Blissful Agony

Blissful Agony, Combat, 1 blood, Valeren/Animalism, R1 , [Bloodlines:R1]

[ani] Strike: make a hand strike at strength+1 damage
[val] Only usable at close range before strikes are chosen. Opposing minion takes 1 damage (damage not preventable) during strike resolution each round this combat if the range is close.
[VAL] Strike: combat ends. Choose a minion controlled by a Methuselah other than the opposing vampire`s controller. The opposing vampire enters combat with that minion.


Question - IMHO the second part of the BA effect kicks in even if the opposing vampire plays S:CE or dodge. I am wrong?

Just wanted to clarify this...

Majesty: Yes, the new combat happens.
Dodge: The new combat doesn't happen. Dodge protects your minion from the opposing minion's strike.

Also remember: can't sup BA if the opponent plays sup BA.

Also remember: can't sup BA if the opponent plays sup BA.

Can you explain this, Pascal?

Malachy wrote:

Also remember: can't sup BA if the opponent plays sup BA.

Can you explain this, Pascal?

There's some confusion here and - unfortunately - Pascal has ruled both ways on this.

1) Back in [LSJ 20011215] , LSJ ruled:

LSJ wrote:

The [two Blissful Agony] strikes resolve simultaneously. The acting methuselah can then order the two pending "after combat" effects - with the one chosen to be first canceling the other.

2) In RTR 2002-05-01 (later than that ruling), the Rules Team changed how queued-up / pending combats were handled.

RTR wrote:

An effect which would cause (a new) combat cannot be used if there is already a "to be resolved later" combat.

The common example for this was Blissful Agony ending combat (which sets up a combat about to happen) and then the opponent playing Psyche! (old text) to start a new combat.

3) In [FZD 20120225] , Pascal ruled that we should follow the ruling in 1.

4) Here, in this thread, Pascal appears to be following the ruling in 2).


However, it's arguable that Blissful Agony doesn't queue up another combat until it resolves and so - when both players play it - there isn't a pending combat to stop them, potentially.




There's some similar confusion regarding Siren's Lure:

2009: groups.google.com/d/msg/rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad/B-OXE85SduA/kvhqdJbbFGkJ Earlier in the thread, a pending Siren's Lure prevents Hidden Lurker being played.

LSJ wrote:

Jozxyqk wrote:
> I actually thought Siren's Lure was ruled differently.
> Since Siren's Lure's timing is "once the action resolves", which is after
> all queued combats _during_ the action would happen, it's a little bit
> different from playing psyche/hidden lurker during the action.
>
> The conversation about this seems very familiar, although I can't find
> the magical google groups search that comes up with a result that supports
> this memory....
Yeah. I had the same vague memory. But found nothing to back it up.

But in 2008 - this perhaps being the vague memory they both had but couldn't find:

groups.google.com/d/msg/rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad/NWoHG9BuKnQ/6sE-FnADoOsJ

LSJ wrote:

John Flournoy wrote:
> On Apr 28, 1:56 pm, "" <> wrote:
>> Hello LSJ,
>>
>> Vamp A1 calls a political action, Vamp B tries to block. Vamp A2
>> plays Siren's Lure. No more blocks are declared. Can Yawp Court be
>> used at this time? I believe no, because a combat is already queued.
>
> Look at it this way: If another block was declared and succeeded, the
> combat resulting from that block is not annulled because of the
> pending Siren's Lure combat. The existence of 'there will be a combat
> later' due to Siren's Lure doesn't pre-empt any other combats during
> the action - especially since that combat by definition doesn't occur
> until after the action (and all of its resultant combats) resolves.
Correct.

And then if SL does prevent other combat queuers being played, does it prevent Blissful Agony being played? Because then it's clear that we know BA will queue a combat, and that might prevent the opponent's BA being played.

But, for example, acting minion plays Blissful Agony. Opposing minion plays agg damage + Rotschreck. The possibly-queued BA combat doesn't happen because the strike doesn't resolve - it's not a question of interruption and being lost, it simply never gets to strike resolution.

Thanks for the catch.
"Sup' Blissful Agony cannot be played if the opposing plays sup' Blissful Agony" is the valid ruling.

Siren's Lure won't disallow the play of sup BA.

Pascal wrote:

Thanks for the catch.
"Sup' Blissful Agony cannot be played if the opposing plays sup' Blissful Agony" is the valid ruling.

Siren's Lure won't disallow the play of sup BA.

Pascal - can you explain the metaphysics behind this as i've been following ruling [1] for sometime as it made sense [the card isn't queuing when it's played as it's not resolved at that stage]

Especially as your thoughts on Siren's Lure and BA interaction seems to go the other way [why would SL NOT prevent a BA being played at SUP if a BA at SUP prevents a BA at sup being played?????]