"As Played" Window Ruling Contradictions?

nc-italy wrote:

About "you play a card" rulebook also states:Drawing Cards. Whenever you play a library card from your hand, you immediately draw another from your library to replace it

"immediately" lead to some misunderstandings given the other rule cited ("cancel as it played") in the timing window "as played"

The rulebook seems pretty straightforward on the issue.

1.6.1.1 - play the card, announce the effect.
1.6.1.1+a-bit - potentially cancel the card, and you haven't replaced the card yet
1.6.1.2 - replace the card

Described in that order, happens in that order. The special exception is described right up front, before you've even been told how or when to replace cards.

The "immediately" means "don't wait until the end of the action or some other time". It doesn't mean "ignore the previous sentence which explicitly tells you it happens before this"!

nc-italy wrote:

I've already quoted actual text stating that you replace immediadely the card whenever you play one, which can lead to misunderstandings if confronted with rule sentenced above in the rulebook

Which is immediately preceded by text telling you to wait for cancel effects.

Rulebook wrote:

Playing Cards. There are four main types of library cards: convictions, master cards, minion cards and event cards. Convictions are put in play during the untap phase (see details in the Imbued Rules appendix); master cards are played by Methuselahs; minion cards are played by the minions (vampires and allies) the Methuselahs control; event cards are put into play during the discard phase to represent events that affects the World of Darkness as a whole (see section 8). Master cards have no icon at the top of the attribute bar while the other cards have an icon there that indicates what type of card it is. A card is played by placing it face up in the playing area or by showing it to the other players and placing it face up in the ash heap. The player completely declares the effect of the card when it is played.

Some effects can cancel a card "as it is played." These effects (and effects that grant the ability to play them, like Forced Awakening) are the only effects allowed during the "as played" time period of another card. Even drawing to replace cards comes after this time period.

Drawing Cards. Whenever you play a library card from your hand, you immediately draw another from your library to replace it (unless card text says otherwise, of course). If your library is empty, then you do not draw to replenish your hand, but you continue to play. The number of cards in your hand should always match your hand size (cards that are replaced later reduce your hand size for the duration of the effect). Whenever they don't match (when an effect changes your hand size or adds or removes cards from your hand, for example), immediately discard down to or draw up to your hand size.

This is not infering anything from context. It's actually reading the words that are there and not selectively quoting them.

Play card.
Cancel happens before replace. This is explained before you're ever told to replace anything.
Now replace - but you've just been told this happens after cancellation. In the immediately preceeding sentence. Go-go gadget attention span!


The moral is: don't take sentences in a random order. Actually read the whole section.

Give guy a break. He read it correct. You are the one who quoted and marked one and a half of other section.

And I agree that term immediately means "right away". If cards are not replaced immediately all the time, that term should not describe time of replacement. In fact word immediately is obsolete in a given marked sentence, and meaning is the same if you erase the word. And more accurate, I might add.

Megabaja wrote:

You are the one who quoted and marked one and a half of other section.

Err, no. This is a common problem. The rulebook is not a series of isolated sentences. You have to read the whole thing.

Did you know that when you play a card, you don't replace it? How do I know that? I read 1.6.1.1 and then failed to carry on reading the rest of the rulebook. Cards are never replaced. Ever.



LSJ pointed out, on occasion, that many problems would be solved if players actually read the whole rulebook, rather than believing they'd learned it by osmosis. This is one of those times.

Megabaja wrote:

In fact word immediately is obsolete in a given marked sentence, and meaning is the same if you erase the word. And more accurate, I might add.

Given that we have players such as yourself who yell at me for daring to suggest that reading the immediately preceeding sentence is a helpful thing to do, the word "immediately" conveys that it happens right there and then. For players from other games which don't have a constant replace mechanism, this is helpful clarification. It would be entirely possible to intuit, for example, that you replace cards for an action at the end of the action, or for the round at the end of the round. Once you encountered cards that said something similar, it might cause enlightenment (or deepen confusion). It is interesting to note, for example, that when - as I recall - White Wolf played and taught people the game back in 1994 at conventions and the like, there were tales that combat was handled by playing precisely one card. Oh look, you played a maneuver, I played Undead Strength... nothing happens. Err, thanks. People intuit all sorts of randomly wrong things. Given that some of the most popular card games on the planet do things differently, emphatic clarifications are not a bad idea.

The word immediately was there in the rulebook back in 2001, by the way. You had to read to the following sentence to find out about an exception (card text, and referendums - the rules on referendums were different back then). Think of the poor, poor players who had to read two whole sentences that were right next to each other. I weep for them.

Historically, you have always had to read whole sections and not just grab random isolated sentences, and then wet yourself when your random isolated sentence "contradicts" another sentence explaining an exception. That other sentence doesn't contradict it - it's explaining an exception.

Regardless of what's in the rulebook, this rule is in reality a totally unnecessary complication to what is otherwise a perfectly understandable system.

Why should there be a timing window between playing and replacing the card? For what reason is this required? There is absolutely no sensible reason for this other than "LSJ said so" and all it ends up doing is cause (unnecessary) arguments at tables because someone wants to play a DI after the card has been replaced.

As icing on the cake is also results in all sorts of required (messy) rulings regarding Barrens (or other card drawing effects) and Rewind Time. None of this mess would be required if the rule was just that - "you play it, you *immediately* replace it (unless the card says otherwise)".