Paying Costs

[LeperColony]

Can you choose not to pay a cost and allow an action/trigger to fail?

This is a follow up to the mandatory trigger question I asked, but it has brought up the larger implications of whether costs must be met if technically possible, or if the player retains the option to refuse to pay them.

I've made this new thread because I think regardless of whether a player may choose to pay a cost or not, mandatory actions are probably a special case and I'd assume a future FAQ would indicate that they, at least, have costs the player may not choose to decline.

[trikk]

I'd say the same thing I said in the trigger topic.

There is no player choice in paying the cost. Player decision making ends at declaring the action/trigger. 

 

Going with making the optional is not only (IMHO) wrong but creates a bunch of loopholes and negative interactions.

[Adran]

I'm not sure that there is going to be a different answer to then other thread, but then I am of the opinion that the "they must be paid now or nothing happens" is not giving you the choice to pay them. its telling you the consequences if you can't pay the cost.

[LeperColony]

5 hours ago, Adran said:

they must be paid now or nothing happens

Except it doesn't say "or nothing happens," but rather it says "or no other portion of the trigger may be resolved." (page 12).  

"Other portion" necessarily divides the trigger into portions, one of which is declaring it.  So if an ability requires a trigger to be declared, a player may want to activate that ability even if they can't pay the trigger.

For instance, consider the following:

Model A has an ability "when this model declares a trigger, draw a card."  

Model A has a trigger with a  suit requirement and a cost pay 2 life.  Model A flips a  but only has 1 life, so it can't pay the cost.  Under your reading of the rules, A can't declare the trigger because it can't pay the cost, so it can't draw a card?

I'm asking because in the other thread, you seemed to imply that because trigger's declaration and payment are NOT bifurcated as they are with actions, they operate differently from actions:

"There is only 1 step for Triggers and that is the declare triggers step when you must pay any additional costs or no other part of the trigger will happen." (sorry, don't know how to quote from other thread)

 

[solkan]

Please note that f you're including Actions in the discussion, there's even less possibility for ambiguity in the Action rules:

Quote

If the Action has any costs in italics, they must be paid now, and are considered paid when declaring the Action. If the costs are not paid, the Action fails; skip steps 3, 4, and 5. Costs that reference an Action's target must instead be paid as part of declaring the target (step 3). Otherwise, the model cannot be targeted.

Compare that to Targeting:

Quote

If the Action requires a target, the target must be declared at this step. The target must be within the Action’s range as well as within LoS of the model taking the Action, unless specified otherwise. If an Action has no legal target, it fails; skip steps 4 and 5. A model may not target itself with an Attack Action.

If a model declares an Action and reaches Step 3 with only valid target, is there is any choice which target will be declared, or a choice not to declare a target?  No, there isn't.

The rules require a target to be declared, and only allow for a target to not be declared if there are no valid targets that can be declared.

Otherwise, you may as well be claiming that every other use of the word "must" in the rulebook is ambiguous.

[Paddywhack]

38 minutes ago, LeperColony said:

Except it doesn't say "or nothing happens," but rather it says "or no other portion of the trigger may be resolved." (page 12).  

Again, the decision point is declaring the Trigger. Once you have declared you are bound by the requirements of the Trigger. 

Let's look at it from another angle. If that 'no other portions of the trigger...' phrase wasn't there and the Sow had to declare that trigger but didn't have any cards to discard what would happen? Would the trigger still go off? Would it fail? Without that phrase we wouldn't know how to handle that situation. However, if you have any cards in hand you 'must' discard a card as you have declared the Trigger. 

And I disagree that 'portions of the trigger' includes anything to do with the step of declaring. Declaring is a step, not a portion of what makes up a Trigger. The Trigger has the Costs, Special Restrictions, and text about what happens including things like potential damage flips, changes of board position, etc. 

2 minutes ago, solkan said:

Otherwise, you may as well be claiming that every other use of the word "must" in the rulebook is ambiguous.

Agreed. Any other interpretation breaks so much of how the game works. 

[LeperColony]

20 minutes ago, solkan said:

Otherwise, you may as well be claiming that every other use of the word "must" in the rulebook is ambiguous.

The very fact that no other example of the word "must" is ambiguous is the point.  "Must" doesn't occur in a vacuum, and this example is the only time I've encountered it in a conditional sentence.  Which is what adds the ambiguity.  And in fact adds to it.  If something is presented in one way 99 times, it's fair to ask if the 1 different situation is significant.

[yames]

So incase people wondered if there is a model this is relvent to I have one. Mei Feng in a sense. She has whenever she declares a trigger she can push two inches.  The blinded by iron trigger has a cost of discard a scrap markers. Can I declare blinded by iron to push two inches but have it do nothing since I can't pay the cost the trigger does nothing happen as the rules state? If there is no scrap markers withen 2 inches.