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Simple and quick question here, having had it turn up in a game I'm running due to the interaction between the following effects...
When you play your harrow, you may heal an ally and may remove 1 of your scourges.
When you would heal any number of cards, you may remove this scourge instead.
When you play your Harrow, can you use the "heal an ally" bonus to remove your Wounded scourge instead - even if you have no allies in your discards?
* If you are presented with two or more options, none of which require a check, you may choose any of those options.
You may not choose an impossible option unless you have no other choice.
I would argue that a 'may' effect is an option, and 'heal an ally' is an impossible option to take if there are no allies in discard pile. I don't think the fact that you're going to replace the heal with something else changes the fact that you cannot make that choice.
However... there's quite a few other corner-cases I can think of where this matters (such as involving various Corrupted cards, and methods of ignoring their trait), so I want to be sure I'm correct here.
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I would say no.
Because you cannot play a power when it doesn’t apply.
If there is no ally to heal you cannot use the power so there is no way you « would heal ».
IMHO
Agree with Frencois
It looks like to me that it depends on when the replacement occurs; Do you start the heal process, interrupt it and then change it or do you change it beforehand?
So far, Matsu Kurisu and Frencois are in line with my opinion.
It looks like to me that it depends on when the replacement occurs; Do you start the heal process, interrupt it and then change it or do you change it beforehand?
From my perspective; PACG rules instruct you to ignore impossible instructions, and you cannot choose to choose an option which is impossible. Healing a card is impossible.
The replacement effect, by definition, requires a heal effect to work. If it's illegal to choose a heal effect, then by extension you cannot replace it.
If you were allowed to choose to heal when it would have no effect (such as if you were allowed to Cure someone with no discard pile just so you could recharge the spell), then that would be different; but as is you've never been allowed to do that. You could not even start the action.
With all of that said, I would still like more discussion on this. I find it... unintuitive that players cannot use a Cure spell to clear Wounded or Poisoned if they have no cards in discard.
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From my perspective; PACG rules instruct you to ignore impossible instructions, and you cannot choose to choose an option which is impossible. Healing a card is impossible.
The replacement effect, by definition, requires a heal effect to work. If it's illegal to choose a heal effect, then by extension you cannot replace it.
Generally, I agree with the majority reading of RAW. I too however would like to explore that a bit more, on "intuitiveness" grounds.
First, imho, "replacement effect", by definition or otherwise, is not something that exists in PACG - this is just something that we as players use a mutually understood shorthand. (It is also a term that can easily be applied to replacing your skill for a check, to add further confusion).
Therefore, there's an argument to be made that voluntary powers like the one in question are NOT in fact "replacing" anything, but instead offer you an alternative option B - *at the time* when an Option A presents itself, and there's no causality between one and the other's legality. From such argument it would follow that you don't care that Option A (you may heal an ally) is currently impossible, as you're NOT picking that option, but Option B instead (you may remove a scourge).
Here's how I imagine that would work logic-wise for a player:
1) There's a "When you would heal cards, you may remove a scourge instead" power
2) "When you would" means that the first half of the power CANNOT happen (is rendered illegal), if you chose to apply the second part
3) Therefore, the first part of the power doesn't NEED to happen (or to even be legal at this particular time)
4) Therefore the *intent* of the power is NOT "When you heal cards, you may choose not to heal them and remove a scourgeinstead", but rather "When you are offered to heal cards, you may choose to remove a scourge instead.
The above reading would also be reinforced by applying in-world logic (which we know is not relevant, but is still something a lot of players bring with them and would use to adjudicate corner cases), as this is what players imagine happens: "A healing force is applied on your character - they may choose for it to close their wounds, or to remove a pending curse" . Which is a lot more intuitive than the supposed "A Schroedinger's Minor Restoration is applied on your character; if they have any wounds, they may chose for it to remove a pending curse instead (without healing any wounds, however), but if they have no wounds - the force has no effect at all".
So, on the above grounds, even though arguable by RAW, I would try to apply "the spirit of the law" and allow scourge removal even if no allies in discards.
It looks like to me that it depends on when the replacement occurs; Do you start the heal process, interrupt it and then change it or do you change it beforehand?
To be more precise than my previous short answer, this is my point:
You may not use a power that doesn’t apply to your current situation. For example, you may not play a card to reduce damage when damage isn’t being suffered, and you may not play a card to evade a monster when you are not encountering a monster.
IMHO: the question is not when do you start the replacement process, because you cannot start it at all! Per the RAW, if there is no ally in your discard, you just cannot play the card, so this is way before trying to read/apply the power on the card (IMHO).
I understand what you are looking at Longshot, but if you start wondering if a power may be ultimately valid later when you will maybe be able to fully process its caveats before applying the condition to start reading it, you open a Pandora Box of chickens and eggs.
I remember a discussion with Vic when the question was something like "can I play a normally forbidden power (e. g. against an immune card) if playing that power would trigger another power that would retroactively make that first power valid (e. g. the triggered power dumps the immunity)?".
Answer was no and that was great else we could create a bunch of infinite loops and other stupid situations that would just make the game worse and certainly less fun (bottom line : do we want to have fun playing characters or screwing up with technical rules far from any logical situation ?).
So not only I think that RAW no ally = cannot play the power whatsoever, but more importantly I think that it has to be that way. IMHO.
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bottom line : do we want to have fun playing characters or screwing up with technical rules far from any logical situation ?.
So not only I think that RAW no ally = cannot play the power whatsoever, but more importantly I think that it has to be that way. IMHO.
I think many people would say that in this case you're arguing for screwing up with technical rules far from any logical situation.
The logical situation has been pretty well described by Longshot11;
the power is offering you an alternative to healing cards.
but if you start wondering if a power may be ultimately valid later when you will maybe be able to fully process its caveats before applying the condition to start reading it, you open a Pandora Box of chickens and eggs.
I'm sorry, maybe I didnt write it well, or I'm not understanding you - but I feel I was suggesting the exact *opposite* thing.
I remember a discussion with Vic when the question was something like "can I play a normally forbidden power (e. g. against an immune card) if playing that power would trigger another power that would retroactively make that first power valid (e. g. the triggered power dumps the immunity)?".
Answer was no
I find this is a bit extraneous to the matter at hand, but... wasn't this *expressly* changed in Core?? It's an honest question, my memory's a bit hazy on what exactly was discussed on the forum, but without a change to this - the new Core Elemental weapons would *still* not be playable (say, Cold Spear with "you may remove 1d4 to remove the Cold trait" would NOT be initially playable against an Immune to Cold monster??)
do we want to have fun playing characters or screwing up with technical rules far from any logical situation ?
Yes, me and you would have the same answer to that question, but as JohnF rightly notices - we seem to be at odds which approach is fun (and intuitive) and which one is overly technical and illogical :)
I rest my case. I'm a bit sick and may not be thinking right.