Conversion for Alchemist's Fire

[Katlyn99]

Ok so I thought I had this figured out in a PbP game I'm in but then more weirdness about this card came up in a home game tonight so I'm very confused and hoping you all can un-confuse me.

My husband and I started playing Dragon's Demand tonight. I'm playing Skull and Shackles Lem (cuz he's almost as awesome as Lini) and my husband is playing Fumbus. We added the alchemist's deck to the set to give him even more fun cards to play with. I managed to acquire an Alchemist's Fire and ended up needing to use it on a Bandit almost immediately. I discarded my Troubadour to add my craft skill. Here is where we get confused.

The conversion guide says:

Spoiler:

If an item has a check to recharge, change its cost to “Banish” and change any recharge powers to “DURING RECOVERY (If proficient,) you may succeed at a (whatever check is required) to recharge this card.” If it was intended to be have another cost if not recharged, such as discard or bury, it should be “(Do whatever is intended to) this card; (if proficient,) you may succeed at (whatever check is required) to (do the other thing) instead.”

During my PbP earlier today I was told that the discarded card goes into recovery. Since I'm playing Damiel in that game, the Alchemist's Fire also goes into recovery and then is auto recharged thanks to Damiel's power.

Lem doesn't have any such shenanigans though so we got confused. (It wouldn't have been confusing if Fumbus had used it instead after I handed it to him next turn like we had planned but oh no, I had to explore just one more time.... Oh well.)

So with Lem, do both the Troubadour and the Alchemist's Fire still go into recovery? Does the Alchemist's Fire now have a way to recover it or is it still auto-banished in recovery then? Help us please oh wise ones on the Paizo forums!

[Yewstance]

The Alchemist's Fire still goes into recovery, for certain. It doesn't have any listed way to recover, though, so there's no way to retrieve it from the Recovery Pile when you Recover at the end-of-turn, so it ends up getting banished.

In this case, the fate of Troubadour is less certain. The Conversion Guide stipulates - for cards like Mighty Steed and Codex of Conversations - that the "other cards" discarded to card powers that allow for a check to recharge should also be thrown into Recovery, and so you can complete a Craft check (as per Alchemist's Fire) to recharge the Troubadour at the end of turn when Recovering. It doesn't specifically say this applies to Alchemist's Fire, though.

====================================

As a secondary question that I myself would like to float (which is relevant in this context)...

As far as I can tell, the Conversion Guide never says that you can ONLY interact with these "other cards" in recovery with the power that put them there in the first place. If you discard a spell to Alchemist's Fire (or Mighty Steed), for example... is there any rule preventing you from just electing to use the "During Recovery" powers on the card you're discarding? If you discard "Remove Curse" to Alchemist's Fire (and you're Lem), can you just automatically recharge it?

That doesn't sound right, as far as intent goes, but I can't see any RAW forbidding the use of Recovery powers on a card that's literally in recovery.

[Vic Wertz]

You lost me on the secondary question. Can you maybe call it out in steps, quoting any relevant card text?

[Yewstance]

First, I don't know what happens to the card that Alchemist's Fire discards - as in, I don't know whether it goes into Recovery or not, because the Conversion Guide doesn't explicitly call that out.

As for the second question, I'll use Mighty Steed as the example here, because that one IS covered.

Mighty Steed, Relevant Power wrote:

Reveal this card and discard another card to examine the top card of your location deck; you may succeed at a Constitution or Fortitude 9 check to recharge the other card instead of discarding it.

Conversion Guide for Mighty Steed, emphasis added wrote:

If an ally has a check to recharge, change its cost to “Banish” and change any recharge powers to “DURING RECOVERY Succeed at a (whatever check is required) to recharge this card; otherwise, (do whatever the card originally required, such as “bury”) it instead.”

These allies include: Anesthetizing Slime, Bound Elemental, Bound Imp, Bound Lantern Archon, Bound Magma Spirit, Bound Ophidian Demon, Bound Shadow Demon, Brodert Quink, Crystalline Carnivore, Deathtrap in a Jar, Flensing Jelly, and the “other card” discarded by Mighty Steed.

Example Spell, Lightning Touch (Core) wrote:

POWERS

For your combat check, banish to use Arcane + 2d4. If the check is against a monster, ignore its after acting powers.
DURING RECOVERY
If proficient, discard this card; you may succeed at an Arcane 6 check to recharge it instead.

Let's say, playing with the Conversion Guide, I do the following...

I discard Lightning Touch to Mighty Steed's listed power. In doing so, as per the Conversion Guide, I put Lighting Touch into a recovery pile.

I end my turn and move to Recovery. Let's look at the relevant Recovery rules from the Core Rulebook...

Core Rulebook, Page 6 wrote:

Then, if you have any cards in a recovery pile, do whatever they say to do during recovery. While you do this, you may play cards or use powers only if they affect things that happen during recovery. (It’s possible to play cards during recovery that go into the recovery pile themselves.) After you’ve dealt with them all, banish any that remain.

(There's nothing else I could find in the rulebook that adds any extra rules or stipulations to Recovery, at least that would be relevant here).

So having reads the rules, this is my understanding...

Now, during Recovery, I could make a Constitution or Fortitude 9 check to recharge Lightning Touch due to the power of Mighty Steed...

OR, if I'm proficient... I could use the "During Recovery" text on Lightning Touch itself and try to recharge it with an Arcane 6 check, as per the rules.

This doesn't seem like the intent, but I see no line in the rulebook that would tell me to ignore the "During Recovery" powers on Lightning Touch in this example. I think there's some "During Recovery" texts which might auto-recharge, or even draw, reload or shuffle cards, which can make this awkward.

[Jenceslav]

Yewstance wrote:

In this case, the fate of Troubadour is less certain. The Conversion Guide stipulates - for cards like Mighty Steed and Codex of Conversations - that the "other cards" discarded to card powers that allow for a check to recharge should also be thrown into Recovery, and so you can complete a Craft check (as per Alchemist's Fire) to recharge the Troubadour at the end of turn when Recovering. It doesn't specifically say this applies to Alchemist's Fire, though.

With your second question you really opened a can of worms (well, revealed its open-ness, in fact), Yewstance. :) For the first part, cards like Alchemical Fire, Old:Noxious Bomb, Old:Bottled Ligthning, Liquid Ice and many other alchemical attack items should be covered in a special point like the Codex of Conversations. My inclination is to use them directly-as-written (attempt to recharge just after the time they are played), with such items going into recovery pile - and with no recovery check, they themselves will be banished at EoT. Second option is that both cards go into recovery, but then I would suggest wording like "ignore the original recovery power and replace it with Craft XX check" (which can be more than 14 for some items!). That way, you just cannot use e.g. Detect Magic recovery/recharge check to circumvent this and fizzling of a spell if you are not proficient. Not talking about Old:Charm Person or Old:Charm Animal, which might be buried instead. However, that poses a problem with remembering which recovery-pile boons were played for their power or not. I often don't remember such things :)

My inclination is to recharge them immediately because that way you get around the recovery pile problem, even though it will hinder the flow of the game.
The third option - cards get into recovery pile and can be recharged per their original recovery check - should not be allowed to happen due to reasons you mentioned above.

[Yewstance]

Reading closer, I note that the Conversion Guide does say to "change any recharge powers to “DURING RECOVERY Succeed at a (whatever check is required) [...]". That could be read to mean "you cannot use the original recharge text on the card you're discarding to Mighty Steed".

However, I propose that that is not a cohesive rule, particularly when you're discarding post-Core cards, as in my example above. Lightning Touch doesn't have a 'recharge check', per se, which is old terminology dating back to RotR - it has a Recovery check. Recovery checks don't necessarily say that your card gets recharged; it can be buried, reloaded, discarded or even drawn. If you discard a card to Mighty Steed that has a During Recovery power that never mentions 'recharge', I find it hard to make a ruling that it's still a 'recharge power' that's being changed.

On top of that, I would have assumed - both as a player and PbP Box Runner - that the Conversion Guide explicitly never changes the text or function of Post-Core cards, because the whole point of it is to change pre-Core cards to function well in a post-Core ruleset.

(In short, if it's intended that all original 'during recovery' powers are negated in this circumstance, I think it needs to be more clear.)

[Vic Wertz]

Added the following bullet to the main entry for Items:

On Alchemical items that you banish to play and that have Craft in the check to acquire, but do not already have a During Recovery power, add “DURING RECOVERY If proficient, you may succeed at a Craft X check to recharge this card” where X is equal to the Craft check to acquire the card + 2.