Ex Nihilo and Newsletter ruling

May 2022 newsletter wrote:

Q: Some cards ask the Methuselah to do “A or B” during the unlock or master phase, for instance Ex Nihilo (“During your master phase, this vampire burns 1 blood or is burned.”) Does the Methuselah get the choice between A and B?
A: Yes (this is a reversal for some cards). Those cards will be reprinted with “do B unless you do A” to make the choice more explicit. Some cards such as Fear of Mekhet don’t leave the choice and are explicitly written so (“During this vampire's unlock phase, they burn 5 blood. If they cannot burn the blood, they are burned.”)

Just to understand this correctly: it means that if a vampire with Ex Nihilo has zero blood in the master phase, he can now choose to "burn 1 blood" (which does nothing, as he has zero) instead of burning the vampire? Ex Nihilo just became stronger!

And if this is it... why the reversal? What was wrong with the previous reading of the card (which seems closer to designer intent)? And may I know what other cards are affected by the ruling (at least before their next reprint)? Thank you!

The reversal is to allow you to choose to burn the vampire if it still has blood. The proposed new wording makes it clear that the vampire is burned if it does not have blood.

The ruling that is reversed said you have to burn 1 blood if you can. This is no longer the case.

The optional choice here is, you can choose to burn your vampire even if they still have blood left.
Why?
Maybe you have fame and there is agg dealing rusher on table, or maybe you're out of blood and another copy in inactive region ready to enter play.
edit: cross post with Yomyal.

emime wrote:

Just to understand this correctly: it means that if a vampire with Ex Nihilo has zero blood in the master phase, he can now choose to "burn 1 blood" (which does nothing, as he has zero) instead of burning the vampire? Ex Nihilo just became stronger!

No, a vampire with 0 blood can not choose to burn blood they don´t have thus leaving the option to burn the vampire as the only viable one.

Ex Nihilo has not been made stronger but restored to its original state.

emime wrote:

And if this is it... why the reversal? What was wrong with the previous reading of the card (which seems closer to designer intent)? And may I know what other cards are affected by the ruling (at least before their next reprint)? Thank you!

The reversal corrects an incorrect ruling and aligns it to the original intent/design and to other similar cards (e.g. Antediluvian Awakening, Eye of Hazimel, Drink the Blood of Ahriman and Society of Leopold).

“During X, do B unless you do A” is to make the choice more explicit and clearer than what it is in the current format "During X, do A or B"

Here is a ruling of a scenario where LSJ could have pointed out that there wasn´t a choice to be made but he didn´t.
Also, check out the text of Society of Leopold which is very similar and includes reminder text making it clear that there is a choice intended.