Shielded vs. suffer damage cost

[Fingalen]

I would like to ask about how exactly "suffer damage" as a cost works. I used to asume, that regardless of if it is action, trigger or ability cost, if a model do not suffer damage (e.g. it is reduced to 0), the effect does not take place at all (action fails).  However it seems to be a bit more complicated and it might differ for actions, triggers and abilities. (I.e. if the cost is not paid, "trigger is not resolved" in case of trigger, "action fails" in case of action, nothing about the ability).

But the practical problem comes with the Shielded. I understand, that using shielded is not optional. Let us look at e.g. Geryon. It gains Shielded by being near an ice pilar, but once it uses "The old ways", the suffered damage is reduced by this Shielded and the effect does not resolve. Correct? Generally, if models have Shielded, they cannot effectively use any action, trigger or ability, that has "suffer damage" as its cost unless the damage is irreducible, right?

[Yore Huckleberry]

Someone referenced this thread in a discord yesterday, so I'm copy/pasting the FAQ's official answer, in case people wind up looking at this again in a search.

[Barbagianni]

I never remember correctly, but can shielded lower damage to 0?

And in any way, the 'reduce damage' seems to happen after 'pay cost'.

[Fingalen]

2 minutes ago, Barbagianni said:

I never remember correctly, but can shielded lower damage to 0?

Yes, it can.

5 minutes ago, Barbagianni said:

And in any way, the 'reduce damage' seems to happen after 'pay cost'.

Not sure, if I understand it well. Damage reduction takes place after damage is determined and if a model suffers 0 damage, it is not considered to have suffered damage (p. 24 digital, 60 physical rulebook). Would that mean, that the cost is considered to be paid even if the damage was not suffered in the end?

[Ogid]

Suffer damage basicaly works like this: The model suffer the ammount of damage listed (which cannot be used if that would reduce the Wds to 0) and then the trigger is free to happens. The damage reduction can be used to mitigate that damage. That "suffer damage" doesn't require the model to reduce its Wds, just to "be hit" by that damage.

I can see a potential problem with the wording of the pg 24 of the rulebook (damage) where it says:

Quote

If a model suffers 0 damage, it is not considered to have suffered damage.

However that is making reference to effects that need to damage to deal an effect like McMourning "Organ Donnor" or  getting the Burning+1 after a "Breat of fire". But it can read as you are saying when refering to costs. I think nobody play it like it; and in fact crews like the Savages are using shielded to block the damage from those kind of costs, but maybe for the sake of clarity a small FAQ could be needed if more players read it like that.

[Fingalen]

Does it also mean, that when using Leveticus' Necrotic decay trigger, you can announce the cost of 2dmg, reduce it (with Marlena, Shielded or ss) to 0 and still deal +2 damage from that trigger?

[Ogid]

26 minutes ago, malyzubor said:

Does it also mean, that when using Leveticus' Necrotic decay trigger, you can announce the cost of 2dmg, reduce it (with Marlena, Shielded or ss) to 0 and still deal +2 damage from that trigger?

That case is a bit different because that trigger says "... target suffers +1 damage per damage suffered when declaring this trigger". That is ambiguous and can refer to the amount of damage you choosed to take or to the damage the model suffered; so that one needs a FAQ.

Check this old thread about it:

[solkan]

There's another rules quote that hasn't been point out yet:

Quote

If a game effect references the amount of damage suffered, it is referring to the amount of damage suffered after damage reduction.

If you reduce the damage for that cost, all you're doing is wasting resources.

 

[solkan]

In the interest of full disclosure, since this has already linked to the "Incorporeal and Costs" thread, and eventually someone will point out the Yasanori thread:

It basically comes down to two things:

1.  The rule preventing you from specifying a cost that will kill your model is attempting to cap that cost at your remaining wounds.

2.  The way the costs are written, they are effectively "irreducible".  

Necrotic Decay (and the Amalgams in general) has a lot fewer mechanical issues if you just take costs as irreducible damage; and cap costs at remaining wounds.

Disclaimer:  This is just my opinion for what the proper corrections to the rules issues are.

 

[Ogid]

1 hour ago, solkan said:

It basically comes down to two things:

1.  The rule preventing you from specifying a cost that will kill your model is attempting to cap that cost at your remaining wounds.

2.  The way the costs are written, they are effectively "irreducible".  

Necrotic Decay (and the Amalgams in general) has a lot fewer mechanical issues if you just take costs as irreducible damage; and cap costs at remaining wounds.

Disclaimer:  This is just my opinion for what the proper corrections to the rules issues are.

The problem of changing the way it works is it will affect the balance of the whole game. Savages for example suddenly lose their defensive use of the Old Ways after that change, something the whole keyword is balanced around.

It should be fixed targeting the costs that are problematics not the general rule imo. In the case of the Necrotic Decay trigger just changing the cost of that trigger to irreducible damage ("This model may suffer up to 2 irreducible damage") would fix it without affecting more models (that way it won't burn the shielded condition because it can't reduce irreducible damage and the incorporeal/armor won't reduce the maximum possible damage).

[solkan]

15 minutes ago, Ogid said:

The problem of changing the way it works is it will affect the balance of the whole game. Savages for example suddenly lose their defensive use of the Old Ways after that change, something the whole keyword is balanced around.

Fair point about the point of damage in The Old Ways not being irreducible.

It's just any situation where a model suffers damage and then references that damage later in the effect that should be considered irreducible.  

15 minutes ago, Ogid said:

It should be fixed targeting the costs that are problematics not the general rule imo. In the case of the Necrotic Decay trigger just changing the cost of that trigger to irreducible damage ("This model may suffer up to 2 irreducible damage") would fix it without affecting more models (that way it won't burn the shielded condition because it can't reduce irreducible damage and the incorporeal/armor won't reduce the maximum possible damage).

Shielded doesn't reduce irreducible damage, so it doesn't lower its value when irreducible damage is involved:

Quote

Shielded +X: Reduce damage suffered by this model by 1, to a minimum of 0. Each time this Condition reduces damage, its value is lowered by one. During the End Phase, end this Condition.

when irreducible ignores it

Quote

Irreducible damage ignores damage reduction from all game effects.

If Shielded doesn't reduce the damage (which it can't, because it's ignored), then it doesn't lower itself.

[Ogid]

1 hour ago, solkan said:

Shielded doesn't reduce irreducible damage, so it doesn't lower its value when irreducible damage is involved:

I know, that is why I said it won't burn the shielded 

[Flib Jib]

What about Hard to Kill interacting with shielded? Can the models controller choose not to burn the Shielded if HTK resolves first?

[Ogid]

I'd say it can't. If the shielded can reduce the damage it'll do it. H2K is applied to the final damage.

[Adran]

12 hours ago, Thimblesage said:

What about Hard to Kill interacting with shielded? Can the models controller choose not to burn the Shielded if HTK resolves first?

Shielded is not optional. you have to do it when you go through the damage reduction step.

And as Hard to kill is not damage reduction, it is done in a later step.

 

[Maniacal_cackle]

Here it's good to remember the forum guideline:

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Constructively:  Where there are several ways to interpret the rules; the one that doesn't break the rest of the game will be right.

Which is why I favour the interpretation that the Geryon suffers one damage, nothing fancy with shielded. Here's some extended reasoning:

Rule regarding damage suffered:

Quote

If a game effect references the amount of damage suffered, it is referring to the amount of damage suffered after damage reduction.

Wording on The Old Ways:

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When this model performs a duel without any Fate Modifiers, it may suffer 1 damage ... to do cool shit.

The Old Ways says the model may SUFFER 1 damage (this means that is the damage it takes after applying damage reduction). If you choose to apply the Old Ways, the model decreases its health by one. No shenanigans with reducing it.

In short, though the word 'suffer' is used multiple ways in the rulebook, I infer here that the model suffering damage to activate the Old Ways is supposed to skip straight to the 'amount of damage suffered after damage reduction' version of suffered.

To support this, see the general rule advice (use the interpretation that doesn't break the game). If we interpret shielded as applying to the Geryon, the game breaks for several abilities.

[Maniacal_cackle]

The rulebook mentions the word 'suffer' 63 times... So there'll be plenty of ways to interpret this rule, I'm sure. But a good interpretation should not break the game, and I think any of the interpretations that allow damage reduction to apply to suffer damage in a cost break the game a bit.

[diki]

Attacks often state "Target suffers X damage" - that damage is reducible, and the overall action would still have succeed even if the damage gets reduce to 0.

The Old Ways doesn't specify its irreducible damage or specify that the subject must have suffered damage from the ability. (Having suffered damage is a clearly defined requirement for some actions/triggers etc but not in this case).

I think burning a point of shielding satisfies the criteria.

An important note about Frozen Vigor however is that it gives shielded at the end of its activation, so it can only burn that point of shield in defensive duels until the end of the turn.

[Myyrä]

I think there is an important distinction to be made here between suffering damage and having suffered damage. The two quoted rules:

Quote

If a game effect references the amount of damage suffered, it is referring to the amount of damage suffered after damage reduction.

Quote

If a model suffers 0 damage, it is not considered to have suffered damage.

refer to a model having suffered damage in the past. Thus, any ability or whatever that refers to a model having suffered damage in the past is affected by these. Examples include Yasunori's card draw, Necrotic decay and Drink Blood.

Then there's costs and abilities that are used by suffering damage. With those, I think it's enough for the model to choose to suffer the damage, regardless of whether model ends up suffering any damage, to have satisfied the conditions for activating the ability. Examples include The old ways, Stampede and Kirai's Hatred.

Either that or abilities that require you to suffer damage cannot be used at all when you have shielded or something else that would reduce the damage to 0.

 

 

[santaclaws01]

3 hours ago, Maniacal_cackle said:

The Old Ways says the model may SUFFER 1 damage (this means that is the damage it takes after applying damage reduction). If you choose to apply the Old Ways, the model decreases its health by one. No shenanigans with reducing it.

The Old Ways is not referencing the amount of damage a model suffered, it is telling the model to suffer 1 damage.

[Flib Jib]

10 hours ago, diki said:

An important note about Frozen Vigor however is that it gives shielded at the end of its activation, so it can only burn that point of shield in defensive duels until the end of the turn

Great point!