RAW: Obey - Horror Duel - Paralyze

[scarlett fever]

Apologies in advance, if you dislike hideous RAW twistings read no further.

 

So in my game today I had a situation where my Thunder Archer performed Rain of Arrows (at the end of the turn make a (2)Sh Attack Action) and choose to shoot Bad Juju, failing a Horror test.

There was a bit of discussion whether the Paralyzed Condition remains on the model so I looked through the rules.

After reading the rules for Actions, Activations, Horror Duels and the Paralyzed Condition I realised something odd.

 

Horror Duels

"A model that fails a Horror Duel immediately gains the Paralyzed Condition"

"Note that models that gain the Paralyzed Condition during their Activation immediately end their Activation", pg.48 big rulebook

 

Paralyzed Condition

"The Paralyzed Condition is removed at the end of a model's Activation"

"If a model gains the Paralyzed Condition during its Activation it loses all of its AP, may not take any more Actions, and ends its current Action with no effect." , pg.52 big rulebook

 

The last statement is conditional, the effects only apply to models gaining the Paralyzed Condition during their Activation.

However in the case in point the model is taking an Action outside of its Activation so therefore there is nothing in the rules to say that it ends its current Action. RAW the Action still goes through but the model gains the Paralyzed condition. I can't see anything in the rules to contradict this.

 

Of course at this point my opponent pointed out the obvious situation I'd forgotten, that of Obey and Terrifying. So we're all playing that you Obey a target to Attack a Terrifying model and give them Paralyzed, ending their Action. So of course that's how I played the Rain of Arrows situation, anything else would be odd (mind you Obey - Terrifying is a bit odd, as is the carry over Paralyzed), but it doesn't quite read that way.

 

Of course there could well be something I've missed.

[Jeebus]

i was just musing over this the other day (obey terrifying), and i came to the same conclusion. it wouldn't end the action but would apply paralyzed. There are similar things that seem to slip through due to actions taken outside of activations such as Shot in the Rear from Ulix and Eat Your Fill on the Warpig. Shot in the Rear lets a pig make a charge action and if it kills the target make another, and another, and another, . . . Eat Your Fill lets you heal all your wounds but end your activation. The warpig isn't activating so it would heal up and continue rampaging due to Shot in the Rear. 

 

at least thats how ive understood it. Someone more educated may see it differently. 

[Myyrä]

Seems you are correct here. Both of you.

It doesn't matter if people like it or not, but that's what's written in the rules.

[enderwiggin]

The pig healing (don't have the book in front of me) may be situational depending on the wording, it may require ending your activation to complete the ability but since I can't check if someone has the text to post it'd be helpful.

 

The paralyze bit seems correct, utterly filthy, but by RAW correct. This is one of the few times I would wish to see some errata addressing an oversight like that.

[Vorschlag]

Agreed if people accept that you can bypass it in such a way I think it needs to be errata'd as I "assume" that is not how it was intended.

[Hateful Darkblack]

Huh. Weird.

[Math Mathonwy]

The paralyze bit seems correct, utterly filthy, but by RAW correct. This is one of the few times I would wish to see some errata addressing an oversight like that.

I don't understand - what is filthy about it? Isn't it less filthy than how people have been playing it this far since you need to also make the Obeyed enemy miss?

[zFiend]

I don't understand - what is filthy about it? Isn't it less filthy than how people have been playing it this far since you need to also make the Obeyed enemy miss?

 

I'm a bit out in the blue as well here. 

[Vorschlag]

perhaps because at no other time do you continue to try and hit after failing a horror duel,...at least that I can think of.

[Adran]

perhaps because at no other time do you continue to try and hit after failing a horror duel,...at least that I can think of.

 

Well every time that you are immune to paralyse you take the duel, and carry on regardless.

 

And if you're taking a Ml attack, the paralysed condition reduces your range to 0. Not going to stop you shooting. But its already the case that you can obey a paralysed model to walk and shoot a gun, so this is pretty much the same.

[Kadeton]

I don't understand - what is filthy about it? Isn't it less filthy than how people have been playing it this far since you need to also make the Obeyed enemy miss?

 

I suspect the bit that's filthy is a shot-in-the-rear Sow only suffering the penalties of Paralysis once her rampage is over and half your crew is dead.

[enderwiggin]

If a model is paralyzed then they should stay paralyzed until the condition is removed. I don't see why that wouldn't be considered filthy that an Obeying master can just get around that condition willy nilly.

 

 

If you meant the pig thing, no I didn't care about that and the paralyze in that case differently. That's why I had the two separated, but I guess it could have been read differently.

[Adran]

i was just musing over this the other day (obey terrifying), and i came to the same conclusion. it wouldn't end the action but would apply paralyzed. There are similar things that seem to slip through due to actions taken outside of activations such as Shot in the Rear from Ulix and Eat Your Fill on the Warpig. Shot in the Rear lets a pig make a charge action and if it kills the target make another, and another, and another, . . . Eat Your Fill lets you heal all your wounds but end your activation. The warpig isn't activating so it would heal up and continue rampaging due to Shot in the Rear. 

 

at least thats how ive understood it. Someone more educated may see it differently. 

 

"Eat you fill

After killing or sacfrificing an enemy model, this model may choose heal all damage it has suffered and end its activation."

 

If its not in an activation that it can end, then surely it can't choose to heal all damage?

[Myyrä]

"Eat you fill

After killing or sacfrificing an enemy model, this model may choose heal all damage it has suffered and end its activation."

 

If its not in an activation that it can end, then surely it can't choose to heal all damage?

If ending the activation is supposed to be a requirement it should read "This model may end its activation to heal all damage it has suffered" or something. Now it is just a part of the effect.

[Fetid Strumpet]

While the action might not officially end, don't forget they still have the paralyzed condition, and the instant they aqcuire it their ml ranges all drop to 0. So unless they are in base to base with the enemy, or they were taking an action that wasnt an ml, the action will automatically fail because they no longer have range to the enemy.

[Kadeton]

Don't you check range before you test for Terrifying? At that point, the current Action would keep going, even if it's now out of range. (Talking purely RAW, of course - I think all this is basically nonsense from a RAI perspective.)

[Myyrä]

You can't possibly test terrifying before checking the range because you aren't allowed to declare an action if you are out of range.

[Kadeton]

Indeed. So you check range, test for Terrifying, fail, get reduced to 0" melee, but still complete the melee attack because you don't test range for the same action again. (As written.)

[Kapten Vendetta]

Can someone enlighten me as to what the Obey - Terrifiying thingamajigg is?

 

I've come across this tactic before, but can't for the life of he remember where, so how does it work?

 

You Obey an enemy model to attack a terrifiying model (your model? Or any model?) and as you control that model for the duration of the Obey, you choose to fail the terriying check that model is forced to take because it's trying to attack said scary piece of plastic? Upon which the paralyzed condition comes into effect, effectively robbing that enemy model of an activation.

 

Is that the correct way to do it, or an I missing something? I don't have any cards or rulebook at hand since I'm currently at a hotel - lacking a fridge so I have to cool my beer in the sink... - and have no other way of deducing this.

 

Thanks in advance.

[Bengt]

You Obey an enemy model to attack a terrifiying model (your model? Or any model?) and as you control that model for the duration of the Obey, you choose to fail the terriying check that model is forced to take because it's trying to attack said scary piece of plastic? Upon which the paralyzed condition comes into effect, effectively robbing that enemy model of an activation.

You Obey it to attack or walk into the engagement range of a Terrifying model that is an enemy to it, as that is a requirement of Terrifying. Then you cheat down the Horror test if needed to fail it, you can't chose to fail a duel. Rest is as you wrote.

[Clement]

Do we know that models with a 0 inch melee range can hit things in base contact even?

I'm having flashbacks to the 0" move scenario.

[enderwiggin]

If ending the activation is supposed to be a requirement it should read "This model may end its activation to heal all damage it has suffered" or something. Now it is just a part of the effect.

 

If it requires the two qualifiers (killing/sacrificing an enemy + ending your activation) then it is worded appropriately though. Your wording would indicate a completely separate ability. Now given the obvious RAI with the killing/sacrificing bit I'm less sure of how to treat the "and" but since it's not a comma then "and" I do think it points to them being done at the same time.

[solkan]

If ending the activation is supposed to be a requirement it should read "This model may end its activation to heal all damage it has suffered" or something. Now it is just a part of the effect.

 

As they teach people in logic classes, casual English is terrible and often written so that the conditions of a sentence are backwards.

 

"Eat you fill

After killing or sacfrificing an enemy model, this model may choose heal all damage it has suffered and end its activation."

 

".... and end its activation" is essentailly meaningless if it's not a condition, requirement or consequence of the ability because a model can usually end its activation whenever it wants.  You can, after all, say the words "This model activates and then ends its activation" as a perfectly legal trivial model activation.

 

Since I assume no one wants to claim that a model could choose to trigger Eat you fill, heal and then not end the model's activation (by claiming that the ability is equivalent to "can heal all of its wounds and can end its activation", the question becomes "What do you do when the model can't perform all of the activities specified by the ability?"

 

Case #1:  Unwounded model kills an enemy model and declares that it's using Eat you fill.  Can it?

Case #2:  Model kills an enemy model outside of its activation and declares it's using Eat you fill.  Can it?

 

I'm still not very familiar with Malifaux's writing conventions.  Does it use the "If you can't do something, just skip it and continue" convention or the "If you can't carry everything out, you don't do anything" convention?

[Kadeton]

I'm still not very familiar with Malifaux's writing conventions.  Does it use the "If you can't do something, just skip it and continue" convention or the "If you can't carry everything out, you don't do anything" convention?

 

There is no default position - M1E had one, and it caused problems, so it was not carried across. M2E uses the "Wait for an FAQ" convention to resolve ambiguities.

 

For what it's worth, I would expect that Eat Your Fill falls into the "Do everything on this list, and if you can't do something, skip it" resolution method.

 

(I also think that the Paralysed condition should prevent the model from taking any Actions, not just reduce their melee range to 0". That was an unfortunate design choice that leads to many suspension-breaking oddities.)

[scarlett fever]

Interesting discussion.

Once you add the 0" melee range it becomes even more convoluted. I must attempt not to enter this twilight gaming zone on the table again. Unless I really want to annoy someone.

[lusciousmccabe]

It's especially weird considering it says you won't engage other models with an engagement range of zero.  That should really be a separate statement since you could still engage people in base contact.