I have a question concerning a neutral character card, the Halflings of D'haz. According to the text box: "The loser of any *combat* struggle in which Halflings of D'haz participated must receive an additional wound for each icon by which the struggle was lost." Last night, I committed to two different stories with the Halflings of D'haz committed to one of them. I chose to resolve that story first, and my opponent didn't have any *combat* icons, so I dealt the initial wound from the icon struggle and then had 5 more wounds to inflict on my opponent. He only had two characters committed to that story and two more committed to the other. My question is, since he had 5 wounds coming his way from the Halflings of D'haz, would he have had to distribute those wounds to 5 of his characters in general, or only to those committed to the same story as the one the Halflings were committed to? We consulted the FAQ but it only said that the loser can't 'double up' the wounds on a single character. Any clarification would be of great help.

The FAQ Errata used to read as follows:

" Search for the Silver Key - Halflings of D’haz (F75) - The loser of the [Combat] struggle where Halflings of D’haz participated must assign additional wounds for each icon the struggle was lost by among characters he committed to the story."

After it was queried further here , FFG revised it and now it reads as:

" Search for the Silver Key - Halflings of D’haz (F75) - The additional wound tokens are assigned one at a time by the losing player."

I'm not sure if they removed the reference to "characters [the loser] committed to the story" because that's just assumed, or if it's because that no longer applies, but I'm guessing it's the former rather than the latter.

Coincidentally I sent FFG a Rules Question about this very thing a few days ago. I'll let you know what comes back.

FWIW, I agree with jasonconlon. The ability doesn't have any effect on characters that couldn't be targeted by the effect of a normal combat struggle. Otherwise the card would have to say so.

@lammassu: Please don't post rule questions in the 'You've got questions...' thread, unless you already have an official answer that you'd like to share. Just create new threads for any questions you'd like to ask the community.

@jhaelen: My apologies, I'm new to the forum and wasn't clear on the protocol regarding that particular thread.

Damon's confirmed that wounds do have to be given among participating characters.

The FAQ Errata used to read as follows:

"Search for the Silver Key - Halflings of D’haz (F75) - The loser of the [Combat] struggle where Halflings of D’haz participated must assign additional wounds for each icon the struggle was lost by among characters he committed to the story."

Now it reads as:

"Search for the Silver Key - Halflings of D’haz (F75) - The additional wound tokens are assigned one at a time by the losing player."

Is the removal of the reference to "among characters he committed to the story" significant? Is this no longer the case, or is it now just assumed that it still needs to be assigned to the loser's participating characters only, and that excess wounds (if all the loser's participating characters are destroyed or invulnerable) are disregarded?

It is not significant. Wounds received from a combat struggle can only ever be applied to your characters committed to that story unless the card effect specifically states otherwise. It was deemed that the original wording of the card and the old wording of the FAQ were were both still not clear enough for some players to understand how the wounds were to be dealt. The new wording is explicit that each wound is to be treated as if it were an additional combat struggle that has been lost, which is to say they are assigned one at a time meaning you cannnot assign more wounds than a character can survive.

The new FAQ entry does not state an errata to the card text, it instead clarifies how the card text is to be resolved. Since the original card text says you receive additional wounds this does not contradict the rulebook wording how characters receive wounds or how players assign them in a fashion that would let said player assign wounds to the opponents characters.