Heidelberg and impulse

It is player A's minion phase. Player A has just finished resolving an action and wants to announce another action. Between the actions, player B wants to tap Heidelberg.

As far as I can tell, the "impulse" passes around the table during the resolution of the first action and then returns to player A, who can immediately announce another action without passing the impulse. It would then stand to reason that player B can't use Heidelberg during A's minion phase until A is done with actions or otherwise allows him to. Is this correct?

Heidelberg Castle, Germany
Type: Master
Cost: 2 pool
Master: unique location.
Tap to move blood, equipment cards and/or retainers between any two ready vampires you control. (You choose the amount of blood you move and which cards you transfer.) Cannot be used during an action.

Suoli wrote:

It is player A's minion phase. Player A has just finished resolving an action and wants to announce another action. Between the actions, player B wants to tap Heidelberg.

As far as I can tell, the "impulse" passes around the table during the resolution of the first action and then returns to player A, who can immediately announce another action without passing the impulse.

Incorrect.

The minion phase has an alternation of "action" / "between action" windows. When an action is done, a "between action" window opens and everyone can use it, following the normal impulse. When they pass, it goes back to the "action" window.

[LSJ 20090123]

LSJ wrote:

A's turn.
Minion phase.
Time to declare an action.
A has the impulse.
A has minion W take an action.
...
Action resolves.

Between-action (Heidelberg)
A has the impulse.
A passes. All pass.

Time to declare an action.
A has the impulse.
(repeat until A passes the opportunity to declare the next action).

An interesting question might be "Given that you (acting Methuselah) just played Haven Uncovered on Arika, can I tap Heidelberg to move the Laptop Computer off her before you have the chance to rush me?" Based on the above, I think the answer is no. Oh wait, that's bollocks based on me mis-remembering the existence of the words "minion phase" on Heidelberg.

Suoli wrote:

It would then stand to reason that player B can't use Heidelberg during A's minion phase until A is done with actions or otherwise allows him to. Is this correct?

No.

IIRC B has a window for Heidelberg between actions, but it is one of those things that have no proper justification in the rules. It works as if there were 2 different impulses, one for actions and one for "fast effects" between actions.

EDIT: James was faster, and indeed, there is no mention of a "between actions" window anywhere in the rules. It must be added to the CRR.

jamesatzephyr wrote:

An interesting question might be "Given that you (acting Methuselah) just played Haven Uncovered on Arika, can I tap Heidelberg to move the Laptop Computer off her before you have the chance to rush me?" Based on the above, I think the answer is no.

Of course you can, at the end of A's master phase. Heidelberg is not restricted to the minion phase only.

Non-existant user wrote:

jamesatzephyr wrote:

An interesting question might be "Given that you (acting Methuselah) just played Haven Uncovered on Arika, can I tap Heidelberg to move the Laptop Computer off her before you have the chance to rush me?" Based on the above, I think the answer is no.

Of course you can, at the end of A's master phase. Heidelberg is not restricted to the minion phase only.

Yeah, I just edited my post as you replied. I wonder what card I'm getting confused with.

Non-existant user wrote:

IIRC B has a window for Heidelberg between actions, but it is one of those things that have no proper justification in the rules. It works as if there were 2 different impulses, one for actions and one for "fast effects" between actions.

Quite a few cards define (explicitly or implicitly) timing windows that we take for granted. There was no justification in the rules for "before range is determined" cards, for example, or for the "Madness Network phase" (which got removed when Madness Network got turned into a normal impulse).

In Heidelberg's case, the justification essentially comes from the original change, way back in 7/7:

www.thelasombra.com/rules/RTR7-7.htm

RTR wrote:

Heidelburg Castle, Germany:
Cannot be used during an action (including during a combat, since that
is part of the action now - including combats resulting from blocks).
Can be used after an action resolves and before the next action begins, at
the beginning of any minion phase, or at any time outside of the minion
phase.

How about adding a note to the CRR, Section III.C:

NOTE: after each action and before the next one, methuselahs can play effects such as tapping Heidelberg Castle or Dreams of the Sphinx, following the normal sequencing rules.