If the Brothel Guard stands in the standing phase, but it is knelt by the Lannisport Brothel (with the owner of the Brothel being first player and therefore getting first response), can the Brothel Guard's response then trigger? Or does the game not remember that it stood, given that it's now kneeling?

Now, I know some of you are going to say, "How is this even a question? The Brothel Guard stood!" To that I would say, we have previous rulings that seem to think otherwise. This question is based on the ruling of Son of the Mist versus Harrenhal (which was based on Dreadfort and a 2-str character that is buffed to 3-str).

So, let's start with the Dreadfort and go from there:

Player 1 has a Dreadfort and a Winterfell Castle in play. Player 1 then plays a Bolton Refugee which is 2-str. Intuitively, this seems like they shouldn't draw from Dreadfort because they only played a 2-str character, but when the game checks for the Dreadfort's response, it only sees a 3-str character (and the game has no memory of Player 1 playing a 2-str character).

Now we go to Son of the Mist:

Player 1 has two Son of the Mist in play. Player 2 has a Harrenhal in play, unqiue character, and only one card in hand (No Quarter). Player 2 wins a 1-claim mil challenge versus Player 1, putting a Son of the Mist in moribund. Player 2 then plays a No Quarter on the other Son of the Mist (also putting it in moribund). Player 1 uses the response of Son of the Mist to claim 1 power since the opponent just played their last card in hand. Player 2 then activates Harrenhal which gives them one card in hand. Now Player 1 tries to activate the second Son of the Mist, but the game doesn't remember a time when Player 2 played their last card (because they have a card in hand now). As a result, the second Son of the Mist cannot activate its response.

These are both standing rulings. So, what do you guys think?

P.S. I think the solution is clear based on the other two rulings. The Brothel Guard cannot use its response, because the game does not remember a time when it was standing.

i disagree but have no evidence as to why, just a gut feeling.

Oh. I forgot to include the specific rule that all of these examples work off of.

Here you go:

Play restrictions must be met at the time a card ability is initiatied.

sWhiteboy said:

This right here.

If the first player, owning the Brothel Guard, chooses to use it's ability, he/she can. It stood, and he/she responded by kneeling a character (or claiming a power through the rest of its text if the opponent decided to pay to keep their character standing).

Then the opponent controlling the Lannisport Brothel responds to the Brothel Guard standing by kneeling the brothel to kneel the Brothel Guard.

I cannot really see why this wouldn't work based on those previous rulings, however it also would mean that cards like

and

could be used to potentially stand a Maester before all of their chains go off and blow up the world.

We also have

that could be knelt by some response before this one is triggered to keep them alive.

And we have the infamous

where if the location is stood up(not sure how) before this Response is triggered, there is a lost window.

Joffrey and other cards below may also lose an opportunity upon an immediate restood character.

For the record, I never agreed with the Sons of the Mist ruling specifically, but had no counterargument based on game rules so I never provided my 2 cents(but maybe I just didn't like the ruling).

The question becomes, what is the play restriction for brothel guard? I guess it is "He was kneeling. He is now standing."

What are the play restrictions for the other cards? "Used to be A. Is now B."?

Generally, the question becomes, what is the definition of a play restriction so that we can determine what will open Response opportunities?

I guess it is all about the current status and sometimes how it got to that status. Sounds clunky and annoying to teach and keep track of, but I can't see how to counterargue it based on previous rulings.

stormwolf27 said:

He is talking about the Lannisport Brothel controller being first player. If the Brothel Guard owner was first player, then there would be zero issue here because it would trigger while it is standing.

I love you, Bomb. You win one internet.

So what do we do now? Throw out Sons of B*%$$ and say the game does indeed have memor? Stand on all of Bomb's examples and say "working as intended" when we start ruling that Inn of the Kneeling Man doesn't work with Maesters? Ask Damon?

To anyone else who needs help convincing that this is the way that it works:

Let's assume that Dreadfort instead said, "After you play a Bolton character with 2 STR or lower…" Now, the example is:

Player 1 has a Dreadfort and a Winterfell Castle in play. He then plays a Bolton Refugee from hand. Once the Bolton Refugee is in play, Player 1 tries to trigger the Dreadfort, but he cannot; the Dreadfort only sees that a 3-str character has been played (regardless of the fact that the actual character played was 2-str at the time that it was played).

I sent Damon this question, and a similar one regarding Quentyn Martell's draw effect Vs Cersei's Scheme. This was the response:

"Okay to understand how response effects work you need to understand that once a triggering condition has been met that effect can trigger. It does not matter if the card is affected by a later effect that changes the changes the current card state away form the one which was required. IT happened, that is all that matters.

Look at it this way, the speed limit is 30 MPH. You go 50. A police officer sees you clocks you on his radar gun at 50. You see the cop and slow down to 30 before he pulls in behind you and pulls you over. Telling him you were doing 30 before he caught up to you doesn't change the fact that you went over the speed limit. Same with the game. If Brothel Guard stands it can trigger its effect. That it is no longer standing later doesn't matter, as long as the Response is triggered in the appropriate window. The same is true of Cersei's Scheme and Quentyn Martell."

While I'm glad that's the the answer, it's considerably more intuitive than the sons of the mist one we have to go on, I'd really like to see an explicit and detailed explanation as to why a response like Dreadfort (which checks a past condition at the time of play) also checks the current state at time of triggering.

Note that Dreadfort doing so doesn't invalidate the Cersei's scheme/Quentyn and Brothel Guard/Lanni Brothel scenarios, since apparently those are only checking if something stoof, but I'm wondering why then "after x has played" is the only case that checks both past and current states

Well, that is certainly an easier ruling.

Essentially, what this does is invalidate KTOM's ruling on Son of the Mist. That makes it impossible to use the original argument.

Still, this does bring up another question:

Is the state of the card checked both before AND during the Response initiation? For example, does the case of Dreadfort+Winterfell Castle+Bolton Refugee see you as playing both a 2-str card and a 3-str card, or does it only see a 3-str card?

The fact is that you actually played a 2-str card (and with this new ruling, it should be able to trigger anything that works off of a 2-str card being played), but the old Dreadfort ruling says you also satisfied the condition for playing a 3-str card.

I'd have to say no. Remember that Winterfell Castle is a constant effect. It has no defined initiation point, and as such, it is applied instantaneously whenever an appliciable character enters play. This is the whole basis for the ruling. {just relized my Enter key isn't working in this post - weird} There is no time in any framework where the character is 2 STR and then later on becomes 3 STR. Looking at the Player Action window, I'd say this occurs in step 1 as soon an "action is initiated" to play an appliciable card. in the {imagin

In the case of Winterfell Castle, you do play a 2-str character. The FAQ says that the STR is raised (keyword) when the card enters play, which means that it starts at 2, but is immediately raised to 3. The reason the Dreadfort works is because, "qualifying characteristics of cards are checked at the time a Response effect is triggered."

And, the new ruling says that once a trigger is achieved, then that effect can be triggered regardless of what happens. This is why I think you play both a 2-STR and 3-STR character in this case (again, as far as triggers are concerned).

I am having a hard time understanding how this fits with the son of the mist not being able to claim the power if they draw a card. Can someone explain

Bomb said:

Ah. I misread the wording, then. It's hard when you're tired and you're trying to distinguish between a Brothel Guard and a Lannisport Brothel .

Though, it was pointed out that it works either way, so it's a moo point. (What's a cow's opinion? It's Moo)

sWhiteboy said:

Well, that's why the fact that passives and constant effects take place before responses. The Dreadfort is a triggered response, while Winterfell Castle is a passive constant (or whatever the exact terminology is, I can never keep it straight). So, even if you "play a 2-STR character," the castle's effect kicks in as soon as the character hits the board, making it a 3-STR before the window to trigger the Dreadfort arises.

JCWamma said:

Bravo!

That really is common sense, right? Unfortunately we are riddled with rulings like Sons of the Mist and it clouds our judgement on these types of situations. It is why I listed off a bunch of those cards. The whole thing just didn't sit right so I wanted to point out how silly it seemed to go against the use of several card effects.

Speaking of Sons of the Mist, was the ruling from ktom or was it sent to FFG and received a response?

sWhiteboy said:

Annnnnnnd Desparate Tactics to the rescue? For reference:

Any phase: Return an Army character you control to your hand to put an Army character with a lower printed STR into play from your hand. At the end of the phase, return that character to your hand if it is still in play.

So, what do we have here? Are there two types of stength? Is Printed Strength referring to the card as printed whether or not it's in play or out of play while Strength refers explicitly to in-play strength?

If this is the case, then Dreadfort can only care about it's in-play strength. From the game's perspective, you would not have played a Str-3 Refugee as it becomes Str-3 the moment it enters play. There is no time where it is a Str-2 character. If this distinction is inaccurate, then you would effectively generate two trigger points as you indicated. Playing a Str-2 Bolton and playing a Str-3 Bolton, which really doesn't make any sense. Although this would probably fall under the precedent that a single card can only satisfy a single trigger. So if you try to trigger two different effects that had opened on the playing of the card, the satisfying of one closes the potential of the other.

And now we can throw out Sons of B&%*$#&. HURRAY! That was a Ktom interpretation. I don't recall what the discussion was any longer, but it was sometime in March so I'm sure someone could go find it if they wanted.

Printed is printed, no game effect can change the ink printed on the card.

sWhiteboy said:

In that a character with a printed STR of 2 leaves your hand, I agree. However, as far as the game is concerned, you do not play a 2 STR character, since it instantaneously becomes a 3 STR character the moment it touches the field.

sWhiteboy said:

Of course the characters STR is raised - otherwise it would still be 2. The FAQ states that it is raised by the "constant effect on Winterfell Castle" which happens at the moment the player initiates a player action to play the card. Thus, step 1 of the Window (for the purpose of this situation) becomes "Playing of 3 STR character is initiated", meaning any passives or responses must trigger off of that action. At no time is the game aware that a 2-STR character left your hand.

Sabferox, the FAQ ruling doesn't support that.

What it says is "Qualifying characteristics of cards are checked at the time a Response effect is triggered", which means that if a passive (OR previous response) had been triggered in step IV or V of that action window to *raise* the strength, you could still trigger the dreadfort. The implication is that conversely, if a passive or response in step IV/V of that action window lowered the character's strength (or, say, a S3 character's strength), you could no longer do so.

I'm not refuting that - I was trying to refute sWhiteboy's assertion that both a 2-STR and 3-STR character were played as far as triggers are concerned.

If there was an event card that stated "When a 2 STR character is played, draw a card" - would it be able to trigger in the proposed condition? I don't believe so because the constant ability of Winterfell Castle is applied immediately. The FAQ states that there is "no point of initiation" for constant abilities, meaning that the first moment the game is aware of the character, its STR is 1 + the printed STR.

Are you saying that my response to him is incorrect regarding this condition?

I am saying that.

Before the FAQ entry, you didn't draw from the Dreadfort because you do play a 2-str character. The FAQ ruling did not change this in any way. The FAQ entry simply added : qualifying characteristics of cards are checked at the time a reponse is triggered.

All of the wording in the FAQ entry points towards the game seeing you as playing 2-str character. It just adds that Responses also check for trigger qualifications at the time the reponse is initiated.

sWhiteboy said:

I don't see that at all. And if that is the case, I don't understand why the FAQ uses the term "immediately" to describe when constant abilities apply. There is no step in the player action window for "Constant abilities are applied", like there are for resolving passives and triggers. This leads me to believe that the application of the bonus occurs simultaneously with the card entering play.

This thread isn't getting many other posters, I can only guess that either other players aren't sure about this themselves, or I'm the lone doofus who doesn't understand when constant abilities apply. I just want to make sure I understand constant effects properly.

As there are plenty of constant effects in the game, this impacts more than just this instance. I suppose instead of arguing the point, we should simply submit it to FFG.

Since the FAQ states that we can trigger the dreadfort *because* the character has str 3 at the time of triggering (regardless of when he gained that strength between being played and the response triggering), it is not clear to me whether a strength 2 character was played.

I'd lean towards supporting Whiteboy on this one. To me, a card has to enter play to become affected by constant abilities, which means it was played (in a liguisitic sense) as a Str 2, there just happens to be no time where he was in play and Str 2.