Parsimony of Seclusion

Any rule erratum or clarification submission for the upcoming 2019 ARV should be posted here.
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CDavis7M
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Konrad Klar wrote: Sun Sep 08, 2019 8:03 am
Theo wrote: Sun Sep 08, 2019 4:49 am Why do you say that some cards untap outside of a chain of effects?
If action is both mandatory (must happen) and nothing causes its declaration then it happens outside of a chain of effects.
Or maybe player declares untap Item 1, untap Item 2 etc.. actions?
I mostly agree with what Theo said. I don't agree with the concept of untapping occurring without being declared and resolved.

My read of the rules is that EVERY action (see next paragraph) is declared and resolved. Including untapping an item in the untap phase. If course, the player doesn't need to declare this action, they just perform it since there is no opportunity or reason to respond. And so the rules don't describe it as such as there is no need to belabor the untap phase, etc.

Also, every movement/positioning of a card or interaction a player makes with the game is considered an ACTION (meaning it will technically be declared and resolved), though some actions are not considered to be actions (eg some actions are considered active conditions instead, or some actions are considered to be synonymous with other actions).
Konrad Klar wrote: Sun Sep 08, 2019 8:03 amTake the Smoke on the Wind as example.
Now look on: "Otherwise, you may tap one character in the company and put this card in your marshalling point pile."
This is the activity that you may take, but you do not must take (even if you can).
Tapping of character is an action. Right?
Was it declared or resolved?
Tapping of a character is an action. In the quote of Smoke, tapping is declared and resolved in the "otherwise" statement.

First, let's look at the previous sentence of Smoke as well.
If no characters are untapped following the attack, discard this card. Otherwise, you may tap one character in the company and put this card in your marshalling point pile.  
"Otherwise" used here means "if at least one character is untapped following the attack and if Smoke was not discarded."

Consequently the declared effect is "if at least one character is untapped following the attack, you may tap one character in the company and put this card in your marshalling point pile."

As a result of the "if" statement, this declaration is NOT a direct declaration of the tapping a character action or a declaration of the action of putting Smoke in the MP pile. The resolution of the tapping and MP actions are conditional based on the "if" statement. The tapping action is not a required action nor is it synonymous with the action of moving Smoke to the MP pile.


Also, I think discussion of whether the player may choose not to tap a character if they have one available (ie they played Smoke but they don't want the MP for some reason) is irrelevant.
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Theo
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But they would still get the MP. O_o Yeah, not relevant here.
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CDavis7M
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Ah. That is silly.

I think that "may" = "must".

UPDATE: But really, I think that the term "may" is completely irrelevant to the action that was declared. The declared action may have conditions, but resolution of the declared action in a chain of effect doesn't involve a choice by the player when the player did not declare that choice.

With Smoke on the Wind, the action of tapping and the action of moving Smoke to the MP pile are already declared, only conditioned upon there being untapped characters. If there is an untapped character, these actions resolve. There is nothing left for the player to decide at this point. Alea iacta est. The chain of effect is casts.
Last edited by CDavis7M on Mon Sep 09, 2019 6:45 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Bandobras Took
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Simple example:

You declare the ability of Spider of the Morlat to return to your hand. This targets Spider of the Morlat (action: return card to your hand. entity: Spider of the Morlat card). When the card resolves, Spider of the Morlat is returned to your hand. But the annotation says that Spider of the Morlat must be in play when the card resolves. So the return to hand action fizzles, which means Spider of the Morlat stays in play.

This cannot be how it's meant to work. And the impossibility of targeting anything not in play with an action is a further flaw of the annotation.

It should rather say, "An action that requires a target in a specific game location (e.g. in play, in the discard pile, in the play deck, etc. is considered to have the active condition that the target be in that location when the action is declared and when determining whether it successfully resolves. An action may not be declared if its target is not in the required game location."

Or words to that effect.
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Konrad Klar
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Bandobras Took wrote: Mon Sep 09, 2019 1:34 pm You declare the ability of Spider of the Morlat to return to your hand. This targets Spider of the Morlat (action: return card to your hand. entity: Spider of the Morlat card). When the card resolves, Spider of the Morlat is returned to your hand. But the annotation says that Spider of the Morlat must be in play when the card resolves. So the return to hand action fizzles, which means Spider of the Morlat stays in play.
Underlines mine.

I'm suspecting that you mean "action resolves".

I'm not denying: as long there is no (acknowledging of) distinction between resolution and execution of action, the problem exists.

What about:
Annotation 7: If any other active condition for an action does not exist when the
action is resolved, the action has no effect; if the action was playing a card from your
hand, it is discarded.
?
Is here no distinction between "resolution" and "having effect"?
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CDavis7M
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CRF Rulings by Term - Active Conditions wrote:Annotation 8: An action that requires a target is considered to have the active condition that the target be in play when the action is declared and when it is resolved. An action may not be declared if its target is not in play. However, dice-rolling actions may always be targeted by other actions declared later in the same chain of effects.
Spider of the Môrlat wrote:...You can return Spider of the Môrlat as a permanent-event to your hand-which counts as one against the hazard limit.
The action is "return Spider of the Môrlat from play as a permanent-event to your hand." How else can the Spider be returned to hand as a permanent-event, but from play?

If we over complicate things, "When it is resolved" refers to the resolving of this action. This action includes a portion of time when Spider of the Môrlat is still in play as a permanent-event, a portion of time when it is returning to your hand, and a portion of time when it is returned to your hand. Even still, there is a portion of time "when" the action is resolved (the movement of the card) that Spider of the Môrlat is still in play.

I don't see any reason to further complicate Annotation 8.

Of course, Annotation 8 does not say "An action that requires a target is considered to have the active condition that the target be in play when the action is declared and when after it is resolved." That would not make sense.
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Bandobras Took
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All the things that use the same language to refer to the same time happen at the same time. This is a problem.

The inability to legally target cards in the discard pile, hand, or play deck is also a problem.

Neither of these were intended by ICE.

Adding letters and commas will only be too complicated to those who have no interest in playing the game, anyway.

@ Konrad: You're right; I misspoke. I meant when the action resolves.

As far as annotation 7 goes, that's interesting. Would this mean that actions that do not meet their requisite conditions nevertheless resolve, but for no effect? And is that different from "The passive condition must exist when this resulting action is resolved in its own chain of effects, or the action is canceled."?
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Konrad Klar
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Bandobras Took wrote: Tue Sep 10, 2019 2:17 am The inability to legally target cards in the discard pile, hand, or play deck is also a problem.
"An action that requires a target is considered to have the active
condition that the target be in play"
should be replaced by:
"An action that requires a target is considered to have the active condition
that the target be in location indicated by declared action (by default in play)".

BTW: the problem does not apply to Parsimony of Seclusion.
As far as annotation 7 goes, that's interesting. Would this mean that actions that do not meet their requisite conditions nevertheless resolve, but for no effect? And is that different from "The passive condition must exist when this resulting action is resolved in its own chain of effects, or the action is canceled."?
Bandobras Took wrote: Tue Sep 10, 2019 2:17 am All the things that use the same language to refer to the same time happen at the same time. This is a problem.
All the things use almost the same language to refer to different things that happen almost at the same time. This is a problem.
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CDavis7M
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If an out of play target were made to be an active condition of the action then wouldn't the card need to be named and the particular out of play deck/area checked at declaration?

This would remove any surprises from Mouth of Sauron and Smoke Rings.

I think the rules are fine as is. Cards specifically targeting an out of play card just resolve without needing to make the target an active condition. The rules don't apply because the card themselves will indicate that it targets the discard pile, sideboard, etc.
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CDavis7M
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The Companion Books state: "These are called active conditions because a player actively decides to invoke the action they satisfy. Active conditions serve as the price of an action. They are restrictions to the player invoking the action."

The rules on Active Conditions were created to solve timing issues. Before Active Conditions, if a card was to be tapped or discarded along with some effect, the tapping/discarding and the effect happened at resolution. This was problematic because the tapping/discarding effect could just fail to resolve (e.g., because the entity was tapped or discarded by some later declared and earlier resolved effect). Otherwise one Ranger could play multiple cards at the end the Organization Phase, or one Sage could play multiple copies of Dreams of Lore at once.

I think regardless of how the card is worded, if an entity needs to be tapped/discarded/whatever action, and the action serves as the "price" of the action and "restricts" the player from invoking actions, then that action IS an active condition.

Annotations 5 and 6 refer to the "main effect." Clearly the "main effect" is the entire purpose of the card -- cancelling something, getting some bonus, retrieving a card, healing a character, etc. Tapping and discarding are the "prices" for performing the main action (which is the entire reason for playing the card in the first place).

Moving a card from your discard pile to your hand is an action. Having a particular card in your discard pile is a "price" as it is a "restriction" (the card has to be there by some mechanism of the game). Therefore, I see no reason for "return any manifestation of Agburanar to your hand" to not be an active condition for the action of "increase the hazard limit by two." Sure, returning Agburanar to your hand is nice and it is a reason to play the card in itself, but it is also a restriction.

Beyond that, surely a non-unique short event cannot increase the hazard limit by 2 without some restriction.
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Konrad Klar
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CDavis7M wrote: Wed Jan 22, 2020 2:31 am The rules on Active Conditions were created to solve timing issues. Before Active Conditions [...]
I do not think that there was the the time before Active Conditions. I think that there was the time before Active Conditions have been formalized.
CDavis7M wrote: Wed Jan 22, 2020 2:31 am Moving a card from your discard pile to your hand is an action. Having a particular card in your discard pile is a "price" as it is a "restriction" (the card has to be there by some mechanism of the game)
CRF wrote:An active condition must be in play or established when the action requiring it is
declared. Active conditions serve as the price of an action.
It makes a sense to put "price" in quotation marks in case of active conditions that must be in play. No one pays for presence or absence of something.

Mere fact that player must something does not mean that he will be able. Requiring presence of manifestation of unique Dragon or Agburanar
in discard pile is like requiring of absence of Bane pf the Ithil-stone in play (for non-minion players).
If the manifestation will be absent in discard pile or if Bane of the Ithil-stone will in play at resolution, then Parsimony of Seclusion will not return anything to hand. But it does not mean that the card will not resolve.
Manifestation that was absent in discard pile at declaration may appear in discard pile before resolution. Bane of the Ithil-stone present at declaration may be discarded before resolution of Parsimony of Seclusion.

Only if the manifestation to be returned would be specified at declaration (would be target), or Parsimony of Seclusion would explicitly require a presence of the/such manifestation in discard pile, then the presence of the/such manifestation in discard pile would be active condition of Parsimony of Seclusion.
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CDavis7M
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Konrad Klar wrote: Wed Jan 22, 2020 8:00 am
CDavis7M wrote: Wed Jan 22, 2020 2:31 am The rules on Active Conditions were created to solve timing issues. Before Active Conditions [...]
I do not think that there was the the time before Active Conditions. I think that there was the time before Active Conditions have been formalized.
Active Conditions changed the last-in-first-out rules. This is explicit.

Konrad Klar wrote: Wed Jan 22, 2020 8:00 am It makes a sense to put "price" in quotation marks in case of active conditions that must be in play. No one pays for presence or absence of something.

Mere fact that player must something does not mean that he will be able. Requiring presence of manifestation of unique Dragon or Agburanar
in discard pile is like requiring of absence of Bane pf the Ithil-stone in play (for non-minion players).
If the manifestation will be absent in discard pile or if Bane of the Ithil-stone will in play at resolution, then Parsimony of Seclusion will not return anything to hand. But it does not mean that the card will not resolve.
Manifestation that was absent in discard pile at declaration may appear in discard pile before resolution. Bane of the Ithil-stone present at declaration may be discarded before resolution of Parsimony of Seclusion.

Only if the manifestation to be returned would be specified at declaration (would be target), or Parsimony of Seclusion would explicitly require a presence of the/such manifestation in discard pile, then the presence of the/such manifestation in discard pile would be active condition of Parsimony of Seclusion.
You have to understand the gameplay considerations made by the player in order to understand whether an action is an active condition (but you will have had to have read the Companion to understand). There is a "price" paid by the player by simply by Agburanar in the deck of sideboard. There is a price to be paid for drawing your 1-3 copies of Agburanar instead of some other card. There is a price to be paid by moving a copy of Agburanar to the discard pile. There are so many restrictions to the player actually getting Agburanar into his discard pile in order to be able to use Parsimony. This is the definition of an Active Condition. Abguranar in the discard pile serves as the price of an action and it is a restriction to the player invoking the action.
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Konrad Klar
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"Nothing is for free" is not definition of "price", nor definition of Active Conditions.
Or it is the definition?
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Konrad Klar wrote: Thu Jan 23, 2020 12:24 pm "Nothing is for free" is not definition of "price", nor definition of Active Conditions.
Or it is the definition?
Determination of active conditions requires reading comprehension.
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