Once more, the Mask of a Thousands...

Pascal wrote:

It's weird because in one sentence LSJ states that you have to pay when you make the block attempt announcement, whereas in another sentence he states that if you have already declared a block attempt, and Giotto masks, you still have to pay.

I think the point he's making is one of "To be able to attempt to block Giotto, you have to have paid the cost of his ability. So now you're being forced to attempt to block him, you pay or back out."

For example: "Anneke cannot be attempting to block Giotto since she hasn't burned a blood to do so."

I think the essence is that LSJ interprets Giotto's text as "A vampire cannot be attempting to block Giotto if they haven't burned a blood to this special" as an ongoing check, rather than "A vampire burns a blood when they announce an attempt to block the action and Giotto is the acting minion" as a one-off effect.

Thus, when my copy of Gilbert Duane announces an attempt to block Giotto on a normal action, he has to burn a blood at that point to do it. But any time Giotto becomes the acting minion, the same check is perpetually applied to any would-be blocking minions. Haven't paid? You're not attempting a block.

Pascal wrote:

The only way this makes sense is to consider that the block attempt is re-established whenever Mask is played.

If that's the case, what happens in the following situation:

- A bleeds.
- D blocks cross-table by playing Eagle's Sight, which now says: "This reacting vampire attempts to block the current action, ignoring the normal prey, predator or target restrictions for blocking actions."
- Another vampire controlled by A plays Mask.

The current card text of Eagle's Sight (or similar effects) only let me break the restrictions for that one block attempt.

Regarding the Giotto text, the same would be applied the card Archon no doubt since they have similar wording.

Juggernaut1981 wrote:

Regarding the Giotto text, the same would be applied the card Archon no doubt since they have similar wording.

Not quite. LSJ is quite specific that the way Giotto works is because it's phrased as a cost, not an effect to be applied.

[LSJ 20020626]

LSJ wrote:

See Giotto's card text.
The vampire must burn a blood to attempt to block Giotto.
If he doesn't burn a blood, he isn't atempting to block.

> 1) Smudge bleeds and Anneke attempts to block. Suhailah, previously
> voted to be an Archon, masks at inferior. Can Anneke now stop attempting
> to block and avoid burning one blood? At the time Mask is played Anneke
> is still attempting to block the bleed.
No. Archon isn't "burn to attempt to block". It's "attempt to block creates
a burn blood effect".

That is, the card text isn't actually the same.

Current card text:

Example: can a vampire with 0 blood attempt to block an Archon? Yes. They attempt to block, then they burn the blood to it - which is ignored on an empty vampire. Can a vampire with 0 blood attempt to block Giotto? No, because they can't meet the cost ("do X to do Y").

Hence, not actually the same card text.