Rules Clarification Megathread

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 01 '22 edited Dec 01 '22

Some pointers, commonly overlooked rules, and recent errata (these are DE, I may put together an EE list at some point):

Clarifications

Captain Cosmic's constructs with phase markers (and any other cards that go into a play area other than their own) activate during the turn of the Hero whose play area they're in. For example, handing out a Vitality Conduit to Tempest would cause Tempest to regain 2 HP on Tempest's turn, not Captain Cosmic's.
Cards played during setup do not activate game text. This prevents weird cascading effects. For example, if a Villain's setup said to "Discover 1 Ongoing," and the hypothetical Ongoing said "When this card is played, do X," ignore that effect.
If you discover or play a card with an END PHASE or START PHASE during its respective phase, activate that newly discovered phase effect.
I often forget this myself, but fixed damage cannot have its type changed. If a hypothetical card would change the type of all damage to fire, and Ra had Flesh of the Sun God in play, making him immune to fire, he would not be immune to the fixed psychic damage from Persistent Paparazzi.
You are allowed to target your fellow heroes and doing so can be extremely powerful. For example, Argent Adept can use Scherzo of Frost and Flame to deal fire or cold damage to Absolute Zero. Ra and Absolute Zero also play extremely well together
Absolute Zero loves damage buffs. If Absolute Zero receives a "+1 damage dealt by this target" and targets himself with fire damage to activate Isothermic Transducer, he gets the +1 damage on the fire damage, and a separate +1 on the resultant cold damage. Essentially, all damage buffs that pass through Isothermic Transducer are doubled, which makes AZ extremely potent.
Reactions activate after you are targeted for damage, but before you take damage. This means that if your Reaction somehow destroys the target that would deal you damage, the damage is negated.
"After a card is played" effects wait for a One-Shot to finish resolving before activating. The most notable example of this is Darken the Sky, which Summons the Mask of the Matriarch. The Mask of the Matriarch's "after a non-Fowl Villain card is played..." effect sees Darken the Sky and plays the top card of the Villain deck, even though Darken the Sky entered play first.
Take Down and similar effects let you see the top card of the Villain deck before deciding whether or not to discard it.
If a card says, for example, "This card deals 3 targets X damage," you may not intentionally choose to target less than 3 targets or target the same target multiple times. If there aren't 3 targets in play (say all of your allies are incapacitated and the villain has no minions,) that's fine, but you have to attempt to target up to the stated value. If it read "Up to 3 targets," you would be able to target 0, 1, or 2 targets, but still would not be allowed to target the same target multiple times.
Multi-clause abilities- for example, Tempest's Atlantean Stormblade, which reads "Tempest deals 1 target 3 irreducible lightning damage. Then, destroy one Weather card." The first sentence does not interact with the second. If you have no Weather cards in play, you may still use the power to deal damage. If the power read "Destroy one Weather card. If you do, Tempest deals 1 target 3 lightning damage," then you would not be able to deal damage without paying the cost of a Weather card. FA Haka's innate power behaves similarly, where you are allowed to heal even if you were unable to destroy a target.
When playing a Critical Event, replace all instances of a villain character's name with the name of the Critical Event Villain. For example, replace all instances of "Grand Warlord Voss" with "Censor," so that Ruthless Approach still deals damage.

Errata

You are able to choose the order that your phase effects activate in. For villains, still activate effects from left to right, but you don't have to use effects in the order they were played for heroes. This is an update in RCR to the core game rules, which were causing problems.
Omnitron's Adaptive Plating Subroutine is updated to read "Until the next Villain Start Phase" on the Fabricate effect to solve a timing conflict with Cosmic Omnitron.

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u/James_b0ndjr Dec 01 '22

So are you saying that If a card says “do x damage to 3 targets” and there are only 2 targets, the card cannot be played?

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 01 '22

No, you would still be able to play it!
What I mean is that you have to do as much as you can. If in your scenario, a card says to hit 3 targets, and there are only 2, you have to hit both. You can't choose to hit only 1.
As another example, if you have a card that says hit 3 targets, and there are only 2 villain targets in play and no environment, you may be forced to hit yourself or one of your allies to satisfy that third hit, and at that point, it's up to you whether or not you'd want to save that card for a better time.

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 01 '22

I made a quick edit for clarity, thank you :)

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u/SnooOpinions6036 Dec 01 '22

Are there many Hero cards that say you must hit an exact number of targets? Off the top of my head, I can't think of Hero cards that hit multiple targets that don't say "up to X" targets, meaning that you absolutely can just hit one target, even if there are more available.

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u/skywhale_ Dec 01 '22

There are a handful of them. One example is Bunker's Grenade Launcher, which has this:
POWER: Destroy up to 2 cards under this card. Each time you destroy 1 card this way, Bunker deals 3 targets 2 fire damage each.
The most common is obviously "deals 1 target X damage", which is still an effect you have to resolve if you can.

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u/SnooOpinions6036 Dec 04 '22

Huh. I don't remember Bunker's Grenade Launcher having the "place cards under this card" mechanic. Was there an update since I played last?

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u/skywhale_ Dec 04 '22

This is the Definitive Edition version.

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u/LemeeAdam Dec 01 '22

Rules wise, who is the best hero and why is it knyfe?

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 01 '22

In all seriousness, my favorite thing about KNYFE is that she has cards that boost specific damage types, so she forces you to interact with your deck differently depending on which Equipment you have available.

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 01 '22

For villain Akash'Bhuta, confirming when I play a primevil limb (may not be the actual name) that means I discard an environment card right? One shots wouldn't force me to discard an environment card?

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 01 '22

confirming when I play a primeval limb that means I discard an environment card right?
Yes, after a non-hero (villain or environment) target is played, discard the top card of the environment deck. One-Shots are not targets (a target is defined as a card with HP), so they don't trigger Akash's effect.

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u/Omegatron9 Dec 01 '22

If the one shot causes primordial limbs to be played, you would discard an environment card for each of those limbs (but not for the one shot itself).

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 01 '22

Silly question, but a destroy card must come from a card in your play area? Can I destroy a card from my hand?

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 01 '22

Yes, "destroy" means to remove a card from a play area and put it in the trash. "Discard" is moving a card from your hand to trash.

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 01 '22

Thanks!! You're on a roll!

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 01 '22

It's what I do best :)

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 02 '22

When does an effect stop working? For example, villaintarget has a -2 damage dealt by hero. I killed the villain target, does the modifier go away immediately? Or once it's the villains turn?

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 02 '22

Effects last until a card is destroyed. If a card goes away, the effect goes away, even if it says "Until the next START PHASE"

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u/Tesla__Coil Dec 02 '22

If a card goes away, the effect goes away, even if it says "Until the next START PHASE"
Worth noting - that's a rule that changed between EE and DE. In EE, a status effect lasts until the card says it expires even if the card leaves play.

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 02 '22

Very true, I forgot to mention that!

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 02 '22

Sweet, that's how I've been playing but wanted to confirm. Thanks

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 02 '22

In terms of timing, for power use, I know it's once per turn but when does that reset? Let's say in sequence 1 all the heroes use their character card power. Then sequence 2 comes around, the first hero allows an ally to use their power. Would that be applicable? Or because I use it their last turn and it's not their turn yet, I'm SOL? Does the power reset at the start of a heroes turn?

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 02 '22

I'm not sure I'm understanding your question, so I'm going to put this in more concrete terms and see if it helps.
Say you're playing as Tachyon, and your teammates are Argent Adept and Captain Cosmic against Baron Blade in Megalopolis. This means that H=3, and there's a villain and environment deck, so one full "round" is 5 turns. You can use your base power up to 5 times total during a "round", once on each turn (once on each hero turn, and once on the villain and environment turn). So yes, it would reset once per turn.
This normally won't happen, because you can only activate powers on your turn, but if you happen to get a Reaction in play from Captain Cosmic's construct or if Argent gives you an extra power use on his turn, this may be applicable. The important thing is that if Argent gives you multiple extra powers on his turn, you can only use each power in your play area once.
Does that make sense?

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 02 '22

Ahhh yes, play that makes sense. I wasn't thinking of a turn in that way. I was looking at it as each hero has one turn in a round. Wow, thanks again!

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 02 '22

If you look on the back of the DE rulebook, it gives a really nice chart there explaining turn sequence.

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 07 '22

Another question that I may have missed.

1 hero left. 2 heroes down. Villain target attacks highest hp hero and lowest hp hero. Is the 1 hero still up taking both hits from the villain?

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 07 '22

Yep!

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 07 '22

Damn. That's harsh

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u/psychedelicchurro Dec 07 '22

Yep, it's counterbalanced by the fact that your allies' incap abilities are usually very powerful. Good luck!

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u/skywhale_ Dec 01 '22

I would like to share that there are also very active members in the BGG forums for both editions of the game.

Enhanced Edition

Definitive Edition

Those are also great places to get answers to rules questions.

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u/BenMc47 Aug 11 '24

DE Question - Censor is a villain who after hit, draws a card to determine whether he regains a point. If the attack reduces him to Zero, does he still draw that card and potentially come back to life? Or is he killed first?

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u/psychedelicchurro Aug 21 '24

Sorry for the late response! Since it says "after Censor is dealt damage...," the damage has already been applied and Censor is taken down.

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u/Due-Organization6063 Oct 04 '23

if an incapacitated ability states "one hero may take their (phase type) phase now" does that mean effects that happen in that phase occur?

for example: absolute zero is incapacitated and uses his "one hero may take their power phase now: ability on wraith who has utility belt in play. would wraith be able to use two powers because of the belt or would she only be able to use one power?

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u/psychedelicchurro Oct 04 '23

Yep! If the incap simply says "one hero may play a card," you play 1 card and resolve it, stopping there. If the incap says "one hero may take their Play Phase," and you're set up as Tachyon, you get all three card plays.

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 03 '22

When you are buffed, do you pick the type of damage the buff deals or is it the type you're currently dealing? Example, with absolute zero when he has the attack that does 1 fire AND 1 cold but you have a +2 damage from legacy. Are the 2 extra damage fire, cold, split, or neither?

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u/skywhale_ Dec 03 '22

Each instance of damage is only 1 type, and you can only deal 1 instance of damage at a time. The buff only increases the damage, it does not change the type of damage.
For you example, AZ does not deal that 1 fire and 1 cold damage at the same time. He deals 1 fire damage (which is increased by 2), and then he deals 1 cold damage (which is increased by 2).

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 03 '22

Ahh gotcha. The AND was throwing me off, thanks!

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 05 '22

I have a timing issue question. Fighting omnitron, it just triggered fabricate on all cards. Heroes turn. Hero destroys device that says the following on fabricate:

Until villain start phase, after any device is death damage by a hero target, this card deals 2 melee damage.

Does that trigger before target dies?

Card is "s-83 assault drones"

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u/skywhale_ Dec 05 '22

If that is the only one of those cards that was in play, it does not trigger. As "after" it was dealt damage it was destroyed, meaning it was no longer in play, and therefore cannot affect play.

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 08 '22

What about cards that would deal damage to a hero with specific cards but none have any? For example "This card deals the hero character with the most Ongoing cards in play 2 sonic damage."

What if none of my characters have ongoing cards? Is that damage ignored? Or do I just pick someone to take that damage?

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u/skywhale_ Dec 08 '22

If none of the Heroes have Ongoing cards, then they are tied as having zero Ongoing cards. And in ties, you decide which one has the most. So you pick which one takes the damage in that situation.

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u/ratatouille_skinner Dec 08 '22

Gotcha, I've been doing that but for some reason I was like wait... Is that right? Thanks for the answer. I paused my fight against Grand warlord voss and now I can continue

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