Hello,
Can you choose to deliberately miss the Knowledge 7 roll in order to put the revealed card at the bottom of the location deck, even when there is no way for you to lose the check?
I don't have the card in front of me. What does the text say?
Paul's situation is that if he makes the check, he will succeed (because he has at least +6 passive on his Knowledge check.)
Can he choose to fail with a non-check, like how you can with checks against unwanted boons? Or, if not, can he choose to bottom-deck the card in question anyway? Or do the "steps" of Slip's power prevent this?
Yeah, I confirm Sandslice's reading of my question. I use Slip. I see a card I *don't* want to encounter. But with a +6 in Knowledge I can't really lose the check. Can I still deliberately lose it in order to put the unwanted card at the bottom of the deck before Slip's "then explore" effect happens?
Specific text says:
"On your turn, discard this card to examine the top card of your location deck. Succeed at an Intelligence or Knowledge 7 check or put that card on the bottom of the location deck. Then explore your location."
Specific text says:
"On your turn, discard this card to examine the top card of your location deck. Succeed at an Intelligence or Knowledge 7 check or put that card on the bottom of the location deck. Then explore your location."
So, you can definitely choose to make the Intelligence 7 check, which will have a chance of failure. That's not a satisfying answer, so someone will hopefully chime in with the rule. I feel like you should be able able to choose not to make the check, but that's just a feeling that i'm not supporting with any rules text.
Just to be 100% clear: I *WANT* to fail the check, to put the card at the bottom of the deck, but I technically *CAN'T* fail if I roll the dice since I have +6 in knowledge. I want to know if I can deliberately choose to say "whoopsie. I failed. Can't remember that bit of info at all" even if there is no way for me to lose the check were I to actually roll the dice.
Paul, I understand. I am pointing out that while you've got a +6 in Knowledge, you probably only have a +3 or +4 in Intelligence, and you could choose to make the Intelligence check instead.
I'm just hoping Hawkmoon comes in with a quote from the rulebook, or perhaps Mike or Vic will say its something they are discussing the intent behind. I think the general theme is you shouldn't be punished for succeeding at a check, but I can't speak to the intent of that card.
Well... Probably the closest thing I've seen is when Vic gave a bit of insight here when there were questions raised about how to understand the checks to recharge a card.
The rules themselves don't say you can auto fail a check, the closest thing there is that you are told you don't have to attempt to acquire a boon, and this is not that.
Personally, I'd say you can let it go to the bottom of the deck. Not because you can choose to fail a check, but because of how I'd read this sentence:
"Succeed at an Intelligence or Knowledge 7 check or put that card on the bottom of the location deck."
Personally, just the like typical recharge check, I take that to mean:
"You may attempt an Intelligence or Knowledge 7 check. If you don't attempt it, or you do and you fail it, put that card on the bottom of the location deck."
But that is a lot of stuff to put on a card. So "Succeed at an Intelligence or Knowledge 7 check or put that card on the bottom of the location deck" is better shorthand for representing that idea.
Maybe that is just me though.
As I understand the rules, you can't choose to fail a check or decline to make it(*) so you are stuck doing the check. As First World Bard pointed out, your plain Intelligence is going to be lower than your Knowledge so you can use that to have a chance of failing.
(*): Pre-emptive response to cover the usual exceptions: the rules say you may attempt to acquire a boon you encounter, so you can choose not to. Cards with a recharge check say you may attempt to recharge them. In both of these cases, the rules/cards make the check optional. Slip's check is not optional.
I've found Slip to be a good ally for Seltyiel; he has strong Intelligence and no Knowledge, so I can choose the Knowledge check and fail it with a d4 if I want the top card to go away.
As an aside, while looking in the rulebook for a specific statement about choosing not to make a check, I didn't find one but I did find this that I haven't seen before: “You can never automatically succeed at a combat check.”
On BGG way back when, Mike said "you have to roll your die [but they don't have to be your best dice]," when people were puzzling over Recharge checks on spells. My memory is a little faulty, because I remember that later being rescinded/overwritten to say you can choose not to recharge a spell, not that "may" attempt to recharge a spell was implicit. With that (possibly faulty memory) in mind, we play as if there's the option to fail any check. I don't know if there's an explicit ruling somewhere that would support that, however.
Info about recharge checks being optional:
Mike points at that he added the part to that BGG post to clarify the rules do make it optional.
Vic's comment about "may" missing from some card's recharge text.
So, recharge checks for cards you play are optional. But specifically because either the rules (in RotR) or the cards (in S&S and forward) say "may" (or at least should say may).
Thank you Vic :)
(because if you can't choose to fail, technically the better you get at your Intelligence/Knowledge skill, the worse the card becomes... And once you hit +6 Knowledge, this level 3 ally is simply a "Discard to look at the card you're about to explore anyway", which would make it worse than basically any Basic ally in S&S ^_^ )
Oh yeah, it's just worse in some situations, totally agree. My worse was meant to imply that without an amendment, once you're high level enough, Slip just became a "discard to explore your location after looking at the card for 3 seconds". Which was technically worse than Basic trait allies that explore and do something else :p
If I may, my suggestion for the amendment:
"On your turn, discard this card to examine the top card of your location deck. If you succeed at an Intelligence or Knowledge 7 check, you may put that card on the bottom of the location deck. Then explore your location"
It's basically the same thing, with the "If you" and "you may" that makes all the difference ^_^
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I can think of both sides to the general problem of "Succeed at X or Y happens" with Y being the desired outcome.
-For it being optional:
The situation being faced here is one in which failing (thus bottom-decking) may be situationally more beneficial than succeeding; it does not seem intended that a successful check should have a worse outcome than its corresponding failure.
Suppose you want a card bottom-decked to reach the location boss faster, or to avoid it because it's something better avoided. If the check is mandatory AND success precludes opting to bottom-deck, then you have a mechanically awkward situation --- one in which you are using very limited options in order to attempt to fail.
And one in which the characters best-suited to passing the check are punished directly for their ability.
-Against it being optional:
Perhaps Slip is just that much of an inflexible butt, due to his personality as an ally, and really doesn't care about the above.
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Related: villains who are evaded during "when encounter" if you don't pass a certain check...
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Personally I don't see a need to make it optional. Sometimes a boon doesn't always give you a choice, sometimes it does.
Sandslice, for your Related piece, I don't think Villain (or any banes) should ever have any optional checks regardless of effect, and I doubt that would even be considered for a change. Unless the effect is 100% positive (Succeed X check to add 3 to your check to defeat Villain, etc.)
Personally I don't see a need to make it optional. Sometimes a boon doesn't always give you a choice, sometimes it does.
Sandslice, for your Related piece, I don't think Villain (or any banes) should ever have any optional checks regardless of effect, and I doubt that would even be considered for a change. Unless the effect is 100% positive (Succeed X check to add 3 to your check to defeat Villain, etc.)
Most of me agrees, actually; the bane part was more "musing aloud" at the similarity in the situation. The part that's holding out is the one that still thinks that success shouldn't ever be inferior to failure.
But I suppose that I can exploit a case of it by not acquiring Slip. :)
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I've never seen an example of success being inferior to failure. There's examples like this where it can go either way depending on random draw, but that's fine, as long as success isn't an inherently worse part of the power every time. If it can go either way, that's OK. If success is always (or pretty mug always) going to be worse, then you have a problem.
I've had some corner cases where it was like that. Some bane (think it was a Henchman) had a "Succeed at an X check or it is evaded" and had either a before or after you act power that damaged you. The character in question had no hope of closing the location if we beat it and there weren't enough blessings in players' hands to help out with that. As such, we really really hoped that he'd roll low enough so that it'd be evaded and we can take it on again with a better character for the job. Since it was a check against a bane rolling was required and go figure that the player rolled high... and don't have any weapons to actually fight the thing and as such lost his entire hand. Ouch. Then the second time he got it (and succeeded at the check to prevent evasion again, of course), he had a weapon but still failed and lost his hand again. But the THIRD time (again accidentally succeeding the evade check) he finally beat it and as expected couldn't close the location. Thankfully there were only 3 other cards left in it at the time, but yeah. And with the damage he took, he had 1 card left in his own deck.
So yes, sometimes failing a check is better than succeeding. Those times are few and far between.
Thing is, if you intend to try to always win with Slip, then he's basically a level 3 ally that says "Discard to explore your location" AND NOTHING ELSE. Would you seriously consider adding an ally to your deck that just let you explore and nothing else, EVER?
There is absolutely *NO* situation in which a successful roll on Slip results in a better result than "Discard to explore". Since when you succeed, you look at the card, then explore it right away. He's basically a Jinx Eater that does not add 1 to combat or prevent failure. Or a Deckhand that can't add to your Strength/Dex or give your the Swashbuckling trait. As is, the only way Slip is better than a basic ally is when you FAIL at your check AND the card you revealed was something you did not want to face. Success should reward you. Especially on "high tier" cards (this is a unique ally from the 3rd adventure... not a common basic boon from the box).
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Skizzerz - I'm saying there's no checks where succeeding is ALWAYS worse. For your example, succeeding is only worse if you have no hope to best him. If you want to fight, succeeding is very much better.
Paul - Just because examining then exploring isn't strictly better than discarding to explore, doesn't make it worse. It's exactly the same. His power does reward you. While sometimes it has downsides, exploring is considered a positive thing, so yes that's going to be the reward for success while being forced to put what may be an amazing boon is going to be in response to failing. Sometimes you find bad cards, it happens. I don't have him in front of me, but I feel like there is a major part of the card that you aren't mentioning.
Yeah, I'm with Paul all the way on this. You can say "you can't really know if it's better or worse in 100% of situations," but the issue here is actually "if you automatically succeed the Knowledge check this card is worse than every Ally that lets you explore."
Which, basically, means the only people who would use Slip are those who don't have Knowledge at all AND don't mind leaving it up to chance whether the next card they would encounter (could be a wooden shield, could henchman they really want to hit) goes to the bottom of the deck. As mentioned, there are a couple characters with decent Int and no Knowledge in S&S, but I certainly wouldn't waste my one Damiel slot on him, even with S&S's extreme paucity of scouting/location manipulation abilities.
Thing is, if you intend to try to always win with Slip, then he's basically a level 3 ally that says "Discard to explore your location" AND NOTHING ELSE. Would you seriously consider adding an ally to your deck that just let you explore and nothing else, EVER?
There is absolutely *NO* situation in which a successful roll on Slip results in a better result than "Discard to explore". Since when you succeed, you look at the card, then explore it right away. He's basically a Jinx Eater that does not add 1 to combat or prevent failure. Or a Deckhand that can't add to your Strength/Dex or give your the Swashbuckling trait. As is, the only way Slip is better than a basic ally is when you FAIL at your check AND the card you revealed was something you did not want to face. Success should reward you. Especially on "high tier" cards (this is a unique ally from the 3rd adventure... not a common basic boon from the box).
You have a very good point.
Remember however that not all allies are purely beneficial.
Dragons will maul you if the charm wears off.
Burglars will steal your stuff
There are a couple unique allies that bone you. (Looking at you Barracuda)
Some of these uniques are meant to mirror their counterparts in the acutal rpg source material in which they are sometimes a benefit to players and sometimes rail against them or can turn into enemies depending on how players interact with them. Slip is one who IIRC has serious ulterior motives beyond helping the PCs.
So they're not all meant to be completely beneficial I think.
Which bugs me too. Quite honestly I'm on your side of this argument, Slip is not in line with the risk/reward level he should be for the adventure pack he is in. He can sometimes be better for idiot characters but not in all situations. He's a gamble. Which seems to be a recurring theme.
I got the feeling the check was meant to represent Slip outsmarting you or not and covering up what was coming your way. I feel like if you outsmart him you should have the option to let him believe he outsmarted you and reap the benefits of your own agenda.
Specific text says:
"On your turn, discard this card to examine the top card of your location deck. Succeed at an Intelligence or Knowledge 7 check or put that card on the bottom of the location deck. Then explore your location."
Let's try some formal logic here. The way the card is written, we are saying:
A OR B = TRUE
A = Succeed at Check
B = Put card on bottomIf A is TRUE, then B may be either TRUE or FALSE - it's your choice.
However, if A is FALSE, then B must be TRUE.The exception would be if the OR was actually an XOR, but that doesn't seem to make sense in this case.
In plain English - logically speaking, it is always acceptable to put the examined card on the bottom, regardless of the status of the check.
What you described is not an OR relationship. What you described is
(NOT A) Implies B
So when A is true B is free to be what it wishes.
When A is false it enforces B to be true.
Specific text says:
"On your turn, discard this card to examine the top card of your location deck. Succeed at an Intelligence or Knowledge 7 check or put that card on the bottom of the location deck. Then explore your location."
Let's try some formal logic here. The way the card is written, we are saying:
A OR B = TRUE
A = Succeed at Check
B = Put card on bottomIf A is TRUE, then B may be either TRUE or FALSE - it's your choice.
However, if A is FALSE, then B must be TRUE.The exception would be if the OR was actually an XOR, but that doesn't seem to make sense in this case.
In plain English - logically speaking, it is always acceptable to put the examined card on the bottom, regardless of the status of the check.
Unless the plain-English "or" is shorthand for "if not, then." There are two typical cases where "succeed at A or do B" happens:
1. When closing locations.
CHOOSE {A,B} = C
If C AND no villains AND location allows AND scenario allows, then location is closed; else location is not closed.
2. Typical bane cases:
If !A then B.
With Slip, the question is whether he's of the second case, or of a third case:
If B then B; else if !A then B.
I've always read the card in a similar fashion. That is, you examine the card. Then you either succeed at the check or you put the card on the bottom.
If you want to keep the card on top, succeed at the check. If you want the card to go to the bottom, go ahead put on the bottom and draw the next card.
Otherwise, as others have said, I don't really see why a lot of characters would want this card over other similar cards from earlier decks.
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Hooloovoo, this wording has been used on other cards, in fact it's how it's worded on many many cards, including every single before/after check on banes that I ever remember seeing.
The question isn't whether the current wording implies it is optional -- it doesn't -- it's whether it should changed so it does.
There are two situations where "succeed at X or do Y" occurs.
One is the location-closing case: choose X or Y. If (X or Y) then close.
The other is the general case: if !X then Y.
Slip appears to be of the general case; you were reading it as a third case: choose X or Y. If (!X or Y) then Y.
And it's not that the card is worse. A high-Int character without Knowledge (eg, Damiel or Seltyiel) or someone who runs Knowledge off a stat other than Int (eg, Shardra) can choose a guaranteed failure or a decent chance (if not an automatic) on success.
It's that someone who can't fail (eg, Enora) would be punished by not being allowed to fail, as the success is generally worse than the failure. How? Two reasons.
1. Examine -> explore is weaker scouting than examine -> bottom-deck -> explore, as you gain more information from the latter.
2. Bottom-decking puts one fewer card between you and the location boss - which is RotR Seelah's main strength.
Chief Technical Officer
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It is true that "or" does not always mean the same thing when translated into logic patterns, but that's because we're not *using* logic patterns—we're using language. Every time I've seen people try to introduce "XOR" and "NAND" and things like that to the grammar, they get it all wrong. Stop that. This is grammar, and grammar is informed by context.
Sometimes "or" is used to connect statements like "Do X or do Y," and sometimes "or" is used to connect statements like "Do X or Y happens."
If you try to map Slip as the first type of statement, it doesn't make sense. If your choice is between "Succeed at an Intelligence or Knowledge 7 check" and "put that card on the bottom of the location deck," then if you choose the first thing, what does that check *do*? Nothing. Context tells you it has to be the second type of statement.
And if you're trying to map it to something like "You can attempt X and if you fail do Y, or you can just choose to do Y," you are way off the rails. "Or" certainly does not mean that in this game, and I'm not convinced it reasonably can be interpreted to mean that in the English language either.
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The existence of Boolean grammar does not mean all things go through logic gates. Boolean grammar is a formalized, context-free grammar, which means there is a non-formalized, context-rich grammar that it competes against. That is the grammar of English.
Rulebooks and card text needs to live in an environment between the two. It must function in a formalized method; if A means B somewhere, then A must mean B everywhere. But it can't ignore the existence of informal, context-rich grammar, because that's what players bring to the table. They specifically don't bring the rules of Boolean grammar, because as is obvious from the above dialogue, even people who know those rules routinely disagree about what they say.
So we split the difference. We try to write rules that function by a formalized grammar that works with the informal one that everyone knows. With this mission, it's not surprising that we have to errata some cards for grammar reasons every now and then.
Paul - Just because examining then exploring isn't strictly better than discarding to explore, doesn't make it worse. It's exactly the same.
Exactly. Which means that as is, Slip is strictly worse than every other ally that lets you explore in the game, including the basic ones, since they all do something else apart from the exploring. Like letting you discard/recharge for 1d4 or 1d6 at whatever. Or giving you the Swashbuckling trait. Or having a strong but gambling effect like the dragon allies. As is, if you intend to get stronger in your knowledge so that you can succeed at all times, you're actually investing your effort into making this card into a lesser version of the Cabin Boy.
I don't think Paul's saying he's unilaterally bad in all people's hands, just that he gets substantially less versatile, to the point of useless, the better you become at directly passing his check. I do like things that let you fuss around with the dice a little (purposely rolling your d4 Knowledge to fail), but it's disappointing that characters like Freiya have no use for him, especially given the limited usefulness of Knowledge in S&S in the first place.
Though I do like the thematic hook of Merisiel (my fave <3) in her Shadow role plunking her d6 Int down on the table and being like "aw shucks, you got me Slip, guess I can't encounter that Storm. ;) ;) ;) ;)"
... Boolean grammar is a formalized, context-free grammar, which means there is a non-formalized, context-rich grammar that it competes against. That is the grammar of English...
And yet English is more leaning towards the letter of the law/rule whereas French leans more towards the spirit of it. Old MTG players tend to be bad rulelawyers, chaotic characters tend to use only that part of the grammar that suits their goal and good GM have faith that the truth may be out there, away for the books and dice [Note to self: remember to add the X-File theme for more impact].
So now here is my issue : I'm a French native having spent years in Colorado, played MTG for 10 years and D&D for 30+ years, my character is a chaotic dwarf, I am a consultant in IT with a Doctorate in Maths/Logic, translated Paranoia in French at the age of 16 and if you listen to my wife it's pretty obvious I've been abducted by aliens a year after. With all that, don't I deserve a bit of slack and could you please let me handle my "you", "would", "may" and others "or" the way I want? Please?
Bottom line, in French "armour" is just about love. Period. And TGIF cause this week has been tought on my "holding that thoughts" capabilities". :-)
Everyone else, thank you for bringing up the question and fleshing out the discussion. With everyone's comments, I need to change my vote on Slip. I would rather see him taken as written, where the check attempt is mandatory. He seems a bit obstinate, and he wouldn't be the first ally to be this way. The right character (one who has either Intelligence or Knowledge but not both) can trick him to get the most out of him but the wrong character (one who has both Intelligence and Knowledge) is too smart by half and ends up outsmarting himself or herself instead.
This does seem like one of those cases where the theme of the adventure path is informing the card game without there being an obvious through line for card game players to understand it. I don't exactly mind that. As someone who spent his entire childhood reading D&D source books without ever playing a game, I am primed for this sort of scenario, where your imagination has to fill in the blanks in lieu of practical experience (and nerdy friends to actually play RPGs with :D)
This change completely removed my use case for Slip. Alahazra used him to skip over undesirable cards. Before, he was the informant who would tell you that Mr X was in the deck, and if you were particularly knowledgeable he would tell you exactly where to go.
I see it - the FAQ has it reversed, bottom-decking is the default and keeping it on top is the purpose of the Int/Knowledge check.
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Thanks! However, I think that the question and the explanatory text also need a reversal:
When I use Slip to examine the top of my location deck, do I have to attempt the check to put the card on the bottom of the deck, even if I don't want to put the card on the bottom of the deck?
Slip is your friend—if you want the card to stay on top, that's OK by him.