Rules Reprise: High Seas Constructed

As our adventure on the High Seas continues beyond Taipei’s shores to the rest of the world, the Rules Team returns to offer a glimpse of the perils you may encounter heading into Pre-Release weekend, Release weekend, and National Championship season! Niccolo Paqueo and Joshua Scott share more specific rules interactions that come up in the waters of constructed play, so that your ship will sail safely towards a bounty of glorious wins!

High Seas Specific Interactions

Does Chowder, Hearty Cook gain life from its own ability?

No. The player that activated Chowder will gain 1 life from Chowder when its ability resolves. Effects like “gain 1 life” are read from the perspective of the hero/player, not the ally.

If I play Portside Exchange with no cards in hand, do I still draw a card?

Yes, you will still draw the card. You always follow the card’s instructions in order. First, you will attempt to discard a card, but since you can’t, that effect fails. Then, you will draw a card because the effect is not conditional on whether you’ve discarded a card. Finally, you won’t create a Gold token because you didn’t discard a yellow card.

If I activate Gravy Bones’ ability with no cards in deck, do I still discard a card?

Yes, you will still discard a card. You will attempt to draw a card, but since you can’t, that effect fails. Then you will discard a card from your hand to the graveyard. This is because the discard effect is not conditional on whether you’ve drawn a card.

If my opponent activates two Chum, Friendly First Mate allies, can I still attack?

Yes. You can attack either Chum.

Chum’s activated ability creates a requirement where opponents must choose the Chum as an attack-target. In the case of two Chums, both present equally restrictive requirements and wouldn’t prevent you from attacking at all. Requirements must be fulfilled if possible, which means satisfying one is sufficient when you can’t satisfy both.

How does Barbed Barrage work (against spectra and allies with ward)?

Barbed Barrage is the latest attack in Flesh and Blood that allows you to declare multiple attack-targets. In contrast to Apocalypse Automaton that specifies the attack-targets being heroes, Barbed Barrage allows you to attack any target, which can lead into some interesting interactions.

If you attack with Barbed Barrage against an opponent who controls an object that requires you to choose that object as the target of attacks if able (e.g. Arc Light Sentinel; Chum, Friendly First Mate), one of the attack-targets must be that required object.

Note, all attack-targets of an attack must be different from one another. If your opponent has activated and resolved a Chum against you, one of Barbed Barrage’s attack-targets must be that Chum; however, the additional attack-target may be the opponent. In the scenario where they happen to have two Chums in the arena, Barbed Barrage can declare one Chum as an attack-target and the other Chum as the other attack-target.

If you attack with Barbed Barrage against multiple targets, one of which is an object with spectra (e.g. Arc Light Sentinel, Shimmers of Silver, etc), spectra will trigger and destroy its source when it resolves; however, the combat chain will not explicitly close from spectra’s effect. This is a change that will be explored in the upcoming Back Alley Oracle where we dive more into the rules changes that will be effective from the set’s release date.

Notably, the combat chain will still close if there are no legal attack-targets remaining. This rule is not changing. An example of this would be if Barbed Barrage attacks two different objects with spectra – both would be destroyed, and the Barbed Barrage would be left without any targets.

Lastly, if you attack with Barbed Barrage and deal damage to both a hero and an ally with ward they control in the first part of the damage step, the ally does not automatically die from damage. Typically, allies that have sustained damage greater than or equal to their life won’t die until the game state actions are checked. However, in this scenario, there are no game state actions until after all damage from the attack has been dealt in the damage step. As a result, the ally will be destroyed as part of its ward effect (if the hero would take damage), reducing the amount of damage dealt to the hero.

Tyler attacks Nic with Barbed Barrage, declaring Nic’s Bellona, Archangel of War, as an additional target. Nic does not defend the attack. In the damage step, Tyler will deal Barbed Barrage’s 5 power as damage to Bellona first. Next, Tyler will deal Barbed Barrage’s 5 power as damage to Nic; however, as Bellona is still around because game state actions have not yet been checked, Bellona’s ward ability will cause Bellona to be destroyed and reduce the incoming damage dealt to Tyler to 1.

If a Barbed Barrage has overpower and attacks two different heroes, can each hero defend with an action card?

Yes. If Barbed Barrage attacks multiple targets and has overpower, each player may add only one action card as a defending card to Barbed Barrage’s chain link.

Heroes will have an opportunity to declare their own set of defending cards. Attacks with overpower, dominate, etc. against multiple targets will allow each defending player to declare their defending cards regardless of what other defending players have declared.

In an Ultimate Pit Fight game, Tyler resolves Monkey Powder then attacks Nic and Sam with Barbed Barrage. In clockwise order, Nic declares their defending cards, adding a Loan Shark as a defending card to the chain link. Next, Sam has the opportunity to declare cards and can add their own action card as a defending card.

If an effect or cost tells me to tap a cog I control, can I tap something with “cog” in its name?

No. Effects and costs that require you to tap/untap a cog you control is instructing you to tap/untap an object with the cog subtype you control. Partial matches of a name do not count.

In addition, only permanents in the arena can be tapped. Attack action cards are never permanents.

If I destroy an angel or dragon with Midas Touch, does the controller get any Gold tokens?

No (for current angels and dragons). The cost of an ally will appear in the upper right-hand corner of the card if it has one. Until High Seas, existing allies such as those that appear on the back-side of figments, invocations, or even tokens created by other cards do not have a cost in their upper right hand corner. As such, Midas Touch will destroy these allies and those allies’ controllers will not create any Gold tokens.

Does Sticky Fingers become unequipped when it attacks an aura with spectra?

No. Sticky Fingers would be tapped, but still equipped (as long as it was equipped beforehand).

When spectra’s triggered effect resolves, the object with spectra is destroyed. Because there are no more legal attack-targets, the combat chain begins to close. As part of closing the combat chain, the attack’s layer is removed from the stack, resulting in neither the attack nor its conditional effect to unequip Sticky Fingers resolving.

Does Arcane Compliance make Blazing Aether deal 0 damage?

No. The setting of the value of X is not an increase, so Arcane Compliance’s effect does not stop it from being set.

Specifically, Blazing Aether has an effect that deals X arcane damage, where X is defined by the amount of arcane damage you have dealt to that hero that turn. This effect simply determines the value of X at the time the Blazing Aether resolves on the stack, which is not considered an increase from any previous number and will not be stopped by Arcane Compliance’s continuous effect.

Arcane Compliance prevents the application of effects that increase arcane damage like card-based buff replacement effects (e.g. Absorb in Aether, Aether Wildfire, etc.) or event-based buff replacement effects (e.g. amp).

If Back Alley Breakline is destroyed while on the top of my deck, do I gain an action point?

Yes (as long as the other conditions are met). If you destroy the top card of your deck during your action phase, the destroy effect was generated by an activated ability or comes from an action card, and the destroyed card is a Back Alley Breakline, you will gain an action point when the triggered effect resolves.

If it is not your action phase, or the effect doesn’t come from an activated ability or action card, you will not get an action point.

Can I activate Breakwater Undertow (attack reaction) when I’m attacking with an ally?

Yes. In an upcoming rules change beginning with High Seas’ release, attack reactions can be played/activated by the controller of the attack during the reaction step.

Previously, the hero needed to be an attacking hero (typically by activating a weapon attack or playing an attack action card) to be able to activate attack reactions during the reaction step of combat.

With High Seas, this is changing. Here are the main points:

We are broadening the ability to activate/play attack reactions to the player that controls the attack so that they can activate attack reactions that affect their allies’ attacks (e.g. Breakwater Undertow).
Activating an attack reaction during an ally attack will not cause the turn player to be an attacking hero.
No changes for opponents: they still won’t be able to play/activate defense reactions if they are not the defending hero.

This rule change and its implications will be discussed more in the upcoming Back Alley Oracle article, followed by the Comprehensive Rules preview.

Other Interactions

How does Bonds of Agony work with Split Cards?

Bonds of Agony’s triggered effect requires you to look at the hand of the hero you hit and choose a card. You then search that hero’s hand, deck, and graveyard, and banish up to 3 cards with the same name as the chosen card.

If a split card is chosen from the opponent’s hand, the only cards that can be banished from the hand, deck, and graveyard would be cards that share the exact set of names as the chosen card. You would not be able to banish other split cards if it only shares only one name with the chosen split card.

Tyler hits Nic with Bonds of Agony, triggering its effect. Tyler looks at Nic’s hand and chooses Null // Shock. They search Nic’s deck, graveyard and hand, which results in them finding two other copies of Null // Shock and 3 copies of Comet Storm // Shock. Even though the chosen Null // Shock has the “Shock” name like Comet Storm // Shock, it is not an exact match since the other names of those cards are different and thus it would not be able to be banished. Tyler decides to banish the other two copies of Null // Shock since the set of names of each of those cards is exactly the same as the chosen card.

Does a “flicked” Kiss of Death count towards the Salt the Wound?

Yes. When a dagger is “flicked” by an effect (e.g. Flick Knives, Hurl, etc.), part of its effect indicates that the dagger has hit. Salt the Wound simply counts how many attack objects have hit this turn. Kiss of Death is an object with the dagger subtype and when it is played, the card itself is considered an attack (as opposed to creating an attack-proxy like other weapons). If it were to be “flicked”, it would satisfy as an attack that hit, resulting in a +1 power increase to Salt the Wound.

If the Kiss of Death had already hit, and then you flick it to hit with it again, it still only contributes +1 power to Salt the Wound. This is because Salt the Wound looks at the number of attacks that have hit, not the number of hits from attacks (an important difference).

It is important to note that “flicking” a Kiss of Death on a previous chain link does not retroactively cause that previous original Kiss of Death attack and its chain link to hit if it was fully defended.

Tyler has attacked Nic with Kiss of Death (which didn’t hit) followed by a hit with Infiltrate. Tyler resolves Infiltrate’s triggered effect, banishing a Salt the Wound from the top of Nic’s deck, then attacks with it. In the reaction step, Tyler resolves Flick Knives’ activated ability, targeting the Kiss of Death on the previous chain link as it is a dagger object. This results in Kiss of Death hitting, triggering its on-hit effect, but it being also an attack object means that Salt the Wound gets another +1 power for a total of +2 power from a total of 2 hits this combat chain.

That’s it for this Rules Reprise. Stay tuned for our Back Alley Oracle as we discuss several rule changes that these tides are bringing to Rathe in time for National Championship season and beyond.