage to that ally, and put the other two points on other cards.

alpha5099 said:

cordeirooo said:

Zjb12 said:

I still don't fully understand the cave troll answer. If there is 2 damage left, does the two damage goe on the next character, or does 1 damage each go on 2 different characters, or does it not matter and you can do it either way?

You assign everything to one dude, than, if he dies, assign to another, and so on.

It is kind of a confusing text, but it is cleared by an official answer!

I'm not sure the official answer does clear it up. If anything, I'm even less certain how it works now.

"The "overflow" damage is assigned point by point. If it kills off a character, there is still overflow from the attack that needs to be assigned."

What does "assigned point by point" mean? To me, that reads like you distribute all the excess damage in whatever proportions you want. You have 3 excess damage. You can't say it all goes to a 1 HP ally, but you can give one damage to that ally, and put the other two points on other cards.

Actually, you are correct. My interpretation is flawed.

There is nothing saying you must assign enough to kill a character.

he means that the dmg spills over from one toon to the next till it runs out of power.... one point at a time. So as soon as a toon dies, the very next point is placed on a new toon, as per the card instructions, this happens until all the dmg from the troll is exhausted.

i think you can spread the damage out, i dont see anything to say otherwise

So all these answers are "official" ones, from Nate?

zeb said:

So all these answers are "official" ones, from Nate?

yes

richsabre said:

zeb said:

So all these answers are "official" ones, from Nate?

yes

Thanks.

richsabre said:

i think you can spread the damage out, i dont see anything to say otherwise

And I don't see anything that allows it. The general rules have always been that you cannot split damage between multiple characters. Even when you defend with multiple characters you have to assign all damage to only one of the characters, you cannot split it.

Also, the Landroval rule is easy... once per game, per player regardless of how many times it enters play or how many copies of the card you have. It doesn't get much simpler than that.

booored said:

1) With the Encounter card "Wargs" there is an effect that says "If Wargs is dealt a shadow card with no effect, return Wargs to the staging area after it attacks." So how dose "Dawn Take you All" effect it? As the shadow card is discarded before it is revealed dose this count as "no shadow effect", or is the fact that the card is discarded before reveal mean that the entire "check to see if it attacks wit ha shadow card" is ignored?

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1) Because "Dawn Take You All" discards the card before it is revealed, the attempt to check whether or not that card has an effect does not trigger. (When the card would be revealed in combat, there is no card there.)

Correct me if I am wrong, this means that if the Wargs do not receive a shadow card through an effect, they do not return to the staging area.

Correct. Dawn will stop Warg ability.

Official word from Nate on the damage: it can be spread around.

The question I asked:

I'm curious as to how the Cave Troll's splash damage is supposed to work.

It seems like there are two possibilities. Let's say after blocking there are still 3 points of damage left to be assigned. Do I need to choose a character to take as much of that damage as they can before dying (with any extra continuing to a third character), or are those 3 points of damage to be distributed among my characters as I see fit?

The Cave Troll's text reads: "For each excess point of combat damage dealt by Cave-troll (damage that is dealt beyond the remaining hit points of the character damaged by its attack) you must damage another character you control."

The official response from someone else asking about the Cave Troll was: "The 'overflow' damage is assigned point by point. If it kills off a character, there is still o verflow from the attack that needs to be assigned."

Phrases like "for each point of damage" and "point by point" seem to me to suggest that it is the latter, that the damage is freely distributed.

Nate's response:

You can distribute the excess damage as you see fit. Each point (as per the language on the Troll) is resolved individually.