Caldara and Fellowship contract : wich timing ?

[FMP_thE_mAd 0]

Hello there.

 

I have a question with my new Caldara deck.

 

What happens if I have Caldara, 8 others characters (3 of them are spirit heroes) and the fellowship contract, and that I sacrifice Caldara to his ability ?

Am I able only to bring one allie, then my contract flip and i can't have two more because of Contract B?

Or does I bring 3 allies? And in that case is my contract on face A or B?

 

Thanks for your answer !

 

FMP

[sappidus 531]

Before addressing the question directly, I want to make sure I understand the initial situation. You have the Fellowship contract, Caldara, and 8 other unique characters in play? And you want to know what happens if you try to trigger Caldara at that point?

[FMP_thE_mAd 0]

Exactly.

To be clear :

Initial Situation in play :

Caldara ; Cirdan the shipwright ; Arwen Undomiel : heroes

Emery + Sword Thain (so, Hero too)

5 others Spirit Allies (Glorfindel ; Bofur ; Damrod ; Elrohir ; Eomund)

Fellowship Contract on Face B (because 9 characters in play).

 

In my discrad pile : 3 others Spirit Allie (Elfhelm ; Jubayr ; Sulien )

 

At this moment, what happens exactly when i use Caldara effect ?

[TheSpitfired 457]

Exactly what you think will happen:

You discard Caldara, Fellowship Forced triggers: flip the Fellowship card back over to side A as you no longer control exactly 9 characters. Resume Caldara ability.

You play two of the characters from the discard pile, Fellowship forced ability triggers and you flip Fellowship to side B. As you can no longer play allies or put allies into play, the ability is resolved and complete, one ally still in the discard pile.

At least that's how I would play it.

[Wandalf the Gizzard 370]

The verdict would come down to whether the allies from Caldara enter play one by one or simultaneously. I would argue for the one by one scenario.

[sappidus 531]

1 hour ago, FMP_thE_mAd said:

At this moment, what happens exactly when i use Caldara effect ?

OK, thanks for the explicit situation.

Here's what I think should happen…

1. You pay the cost for Caldara's ability (discarding Caldara). [You can do this because the ability has the potential to change the game state, which is assessed independent of the fact that Fellowship side B would actually prevent you from actually putting any allies into play at this point.]
2. Fellowship immediately flips to side A, as you do not control 9 unique characters. Conveniently, you can also put (unique) allies into play now. [RR Initiating Abilities / Playing Cards is good reference text for why this can happen in the middle of a sentence.]
3. You put into play Elfhelm/Jubayr/Súlien simultaneously. You now control 11 unique characters. 11 ≠ "exactly 9", so Fellowship stays on side A. To get it to flip to side B again, you'll have to lose (exactly) 2 characters.

Where this differs from @TheSpitfired's take is in step #3, where they essentially said you resolve the puttings into play individually and one at a time, but I say you do them all at the same time (similar to committing characters to the quest).

My evidence: Caldara is worded "Discard Caldara to put 1 Spirit ally from your discard pile into play for each other hero you control with a printed Spirit resource icon." There is a ruling on spirit Elfhelm ally that I'll have to track down, but basically says the following:

Quote

With spirit Elfhelm ready, encounter card effects that raise your threat "by 1 for each [whatever]" work thusly: the value is calculated first, your threat is raised by, say, 5, then Elfhelm kicks in for –1. (Not 1, –1, 1, –1, etc.)

I take this to mean that Caldara's effect is also "calculated" completely—"how many Spirit heroes do I have now? 3. so how many allies do I put into play? 3."—before firing as a single instance of putting multiple allies into play, as opposed to several instances of putting 1 ally into play. (The "several instances" interpretations would lead to the 1, –1, 1, –1, etc. Elfhelm situation above, which does not occur.) I similarly think that the allies from Reinforcements ("put 2 allies into play…") enter play simultaneously.

Edited November 5, 2019 by sappidus

[FMP_thE_mAd 0]

Ok thank's for your answers everyone.

 

I think the Allies come in play simultaneously too. So i'm agree with Sappidus solution.

 

So other question : can i choose not to put in play ALL Allies i could with Caldara ? For exemple here : can i choose to put in play juste Jubayr with the Caldara abilite ? (and then i can flip Contract again).

 

I think it's not possible because when you are doing an effect, you have to do it at his maximum. But in case...

[TheSpitfired 457]

A very fair counter point @sappidus, truth be told I could go either way on it!

[Miceldars 24]

I think you have to resolve Caldara's effect at its maximum, because it doesn't say something like "you may", or "you can choose a maximum of...". But you can still manage to have only 1 ally in the discard pile, then you are not able to put more than one ally. Unless you MUST have enough allies in discard pile to trigger Caldara's ability ?

[player3351457 167]

I believe sappidus is right on this but might worth an official ruling. A very good tale has similar language and the "simaltaneous vs consecutive" action is an important distinction for this, too.

[sappidus 531]

5 hours ago, Miceldars said:

I think you have to resolve Caldara's effect at its maximum, because it doesn't say something like "you may", or "you can choose a maximum of...". But you can still manage to have only 1 ally in the discard pile, then you are not able to put more than one ally. Unless you MUST have enough allies in discard pile to trigger Caldara's ability ?

I think this is covered by RR Effects, http://www.lotr-lcg-quest-companion.gamersdungeon.net/#Rule525:

When a non-targeting effect attempts to engage a number of entities (such as "draw 3 cards" or "search the top 10 cards of your deck") that exceeds the number of entities that currently exist in the specified game area, the effect engages as many entities as possible.

That clause of Caldara's ability is not a cost, so it nonoptionally puts into play as many allies as possible, i.e., it will put one into play if you only have one Spirit ally in your discard pile.