Self Loathing question?

[Omadon]

This is kindof in response to the hamelin stuff people are talking about at the moment. Right - here we go.

Self Loathing

"Select one of the target model's basic melee weapons. Target suffers a damage flip with that weapon that receives -. This damage flip cannot be Cheated."

Now, does this count as a spell damage flip for the purposes of the Essence of Power's Empower ability?

[Wombats]

Can you actually hire a totem from another Faction?

Rules as Written I'd say yes it does.

I wouldn't play it that way, though, as its pretty obviously a melee strike against yourself, slapstick style.

There is precedent for cancelling the negative twist (Lilith's Greatsword cancels it out with a positive twist) hence the explicit statement that it cannot be cheated.

[Tonytone]

You cannot use the + from Empower because nothing can effect the flip except for the actual weapon used. And that is only since the errata. Channeling Self Loathing does nothing as well.

Of course the good news is that 'hard to wound' does not effect it either.

[goblyn13]

The Empower form the spirit of Essence's on Damage wouldn't work because the it isn't spell damage you are causing. The spell states to pick a melee weapon and make a damage flip at (you're doing a melee damage flip, caused by a spell not a spell damage flip)

[Omadon]

I had thought as much - was wondering if the spell simply checked the weapon for it's damage band. Ohwell! It wasnt particularly brilliant anyway ^^ I kindof lost the point of the spell half way through the post when I read that you couldent cheat it reguardless.

[goblyn13]

the spell is actually one of the best weapons with Pandora and/or Candy

its a resisted WP duel, so i Pandora is in range for the spell, the model is going to get plinked for a point of damage from Emotional Trauma, if you hit the right trigger with Pandora you can cause them to fallback (as if they lost a morale duel) then you use their own melee weapon to have them inflict damage upon themselves. So what if your at a , a good portion of your standard melee hits are at anyway. Can't cheat it, but it now picks up any specials from the weapon on the model, so against Sonnia you can make her unable to cast spells, or get the from Justice's or Lilith's great sword, etc.

If can be cast up to three times an activation by the models that have it. all in all, the isn't that daunting, especially when you add in that if you flip the Red Joker it still take precedence on the flips.

[Black_Mamba]

You cannot use the + from Empower because nothing can effect the flip except for the actual weapon used. And that is only since the errata. Channeling Self Loathing does nothing as well.

Of course the good news is that 'hard to wound' does not effect it either.

Oh, I'd missed that! So, Hard to Wound doesn't affect the damage flip from Self Loathing. Very nice!

[Csonti]

You cannot use the + from Empower because nothing can effect the flip except for the actual weapon used. And that is only since the errata. Channeling Self Loathing does nothing as well.

Of course the good news is that 'hard to wound' does not effect it either.

I really don't see in the errata that only the weapon's ability can be used to alter the [-] flip.

I just see that the spell's duel difference doesn't matter. And I can see that the weapon's ability does count. But these two things doesn't lead to the conclusion that "hard to wound" doesn't effect it. Maybe it's true anyway but I don't see this from the text.

So a little help would be nice!

[Tonytone]

It has always been a flat unmodifiable negative flip until the recent errata which added weapon modifiers to the total. Personally I think this was not needed and really just adds to the confusion.

I would imagine the majority of players resolve this spell wrong. If I did not have TBK nearby to discuss stuff like this I would have been doing it wrong all along as well. The wording on the spell before the errata was not exactly crystal clear and post errata it could use a looking at as well.

Edited January 22, 2010 by Tonytone

[Tonytone]

Let me elaborate:

As it was explained to me the intent of this spell was to be a unmodifiable negative flip which in essence means it could never be cheated. Simple enough. Most of the time you will be doing minor damage with the occasional moderate and the rare severe.

With the new errata a whole new can of worms is opened up. It is now a negative not a positive for a model to have a special weapon when facing Pandora/Candy. Odd. This also required them to errata in the line 'This flip cannot be cheated' ( was not needed before).

If TBK's explaination to me gets overruled and Hard to Wound modifies it this SHOULD mean channeling would also work and the OP's question about Empower from the arcanist totem should also work. If it is ruled that only Hard to Wound effects the spell then Hard to Wound becomes extremely powerful because in my mind that is what Channeling is for, to overcome negative flips such as Hard to Wound.

In any case if Hard to Wound does apply you are going to gets some extremely variable results for this spell damage.

Example:

Pandora and Candy are within 8" of a Flesh Constuct ( Hard to Wound 2)

If they each cast SL their possible 3x (assuming all 6 hit) that is 24 cards you just burned through.(1 flip, 1 for SL neg, 2 for HTW neg = 4 per cast)

The odds of flipping a Red Joker one time are better than 50/50 assuming the RJ is not in your hand or discarded.

So on 5 of the flips you are going to be doing 2 dmg pretty much without fail. BUT that one time you do 8-12 dmg with the RJ in the flip. Your 5 casts would have just barely killed but one kills it outright. Odd.

Want to simplify this spell and keep it's intent?

Self Loathing: Select one of the target model's melee weapons. Target suffers Minor dmg ( or Moderate depending on how powerful you want SL to be) from that weapon.

Simple.

[Calisto]

Either that or just specificly say it's unmodifiable.

[Csonti]

Let me elaborate:

Example:

Pandora and Candy are within 8" of a Flesh Constuct ( Hard to Wound 2)

If they each cast SL their possible 3x (assuming all 6 hit) that is 24 cards you just burned through.(1 flip, 1 for SL neg, 2 for HTW neg = 4 per cast)

The odds of flipping a Red Joker one time are better than 50/50 assuming the RJ is not in your hand or discarded.

So on 5 of the flips you are going to be doing 2 dmg pretty much without fail. BUT that one time you do 8-12 dmg with the RJ in the flip. Your 5 casts would have just barely killed but one kills it outright. Odd.

I get your problem but:

- it's quite theoretical

- Candy is not that good at casting SL

- the Flesh Construct does have a chance resist each of the spells

- you count on two models' attacks but the opponent usually has a chance to activate a model between those two

So the 50/50 odds is a bit of an exageration.

On the other hand I got confused about who makes the damage flip?

We always assumed that the defending player. It's his model's weapon what does the damage. And the spell doesn't say the caster gets control over the defender. But this could be wrong.

[Omadon]

I actually think you're wrong here, and the intent you're applying to it isn't necessarily the one had in mind. I'm pretty sure it's "intent" is to do damage.

That said, theres nothing that says hard to wound or any of the other damage changing things do/don't apply. The only possible source of confusion here is that the spell is checking the weapons power for it's damage, and thus may not be classed as magical damage. It doesn't have a minus flip built into it so it can't be cheated, it has the line of text "This cannot be cheated" in it, so that it can't be cheated

EDIT: Furthermore, saying that about the red joker applies to pretty much everything. Not just this spell.

On a totally unrelated note - I've been playing as though only the black overwrote everything, and I think I much prefer it that way. The idea of getting Red off -4 flips feels too random. You shoulden't potentially suffer from stacking defensive abilitys. Hm - need to address this in a more public forum.

Edited January 23, 2010 by Omadon

[ispep]

On a totally unrelated note - I've been playing as though only the black overwrote everything, and I think I much prefer it that way. The idea of getting Red off -4 flips feels too random. You shoulden't potentially suffer from stacking defensive abilitys. Hm - need to address this in a more public forum.

Remember: The sum of positive and negative twists cannot exceed +3 ( :+fate ) or -3 ( :-fate ). If the sum of any twists of fate is more than +3, the players twist of fate maximum is limited to +3, and any twists of fate that sum to less than -3 are limited to -3

Just thought I'd point that out.

[eruletho]

I think what Omadon meant was flipping 4 cards total (1 for the initial flip and the other three for the :-fate:-fate)

As for the question at hand, I think it would be best if all abilities that modify an attack would come into play. A flesh golem is always going to be hard to wound, whether he is being hit with Kade's giant knife or his own meat hook.

However, abilities that modify spells should not be taken into account for the damage flip, since it isn't a spell once you reach damage. Essentially, Pandora/Candy is psychicly making you stab yourself with your own weapon. Once the resistance to that is done, it isn't a spell, it's a melee hit.

Also, I would kinda like to know who should make the flip. I think we've been playing it that the defender does (but the only time I was in the same game as Pandora is in a 3v3 and I never interacted with her) and could choose the lowest of the cards. I think (personally) that it should be the caster.

Keep in mind that I'm relatively new to the larger rules discussions so take what I put down with a grain of salt.

[ThatTyeGuy]

a question with self loathing with McM, does he get his heals from doing damage to himself...i hope not lol, and can u even self loathing on a flesh construct, being immune to influence?

[Rathnard]

and can u even self loathing on a flesh construct, being immune to influence?

Yes, you can, provided Pandora or another model with "The box opens" (like a doppleganger mimicing the ability) is within 12".