Tara bomb doesn't work?

[Math Mathonwy]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I always believed that the so-called Tara-bomb was supposed to work like this:

1. Activate Tara first getting Eternal Moment

2. Give something nasty Fast while Burying it using Obliteration Symbiote

3. Do stuff with your other models

4. Gain reactivate once all your models have activated

5. Run Tara towards the enemy, unbury the big nasty and do bad things with it

The problem is that step number four.

Eternal Moment says:

"Eternal: Once all other friendly models have Activated, this

model gains the Reactivate Condition."

It doesn't say "friendly models in play". The Buried model hasn't been activated and thus denies the Reactivate. This also means that a buried Killjoy or buried Bete messes up Eternal Moment.

Please tell me I have missed something here.

You can, of course, forfeit the Reactivate from first turn and just throw the nasty at the enemy at the start of turn two, but that's not a "bomb". Then your big nasty is in the midst of enemies and has been activated. It will die. The bomb part, to me, always was that you can activate almost twice in a row since you activate at the end of the first turn and then near the beginning of the second turn.

I have seen this tactic executed in several playtest battle reports. Those have been lost when the forum beta sections were taken away, but I find it hard to believe that no one else has caught this. So is there somethingthat I'm missing? (Please tell me that there is something as this kinda kills Tara for me)

[zFiend]

Now this is exactly why you needed to post this We had 3 people wondering this today and all came to the same conclusion. 

[Sevorin]

I agree. Have people been playing it the way you described? If so (and if something isn't missing from this equation) that is incorrect.

 

 Edit: And honestly, Tara doesn't need this to be good. She is good anyway (though I know that isn't a popular concept).

[Justin]

Unless a model's printed action or ability specifies that it accounts for models not in play, then it doesn't.

 

"In play" is implied in pretty much all rules text, and spelled out in a few just to make things absolutely clear.

[The Godlyness]

Doesn't the buried text say if your buried you don't activate? Therefore Tara does gain reactivate since all models in play have activated. So Tara bomb works just fine how it is supposed to.

[Math Mathonwy]

Unless an action/ability/whatever specifies that it accounts for models not in play, then it doesn't.

 

"In play" is implied in pretty much all rules text, and spelled out in a few just to make things absolutely clear.

OK, that solves it then, thank you.

I'm a bit disappointed that you caught this so fast since the conversation would've certainly been interesting, but fair enough. And, as a Tara player, I'm happy with the result, I have to say.

[Math Mathonwy]

Doesn't the buried text say if your buried you don't activate? Therefore Tara does gain reactivate since all models in play have activated. So Tara bomb works just fine how it is supposed to.

You added an "in play" there that isn't in there RAW but rather as an implied thing as Justin clarified. A buried model can be in the activated state or non-activated state just fine.

[The Godlyness]

I added in play since buried models do not activate.and are not in play. And since all friendly models that could activate (at that time) did then she gains reactivate.

[Math Mathonwy]

I added in play since buried models do not activate. And are not in play.

Yeah, they don't activate but they can be in a state of "has been activated" or in a state of "has not been activated". Whether they can activate or not doesn't affect Tara's ability one bit.

But as Justin clarified, there is an implied "in play" in the rules text of Eternal Moment so it's a moot point.

[Adran]

Without that implied in play, you could have argued that models that are dead, and models that were never hired could also stop her reactivating. After all they are also not in play, just like the buried model. (ok its taking the point to the extreme. But no one would think the arguement "You can't reactivate, I killed that model and it hasn't activated yet" had any legs)

[zFiend]

Without that implied in play, you could have argued that models that are dead, and models that were never hired could also stop her reactivating. After all they are also not in play, just like the buried model. (ok its taking the point to the extreme. But no one would think the arguement "You can't reactivate, I killed that model and it hasn't activated yet" had any legs)

 

I don't think that quite works.

[Math Mathonwy]

Without that implied in play, you could have argued that models that are dead, and models that were never hired could also stop her reactivating. After all they are also not in play, just like the buried model. (ok its taking the point to the extreme. But no one would think the arguement "You can't reactivate, I killed that model and it hasn't activated yet" had any legs)

Neither dead nor unhired models can be in a state of "has been activated" or in a state of "has not been activated". Buried models do have these two states.

[Ausplosions]

But as they are not in play their state doesn't matter.

Can this be locked now? It has been answered.

[Math Mathonwy]

But as they are not in play their state doesn't matter.

That doesn't make any sense.

Can this be locked now? It has been answered.

You could, of course, just stop answering it. Especially since your contribution wasn't very useful.

[The Godlyness]

What ausplosions means is that this "state" business does not exist in the rules. What does exist is the question "can this model activate yes or no?" Then you reference other rules that say if the answer was yes then it can't do so again with out reactivate. And this only cares about things that can active.