The power card name "Trap master" (I'm not sure of the name) that add 2 wounds and -1 to the cost of all the trap:

Is the card work with Dark charm? (The card that allow the overlord to control the hero for an attack)

Some say Yes beaucause the card is a TRAP and the trap master work with the TRAP!

Some say No because this is not the trap that hurt but the hero control by the overlord! (To me, this argument seem to use logic... logic doesn't work with descent)

What's your idea about this?

No. Trapmaster explicitly says Traps that do damage (not 'all traps') do 2 extra damage.

The card (Dark Charm) is a trap yes, but the card does not do any damage (therefore the trap does not do any damage, therefore the trap does not do 2 extra damage). The hero makes an attack and the hero does the damage.

This is significantly different from cards that do damage directly, such as pit trap, crushing block, exploding door etc.

Logic + Descent may indeed be madness, but the words still mean exactly what they say. This isn't logic, its fundamental language skills (those whose first language is not english are excused).

Does the card in english say: To the trap that do dammage

or like in french: +2 dammage (If it do so).

Because in the second option, the specification is for the dice roll that made the heros to escape the trap. If he succeed the roll, the trap does not inflict dammage.

We've house ruled that Dark Charm is an Event and not a trap.

Paul Grogan said:

Given that it's in the trap treachery, why? Why is the house rule necessary? This would allow players with only event treachery to pick Dark Charm during encounters.

The thing is, Dark Charm actually does do damage. It causes an attack to occur, and that attack inflicts damage. This happens during the resolution of the trap card, at the direct instruction of the trap card, and would not occur if the trap had not been played.

The word "damage" does not actually appear on the Dark Charm card. It's possible that they intended that as the trigger--but that's never said anywhere, so that's just conjecture.

Scything Blades doesn't mention damage, either, but it says that heroes suffer as if they'd just entered a scything blades space, or something to that effect. That'll result in damage if the hero doesn't roll a surge. Do you think that Trapmaster should apply there?

This really looks ambiguous to me. My best guess is that Trapmaster wasn't intended to add damage to Dark Charm, but that's a guess , not a deduction made with "fundamental language skills." And I honestly have no idea whether it's supposed to work with Scything Blades.

Antistone said:

I consider there to be a significant difference between 'doing damage' and 'causing an attack'. In the case of Dark Charm, the trap card does not deal the damage, the attack does.

As for Scything blades, the second effect (the heroes are affected as though they'd entered a Scything Blades space) is caused directly by the trap card, not by the Scything blades token. Just because there wasn't space to write out the effects in full, does not preclude them from actually being the effects of the card. The first effect, BTW, is to place a scything blades token, however that token does nothing (yet) as there hero has not moved onto its space. The trap card does the initial damage, not the token. Effectively, Scything Blades (trap card) does mention damage.
The actual effects of the Scything Blades Trap card are: Place a Scything Blades token (doesn't do damage, no bonus from trap master) and do 2 wounds and a bleed token to the trapped hero unless he rolls a surge (does damage* so gets the bonus from trap master).

The 'trapped' hero suffers 2 wounds and a bleed token, +2 damage for trap master (assuming no surge). Any hero moving into a scything blades space thereafter will not suffer the extra two wounds from trapmaster.

The exact wording, in english, of Trapmaster
"... Trap cards that deal damage deal an additional 2 wounds."

I still think it is very clear and a simple matter of applying fundamental language skills. I'm not sure if mis-applying basic language skills is a good enough excuse to create ambiguity. However, I'm probably wrong, since if there is anyone I'd trust to get the language skills right its Antistone.

*Ok, I have to admit, SB does wounds, not damage. So strictly speaking Trapmaster does not help in the damage area. However this is just the usual FFG terminology inconsistancy IMO (oh how they need a rewrite!), and should be considered to be the same thing (unlike in an attack where there is a significant difference between wounds and damage).

So because Dark Charm "causes an attack (that causes damage)" rather than "causing damage," the bonus doesn't apply?

So if I rewrote Crushing Block to say "roll 4 black dice, and take 1 damage for each die that is not a surge" instead of "take 4 damage, reduced by 1 for each surge rolled on 4 black dice", that would mean that it no longer benefits from Trapmaster, because it would then be "causing a die roll (that causes damage)" rather than "causing damage"?

Or if we rewrote Scything Blades to say "the scything blades affect the hero as if he had just entered the space" instead of "the hero suffers effects as if he just entered a scything blades space," that would prevent it from getting the bonus?

I have two basic objections to this line of argumentation:

1. I don't see why this distinction should matter. I mean, it might matter, but I don't see any clear indication on the Trapmaster card that this was the intent, and you don't seem to have given any supporting reasons for latching onto this particular distinction (or even defined it very clearly).
2. This distinction means that very subtle changes in the wording of a card will change whether it is affected by Trapmaster or not. Given the rigor generally applied in writing Descent rules, that seems like a Bad Idea, because I do not remotely trust the card-writers to have paid such close attention to their wording.

Antistone said:

I agree that its a Bad Idea to have to worry about the rigour of the writing in Descent, but the cards say what they say.
If the Trap card itself causes damage (and IMO it would be the trap card that did the damage in the CBk example you give, but the ScBl token doing the damage in your ScBl example) then it causes 2 extra damage. If it doesn't cause damage, but causes something that might cause damage (an attack, a ScBl token), then the Trap card did not cause the damage.

Frankly, Dark Charm doesn't need the extra damage from Trapmaster, it is already easily the best Trap for its price. If you are going to give one level of secondary affects the bonus, why not two levels - a Paralyzing Gas trap that ends a heroes turn, preventing him from escaping through a portal and allowing the monsters to attack him one more time. Thats causing extra damage, due to the trap. IMO it has to be one degree of association only (ie directly from the card), or any amount of degrees of association (which more or less means every single trap as whatever affect it has may change things just enough so that somewhere down the track a hero takes damage).

Clearly, we don't want to say "any damage you take for the rest of the game that you wouldn't have taken if the trap hadn't been played is increased by 2." That's stupid and unenforcible.

And it's true that Dark Charm probably doesn't need a boost, but you can't expect people to resolve rules questions by going with the "most balanced" option. That's effectively asking the players to redesign the game (possibly while they play it), and that's neither fair nor practical. Besides, pretty much the only logical reason for Dark Charm to be a "trap" card in the first place is so that it is affected by Trapmaster (it would otherwise make at least as much sense for it to be an "event"). Perhaps they only wanted it to get the cost reduction and not the bonus damage, but either way, they clearly intended Dark Charm to get a boost of some kind from Trapmaster, whether it needs it or not.

So that leaves your argument about direct and indirect effects, and frankly, your decision that Dark Charm's damage is not a "direct" effect still seems kind of arbitrary. If there were a Power card that said that whenever a monster deals damage, it deals 2 more, would you argue that that didn't apply to monster attacks? An attack is a method of causing damage. Causing damage is usually the sole function of an attack, and attacks are far and away the most common method of dealing damage in the game.

Heck, if this card applied to monster damage, I suspect you'd probably be arguing that it applied only to attacks (and not to, say, Aura), rather than the reverse. And that would only be consistent if you were arguing for it to only apply to "typical cases," not to "direct effects, based on precise wording." (Apologies for putting words in your mouth if you'd actually argue otherwise--let me know.)

And if you want other possible rules to consider (besides limiting the bonus to "direct" effects or opening the floodgates to infinite repercussions), here's some other options for you:

• Applies to damage inflicted as part of the resolution of the trap card's text. Dark Charm gets bonus damage because the attack is part of resolving the card. Scything Blades deals bonus initial damage but not on subsequent contact with the blades (or from the Bleed token on intial contact) because the card's instructions have been completed (and the card discarded) by the time the later effects occur. The monster from a Mimic trap deals bonus damage on it's first attack, because the card tells you to activate it immediately but doesn't tell you to activate it every overlord turn thereafter (or maybe it does, don't have the card in front of me). Dance of the Monkey God deals no bonus damage because the card is discarded after turning heroes into monkeys (a standardized effect described in the rulebook).
• Applies to cards that actually use the word "damage." Scything Blades gets no bonus damage because it references the effects of a scything blades marker rather than saying "the hero suffers 2 damage (ignoring armor) and recieves a bleed token." Crushing Block deals damage even with my rewording because it uses the word "damage" in its text in either case.
• Applies to any effect that is thematically part of the trap. Scything Blades creates a scything blades token that deals extra damage to any figure hit by it for the rest of the game. The Glass Armor dark relic causes heroes to suffer 4 extra damage instead of 2 because it was created by a trap card. Dark Charm and Mimic get bonus damage, but Curse of the Monkey God does not, because it just sets the hero's armor to zero, and any damage taken as a result originates from an effect outside the trap.

I'm not saying any of those are better, I'm just pointing out that there's more than two possible options. Arguing that any particular alternative is a bad idea isn't going to help much in the positive argument for your own suggested ruling.