Timing in Call of Cthulhu LCG. Part 1 – Basic Introduction

Part 1 – Basic Introduction

Hello everyone.

As I very much like Call of Cthulhu (CoC) and I’m a person who wants to understand rulings in as detailed a way as possible, I started to think a lot about the timing of CoC. Timing is something that regularly creates confusion among players, regardless of if they’re completely new, experienced or coming from other titles.

I’ve decided to write three articles about timing. This one is a basic introduction into the timing of CoC. It is aimed at beginners to the game. The next article deals with the subtleties of timing that can occur and the target audience are more experienced players. The third article focuses on passive effects and how they resolve in conjunction with the timing of the other triggered effects.

If you play CoC regularly, this article is probably going to be a little remedial for you, but stay tuned for the next one where we delve much deeper into the game's timing mechanisms!


Triggered effects and passive effects

A triggered effect is an effect that has a bold trigger written before it (”Action:”, ”Disrupt:”, ”Response:” and ”Forced Response:”). For example a card like Shotgun Blast (Core) has a triggered effect. Shadowed Reef (Core) on the other hand, having an absence of a bold trigger word doesn't have a triggered effect. Instead it has a passive effect.

There are several forms of passive effects, I’ll talk about them in more detail during the third article. For beginners it is sufficient to know that there are passives and they have a lasting effect which is “always on”, like Shadowed Reef (Core), and that there are passives that have a condition and for the most part behave like “one shot” effects. The middle text in the text box of Khopesh of the Abyss (TSS) features a passive that contains a condition.


Action window timing structure

The first and most important thing to know is that CoC doesn’t use a stack, which is to say a timing resolution system that has a LIFO behavior (last in - first out). Magic the Gathering is the most famous example of a card game that uses the stack mechanism. As many other card games also use the stack most players have some experience with it. In CoC’s case instead of a stack there is a timing structure. It consists of a temporal sequence containing different types of triggered effects and this sequence is predefined. Coming from a LIFO system to the timing structure system can be confusing at first.

Ok, now let’s look at the predefined timing structure itself. In CoC, the sequence of effects for an Action is called an Action window. Actions are the fundamental building blocks of the game, and the Action window timing structure is similarly fundamental to the timing in CoC. The order looks like this:

• Action window starts with the initiation of an Action
• Disrupts
• Resolve Action
• Passive effects
• Forced Responses
• Responses
• Action window closes

Here is a short summary of what each of those effects does:

• Actions represent basic deeds that can be triggered at will in the game. You must deal with one Action (including all Responses to it) and then after its window is completely finished the next Action can be triggered. In other words: Actions don’t interleave.
  Actions are taken alternatively by players. The active player has the first opportunity to take an Action in any given phase and if a player passes, then there is the opportunity for a player to take a second Action in succession.

• Disrupts interfere with another effect that has been initiated but not yet resolved. Usually they cancel or alter the interrupted effect just triggered.

• Responses can be triggered in response to something specific that has just occurred and completely resolved.

• Forced Responses are a special kind of Response. Forced Responses must happen, and are game triggered effects. Actions, Disrupts and Responses are player triggered effects which are always optional.

• Passive effects can be ongoing effects like Shadowed Reef (Core) and don’t fit into the sequence as they are “always on”. Passives can also be something more complicated than that, and I will deal with this in another article. Basically passives are not triggered effects, as they lack a bold trigger; and they cannot be canceled.

Enough theory and let’s look at an example!

Assume that Player A has Nikola Tesla (TKatG) in play under his control. He already has 1 success token on him and he is posing a growing danger to Player B. Player B has a Deep One Assault (Core) in his hand and wants to destroy Nikola Tesla (TKatG).

B declares an Action, chooses Nikola Tesla (TKatG) as the target, pays with a domain containing at least 2 Cthulhu resources, because Deep One Assault (Core) (Core) is loyal and plays the card. The Action Window has started and the Action has initiated, but the card text for that Action has not yet resolved:

• Action window starts with the initiation of an Action
• Disrupts
• Resolve Action
• Passive effects
• Forced Responses
• Responses
• Action window closes

Now there is the opportunity for Disrupts. Nikola Tesla (TKatG) would be destroyed from the Deep One Assault (Core), so the triggering condition for his Disrupt is met. Remember that Disrupts trigger before the specific effect is resolved, and not after. So Player A triggers Nikola Tesla (TKatG)'s Disrupt and moves the success token to a story of his choice.

No one wants to play any more Disrupts, and therefore the Action on Deep One Assault (Core) is resolved. Next, Nikola Tesla (TKatG) is destroyed and placed into the discard pile of A.

• Action window starts with the initiation of an Action
• Disrupts
• Resolve Action
• Passive effects
• Forced Responses
• Responses
• Action window closes

In our example there is no passive effect or Forced Responses to consider, so we go straight to Responses. Player B has built his deck well and has included Dreamlands Fanatic (ItDoN), to benefit from the synergy of opponent character removal cards such as Deep One Assault (Core). The Dreamlands Fanatic (ItDoN) requires an opponent’s character to have left play as its Response condition, which is met as Nikola Tesla (TKatG) has been moved to A’s discard Pile. With this having occurred, satisfying the Response requirement of Dreamlands Fanatic (ItDoN), player B may now trigger the Response and put the Dreamlands Fanatic (ItDoN) into play without paying its cost of 3.

Player B is even more prepared for the Deep One Assault (Core) since he also played the prophecy Hanyatl's 1:9 (SoK) onto his draw deck during the last draw phase. In the timing rules of CoC, Responses may trigger off any occurrence that happened during the current Action window. In this case the Action window that had been started by Deep One Assault (Core), so this is still the same Action window. Hanyatl's 1:9 (SoK) triggers because of the Dreamlands Fanatic (ItDoN), which triggered because of the Deep One Assault (Core). Player B accordingly selects and destroys one of A’s support cards.

Note that if B had more than one copy of Dreamlands Fanatic (ItDoN) in hand, he could also trigger other Dreamlands Fanatic (ItDoN) cards, as each Dreamlands Fanatic (ItDoN) can respond to the same occurrence. Each occurrence in the game, like a character being destroyed, can feed any number of consuming effects even on multiple cards. But the occurrence can only be used as a trigger once for each consuming effect.

• Action window starts with the initiation of an Action
• Disrupts
• Resolve Action
• Passive effects
• Forced Responses
• Responses
• Action window closes

Now that this Action is completely over and the Action window is closed, another Action could be taken by Player A. Than by player B, and so on. Players alternate taking Actions. This goes on until both players consecutively pass and the game advances to the next phase in the current turn.

Although the previous example did involve some cards, it wasn’t really complicated. Just by guessing and thinking of the meaning of the word “Disrupt” and so on you probably would have figured out the correct play intuitively. In the majority of your CoC games, you don’t need to look up the timing structure but sometimes there’s a case that’s a bit difficult, and here lies the rub.

Take for example the cards Khopesh of the Abyss (TSS) and Snow Graves (AtMoM):

Snow Graves (AtMoM) doesn’t permit the removal of cards from the discard pile, and Khopesh of the Abyss (TSS) has a passive effect on it that shuffles itself back into the draw deck after it entered the discard pile. Now what happens of those two cards are simultaneously in play and your opponent plays Burrowing Beneath (Core) to destroy the Khopesh of the Abyss (TSS) – will Khopesh of the Abyss (TSS) “win” and be shuffled back, or will Snow Graves (AtMoM) “win” and make Khopesh of the Abyss (TSS) stay in the discard pile?

In CoC, the word “cannot” is an absolute. This means that once a card is in the discard pile, there is no way to remove it from there. If an effect would remove a card from the discard pile, the initiation of that effect fails, since a card in the discard pile is an invalid target due to the word “cannot”.

To further elaborate on the proper resolution, recall and apply the steps outlined above:

• Action window starts – your opponent chooses Khopesh of the Abyss (TSS) as the target, pays 2 and plays Burrowing Beneath (Core).
• Disrupts – nothing to do here.
• Resolve Action – Burrowing Beneath (Core) puts Khopesh of the Abyss (TSS) in the discard pile.
• Passive effects – Khopesh of the Abyss (TSS) states “after” it leaves play, so its passive would like to initiate and resolve here. But Snow Graves (AtMoM) features a lasting effect that is “always on”, so it is also on right now and prevents the effect of Khopesh of the Abyss (TSS) from initiating and resolving.
• Forced Responses
• Responses
• Action Window Closes

Especially for beginners to CoC, it might seem unfamiliar to not have a stack. The stack is an intuitive approach because of the Disrupt / Instant mechanism, and many gamers have experienced it working well in popular titles such as MtG. Still the timing structure in CoC is just as robust and takes much of the mental work from the players allowing for smooth and ordered play.


Stack vs Action Window

Take a look at these cards here. They are from Middle Earth CCG (MECCG), another beautiful card game that is well worth looking into:



If you read the text of “Wizard’s River Horses”, it is clear that its second option, “cancels an attack” would have been worded as Disrupt in CoC. “The Names Among Them” would have been worded as Response, because it states that it is playable after a scout faced some sort of attack. The Watcher in the Water is a creature, and in MECCG a creature must always start a “chain of effects” (the MECCG equivalent for the stack). This means that no other creature may be played while a creature is in the stack, so creatures are played one after each other and don’t interleave in any way. Their behavior is similar to an Action in CoC.

Now you can see a practical difference between the stack and CoC’s system: you as the player have to read and “parse” the MECCG cards’ texts and rules on your own, whereas the proper slot in the timing structure of CoC can be determined just by looking at the bold trigger.


Partial resolution of effects

Generally you should resolve as much as possible of an effect. Take for example Y'Golonac (Core).

Its Action can be used to target a character that is already ready, because the text only states “choose 1 character”, not “choose 1 exhausted character”. The effect does two things: The first part readies the character. If a character has been ready from the beginning, this part fails yet the effect continues. The second part of the effect makes the chosen character commit to the same story as Y'Golonac (Core) itself. This part is resolved even if the first part failed. Therefore you can use the Action of Y'Golonac (Core) to force a ready character of your opponent to commit to the same story where Y'Golonac (Core) is committed.

In contrast to that there is the special word “Then”. This is like “cannot” and has its own meaning in CoC. If two effects are separated by the word “Then”, the second part of the effect will only be resolved if the first part has successfully resolved. Example: Small Price to Pay (Core). The first part is to choose two characters and drive one of them insane. The second part is to wound the other character. If you choose your own character to go insane but trigger the Disrupt on The Doorway (TBJ) to return that character to your hand before going insane, you may not wound the opponent character: Card effects refer to cards in play if nothing specific is mentioned. Driving the character insane fails because the character has left play, and therefore the precondition for the second part of Small Price to Pay (Core)'s effect failed. In a way "Then" can be considered a response inside an effect upon the card, linking two parts of the effect.

Also note that you may only trigger an effect if there is at least one valid target. For example if there is no Yithian in play, you are not allowed to play Interstellar Migration (TkatG) and say “Oh, there’s no Yithian so this part fails and I put the event into the discard pile. And then I trigger its second Action”. You need legal targets to start any given effect before the effect resolution can begin. So if there is no valid target, then the effect itself never starts and thus never gets to the “then” stage during the resolution.

Ok, you should be familiar with the basic concept of triggered effects in CoC. I hope you enjoyed the article. Go play some games, and stay tuned for the next article!