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1
What to Do When Something Goes Wrong- Conquest version
Feb 09 2016 03:00 PM |
steinerp
in Warhammer 40k: Conquest
The Disclaimers:The great and almighty ktom has spoken to this topic recently in the Conquest Rules forum. Here is his answer:
There is no "official stance" on what to do if players break the rules, accidentally or on purpose. The rule is simply that the ability cannot have been initiated in the first place.
Now, that answer is kind of trite and takes the unrealistic approach that mistakes never happen. However, there is no official stance on what is the "correct" or "fair" thing to do if a mistake is made - largely because every situation is unique. How big of a mistake? Was it discovered right away, or after other actions have been taken? Was it really a "mistake" or was one player trying to take advantage of the other through misdirection or exploitation of a lack of experience? FFG has pretty much opted not to try to make a general rule to cover every situation and all the possible variables.
What FFG has said, and thus made the "official stance," is that the quality of the game state is the responsibility of all players. This means that it is incumbent upon the players to try their best not to make mistakes, and to work together to "repair" the game state and come up with their own solution if mistakes are made.
Essentially, if mistakes are made and the players agree to take it back, that's the right thing to do. If mistakes are made and the players agree to proceed with the effect of the ability being unsuccessful (but all costs paid), that's also the right thing to do. If the players can't agree in a tournament and call a judge over, it is left entirely to the judge's discretion - and the players have to abide by the decision (which, obviously, encourages people to settle things for themselves).
Nothing written below is intended to contradict this. The second disclaimer is that nothing here should be taken as an official stance. The official stance is above. Finally, this article is not intended to shift how people play, if it takes six steps to play a card or trigger an ability games would be extremely long and dull.
Things go wrong?
So now that the disclaimers are out of the way, why am I writing this? Because sometimes things do go wrong and as Store Championships are going on and Regionals are approaching it is a good discussion to have to help the players and judges decide what the “right†course of action is. I’m not going to attempt to talk about what to do with missed Forced triggers or actions that were completed only to be found to be illegal a phase later, nor am I looking at intentional cheating. You have to figure that out on your own. This is just looking at situations that are mistakes resulting in illegal actions such as using Archon’s Terror when the only army unit in play is a Stalwart Ogryn.
The Principals
1. It is the responsibility of all players to ensure the game state is legal.
2. The “punishment†should fit the crime.
3. We should attempt to create a new game state as close as possible to the current game state but resolving the illegal game state.
The Rules
The RRG does talk about how to initiate an action or ability. Pages 8 and 9 for Conquest state the following as the order of operations:
1. Check play restrictions: can the card be deployed or played, or the ability initiated, at this time?
2. Determine the cost (or costs, if multiple costs are required) to deploy/play the card or initiate the ability.
3. Apply any modifiers to the cost(s).
4. Pay the cost(s).
5. Choose target(s), if applicable.
6. The card is deployed/played, or the ability resolves.
Have you ever used this checklist? I haven’t. I may have done the steps in order but it just as likely that when I want to play a card sometimes I put the card into play (step 6), pay the cost (step 4), and then declare the target (step 5). Or sometimes I play the card, declare the target, resolve the effect, then pay the cost. Or sometimes I pay the cost, declare the action, play the card, then choose targets. It is absolutely normal to treat these six steps as one and just “play the card.â€
So what happens when my opponent plays an event that can’t change the game state and has already paid the cost and discarded the card?
Short answer- You have created an illegal game state. Both players are responsible (see principle 1). So you both get a game loss. (If a judge actually does this go find a new place to play.)
A better answer- Figure out where in the condensed steps the illegal game state occurred and stop the action there. Although this too may result in an illegal state (revealing cards from hand is illegal in some games) this is usually the least harm solution. The rest of the steps occurred in reality. According to the game they could not have occurred and therefore didn’t. So what does this mean in practice? Let’s look at a couple of scenarios.
Scenario 1: The only unit in play anywhere is a Stalwart Ogryn at planet 1. The Zarathur player has 2 resource and 3 cards in hand. The Zarathur player attempts to cast Archon’s Terror, targets the Stalwart Ogryn, and discards 2 resources and the card . Step 1 says this action is a failure as it will not result in a game state change. So the Zarathur player never makes it to step 4 (pay costs) or step 6 (place event card in discard pile-technically this is right after step 6 but close enough). The Zarathur player should then return the card to hand and the resources to his pool. Since he didn’t take an action, he then uses one of the resources he “got back†to play Infernal Gateway to play a Zarathur Flamer and play continues as normal.
Scenario 2: Same as above except the Zarathur player has a Flamer already in play at the planet as well. In this scenario Step 1 will not trigger a failure as the Flamer would be a legal target and game state would change if it were targeted. When he gets to Step 5, he would be forced to target the Flamers and rout them even though this clearly is not the intention. The action is completed and resources and card are spent. Zarathur is now out of resources and will not be able to play the Gateway.
Scenario 3: Same as 1 but Stalwart Ogryn have a Hostile Environmental Gear on them giving them 5 HP and Zarathur has 7 resources. This is a win planet so Zarathur plays a Firestorm for 7 resources to ensure they are dead. There are no legal targets so Zarathur gets all the money back and plays the riskier Gateway into Flamer combo and wins the game.
Scenario 4: Same as scenario 3 but there is a Ratling Deadeye at the planet with the Ogryn.. Now Zarathur needs to kill both units to win the game; if he doesn’t he loses. So he declares a Firestorm on the Ogryn for 7, with the intent (unknown) to attack the Ratlings. When we get to step 5 it is determined that the Ogryn are not legal and he must target the Ratlings. Since the cost was already determined to be 6 the Ratlings are really, really dead and Zarathur is out of resources and loses the game.
Scenario 5: Warlock Destructor is in play. The forced reaction is not activated. The owner (player A) declares intent to deploy a unit and Player B says. “You missed the trigger so the warlock dies.†At this point you really have to call over a judge unless you can mutually agree on a solution. Keeping in mind that it is the responsibility of both players to enforce the game state, it is not the right call to destroy the warlock. Player B is just as responsible for the missed trigger as Player A is, if not more since they were apparently waiting on the missed trigger to force the negative effect. Player A should be given the opportunity to decide to pay or not. (Note: If Player A is missing the trigger on purpose, the judge may feel the need to take other actions and it is not Player B’s sole responsibility to force the trigger either.)
Scenario 6: Warlock Destructor is not paid and no one notices until late in the deploy phase. This is where the FFG position of no set rule really shines. Can the player decide now? Would it have affected other deployments? Should you reset the game to beginning of the deploy phase or is the information gained by knowing the opponent’s hand too great? Is it even really a choice (no one is going to save a warlock with 3 damage in HQ)? When trying to figure out what to do, remember the principles above and don’t be afraid to ask a judge for help if there isn’t a clean solution. That is what the judges get paid the big bucks for.
Bonus Hypothetical Scenario: Zarathur and a Flamer are facing a Ratling Sniper. Zarathur plays a Firestorm for 4 to kill the Ratling. At this point a hypothetical card is played by the opposing player “Reaction: After costs are paid, sacrifice a unit.†The Ratling is sacrificed and the Zarathur player is forced to target the Flamers.
Super Bonus Scenario: What happens to the Firestorm and Resources if the Ratlings were the only unit in play?
Summary:
FFG has purposely made the rules vague on what to do and that is a good thing. That being said the vagueness shouldn’t be used to gain an advantage for either side. Both players are responsible for ensuring game play is smooth and as close to the rules as possible, while being enjoyable (see: not doing a 6 step checklist for every action). These shortcuts will result in problems sometimes, and they all need to be dealt with on a case by case basis. The above scenarios are suggested actions from one player and assume the issues are found quickly and there is no intent to cheat the game or the system.
Note 1: There is nothing special about the Flamers in this scenario 1 or the ratlings in Scenario 4. A unit controlled by either player and any planet that could be affected would allow the action to proceed.
Note 2: This is absolutely 100% personal opinion with no basis in the rules at all. But unless you feel like the opponent was attempting to cheat and target a unit he knew he couldn’t in Scenarios 2 and 4, consider allowing them to take back the entire action. But as a judge, this is NOT an option.
- HidaHonk, xRAVEx and Kaloo like this
10 Comments
#5 is an interesting one, because I think most players' immediate assumption would be that the ruling should be "you forgot to pay, so it gets discarded". It's definitely how I would have thought it should be played until I read this article and thought about the scenario in detail)
And that outcome would make sense if it was an optional reaction that the player forgot: "You forgot to activate the optional trigger that keeps the unit alive, so tough luck, it dies".
But that's not how Warlock Destructor works. It has a forced reaction telling you to either discard or pay and you forgot to do either. You have to do one of the two at the time specified. Discarding after the fact is technically no better than paying the resource after the fact. Both repair the broken game state, but neither is technically legal.
(An additional note is that we know that forced reactions aren't resolved by a player, but by the game state itself, giving additional weight to the argument that "both players had a responsibility to remember this trigger".)
^^this. I'm loving the big bucks we're all rolling in from TOing those events. I might have to build another wing on the house just to fit it all. ;D
What? Judges are paid? I've been robbed!
Caldera- A card may only be played/an ability used if its effects would change the game state. Since there are no legal targets for the Terror, its effect can not change the game state. That there is a reaction to the play that would change the game state is unfortunately irrelevant.
Under Card Effect in the RRG: "A card ability can only be initiated if its effect has some potential to change the game state, and its cost (after modifiers) has the potential to be paid in full."
You would fail step 1. The effect of the action (destroy a target exhausted support card) would not change the game state so it cannot be initiated.
The sacrifice is a cost not an effect. The effect has to change the game state (otherwise that rule would be meaningless as just about every action has some sort of cost that changes game state)