1) Does Voice of the jungle prevent characters that go insane (losing T struggle for example) while committed to the story from uncommitting?

2) Apeirophobia + no hand.
If opponent has no hand and character can go insane he has to choose go insane, right?

3) Neils couriosity shop.
What does "attached character" mean when copying an attachments effect? (I guess its illegal target, but some effects can stillignore partially illegal targets… can you shot infinite number of times copying the Khopesh? Attachments that don't refer to attached character work ok, like Book of Iod? Any self referential text would affect Shop right?)

4) Dr. Laban Shrewsbury
Disrupt: When you draw Dr. Laban Shrewsbury, if you control at least 1 [Miskatonic University] card, reveal him to your opponent and shuffle him into your deck. Then, choose and shuffle 1 Villainous character into its owner's deck or draw 1 card. (Limit 1 per turn.)

Only cards in play count? Resource is not enough, right?

5) Peslee + taking control
Response: After Professor Nathaniel Peaslee enters your discard pile from play, pay 2 to put into play all characters that entered a discard pile this phase.

If opponent takes control of Pealslee does control go back when he triggers this after Peaslee dies? Id say yes, but FAQ says effect is triggered as if card was still in play… Or does control go back at some point? Can owner trigger it after it dies under opponents control?

6) Alyssa Graham + Prism of many views
Do you see the next card before deciding to trigger her card swapping disrupt? I guess not, right?

7) Can Eryn Cochwyn
Action: Drive Eryn Cochwyn insane to choose a Tome card and trigger its effect without paying any costs. Then, the controller of that Tome card must sacrifice it.

Trigger effects other than "Action:". I guess she cant, right?

1) I'm not entirely sure, but I assume that is correct? It seems to bypass the rule on insanity.

2) Yes. His hand has no cards to discard, so he must choose someone to go insane, if able.

3) With Khopesh, there is no valid target for "attached character" so it can't be triggered.

4) Correct, the card must be in play. As a resource, a card's text box is blank (aside from Subtype purposes for Twilight Gate).

5) If it's in your discard pile, your opponent no longer has control. Therefore, s/he can't trigger Peaslee's effect.

6) Cards are drawn individually, so during the draw phase the first card would be drawn. Then, the top card of the deck must be flipped over prior to drawing the second card. So yes, you would see the next card.

7) I assume she can trigger Actions on Tomes. That would still be an effect that would need to be triggered by you choosing to perform it, right?

AD4 Don't see how is blank textbox relevant. I'm asking is controlling MU resource enough to satisfy condition of "if you control at least 1 [Miskatonic University] card" or do you need a character or support in play to satisfy this.

AD5 I really don't get your response… You mean it goes to owners discard so only owner can trigger this response even though control was taken?

AD6 Alyssa says "When a player would draw a card". My question is: When you make the decision to trigger Alyssa and have Prism of many views in play what do you know when you make the decision? Now that I think of it timing on getting second card from usual draw is quite weird. Are disrupts announced before or rather during resolution between each step of complex effect… With simple effects it doesn't really matter but with more complex ones that can be interrupted at many stages of execution it might make a difference. Also is "When a player would draw a card" before or after he picks it and reveals next card, I assume its before, so you don't know is the card that will be drawn instead better or worse. Also I wonder can you disrupt drawing second card and if you can do you see it before making a decision or do you have to make decision before any card is drawn revealing the second card.

AD7 ??? You can trigger Action on tomes, that's the obvious part. The second sentance i dont get at all.

Action: Drive Eryn Cochwyn insane to choose a Tome card and trigger its effect without paying any costs. Then, the controller of that Tome card must sacrifice it.

My question is, can you trigger stuff like "Cthaat Aquadingen; Response: After you play a Deep One character, choose a non-Location support card. Shuffle that card into its owner's deck." Ignoring the fact that its a response and has condition.

"Choose a tome": chosen; "trigger its effect" ok the effect is: "choose a non-Location support card. Shuffle that card into its owner's deck" i can do that no problem. But i just ignored condition of triggering and usual timing of this effect…. can i do it or not? And why?

.Zephyr. said:

I'm not quite sure about 7). In any case you'll always trigger the effect at 'action' speed. If the triggered effect has a pre-condition you'd need to fulfill it, I'd think. Better send the question to Damon (or whoever is currently CoC's official 'ruler' ).

1) I'm not saying he doesn't go insane, he goes insane. The problem is that going insane usually triggers game effect that uncommitts. Cannot also affects game effects so i don't see why would character be uncommitted. Its quite different when it dies. Its not in play so being commited makes no sense. If its out of play it doesnt realy uncommit by some game effect, here it stays in play just changes state, its usually uncommited because of game effect. So what I think is that this character should stay committed to this story while being insane.

I see no rule that would prevent insane character from staying commited. Voice of the jungle makes characters commited on all phases and thats quite wierd, keeping insane ones there is just a bit more weird. And i don't see why not keep insane guys there? Is there a rule I missed? Or there is a flaw in my reasoning? Was this discussed earlier? I played Gollonac + Negotium Perambulans in Tenebris + Voice of the jungle as one of my more important interactions and when other player asked I thought about it more and got confused. I uncommited insane guys as usual, but now i see no reason to uncommitt them.

7) I think its really basic interaction. I thought I just don't know something. Really its not clear?

The rule book tells us that if you lose a Terror struggle, you choose a character to go insane and " That character is no longer considered to be committed to the story." There is no uncommit step - that character just is no longer there.

Next sentence is: "(That character is considered to have fled the scene, gibbering and drooling)". For me it sounds like a description of uncommiting.

Hmm i guess this one would be worth asking designer as this interaction does not seem foreseen.

.Zephyr. said:

If something prevents a character from being uncommitted, it prevents effects that would cause the character to uncommit and nothing else. It doesn't do a thing about any other effect that would cause the character to be removed from the story. I recall we once had a flood of threads asking this kind of questions and in every single case there was no interaction whatsoever.

I still find "Is not considered commited" to be not really different than "is uncommited" especialy as there is no general mechanic of "being considered uncommited". Also arent cards that remove characters from the story the same as cards uncommiting them?

Uncommiting them ignoring Voice of the jungle is actually better for me and simpler, but i still find it confusing.

What does overthinking even mean? I want simple answer based on clear rules and general ideas. When i get opinions I try to think the opposite way and get me corrected by actual rules of the game.

While were at it:

8) Is re-commited the same as commited? I think about using "Ravager from the deep" and cards that recommit stuff to make him even more scary and usable on my story phase, does this work?

Overthinking I believe is when you try to add meaning that isn't actually present in the text, typically by making assumptions that it is similar/identical to something else, or because that's how you're used to it working in another game/card, or simply because it "makes sense" to you. It is trying to fill in meaning beyond what the direct literal interpretation.

The fact is that fine distinctions matter a lot in games, from LCGs to miniatures, and so on - and it's not a safe assumption that because two things appear to have similar effects that they are in fact identical. For instance, we know that "play" and "enters play" describe two very distinct things. "Does not X" means something different from "cannot be X". etc…

On the Privateer Press forums there is a well known saying, "Fluff does not equal rules". Regardless of the flavor description, the actual rules for insanity state only that the character is no longer considered committed. You can picture it in various ways. Maybe he is still physically present, but unable to contribute. Maybe "uncommit" is meant to describe an orderly withdraw and running away screaming doesn't qualify. But regardless, these are just idle things with no game meaning. What is fact is that the character is no longer committed, and since it doesn't use that term, this is not done through a process called "uncommitting".

I did a search on cardgamedb, and was unable to find any matches for the word "recommit" on any card, can you give an example of what you mean here? As far as I know, there is no such concept as "recommit". You can commit, and there is no memory of whether you committed previously which would be necessary to support that term.

I agree that diffrent mechanic effects are different. I disagree about literal meaning - there is no such thing as literal meaning, you always interpret meaning with some general rules. They might not work when theyre tailored for different game, but it's not like you can get rid of all assumptions and read text. (but the more those assumptions match games rules the easier it will be to grasp those rules; and you eventually learn conventions used by the game) It is the only case where i see a phrase "character is considered X" so it is a serious concern is it in fact other effect or person who wrote this ment something else. And if it is an intended new effect some more emphasis like stating "this is not uncommit" should be made. FAQ on play/enters play/put into play and sacrifice/destroy/discard is a good example that such fine differences need claryfication.

About 8)

Military Bike
Attach to a character you control. Disrupt: After a story to which attached character is committed resolves, exhaust Military Bike to immediately re-commit attached character to another unresolved story.

Noises in the Hills
Play after all players have committed characters to stories.
Action: Choose a committed character you control. Uncommit that character and re-commit that character to a different story.

Ravager from the Deep
Forced Response: After Ravager from the Deep is committed to a story, wound all other characters at that story.

Newer cards say just commit:

Flush them Out
Play during your opponent's turn.
Response: After your opponent has committed characters, choose a story. Uncommit each character at all other stories. Then commit them to the chosen story.

With cards like Dynamite, Cthuloid Spawn, Feeding Frenzy it might be quite fun Cthulhu-Agency deck idea.

Ah, I just searched for "recommit" without the hyphen, that's why I didn't see those two cards.

This looks like the sort of thing that needs an official answer from Damon.

On the surface, "re-commit" is different from commit, so from a strictly literal point of view these are not the same and it doesn't work. However, it seems plausible that the older cards are using a rather loose terminology which has been corrected on newer cards - and that it IS intended that characters here are committing and the cards in question should have an errata. Anyway, click the button and lets find out.

If you want to go with the claim "there is no such thing as literal meaning, you always interpret meaning with some general rules" that's fine. So then instead of overthinking being defined as "trying to add meaning beyond the literal" it becomes something like "trying to add interpretations which are not well supported". Of course the actual printed words are "interpreted" within the framework of the current rules and FAQ of the game, but I don't know that I'd consider that real interpretation.

My main point is that stuff that appears obvious is more often than not obvious only becouse of some assumptions you make. If you dont have those assumptions or assume something a bit different it might stop being obvious. Like 2+2 = 4 is obvious, but when the set youre making those calculations is Z3 the answer is 1 (only 0,1,2 are there, no 4; all operations are calculated mod 3). I really think that because someone deosnt see my problem it doesn't mean it's not there.

Got some answers:

AD1 - Youre right, they flee

AD2 - didnt ask, im quite certain it works like this, just want to make sure noone finds argument for other way around or i missed sth.

AD3 - didnt ask, noone seemed to comment on my initial thoughts and im still to confused on this ignore/cant trigger to aske good questions

AD4 - didnt ask, pretty sure he needs something in play, same reason for asking as with 2

AD5 - asked, he is triggered afer he goes out of play, so hes back to owner then and previous controller cant trigger this (as far as i understand the answer i got)

AD6 - asked about Parlor and conformed it gets revealed first, reasked abut this but the more i think about it the less sense it makes to reveal the card under before disrupt, well see

AD 7 - She can't trigger other stuff becouse other stuff requires firing in some specyfic timing, only Actions for Eryn

AD8 re-commit is not the same as commit; no old wording errata (confirmed by Damon)

Also i fead insane section from rulebook again and its quite clear Insane characters cannot commit and are never considered commited (i missed that, and this makes Voice issue clear)

.Zephyr. said:

This also did confuse me in the beginning. One important thing that I learnt in this forum here is, that there is a difference between the states of being committed or being uncommitted and the act of to commit or to uncommit. When you do the act of committing a character to a story (e.g. in the green boxes of the story phase, or because of the Disrupt of Jiang Shi), this also makes the character to be in the committed state. But this is not the only thing that can put a character into the committed state. E.g. when you use Dirk Sharpe's ability, you put him into play in the committed state, but you never did do the act of committing him.
The same is true for the uncommitted state: To uncommit a character is not the only way of achieving this state. If you destroy a character because of a lost combat struggle, he goes into the discard pile and therefore is in the uncommitted state, but you did not do the act of uncommitting. So Voice of the Jungle (which refers to the act of uncommitting) does not prevent characters from being destroyed or driven insane because of lost struggles.

Regarding 2): I disagree here with AUCodeMonkey here ;-) I can choose to discard X cards, and if I don't have X in my hand, I just discard as many as possible. The reason is, that I don't need to choose X cards in my hand (then that option would be not allowed indeed) but that I only need to choose the option of discarding. You can also see this reasoning here (at the bold words).
(To the contrary, if my opponent chooses my character with willpower, I am unable to select the option of driving him insane, because that character may not even be chosen as the target for an effect that would drive him insane, as stated the core set rules p. 9.)

AD2

"discards X cards from his hand"

FAQ says 0 cards = no hand, so i think you cannot choose to discard any cards from hand when you do not have a hand.

You can discard less, as there is no "if able" nor "choose and discard", but FAQ makes 0 cards a special case I think.

Oh, I overlooked that FAQ 2.6… but I'm not sure if this means that I can't choose this option. Even if I had 0 hand cards and therefore had no hand, the effect would just fail, I think. But it should still be possible to choose the discarding option, since neither my hand nor hand cards are targets according to FAQ 1.5…

Idk, i find those "cant trigger" rules quite arbitrary. I see no clear rule here. Anyone knows better?

After reading through this thread and the FAQ entries regarding a player's hand (section 2.6) and choosing multiple targets (section 2.14), I'm confused on when Apeirophobia can be legally triggered. Hopefully you guys have it all sorted out.

Example:

My opponent has 2 cards in his hand. I play Apeirophobia and target a 3-skill character with terror. My opponent can't choose to make his character go insane, so he must discard. However, he doesn't have 3 cards in his hand. What happens?

Apeirophobia reads "That character's controller chooses… or discards X cards from his hand. X is the skill of the chosen character."

The card specifically says "choose" and doesn't include "up to" in the text. Therefore, does the following section from the FAQ apply:

"Any card effect that involves choosing multiple targets (including choosing multiple cards to draw or discard, or choosing multiple tokens) can only resolve if the exact number of targets, cards, or tokens can be chosen."

Does this mean the effect fails, or does X inherently mean "up to" so my opponent discards as many cards as he can even if it's not the full amount?

If Apeirophobia only works when the exact number of cards can be discarded, why wouldn't an opponent opt to discard (even if the target character could go insane) as long as they don't have the right number of cards in their hand, thus making the effect fail without any consequence?

Apeirophobia says: "discards X cards from hand" not "chooses [and discards] X cards".

There is "choose" but it refers to insane or discard. Not to choosing specyfic cards.

When player chooses discard option, he doesn't choose a set of X cards and then discards them (well, he does choose the cards, its just "discard X cards" is not "choose and discard X cards" effect)

Thats why this FAQ fragment does not apply and you do as much as you can. At least thats how i think it works based on what i understnand from earlier Apeirophobia discussion with Penfold on some thread. Maybe it should work differently… idk… and kind of hate such wordings, but i slowly live it down… especially with "your operation phase only" errata IMO Apeirophobia is really situational card used for gaining card advantage if opponent does play sth big and T proof. Limiting it even more doesn't make much sense to me, it is quite hard to make use of already, but if played right it does limit opponents options, and even not played forces your opponent to play all he has, or not play big guys.

I agree, you would have to discard as many cards as you can - keeping a small hand will not cancel the effect.

Though Apeirophobia does say choose to either make a target character go insane or discard X number of cards, whichever you pick also implies that you choose to do something - in this case discard. The FAQ clearly states that means an exact number of cards.

Anyway, I don't fully understand how you guys came to your conclusions (CoC rulings often get the better of me), but I'll go with it. Otherwise Apeirophobia becomes a fairly useless card.

Choose in the FAQ quote does not apply. The FAQ is clear about cards being drawn or discarded individually, and that only when you are told to choose them as a set do they count as a group. In this case since it does not say choose and discard X cards you discard up to that number, regardless of how many you have in your hand.

9. What is printed skill when there is X printed. 0 or what effect defines?

From:
http://www.cardgamedb.com/index.php/CoC/CoCCards.html/_/the-rituals-of-the-order/aspirations-of-ascension/yha-nthlei-statue-aoa?st=0#comment_7665
I dont really know so i ask here.

Good question.

By intuition, I'd say X is just a placeholder for the definition on the card (e.g. Elise Warren) that specifies X exactly, so printed skill = 2 if 2 insane characters are in play.

But reading the FAQ, I come to another conclusion.
FAQ 2.11 makes it clear that if no effect defines X, X is 0.
FAQ 2.7 states that "printed" refers to the value physically printed on the card (= without any modifying effects like on Ocean Crawlers). Since the effect for Elise Warren is just a passive effect like the one on Ocean Crawlers, it should also not be taken into account for "printed skill", therefore X = 0 by FAQ 2.11.

If nobody else knows anything, I think it's best if you send in a rules question…