Lucky Effigy's Condition and what is a flip

[Math Mathonwy]

Lucky Effigy can give this Condition:

"Lucky Draw: Whenever this model flips a  in a duel, it may immediately heal 1 damage."

If the model with a Condition has suffered four damage and then has  for a duel and flips 12, 11, and 2 does the model heal two as it flipped two Rams cards even though it is forced to choose the two of crows?

Also, does the model heal when flipping a Red Joker?

I'm guessing that the answer to both questions is yes, it heals in both cases. But there was some discussion about this one in a game today.

[Myyrä]

14 minutes ago, Ludvig said:

@solkan You think it's more likely the entire section on causing damage from the base rules that has never been put into question (afaik) is poorly written than this single ability being poorly written? A lot of times when something being flipped is referenced in the base rules it seems to indicate you go by the "final flip" so to speak.

It isn't a just single ability either. Malifaux Rats and Molly use the same wording as well. Quite possibly some other models too.

[Math Mathonwy]

19 minutes ago, Myyrä said:

Nowhere does it say that. Lucky Draw doesn't say you can heal every time you flip a ram card.

Your argument is (and correct me if I'm wrong) that the shorthand  isn't "ram card"?

19 minutes ago, Myyrä said:

There is only so many ways I can say that a flip only produces a single result, regardless of the number cards flipped, which is pretty much what the rulebook says word for word.

It produces a single active card. You flip several cards and have several cards flipped. "Whenever flips" is consistent with the latter. All this is IMO extremely obvious from the quotes I gave.

[lame0]

BTW a flip can in fact have two suits (look at mah emmisary upgrade). 

Also I think just reading the example on page 17 of the small rule book say it all "the guild guard flips two cards one base, plus one additional card for the final  (after cancellations)."

It goes further and says how to choose which is the active card depending on the modifier but the most important fact is that both are "flips" and thus both would fall under:

Luchy Draw: "Whenever this model flips a  in a dual, it may immediately heal 1 damage." 

Technically speaking this effect must go off before you choose the card that ends up being the active one because the effect must go off immediately when a card "flips." 

Since the rule book gives this example and clarifies "flips" on a modifier and says the order to resolve I think that's all there is to say.

[Math Mathonwy]

30 minutes ago, Ludvig said:

So you agree that a negative damage flip will deal every card "flipped" as damage so it's actually better to go neg than straight on damage flips? Lawyers also paralyze you if any card flipped on a negative belongs to the severa category? That is going to devalue hard to wound quite significantly.

Of course not - you take the active card and use that one for damage the same as you take the active card and use that for a duel. You do flip the other cards but you don't set them active.

I'd agree with Solkan in that the Lawyer (and similar others) are written wrong.

[Angelshard]

Lawyers just seem to have a horribly written attack Honestly, it should have said "if moderate damage is dealt" like every sane card. Mr tannen has the same issue where he says played instead of cheated.

As for flips, if I understand @Ludvig and @Myyrä correctly your argument is that it doesn't matter how many cards you flip as only the one chosen to be the active card counts as flipped. So unless you choose the  card you won't heal and you can only ever heal 1 from any duel.

I have two problems with this.

1. under cheat fate (p.19 of the small rulebook) it says that you choose an active card from the flip. That seems to indicate that the flip and the active card are two different things.

2. Lynch has the (0) pay up that allows you to flip a card for each enemy with brilliance and take all  flipped into his hand. According to your interpretation that can only ever be one card.

As for the damage rules it's one line that is badly written as it's also written so that you apply damage before cheating, allowing you to do damage twice. Also it refers to the chart below instead of above as it should (at least in the small rulebook).

[Ludvig]

15 minutes ago, Angelshard said:

Lawyers just seem to have a horribly written attack Honestly, it should have said "if moderate damage is dealt" like every sane card. Mr tannen has the same issue where he says played instead of cheated.

As for flips, if I understand @Ludvig and @Myyrä correctly your argument is that it doesn't matter how many cards you flip as only the one chosen to be the active card counts as flipped. So unless you choose the  card you won't heal and you can only ever heal 1 from any duel.

I have two problems with this.

1. under cheat fate (p.19 of the small rulebook) it says that you choose an active card from the flip. That seems to indicate that the flip and the active card are two different things.

2. Lynch has the (0) pay up that allows you to flip a card for each enemy with brilliance and take all  flipped into his hand. According to your interpretation that can only ever be one card.

As for the damage rules it's one line that is badly written as it's also written so that you apply damage before cheating, allowing you to do damage twice. Also it refers to the chart below instead of above as it should (at least in the small rulebook).

What I am saying is we need m 2.5 or something. This is a mess. I agree on how the upgrade should play but if that wording means that some models are going to work very differntly. Basically I might start bringing lawyers and a printout of this discussion to a lot of finnish tournament games because they just became flippin' awesome.  

1. Which only strengthens the idea that lawyers are amazing.

2. I flip for one model and choose that card. Flip for another and choose that one. And so on... The ability doesn't say "make one flip that gets a  for each model with brilliance nearby" it's several flips.

[Myyrä]

4 minutes ago, Ludvig said:

What I am saying is we need m 2.5 or something. This is a mess. I agree on how the upgrade should play but if that wording means that some models are going to work very differntly. Basically I might start bringing lawyers and a printout of this discussion to a lot of finnish tournament games because they just became flippin' awesome.  

I doubt that would fly very far seeing who is actually doing the rules refereeing in most of those tournaments.

[lame0]

11 minutes ago, Ludvig said:

So you agree that a negative damage flip will deal every card "flipped" as damage so it's actually better to go neg than straight on damage flips? Lawyers also paralyze you if any card flipped on a negative belongs to the severa category? That is going to devalue hard to wound quite significantly.

 I always thought hard to wound was the worst defensive ability. It's decent but has negatives (more likely to hit jokers, etc).

In terms of a negative flip for damage it's pretty clear the active card is the only one used 

"A model flipping cards with one or more  must choose the flipped card with the lowest value to be his or her active card and discard the others to the discard pile." Active card is the one that resolves. Basically effects like the lucky effigy resolve before an active card is chosen unlike most other things. The cards may be flips but the active card is the only one that would be resolved.

Guild lawyer is better than I thought pretty cool interaction (and seems super lawyery). 

[Ludvig]

Just now, Myyrä said:

I doubt that would fly very far seeing who is actually doing the rules refereeing in most of those tournaments.

Haha, dammit, here I was being dead serious!

[Myyrä]

2 minutes ago, lame0 said:

"A model flipping cards with one or more  must choose the flipped card with the lowest value to be his or her active card and discard the others to the discard pile." Active card is the one that resolves. Basically effects like the lucky effigy resolve before an active card is chosen unlike most other things. The cards may be flips but the active card is the only one that would be resolved.

Where does it say Lucky Effigy's effect is resolved before the active card is chosen? If you could provide clear rules reference that would be awfully convenient as that would put an end to this conversation.

[lame0]

7 minutes ago, Myyrä said:

Where does it say Lucky Effigy's effect is resolved before the active card is chosen? If you could provide clear rules reference that would be awfully convenient as that would put an end to this conversation.

In the abilities effect. "Immediately" it's not like a bunch of other things that say after the action resolves etc. It says what and when clearly. The rule book clearly states in the example that a modifier "flips" cards.

"the guild guard flips two cards one base, plus one additional card for the final  (after cancellations)." Pg 17.

Luchy Draw: "Whenever this model flips a  in a dual, it may immediately heal 1 damage." 

Both use the same word and it shows when it's happening. Since it's immediately you must do it before you can continue flipping cards.

Thus it plays out as such:

Model with  modifier 

1) Flip card one -> checks 

2) Flips card two -> checks

3) Chooses card.

I can't find any evidence against this interaction and as far as I know this is the way it's typically played (though I guess it doesn't come up much so.....yeah)

Totally separate from that.

I think the guild lawyer is in the clear to just get itself on negatives and get the severe effect. I will say it was probably not intended but as far as rules go I don't think it's all that arguable because flipped/flips etc are used interchangeably (I tried to find some reasoning why it wouldn't). I also don't see anything op about a charge 6 rg 1 model that can do some wonky stuff to give out slow/paralyze. (compare it to a nurse.... Lawyer costs more and requires a bunch more setup to get the paralyze often). Literally nothing on his card says he can't get more than one effect or is locked into one.

The rules are unclear for some stuff but as written the lawyer and lucky effigy seem to work the way I described since I don't see evidence of the opposite.

[Myyrä]

17 minutes ago, lame0 said:

In the abilities effect. "Immediately" it's not like a bunch of other things that say after the action resolves etc. It says what and when clearly. The rule book clearly states in the example that a modifier "flips" cards.

"the guild guard flips two cards one base, plus one additional card for the final  (after cancellations)." Pg 17.

Luchy Draw: "Whenever this model flips a  in a dual, it may immediately heal 1 damage." 

Both use the same word and it shows when it's happening. Since it's immediately you must do it before you can continue flipping cards.

Thus it plays out as such:

Model with  modifier 

1) Flip card one -> checks 

2) Flips card two -> checks

3) Chooses card.

I can't find any evidence against this interaction and as far as I know this is the way it's typically played (though I guess it doesn't come up much so.....yeah)

If a flip always only involves a single card, why do the rules say "When a flip is required, the model turns over one or more cards from the top of the Fate Deck to achieve a random number and/or suit."? When would you ever flip more than one card?

17 minutes ago, lame0 said:

Totally separate from that.

I think the guild lawyer is in the clear to just get itself on negatives and get the severe effect. I will say it was probably not intended but as far as rules go I don't think it's all that arguable because flipped/flips etc are used interchangeably (I tried to find some reasoning why it wouldn't). I also don't see anything op about a charge 6 rg 1 model that can do some wonky stuff to give out slow/paralyze. (compare it to a nurse.... Lawyer costs more and requires a bunch more setup to get the paralyze often). Literally nothing on his card says he can't get more than one effect or is locked into one.

The rules are unclear for some stuff but as written the lawyer and lucky effigy seem to work the way I described since I don't see evidence of the opposite.

Molly just got a lot better.

[Math Mathonwy]

1 hour ago, Ludvig said:

Duels clearly tell you to choose one card which is the only one counted. Damage flips just say that you inflict damage based on the flipped card, it never tells you to only consider the final card chosen. At the very least the entire section on damage would need clarification if the term flip means any card flipped and not the final one chosen. The base problem is that flip is used to refer to two very different things which I think is bad. We all know how damage flips work and several other abilities use the same language as the damage section. What I don't see is why his particular ability isn't the poorly written one when everything else lines up?

Technically the Fate Modifiers section on Damage doesn't even tell you what to do with those modifiers so I think that it is a safe bet to refer back to the flips part which does tell you to pick one card as the active one. Note that the Fate Modifiers section under Flips begins with "Normally a player flips one card when performing a duel or a flip..." so a damage flip falls under that part quite nicely.

The point of contention here seems to be twofold with a bonus:

1) Is flipping additional cards flipping cards? Which seems kinda clear-cut to me but whatever. And

2) Does "When a model flips a card" only refer to the active card or to all cards that have been flipped. Which is a more legitimate question that I can honestly see going either way and I really don't see a watertight interpretation one way or the other based on just the rules text. Especially if one considers other abilities as well.

And finally, bonus) if number 2) goes a certain way, are Lawyers really stupid? Which is a bit of a silly question as obviously they aren't that stupid (does someone legitimately think that there is going to be a FAQ entry that says that yes, you get all the status effects from the flipped cards?) but, again, whatever.

[Angelshard]

From page 52 of the small rulebook.

"To perform a damage flip the model dealing the damage flips the top card of its deck and compares the card's value to the damage flip chart below. A model may cheat fate on a damage flip with the same restrictions as any other flip."

As I read this it's always the top card that will deal the damage regardless of modifiers.

The damage flip chart is above this sentence, not below.

Cheat fate allows you to replace the active card, this happens after flip, so either it will do nothing or this card will deal damage too.

I'm fully aware that it's meant to be the active card that is used, but as written it's only the top card of the deck that is relevant.

As for flips page 17 fate modifiers under bonus flips says that the model flips additional cards and then choose which to use. I interpret this as flipping and selecting active card are two different steps.

[Myyrä]

16 minutes ago, Math Mathonwy said:

Technically the Fate Modifiers section on Damage doesn't even tell you what to do with those modifiers so I think that it is a safe bet to refer back to the flips part which does tell you to pick one card as the active one. Note that the Fate Modifiers section under Flips begins with "Normally a player flips one card when performing a duel or a flip..." so a damage flip falls under that part quite nicely.

The point of contention here seems to be twofold with a bonus:

1) Is flipping additional cards flipping cards? Which seems kinda clear-cut to me but whatever. And

2) Does "When a model flips a card" only refer to the active card or to all cards that have been flipped. Which is a more legitimate question that I can honestly see going either way and I really don't see a watertight interpretation one way or the other based on just the rules text. Especially if one considers other abilities as well.

And finally, bonus) if number 2) goes a certain way, are Lawyers really stupid? Which is a bit of a silly question as obviously they aren't that stupid (does someone legitimately think that there is going to be a FAQ entry that says that yes, you get all the status effects from the flipped cards?) but, again, whatever.

You keep trying to build these weird strawmen to attack, when this all really boils down to the question of whether flipping multiple cards (simultaneously) and choosing an active card is indeed what is meant by a flip. "When a flip is required, the model turns over one or more cards from the top of the Fate Deck to achieve a random number and/or suit." If choosing the active card isn't part of the flip, how can multiple cards translate into a single number and up to one suit?

[Math Mathonwy]

7 minutes ago, Myyrä said:

You keep trying to build these weird strawmen to attack, when this all really boils down to the question of whether flipping multiple cards (simultaneously) and choosing an active card is indeed what is meant by a flip. "When a flip is required, the model turns over one or more cards from the top of the Fate Deck to achieve a random number and/or suit." If choosing the active card isn't part of the flip, how can multiple cards translate into a single number and up to one suit?

I don't think that those were weird strawmen and I think that the question number two that I referred to as legitimate is exactly what you describe above?

And to answer your question, it says you "flip additional cards". If a flip requires the choosing of the active card, how can you "flip additional cards"?

"Once all cards are flipped, the model chooses one to use as its active card". Note the wording "cards are flipped". Obviously you first flip a bunch of cards and then choose one as the active one.

[Myyrä]

43 minutes ago, Math Mathonwy said:

I don't think that those were weird strawmen and I think that the question number two that I referred to as legitimate is exactly what you describe above?

And to answer your question, it says you "flip additional cards". If a flip requires the choosing of the active card, how can you "flip additional cards"?

That doesn't actually answer my question. You just ask another question that's just tangentially related. Additional cards in the fate modifiers refer to the cards that you have to flip in addition of that one that you always have to flip.

43 minutes ago, Math Mathonwy said:

"Once all cards are flipped, the model chooses one to use as its active card". Note the wording "cards are flipped". Obviously you first flip a bunch of cards and then choose one as the active one.

I'm perfectly capable of holding literally hundreds of cards in my hand and turning them over at the same time in one smooth motion. I do just one flip, regardless of how many cards there are.

[MrDeathTrout]

19 hours ago, Math Mathonwy said:

20 hours ago, Myyrä said:

"When a flip is required, the model turns over one or more cards from the top of the Fate Deck to achieve a random number and/or suit." pg. 26, big rulebook, pg. 16 in the small one.

Underlining mine. A flip only ever produces a single suit, regardless of how many cards you flip.

As that is the part of the rules that explains what a flip is, it deserves quite a lot more weight than all the instances that may or may not use the term incorrectly.

But that part hasn't yet gotten to the  and  and there it talks about flipping additional cards. You naturally get only a single suit and a single number for the duel but Lucky Draw isn't talking about the result but about flipping.

 

It may not have gotten to the +/- flips yet, but it says "...the model turns over one or more cards..."  So how how does this not apply to +/- flips.  Is there another way to flip multiple cards I don't know about?

 

Quote

 

Small Book pg 27

The maximum number of cards a model may flip is four,  regardless of the number of Fate modifiers in effect.

 

If each card flipped is a flip what does this mean?  Each time you flip a single card don't flip more than four of them?

 

 

Quote

 

Recalled Training

This model gains the following Ability:
Recalled Training: At the start of this model’s Activation, this model may discard this Upgrade to gain + to all flips for the remainder of this

 

if each card is a flip that means I flip an extra card for each card flipped.  So that's an infinite number of cards?

I'n guessing you'll sat this is another card that is written incorrectly?  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Myyrä]

2 minutes ago, MrDeathTrout said:

If each card flipped is a flip what does this mean?  Each time you flip a single card don't flip more than four of them?

That part is there to make sure the games don't run too long. Once you try to flip a fifth card on single model, the game will end immediately, because there is nothing you can do anymore.

[lame0]

1 hour ago, Math Mathonwy said:

I don't think that those were weird strawmen and I think that the question number two that I referred to as legitimate is exactly what you describe above?

And to answer your question, it says you "flip additional cards". If a flip requires the choosing of the active card, how can you "flip additional cards"?

"Once all cards are flipped, the model chooses one to use as its active card". Note the wording "cards are flipped". Obviously you first flip a bunch of cards and then choose one as the active one.

I agree with you here this is all super convoluted and confusing since flip/ flips/ flipped etc are all terms used in so many different ways and places. I think the whole section about flips needs to be clarified. Basically the main issue here is that the term itself is used to describe what it does thus leaving a circular reference. The other apparent issue is that term flip might have more than one meaning

 1) as a game term (pg 16) 

2) could potentially just be referring to just turning over a card. (Ie the example about the guild guard I use on page 17 could be this? maybe? maybe not?)

Since it could have two meanings in the rule book it makes every single place where the word "flip" appears a question. Since we now have a huge game altering problem due to this I think it needs an faq or something. As is due to how it is explained I see it as working as all cards taken from the top of the deck and turned over as flips/ flipped/flip.

 

 

Side note: 

Molly would become such a toxic master if the interaction works. She would probably be tied with Collodi for best attack. (hers would be better if she had 10 inch range instead of 8 inch range). A tie on the attack flip means:

60.2% chance at paralyzing

75.8% chance of slow 

95.4% chance of one or the other happening.

Winning by 1-5

45.5% chance at paralyzing

60.8% chance of slow 

86.7% chance of one or the other happening.

All that + good triggers on a 8 inch range no cover no tn on a usually mobile master...... Sad Days. Also one of her triggers moves her 5 inches so she can get to her next target.............

[Myyrä]

22 minutes ago, lame0 said:

2) could potentially just be referring to just turning over a card. (Ie the example about the guild guard I use on page 17 could be this? maybe? maybe not?)

You choose to assume the term isn't used consistently, when there are no contradictions that would require you to make that assumption. The only real implication of just accepting that flip includes choosing the active card, is that Lucky Emissary's buff becomes less good. Deal with it.

[Math Mathonwy]

1 hour ago, Myyrä said:

That doesn't actually answer my question. You just ask another question that's just tangentially related. Additional cards in the fate modifiers refer to the cards that you have to flip in addition of that one that you always have to flip.

I'm perfectly capable of holding literally hundreds of cards in my hand and turning them over at the same time in one smooth motion. I do just one flip, regardless of how many cards there are.

You flip "additional cards" - did you flip those cards or not? If you flip three cards, how many cards did you flip? Did you flip only the active card or did you flip three cards?

If you have   for a duel and flip 12, 11, and 2I posit that you flipped 12, 11, and 2. Amazing, I know! Immediately after flipping those three cards, you note that you flipped two rams and heal two. After doing the thing you were instructed to immediately do, you set 2as the active card. Congrats, you have successfully performed a flip.

I really don't understand how this interpretation seems so beyond the pale to you.

[Myyrä]

4 minutes ago, Math Mathonwy said:

You flip "additional cards" - did you flip those cards or not? If you flip three cards, how many cards did you flip? Did you flip only the active card or did you flip three cards?

If you have   for a duel and flip 12, 11, and 2I posit that you flipped 12, 11, and 2. Amazing, I know! Immediately after flipping those three cards, you note that you flipped two rams and heal two. After doing the thing you were instructed to immediately do, you set 2as the active card. Congrats, you have successfully performed a flip.

I really don't understand how this interpretation seems so beyond the pale to you.

You made a single flip with resulting in a 2. Neither 2 nor is a so you don't get to heal.

Your interpretation is so abhorrent, because it doesn't follow the rules.

[Math Mathonwy]

8 minutes ago, Myyrä said:

You made a single flip with resulting in a 2. Neither 2 nor is a so you don't get to heal.

Your interpretation is so abhorrent, because it doesn't follow the rules.

I disagree.

[MrDeathTrout]

I think we all need to take it down a notch.

 

My 2 cents.

The rule book clearly defines a flips as turning over one or more cards.  Dismissing this because is it not in the +/- flips section is completely invalid.

The game works perfectly well using this definition.  The fact that so many things do not work as we know they are intended (Recalled Training, Lawyers, Damage Filps) with the alternate interpretation it should be enough to convince anyone which interpretation is intended.  You can dismiss them all as poorly writen or consider the Lucky Emissaries trait is the one that is poorly written in a game that is full of loose language.

Anyone who has played Malifaux for any length of time should know the language is very loose and can often be used to support unintended outcomes when desired. 

Flip is probably used to refer to a single card flip many places, but the intent of the Lucky Emisary's trait is pretty obvious.