Spare Hood and Cloak: " Action: Exhaust Spare Hood and Cloak and exhaust attached character to ready another character. Then, attach Spare Hood and Cloak to that character. "

Can I exhaust Spare Hood and Cloak and the character, to whom it is attached, to "ready" another character, who is not exhausted?

Or more general: Can I use effects, which ready characters, on already ready characters? Or can only exhausted characters made ready?

Hermjard said:

Only exhausted characters can ready- otherwise they would not need to. could you give an example where you would wish to use it like this?

rich

Of course I can. With Spare Hood and Cloak the advantage to ready a ready character should be obvious: I could change the character, to whom this attachment is attached, without the need, that this character has to be exhausted. This would have the obvious advantage, that in the next round, Spare Hood and Cloak could ready the character, it came from.

Example: In round T, Spare Hood and Cloak is attached to character A. I exhaust character A and Spare Hood and Cloak, to ready character B (who is already ready). For this, I have to attach Spare Hood and Cloak to character B. In round T+1, I could exhaust character B, to make character A ready, after I have exhausted character A for some important effect. If character A is an "important" character (a good defender, for example) and character B is mainly useless at the moment (for example a healer, while all chars are in perfect health), this could be a real advantage in the right moment.

There are other cards, where the effect, to ready a character, is connected with another effect, for example "Ever My Heart Rises". So the question, if I can ready a ready character, only to benefit from a secondary effect, is a more or less important general question.

Btw, I know that the phrases of the two mentioned cards are different. "Spare Hood and Cloak" says " exhaust attached character to ready… then …" , while "Ever My Heart Rises" says " reduce your threat by 1 and ready… ". I am aware of the difference of these terms, namely that effects, which are connected with an "and" can be done without the other. Nevertheless, maybe there are more cards (still existing or to be released), which state " ready a card of a certain type, then benefit from these and that ". For all these cards, with these phrases, it should be settled one for all, if ready characters could be made ready.

Btw, if you should be right, and only ready characters could be made ready, what is the reason then, that you find in the basic rules and on countless cards alike, the phrase " ready all exhausted characters " or " ready an exhausted character "? If only exhausted characters can ready by general rule, then the term " exhausted " would be superflous in all these phrases.

For Spare Hood and Cloak, I would say yes, you can use it to ready a ready character, since the text only require a Character target, so any characters are eligible targets. However, it will have no effect for the 1st part (ready a character, since it is not exhausted in the first place), as noted by Hermjard, the next part of effect (attach the Spare Hood and Cloak to that character) is connected by the word "then", so it is not carried out because the previous effect cannot be resolved successfully.

In general, you can use an effect to ready any characters, even if the characters are not exhausted.

To quote from the rulebook, p.14, "An exhausted card cannot exhaust again … until it has been readied once more. When a player is instructed by the game or by a card effect to ready a card, he moves that card to its normal upright position." Note that it does not mention that "ready card cannot ready again", so I would say that you can indeed ready a ready character.

I think, your posting contains a contradiction:

On the one hand you say, that you think, that "you can indeed ready a ready character". If that is true, then it is a valid and therfor successful action, to ready a ready character.

On the other hand you say about Spare Hood and Cloak, that the then-sentence cannot be resolved, because the game action before it could not be executed successfully with a ready character.

Either you can ready a ready character, then this can be executed successfully.

Or you cannot ready a ready character, because a ready character is not a valid target for any readying action.

I cannot imagine, that there is something in between.

ah sorry - i completely misunderstood your question. now i understand. i am actually not sure to the correct ruling. ill have to check the faq.

theme wise it doesnt make much sense, but there are of course rules which contradict theme

rich

Hermjard said:

Ok, my last sentence does not correctly reflect what I would like to say. I would modify "you can indeed ready a ready character" to "a ready character is a valid target for ready action". (Actually, I will not be surprised if the official ruling would be to the contrary) However, the effect is not successfully resolved as there is no change in the state of the character.

I'll illustrate this point with an example: If a card effect says: "Choose a player and that player discard 1 card from his hand. Then that player draw a card."
You can choose a player with no cards in hand (he is a valid target because he is a player indeed); however, he fails to discard 1 card, so this part is not successfully resolved, so the next part (draw a card) cannot take effect.

I don't think, that this differentiation can be made. Either something is a valid target for an effect, then applying this effect on this target is always successful. Or it is an invalid target, then you cannot apply this effect. I don't think that this game knows something like unsuccessful effects on valid targets.

Look at the card "Followed by Night", it says: " When Revealed: The first player (choose 1): deals 1 damage to all allies in play and Followed by Night gains surge, or all enemies engaged with players make an immediate attack, if able. "

The first player is always free to damage all allies even when there are no allies in play (plus surge). Or to let all engaged enemies let attack, even when there are no enemies engaged. The demands of the card are fullfilled by that. So this effect must be successful.

Hermjard said:

A valid target does not necessarily guarantee that the effect can be successfully resolved because the requirement of the target may not be specific enough to ensure the effect can be resolved successfully.

For your example, "Followed by Night", demands of the card are fulfilled by choosing one of the options, but it does not mean the effects of the chosen option are successfully resolved, since to be able to successfully resolved is never a condition for the option to be valid in the first place.

And for the original example, Spare Hood and Cloak, if it says "… to ready an exhausted character" then the target requirement will be more specific to ensure that the validity of the target would mean the effect can be successfully resolved in the most cases. Therefore, I still think there are cases where you can choose a valid target but the effects cannot be successfully resolved.

I am pretty sure there was a ruling by nate or one of the other designers on that topic some time ago.

To ready somebody, he must be exhausted first.

To heal a character, he must be damaged

……and so on.

Can´t remember where fo find it.

I repeat: If you should be right, and only ready characters could be made ready, what is the reason then, that you find in the basic rules and on countless cards alike, the phrase " ready all exhausted characters " or " ready an exhausted character "? If only exhausted characters can ready by general rule, then the term " exhausted " would be superflous in all these phrases.

Hermjard said:

i really think theres a point where you could read too far into any rule into this game and while it is obviously wise to question the wording to find out the real way to play the game, some of the wording is there just becuase thats the way it is written.

there is nothing as far as i know that says you can ready a ready character…but then again there is nothing that says otherwise (however i also remember something similar to muemakan…though i cant find it) so does that mean you can't? well if you want to know for sure send a rules request to caleb…im sure thats the only way to know for sure, and im interested to know the outcome

rich

Sorry, but I am not aware of a single card that says " ready an exhausted character" or " ready all exhausted characters".

Core rules, p.22: " During the refresh phase, all exhausted cards ready (…)"

Hermjard said:

countless = once in a poorly written rulebook.

I guess rich is right here : you could read too far into any rule into this game

Just think what makes more sense gamewise or what makes the game harder , then you know what´s the right way to read the rules most of the time.

But if you want to play it your way just do it.

To use the rule of thumb, that a rule is correctly interpreted, if it makes it harder for the players, is useless, because the same interpretation can be disadvanteous for players in one situation, and advantageous in another. So, as long as you don't want to have a collection of special case decisions, but a general guideline, it's better to argument from the view consistency, and not from view of challenge, IMO.