Lem Virtuoso discard exchange

[tech_biscuit]

Just looking for a bit of clarification on Lem's ability.

The exchange w/ discard feat box says '([] or end)'. I assume this is a "cards don't do what they don't say" instance: that it's only to be used once per turn, so you can only get 1 card from the discard a turn, but you get to choose whether it's at the beginning or the end of the turn. Is this assumption correct?

If that's true my concern is that when I get to the end of my turn I'll forget whether I took one at the start, and accidentally make a second trade. Could flip something over as a marker, but I'd forget to flip it back over I'm sure!

Thanks!

[Mike Selinker]

You can do it twice a turn. Your card doesn't remember that you did it earlier.

[tech_biscuit]

I was hoping that would be the case! Thanks for the quick response!

[Drunkenping]

Mike Selinker wrote:

You can do it twice a turn. Your card doesn't remember that you did it earlier.

Seelah's power says, "You may examine the top card of your location deck at the start ([] or end) of your turn. If it's a boon, put it on the bottom of the deck.

By the same ruling she is allowed to use her power twice? This makes Seelah much better!

I have a follow up question on Hark the Tracker. Hark normally has the power to examine the top ([] or bottom card) of his location deck at the end of his turn. But when he becomes a Tracker there is a ([] or both) power feat. Why do we need to select this feat at all? When does the 'card forget'?

We can do multiple things 'at the end of the turn', right? (i.e. play Levitate, then use Hark's examine power) so by the above ruling why does he even need to select the ([] or both) feat? He could, after selecting ([] or bottom card), at the end of his turn; examine the top card, examine the bottom card, play Levitate, examine top card (new location), examine bottom card (new location).

I have to be missing something, I see no advantage for looking at the top and bottom card simultaneously. That or we are not allowed to do multiple things at the end of our turn?

[kysmartman]

You're confusing things. Lem has a power that at the default only works once at the start of his turn. Giving him the ability to do it at the end of his turn means that he now has both the start of the turn AND end of the turn to do his power. That's what Mike was clarifying. Same thing with Seelah's power too.

Harsk's examine the deck ability only triggers once (at the end of the turn) thus why he has the Both box so you can upgrade from seeing one card to seeing two. Granted, he'd likely only need to see the bottom card once per location deck as that won't change very often or the bottom card would be already known (Augury/Scrying).

[csouth154]

Mike Selinker wrote:

You can do it twice a turn. Your card doesn't remember that you did it earlier.

Please help me understand, then, why it says "or" and not "and". I'm having trouble reconciling this ruling with the words on the cards.

[Russ Taylor]

Because or has two possible meanings in English, and you can generally discern which pretty easily by context.

"I can have milk with breakfast or dinner."

"I can have chicken or fish for dinner."

For the first one, you'd add something like "either" or "but not both" if you meant it other than the obvious way. For the second, you'd add "or both" to clarify it.

[csouth154]

Well...I'll go by the ruling, but it would have been eminently less confusing had they used "and".

[Brainwave]

I dunno, for me the bigger issue here is this supposed basic rule of "cards have no memory". It's just hard for me to take that rule seriously when you have cards like the Yeth Hound that require you to remember to increase your checks until the end of turn. If something like that can exist then it seems reasonable to me that you could remember that you used Lem's ability at the beginning of the turn, so you can't use it at the end.

As for the wording on the card, I think it's unclear. It may well be more correctly interpreted that you can use it at either time, but I'd never read it that way before, which tells me that it could be worded better if that's the correct interpretation.

[Joshua Workman 272]

To add another bit of depth to the interpretation, I does not specify that you can only use it once per turn. While you may be able to use abilities only once per "Trigger", you can re-use the ability as often as it becomes triggered unless it specifies a restriction(once per turn).

As for your yeth hound, the card itself does not have memory, the card is banished and no longer even in play. the effect of the card however is different. The effect specifically states a duration(for the rest of the turn), and what impact it has for that duration(-1 to all checks). It never once has to remember if it already impacted your character with that effect. Because of this lack of memory, it also means that if you happen to draw the "same" yeth hound again during the same turn, it isn't actually the same hound. The card has no memory of what it did, or what it once was.

[Russ Taylor]

That's a better if longer explanation than no memory, because there are a few other cases like the Yeth hound (like General Store / first exploration, or the first time you defeat Mammy Graul).

[quicksilver89]

Yeah, I don't get that cards have no memory.

So if your at the academy, do you get multiple free explores, since the card can't remember if you have explored here or not yet?

Is it impossible to defeat Mammy Graul, since the card has no way to remember if it has been defeated before?

The "cards have no memory" statement just doesn't make sense to me. Sure they are just paper, but players have memory. In fact it seems like it is necessary for players to remember the state of certain cards, even some cards like Mammy Graul that get shuffled away and encountered many turns later.

It seems like invoking the "cards have no memory" rule here and not other places is completely arbitrary? How do you expect people to be able to know the rules when the rules are arbitrary with no way to know when the developers want to say it follows a rule or not?

[Russ Taylor]

It's a good GENERAL statement that unless otherwise stated a card has no memory. There are games that isn't true for. Sentinels of the Multiverse, for example, where it can be a pain to remember that you have to take effects off because you can't track where they came from. A game I also love, by the way :)

[quicksilver89]

Mammy Graul does not state that she has memory, and I don't think any card does.

Are we just supposed to guess when a card has memory and when it doesn't?

Also I guess this brings up Harsk's ability to look at the top (or bottom) card. This is worded identically to lem's ability. So am I correct that Harsk can look at the top, then since the card forgets he looked at the top he can look at the bottom?

[Russ Taylor]

When it refers explicitly rather than implicitly to a temporal condition. Don't add words to the cards :P

Mammy Graul TELLS you "the first time", therefore, "the first time" is special, and the "second and subsequent times" are not.

And no, since you cannot use a power more than once while resolving a step in the game. You've looked at the card at the end of the turn. You can't activate the power again until your next end of turn. Note he does eventually get "or both" on one of his role cards (maybe both).

As I think I mentioned here, "or" is generally clear from context, and this "or" is exclusive from context, particularly since it's hard to imagine a situation where you'd NOT want to look at both if you could. That is the "you can have fish or chicken" or.

[quicksilver89]

I do not know where you are getting this idea that "or" means "and". They are two very separate words and do not mean the same thing.

The statement "I can have milk with breakfast or dinner" means that you can have it with one, but not both. If you wanted to say you could have milk with both, the correct way would be to say "I can have milk with breakfast and dinner". If "or" was correct here, then being more specific like "I can have milk with both breakfast or dinner" would be correct, which obviously makes no sense, in the same way that "I can have milk with either breakfast and dinner" makes no sense.

"Or" means one or the other. "And" mean both. There isn't really any ambiguity here. To use "or" when you mean "and" is simply incorrect.

If you look at the Barbarian, who's movement is very similar to Lem's exchange in timing. It clearly uses "and/or" to be very specific that you can do one or both. One would imagine that if Lem's exchange was one or both they would have used the same wording here.

So you say Harsk is understandable by context, because "it's hard to imagine a situation where you'd NOT want to look at both if you could". I could just as easily apply that logic to Lem, he would always want to be able to use that ability twice. I think reasoning that Lem can use the ability twice just because it wouldn't be very good if he could only use it once per turn, is not the proper way to figure out what it would mean. Cards do what they say and don't do what they don't say. Don't add the word "and" to the card just because you think the ability would be better. "Don't add words to the cards :P"

However Mike Selinker does not say that "or" means "and" here. "Or" means one or the other but he is making this ruling on the basis of card memory. Now the "or" states that you can choose one but not both. Which means that in order to function as written it needs to have memory. However, despite saying that it needs memory, they are arbitrarily deciding that it doesn't. I do not understand how you are supposed to tell when something should have memory and when it doesn't.

Now I think the ability would be great if it was usable twice a turn. And I would be fine with them saying that it was a typo or something. What I cannot understand is arguments saying "or" means "and" or this card arbitrarily has no memory while other similar cards do.

[Russ Taylor]

I'm getting that idea because I write, I read, and I understand English. There can be more than one correct way to write something.

And, like or, can be used two ways (probably more ways for both, to be honest).

"Or" does not have to be the exclusive or in English usage. It can be the inclusive or. Which it is you figure out by context, because English, like all human languages I know of, uses words that mean more than one thing. Any argument based on the idea that or always excludes and is inherently flawed, and demonstrates some problems with both English comprehension and English writing.

Honestly, I should follow my better instincts and continue this argument, because it's just one of those things that's largely pointless to argue. Which this thread is demonstrating fabulously well. Or can be inclusive in English. That's just how it is.

But don't take my word for it. Or Wikipedia's word either.

Playing with some more googling brings up a few fun examples of inclusive ors:

"Cream or sugar?"
I'm sorry, you can't have both.

"Do you have Titanic or Armageddon in stock?"
No I don't, because I have both in stock! :)

[csouth154]

Yeah, after considering it, I understand. A sentence that said "You may switch out cards at the beginning and end of your turn" could just as easily mean that, if you choose to do any switching out, it HAS to be at both the beginning and end of he turn or not at all.

They could have been more clear, though. Something like "You may also do this at the end of your turn" tacked on as a second sentence that you have to pay a feat to add.

[Brainwave]

quicksilver89 wrote:

It seems like invoking the "cards have no memory" rule here and not other places is completely arbitrary? How do you expect people to be able to know the rules when the rules are arbitrary with no way to know when the developers want to say it follows a rule or not?

Thank you for bringing up a better example than the Yeth Hound - this is exactly how I feel about this rule.

Russ Taylor wrote:

It's a good GENERAL statement that unless otherwise stated a card has no memory. There are games that isn't true for. Sentinels of the Multiverse, for example, where it can be a pain to remember that you have to take effects off because you can't track where they came from. A game I also love, by the way :)

But a general statement isn't something that helps a player know when to apply a rule. If the rule is "Most of the time, cards have no memory" that does nothing to help me when I encounter a card and am trying to figure out as a player how it functions in the game.

What you need as a player are rules that apply all of the time unless the card tells you specifically to ignore that rule. Rules like "multiple effects are determined in the order the cards are played", and "in the case of a conflict or tie, the players determine the order."

Sentinels is also one of my favorite games and, sure, it is much more involved to remember everything that's going on in that game. But I would hope that you wouldn't argue that there is much less ambiguity in the cards. While I have had to look up a few things while playing Sentinels, it's not been anything like the rules questions I've had with Pathfinder.

[huskyskins]

"Or" is used to connect alternatives, but does not imply those alternatives are necessarily mutually exclusive. However, without context, it can be very difficult to distinguish the exclusivity of the alternatives.

When your host asks you "Cream or sugar?" the context is that one does not preclude having the other and is implied to be followed with "or both."

If you are reading a menu at a restaurant, "mashed potatoes or french fries" comes with the context that the phrase is preceeded by "either," because only one side comes with your cheeseburger.

Lem's power is accompanied by very little context. It states: "At the start or end of your turn, you may exchange 1 card in your hand with 1 card of the same type in your discard pile." This sentence would greatly benefit from adding "or both" to clearly state that the alternatives are not mutually exclusive. And in other instances where the alternatives are intended to be mutually exclusive, the phrase should be preceeded by "either."

[Joshua Birk 898]

I would love to see a ruling on this as it pertains to Seelah as well. If she can look at cards at both the beginning and the end of turns picking feats for her got even more challenging. Too many good options!

[Hawkmoon269]

Seelah's reads just like Lem's, as far as that phrase, so I think it would work the same. You can do either start, or end, or both.

[Russ Taylor]

Yes, Seelah's the other card I was thinking of, where you can do it at both ends of a turn.

Apparently an article was written disputing the exclusive or assumption back in 1972, this is an old argument :) And likewise, the English "and" is not the logical and.