Are keywords abilities or not?

[AlKusanagi 21]

Still new to the game, and recently there was a debate in our game as to whether keywords like stealth and deadly were counted as abilities or not in regards to "immune to character abilities" cards. Nothing in the rulebook seems to answer the question and looking at the FAQ, I don't see keywords mentioned anywhere in the abilities section, so I would assume they are two different things.

Thanks!

[Ratatoskr 34]

Welcome to the game and the forum!

Look again at the FAQ, page 8 (emphasis mine):

(3.7) Card Abilities
"Card abilities" (i.e. "Character ability,"
"Location ability," or "Attachment ability")
refers to anything in a card's text box, except
for traits, keywords, and flavor text. "Card
abilities" also refers to any abilities (again,
keywords and traits are excluded) gained by
card effects

So, keywords do not count as abilities.

[AlKusanagi 21]

Thanks! But that definitely makes immunity to abilities seem a lot less powerful then.

[ktom 598]

AlKusanagi said:

Thanks! But that definitely makes immunity to abilities seem a lot less powerful then.

It does seem that way, but it's not really the case. There are really only three keywords that act directly on other characters (Stealth, Deadly, and Intimidate), so those are the only keyword "holes" in immunity to character abilities. And while immunity to them would be nice, most players are so used to employing mitigating strategies to guard their non-immune characters from those keywords that you hardly notice the immune character's vulnerability to them at all. Essentially, most players expect opponents to be utilizing those keywords, so they are prepared for them whether their character is immune or not.

You can prepare for those three keywords as "generic tactics" available to all Houses. But there are so many non-keyword abilities that you simply cannot prepare for all of them - especially across all Houses and deck types you might face. That's where ability immunity really shines - protecting key characters from the things you cannot anticipate. Not offering any protection to keywords that you can (and should) anticipate really doesn't detract as much from the power of immunity in practice as you might think.

[Archrono 0]

 Now, how does this apply to the Snakeskin Veil? It says attached character is immune the card effects. That is a pretty broad statement.
Do keywords count as card effects? Does the veil make the equipped character immune to stealth deadly and intimidate?

another question I had was about 2 part abilities,The RoR Melisandre's ability pulls a power off a character and if it was the last power on said character, that character dies.

Now, the way I understand it, (which may be completely wrong,) is that you can still take the power off of the character, but it will not die if it has the snakeskin veil equipped. (Because it blocks the effect part of the ability.

 

[sabrefox 0]

Any effect that occurs in the game can be considered either a card effect or a framework effect so yes, "immunity to card effects" provides a huge amount of protection.  

In regard to card effects, you can search for threads on Cat 'o The Canals for more information.  That character has a printed immunity to opponent's card effects.  The conclusions you reached regarding immunity to deadly, stealth and intimidate align with what I've read in these threads. 

I would also agree with your conclusion about Melisandre's kill effect not resolving against the character with Snakeskin Veil attached.  About the only way it can leave play is by being selected for military claim (a framework effect) or Pyat Pree's effect (that ultimately resolves as a framework effect), or plot effects that kill or discard it from play (since the immunity is specifically to non-plot card effects).

[Khudzlin 734]

Or effects coming from your own cards (like House Umber Berserkers in the unlikely event you play them yourself), since the immunity refers specifically to opponents' non-plot card effects.