Does discarding an animal card to activate Lini's 2nd power (use a d12 for Str or Dex) count as discarding it for its power, and therefore triggers her 1st power to allow you to shuffle that card back into her deck instead of discarding it?
I assume the answer is 'no', and that her first power only triggers when you use the animal ally for one of the powers printed on that particular card, but I'm not positive.
Does discarding an animal card to activate Lini's 2nd power (use a d12 for Str or Dex) count as discarding it for its power, and therefore triggers her 1st power to allow you to shuffle that card back into her deck instead of discarding it?
I assume the answer is 'no', and that her first power only triggers when you use the animal ally for one of the powers printed on that particular card, but I'm not positive.
You assume correctly. Lini is really good, but not that good.
You are discarding it for Lini's power, not discarding it for the card itself's power. Discarding a card for its power means that you played the card for one of its powers, and playing the card involved discarding it. Doing something with a card that is not using one of the powers printed on the card itself does not count as playing that card.
skizzerz's answer is practically a quote.
Playing a card means using a power on that card by revealing, displaying, discarding, recharging, burying, or banishing that card or by performing another action specified by that card... Doing something with a card that does not use a power on that card does not count as playing that card.
Lini's power specifically says you have to play the card:
When you play an ally that has the Animal trait, if you would recharge, discard, or bury it for its power, you may instead shuffle it into your deck.
Thanks, everyone. Glad I was playing it correctly. I guess I should re-read the rules, now that I've got a few games under my belt. A lot of the specifics will probably be more applicable to things I've seen, and I'll hopefully be more able to remember them.