MM Scourges and Sunbursts


Rules Questions and Gameplay Discussion


Just got me Mummy's Mask and haven't actually started playing it yet but looking over the cards, I've come up with a few questions I feel I'll have to deal with sooner or later.

First is the Scourges. Besides Curse of Poisoning, we have three copies of each Scourge. I'm going to guess that it's unlikely but still possible for these three copies to be doled out and then require a fourth copy. In the event that there are not enough copies of the Scourge card, do we ignore it (ignoring impossible instructions) or do we "proxy" extra copies of the Scourge as necessary (such as Mythic Role card in Wrath)?

Second is the Sunburst Market which I'm not certain I'm understanding correctly. This Trader tells me to "choose a non-loot boon that has the Basic trait". Does this mean that I choose a specific boon, such as Camel or Holy Water Grenade? Or does it mean that I choose a type of boon, such as Item or Armor, and randomly pull a Basic card of that type from the box? Or something entirely different? o_O

Paizo Employee Chief Technical Officer

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On your first question, the default rule is found in the "Limited Resources" rules sidebar on page 25:

Rulebook wrote:


If you’re required to do something with a certain number of things and there aren’t that many things available, use as many as there are. For example, if you’re told to choose 2 characters at a location occupied by only 1 character, choose only that character. If you’re told to draw 4 cards from a deck that has only 3 cards, draw the 3 cards. (Regardless, if you need to do anything with any number of cards from the blessings deck, other than shuffle it, and you don’t have enough cards, you lose the scenario; if that happens with your character deck, your character dies.)

So if all of the copies of a particular scourge are already in play, you get out of that one. (Your party is clearly already having a bad day, so it's the least we could do for you!)

The answer to your second question is that when we say "choose," we mean "choose" If we'd wanted you to choose a type of boon, we'd have said "choose a type of boon." (And if we wanted it to be random, we'd have said "draw," which—according to the "Dealing with Cards" rules sidebar on page 12—means "random" when drawing from to the box.)


Are there (m)any basic boons in AD1?
Otherwise I don't really get the purpose of Sunburst Market, since the cards with the basic trait are exactly the ones you can build your starting deck with.
Will probably take another 3 weeks before I have both access and time to get my base set from my local vendor.


One use is letting you get back a Basic boon you've banished rather than being stuck with whatever random boon of the same type your party happened to have picked up. (Might be very useful if there are effects that eat your cards; you could at least get a boon that matches your character even if you lost a better card.)

Otherwise, it's a way to adjust your early deck. Sunburst Market is an AD1 card, after all.


Doppelschwert wrote:
Otherwise I don't really get the purpose of Sunburst Market, since the cards with the basic trait are exactly the ones you can build your starting deck with.

I took the Sunburst's intent to be allowing you take different Basic cards 'for a spin', for a scenario or two, without getting locked into them. ("So I thought Troubadour will help me get Allies easier, but I realized the Animal allies are better - I better switch out for a Sage...)

The other possibility - *shudder*- is plenty of 'banish a card' effects, but that'd mean MM and I will get off on the wrong foot...


The Sunburst Market actually makes official a house rule lots of people have mentioned: You can go back to the box for Basic boons even when other boons are available to rebuild with.

It isn't quite the free for all I've seen in most versions of the house rule, but it does let you do it a little bit.


Thanks Vic, I'll bear that all in mind.

As for the purpose of the Sunburst Market, I'd say any of the above could be equally correct. But I haven't got that far yet so I couldn't say for certain. In any event, I can see the Traders being hugely useful to characters who just haven't been lucky enough to pick up the cards they really need/want. Myself playing as any spellcasting character would be a prime example. I can't tell you how many times I've been going into deck 5 and still carrying the very same spells I started out with. :P


Hawkmoon269 wrote:

The Sunburst Market actually makes official a house rule lots of people have mentioned: You can go back to the box for Basic boons even when other boons are available to rebuild with.

It isn't quite the free for all I've seen in most versions of the house rule, but it does let you do it a little bit.

Actually we never house ruled that, up to the point that when we build our character for the first time or when we need to add cards when rebuilding we always draw random cards. It's more fun as you start your newbee character with half useless cards and any first boon you pretty much any of the first boons you aquire improves your game.

Thus the Sunburst Market makes a lot of sense for us and will be really cool.


Frencois wrote:


Actually we never house ruled that, up to the point that when we build our character for the first time or when we need to add cards when rebuilding we always draw random cards. It's more fun as you start your newbee character with half useless cards and any first boon you pretty much any of the first boons you aquire improves your game.

This sounds intriguing, I think I'll try this out next campaign.


Pyrocat wrote:
Frencois wrote:


Actually we never house ruled that, up to the point that when we build our character for the first time or when we need to add cards when rebuilding we always draw random cards. It's more fun as you start your newbee character with half useless cards and any first boon you pretty much any of the first boons you aquire improves your game.
This sounds intriguing, I think I'll try this out next campaign.

I often deliberately start with the recommended decks for essentially the same reasons, plus the unmentioned one of making things just a bit harder. I didn't think of going totally random though, I guess I figured the recommended decks were random enough already!

(not that the recommended decks are that bad, but they're constrained by only one character getting each physical card, and just generally more theme based than power based)

Contributor

Doppelschwert wrote:

Are there (m)any basic boons in AD1?

Otherwise I don't really get the purpose of Sunburst Market, since the cards with the basic trait are exactly the ones you can build your starting deck with.
Will probably take another 3 weeks before I have both access and time to get my base set from my local vendor.

This will be valuable for us, as we play with the suggested starting deck lists.


Irgy wrote:
Pyrocat wrote:
Frencois wrote:


Actually we never house ruled that, up to the point that when we build our character for the first time or when we need to add cards when rebuilding we always draw random cards. It's more fun as you start your newbee character with half useless cards and any first boon you pretty much any of the first boons you aquire improves your game.
This sounds intriguing, I think I'll try this out next campaign.

I often deliberately start with the recommended decks for essentially the same reasons, plus the unmentioned one of making things just a bit harder. I didn't think of going totally random though, I guess I figured the recommended decks were random enough already!

(not that the recommended decks are that bad, but they're constrained by only one character getting each physical card, and just generally more theme based than power based)

Recommended decks are great for new players. They are usually quite tuned to the character without totally optimizing it, thus letting a little room for the pleasure to upgrade a bit. For veteran RPG and/or PACG players that do not need a powerful-enough character to start and don't mind roleplaying a fighter that just happen to never having found a sword before debuting his career (trust me that's where this already fun game gets one level of additional fun), pure random is fun. If you want to mitigate full randomness, you can mimic traders this way: if your group of newbees altogether needs X cards of a given type (like 10 weapons) to build their decks, draw X+1 basic (11 basic weapons) from the box and have the players distribute among themselves and discard the reamining one. We are using that exact way to be really close to the pure random but avoiding total panic (still, if you only draw arcane spells or ranged weapons, the cleric or fighter will have fun dealing with that during the first scenario).

Anyway that's for creating newbees at the start of the campaign or after a character's death.
When it is just to finish building a deck between scenarios and there are not enough cards of a given type (because of during scenario banishment or post scenario trades to traders), we ALWAYS draw missing cards at random (so if the last scenario was AD5 and you are missing a weapon, you draw the first one that has AD3 or below - yes you can get a basic one... you will enjoy more your next upgrade).

Lone Shark Games

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Sunburst Market is pretty niche, but it's valuable to be able to do something like "Our 1 Cure got banished during this scenario, let's get it back." or "Guys, I just read Curse of the Ravenous. That's it: we're picking up a Remove Curse"

It's also potentially helpful for Mavaro, whose deck building can be a bit schizophrenic and occasionally require more elaborate rebuilding. :)

Grand Lodge

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On a related note, if a non-caster takes a spell just so they always have a Cure around to banish, this gives them an AWESOME way to make sure they can get their cure back rather than whatever garbage the actual casters in the party picked up.

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