Venture Total - Removing hits

[BigBadHarve]

Official rules, do you mean the table of meta where it list out offense/defense? If so, I always thought that defense=yes for AH code was referring to Vision's version of the special. However, applying defense=yes to all AH specials does make more playable cards, which is fine with me. Learned something new.

That list of attack/defense applies to all cards with that code.

With that out of the way, the new understanding of how AH specials works got me thinking about other specials that are flagged defense=yes, and I came up with this.

Let say I have a Morlock Tunnels battlesite, with one hero left and I drew both a Storm and Dark Beast activators. You attack my hero with a powercard, I exchange Dark Beast for his CD special (Only attacks made with Universe cards may be played against Beast for remainder of battle.) and play it to avoid the powercard. On your next turn, since you are restricted to universe cards, you launch a teamwork on my hero, and I exchange Storm for her AH special (No Universe cards may be played against Storm for remainder of battle), successfully avoiding the attack. Is this played correctly? and if so, has my hero shut out all attacks for the battle, unless negated?

Yup, that's exactly how it would work.

-BBH

[Onslaught]

Yes, I forgot about EE's and some others, I only did a quick search for 'Current Battle' and picked out those. I'd like to hear Onslaught's thoughts.

Hits removed by an EE (or a negate, or whatever) were always ruled to not count towards venture total. This is also supported by the fact that it was specifically mentioned that you can remove hits from a dead character (the only reason to do so would be to keep them from counting to venture, so that's the only reason they would bring it up really). Hope this helps!

[Palatinus]

Going by what Onslaught says, it sounds like whether they intended it or not, all the remove hits cards were essentially erratted to indicate that they affect the venture.  Onslaught, do you know if they printed a ruling anywhere to indicate this?  If not, this would go back to the ease of play versus rules interpretation difference from earlier.  Someone coming to the game cold with nothing but the written rules would still be faced with figuring this out if nothing was officially added.  When my friends and I used to play, for example, we never would have thought to use a special as an avoid that didn't specifically say so.  In fact, there is a whole ton of stuff that can be done as a defensive action that I've learned about nowadays that we had no idea about back then.

[The Dude]

Two things on this.

1 - I can say for a fact that back in the tournament days Master Mold (EE) and Run From the Slaughter (Morlocks) where definately removing hits from both Venture and Current Battle and I used to attend in tournaments in three states with three different sets of judges/organizers. In fact one tournment I went too the winning deck was Sentinels, Holocaust, Morlocks and a big factor of its strategy was that all three heroes had a different way to remove a hit in the current battle and manipulate venture as it needed to win each battle.

2 - to Platinus. A general rule is if the special only mentions your hero it can be played defensively but if it mentions the opponent it has to be played offensively. So in the cases of Doom, Storm and Beast the Specials you named can be played defensively because they only names your hero and not the word "opponent". Conversely Mystiques Illusion of Ally or that Mr. Fantastic special with Universe cards no one plays (Object Bounce, i think) can only be played offensively because they have the word opponent on them. Likewise War Machine could make himself +2 to defense defensively, but Black Cat cannot make an opponent -2 to attack defensively. Another example of similar effects with different wording, Onslaught can play Cannon Fodder defensively to force attacks to a teammate, but KC specials cannot played defensively because they affect how the Opponent attacks. Also this rule extends to teamwide effects that only affect your team so for example Proffesor X's Telepathic Unity can be played defensively as well. (This is also why for most of the game's life Vertigo and Trick Transport could be played defensively as well - - and in fact in our circle we still play them that way).

I think in an earlier post you mentioned you stopped playing around Mission Control, and if I recall this rule wasn't really clarified until DC/IQ when new rulebooks were printed so hope this helps.

Post Merge: July 11, 2011, 06:27:10 PM
Harve,

You just mentioned my all time biggest pet peeve with the rules committee. It gives me Vietnam style flashbacks of annoyance.

I'm talking about the idiotic Brood Spawn ruling where they clearly contradict the text of the card, and in the process ruin a perfectly good pair of characters. And for what reason? Was there some phase of the game where Brood Spawn and Aquaman decks were running amuck ala FF Plaza and X-Babies-Marauders that I slept through? It seemed sometimes like they wanted to sabotage the game and limit playing options. No human being who speaks and understands English would ever make that interpretation of those cards based the text written on them.

The KC ruling was perhaps even stupider (although slightly less annoying only because I don't like Leader and Mole Man as much as Aquaman--who is probably my all time favorite DC Hero) in that people were actually trying to play Leader decks in tournaments before the stupidity from on-high. Then just to be a slap in the face they release Grunge in the next set as a nigh unkillable hero with this same special as a remainder of the game and the -2 built in. Well if he can have it and it isn't broken then why in God's name can't two lesser heros who will most likely be KO'd in three hits play it as written as well?

Thanks now that I had to remmeber all this again I need to go shower and wash the stupidity off me.

[Palatinus]

Thanks, The Dude, that definitely gives me a clearer picture of how things can be played.  Since I started collecting and playing again it's been quite an eye-opener about how the game has changed.  It took me days of searching to finally find out what an activator card was.  But that was before this forum.

[BigBadHarve]

2 - to Platinus. A general rule is if the special only mentions your hero it can be played defensively but if it mentions the opponent it has to be played offensively. So in the cases of Doom, Storm and Beast the Specials you named can be played defensively because they only names your hero and not the word "opponent". Conversely Mystiques Illusion of Ally or that Mr. Fantastic special with Universe cards no one plays (Object Bounce, i think) can only be played offensively because they have the word opponent on them. Likewise War Machine could make himself +2 to defense defensively, but Black Cat cannot make an opponent -2 to attack defensively. Another example of similar effects with different wording, Onslaught can play Cannon Fodder defensively to force attacks to a teammate, but KC specials cannot played defensively because they affect how the Opponent attacks. Also this rule extends to teamwide effects that only affect your team so for example Proffesor X's Telepathic Unity can be played defensively as well. (This is also why for most of the game's life Vertigo and Trick Transport could be played defensively as well - - and in fact in our circle we still play them that way).

I have a gripe about that idea, that cards that have the word opponent may not be used defensively. If that's a blanket rule, then why would negates be omitted? If it applies to one then it must apply to all, otherwise confusion is created.

Now, I do understand what they were trying to do, but there are a few cards that affect the 'opponent' that should be playable defensively. Iceman's Snow Blind, for example, or the aforementioned 'Object Bounce.'  I might even use 'The Unlucky At Love' Any hero if I could play it as a response. I think it's worth going through the cards to see how best to apply it.

I would say that, if the card has the word 'opponent' but affects any card being used to attack then it can be played defensively. So, if you attacked me with a teamwork, and I used Snow Blind to make all of your actions -1, and played a 5 to defend, that should be legal. Conversely, I wouldn't be allowed to play Colossus' 'Siberian Strength' to make you discard 3 cards from hand as a defense, because it doesn't affect the attacking card in any way.

Something I want to think on more, after looking at the cards that would possibly be affected.

As for trick transport, I don't mind the ruling that took away their defensive ability. All other 'target' cards are strictly attack oriented (excepting Spider Girl's Target Teammate defense). But it's a worthy argument either way. Vertigo I think should have been ruled OPD, but playable as written. I find it interesting that many people who agreed that vertigo was too powerful didn't want it to be OPD....

Harve,

You just mentioned my all time biggest pet peeve with the rules committee. It gives me Vietnam style flashbacks of annoyance.

I'm talking about the idiotic Brood Spawn ruling where they clearly contradict the text of the card, and in the process ruin a perfectly good pair of characters. And for what reason? Was there some phase of the game where Brood Spawn and Aquaman decks were running amuck ala FF Plaza and X-Babies-Marauders that I slept through? It seemed sometimes like they wanted to sabotage the game and limit playing options. No human being who speaks and understands English would ever make that interpretation of those cards based the text written on them.

The KC ruling was perhaps even stupider (although slightly less annoying only because I don't like Leader and Mole Man as much as Aquaman--who is probably my all time favorite DC Hero) in that people were actually trying to play Leader decks in tournaments before the stupidity from on-high. Then just to be a slap in the face they release Grunge in the next set as a nigh unkillable hero with this same special as a remainder of the game and the -2 built in. Well if he can have it and it isn't broken then why in God's name can't two lesser heros who will most likely be KO'd in three hits play it as written as well?

Thanks now that I had to remmeber all this again I need to go shower and wash the stupidity off me.

Don't forget behind the ears.... 

I agree totally. Especially on the Mole Man/Leader issue. I can accept that their cards aren't defensive (they originally were) but Battle only? Come on! I liked Mole Man, I found him quite effective. Especially with a defensive team. Leader too, though Mole Man's negates are a selling point.

I took a Spawn, Grifter, Grunge and Spider woman team into a tournament (before the 'dead is dead' rule) and actually got yelled at by another player for creating such a cheesy team. With Grunge, I was able to absorb every single hit, and save all my avoids only for the multipower hits that would kill him. Every hit I let land just infuriated him more. That's a worse combo than the marauders/x-babies ever were. When we counted up the damage on Grunge at the end of the game it added to something like 87 pts of cumulative! The stack of cards in his record was ridiculous.

Oh, and for the record I agree 100% with the 'Dead is Dead' ruling. It really does bring a good amount of balance into the game without depowering characters with extra tough inherents or specials. No character should be unkillable. Wow, something the OP legion got right? Is that possible?

-BBH

[Nostalgic]

I took a Spawn, Grifter, Grunge and Spider woman team into a tournament (before the 'dead is dead' rule) and actually got yelled at by another player for creating such a cheesy team. With Grunge, I was able to absorb every single hit, and save all my avoids only for the multipower hits that would kill him. Every hit I let land just infuriated him more. That's a worse combo than the marauders/x-babies ever were. When we counted up the damage on Grunge at the end of the game it added to something like 87 pts of cumulative! The stack of cards in his record was ridiculous.

Oh, and for the record I agree 100% with the 'Dead is Dead' ruling. It really does bring a good amount of balance into the game without depowering characters with extra tough inherents or specials. No character should be unkillable. Wow, something the OP legion got right? Is that possible?

-BBH

The Grunge story is funny because not only is he sucking up all the offense, but if it goes to the power pack many cards won't be available to your opponent because they're in his permanent record. LOL!  Who needs Holocaust's Devestate card if you can just absorb the entire dead pile!  I pulled that off with Morph, in a non tournament game, using his specials to take on the power of his teammates Vision and Strong Guy so that he couldn't be spectrum or cumulative KO'd. 

I've enjoyed reading all the responses.  The reason I asked the question in the first place is because I've become more interested in the 'theory' as Palatinus put it.  I see different possibilities of combinations now that I just didn't think about back in Junior High and high school when I was playing regularly.   

Anyway, I see both sides of argument and though I think all cards removing hits in the current battle may have been errataed to affect venture total, it is also possible that they could represent different 'power levels' among similar cards.

Let us look at it from the standpoint that general is sometimes more powerful than specific.  A card that says, 'discard 1 placed universe card', is more 'powerful' (due to its broader use) than a card that says discard one placed ally card.  However a 'discard 1 placed card' would be better than both.  Of course if one card says target character and another says opponent, then the opponent card is more 'powerful' because it can't be avoided and can be used to affect the reserve character.  Another example is 'avoid 1 attack' is obviously better than any 'avoid 1 E,F,S,I, Universe attack.'

On the other hand sometimes specific is better than general.  For instance, 'avoid 1 attack that contains a E,F,S,I  icon' is better than 'avoid 1 E,F,S,I attack.' My only point is than in this case perhaps the more specific cards that say they affect venture total, may just be 'better' than the others...

[The Dude]

To Harve,

I have a gripe about that idea, that cards that have the word opponent may not be used defensively. If that's a blanket rule, then why would negates be omitted? If it applies to one then it must apply to all, otherwise confusion is created.

My intiial response is to say where any of the rules of ever applied consitently by the powers that be? But I definately recall the powers that by using that reasoning regarding Mr. Fantastic, Mystique and KC in almost weekly rules chat they published (as it seemed to come up repeatedly).

From a more logical point of view, the argument can be made that negates can be played defensively because they don't affect the opponent like most cards with that word do. You throw a level 7 AR special at me and I have a right to defend it so the negate is playable. I don't think it ever came up but I'd bet a negate couldn't be played defensively to affect an opponent. Example Hank Pym has Giant Man in play for three battles. He now attacks Beast with a level 7 powercard. I'd be extremely dubious of Beast using a negate in those circumstance.


Regarding Trick Transport. I honestly don't have a huge problem with it not being defensive, only because I always found it a little shaky as being playable on a teammate to begin with. To me the word "Target" sort of indicates an attack. (and the concept of playing it on yourself is even more dubious just looking at the word "target"—what can I say I was journalism/lit major so I'm something of a grammar nazi.) And in fact it wasn't until I got online in 1998 that I even learned people were playing it on teammates so I had a good two years of playing it only as an attack. Plus Nightcrawler has plenty of good stuff to fall back on so it's not a big deal. I do think however that making the related cards like Mutant Headmistress and its ilk offensive only is a choice for the worse. I certainly get the concern with lock decks but overall they were a flash in the pan who barely had their 15 minutes of fame, and the loss of those cards being played defensively created a few heroes who have no defensive specials at all now. Plus at the end of the day this goes into the ease of use / consistency concept that several other posters alluded to earlier in the thread. If the general rule is cards that affect only your heroes can be played defensively then I'm all for keeping it consistent to the point that I play cards that the rules committee for whatever reason never allowed defensively such as BQs that play immediately (but do include the phrase "on his/her turn") or cards that move a hero into reserve provided the incoming attack cannot hit a reserve hero.

I actually have a slightly unique perspective in that I just taught this game to an 11 (now 12) year old relative last year, (after what was probably 8 years of not playing myself at all) and the easiest way to teach it is just to play all cards as written (this goes back to the Brood Spawn, KC thing as well). The only errata I'm using is the FF Plaza one because in it's original form it's just ridiculously broken. I'd probably stick with the X-babies one too but by and large we don't play X-Babies unless I have new homemades that I think are tournament level that I want to test against some old school tourney staple deck. (Otherwise most of our games tend to center around actual popular heroes and fun characters).

With Vertigo I never it felt was too powerful. I certainly don't think it needs to be one-per-deck. On its own with normal characters Vertigo is certainly a very strong card for a non one-per-deck, but its not broken. Heck if both players have a perfect draw then as much as I can shift with Vertigo I'm taking one hit somewhere since you have an 8th card that I can't block I can only move. And since a lot of Vertigo decks were built around that card chances are it may duplicate once or twice too making the team two cards short if the opponent has a perfect draw. And of course it can always be negated and/or lil ice-man'd away. I actually think a better solution would have been to create a few more heroes with shifting cards and then an equal number of heroes with anti-shift cards ala Brass so that it would just be one more strategy element to consider during hero selection.

It's only with X-Babies that it becomes abusive, but I tend to find (pre-erata) X-Babies broken on their own, let alone with Vertigo. I think the more sensible solution is just to ban them (and probably likewise Grunge, those types of inherants are just poor character design choices from the start). Certainly it's a better solution than running around errating 19 other cards just to accommodate them (see Veritigo, Image Inducer, even the dead is dead rule is an ill-fit vs. just banning the little brats since it unnecessarily weakens a perfectly innocent Deadpool just because the X-Babies and Grunge are poorly designed).

So that's my two cents.

[BigBadHarve]

I agree that negates should be defensive (though it would make for some interesting matches if they weren't!) but the same rule should apply to various other cards.

I actually have a slightly unique perspective in that I just taught this game to an 11 (now 12) year old relative last year, (after what was probably 8 years of not playing myself at all) and the easiest way to teach it is just to play all cards as written (this goes back to the Brood Spawn, KC thing as well). The only errata I'm using is the FF Plaza one because in it's original form it's just ridiculously broken. I'd probably stick with the X-babies one too but by and large we don't play X-Babies unless I have new homemades that I think are tournament level that I want to test against some old school tourney staple deck. (Otherwise most of our games tend to center around actual popular heroes and fun characters).

With Vertigo I never it felt was too powerful. I certainly don't think it needs to be one-per-deck. On its own with normal characters Vertigo is certainly a very strong card for a non one-per-deck, but its not broken. Heck if both players have a perfect draw then as much as I can shift with Vertigo I'm taking one hit somewhere since you have an 8th card that I can't block I can only move. And since a lot of Vertigo decks were built around that card chances are it may duplicate once or twice too making the team two cards short if the opponent has a perfect draw. And of course it can always be negated and/or lil ice-man'd away. I actually think a better solution would have been to create a few more heroes with shifting cards and then an equal number of heroes with anti-shift cards ala Brass so that it would just be one more strategy element to consider during hero selection.

It's only with X-Babies that it becomes abusive, but I tend to find (pre-erata) X-Babies broken on their own, let alone with Vertigo. I think the more sensible solution is just to ban them (and probably likewise Grunge, those types of inherants are just poor character design choices from the start). Certainly it's a better solution than running around errating 19 other cards just to accommodate them (see Veritigo, Image Inducer, even the dead is dead rule is an ill-fit vs. just banning the little brats since it unnecessarily weakens a perfectly innocent Deadpool just because the X-Babies and Grunge are poorly designed).

So that's my two cents.

Not so unique, I've done the same. Trying to teach a new player with the official rules is a nightmare! Everyone I tried to get into the game with official rules just said to hell with it!

And yes, I am with you 100% - play all cards as written. It requires a few errata, and some tweaking of the rules, but it changes the game and takes it to a whole new level. But play as written, it's simple and fun, and many of the existing cards become that much better.

My solution for the Four Freedoms was to limit the defense after shifting - after shifting you must use a power card of 4 or less to defend. This basically ties the two inherents together, the shift and power card bonus. It's still strong, and a great starter team for a new player, but not too powerful or game breaking.

I still think Vertigo is too much, hence my thoughts on it being OPD. In the situation you described, perhaps it's not as potent, but you can still hammer an opponent's key character while distributing your hits as you see fit - even with one less hit to play, that's dangerous. But not all situations are perfectly equal like that. More often than not, the player with vertigo will load up and play when he's got a brutal series of attacks. And to be able to do that multiple times per game will more often than not give you the win.

I don't like the idea of spreading the wealth and giving a bunch of characters a vertigo equivalent, because then you'd still have the same problem - every single team would combine a shifting character with a damage resistant character. Even depowered - X-babies/Marauders is still effective. It would just replace Marauders with someone else. No, the best bet would be to leave Marauders with Vertigo as a unique card to them. In fact, THAT is the best solution, I feel - to have as many characters as possible with a card that's unique to them. That's the best way to add flavour.

I'm not a fan of banning anything. With the 'Dead is dead' ruling, the babies and Grunge aren't nearly so broken. Hell, the X-babies are quite vulnerable. Their inherent is good, but not unbeatable. Grunge is also good, but not unbeatable (anymore.) The image inducer didn't have its own errata, it simply fell under the duration meta rule, which works. Besides - how am I to create my Mojoworld homebase without the Babies? I mean, I CAN do it, but it's just not right, they belong with Mojoworld. 

Incidentally, on another issue - regarding basic universe cards - Mojoworld's aspect is sooo much better if you recycle basic universe cards into the power pack after use.

-BBH

[The Dude]

I can certainly see your points and the logic behind them.

As I explained in my first post here I took the opposite route with FF Plaza. Once the card is limited to powercard block shifting I think its just fine in power-level and in fact spread the wealth to every other homebase gaining powercard shifting as well, while FF Plaza remains unique with its secondary level 4 powercard defense unique to them. To me its the easiest solution to what I considered the game's biggest flaw: that real comic teams can't compete because of incompatible powergrids. I really like the idea that the Avengers/X-men/Spiderman & the Black Cat on Daily Bugle, etc work better together as a team than some motley collection of Spawn-Marauders-X-Babies-Flash who exist not only never teamed the exist in 3 seperate universes (4 if you consider Mojo World another diminesion ).

In such an environment Vertigo is both unique because it allows shifting with hit stacking, which the homebases do not; but also less unique in that team shifting in general is far more common place. And so far I've only given Vertigo to Scooby Doo of all people in my homemades although I always thought Typhoid Mary would be a natural among existing heroes to play said card (with a name like "Induce Fever") while Polaris would be a natural for a "Malice Possessed" variant that could play non-opd Marauders specials since Malice is the leader of that team. So I'm not talking 70 million new Vertigo heroes but I could see having three of four more.

Needless to say the homebase shifting environment also makes Brass's card much more likey to be an effective strategy killer.


Anyway I'll post more in a ferw days about some of my make every card playable ideas, but for now I'm off for a family function for the next few days.s (at which point in the downtime there will be a few OP games played so woo-hoo)

[Nostalgic]

As I explained in my first post here I took the opposite route with FF Plaza. Once the card is limited to powercard block shifting I think its just fine in power-level and in fact spread the wealth to every other homebase gaining powercard shifting as well, while FF Plaza remains unique with its secondary level 4 powercard defense unique to them. To me its the easiest solution to what I considered the game's biggest flaw: that real comic teams can't compete because of incompatible powergrids. I really like the idea that the Avengers/X-men/Spiderman & the Black Cat on Daily Bugle, etc work better together as a team than some motley collection of Spawn-Marauders-X-Babies-Flash who exist not only never teamed the exist in 3 seperate universes (4 if you consider Mojo World another diminesion ).

QFT !!!

In my opinion this is a house rule everyone still keeping the game alive should agree on. 

[gameplan.exe]

I agree that negates should be defensive (though it would make for some interesting matches if they weren't!) but the same rule should apply to various other cards.

I actually have a slightly unique perspective in that I just taught this game to an 11 (now 12) year old relative last year, (after what was probably 8 years of not playing myself at all) and the easiest way to teach it is just to play all cards as written (this goes back to the Brood Spawn, KC thing as well). The only errata I'm using is the FF Plaza one because in it's original form it's just ridiculously broken. I'd probably stick with the X-babies one too but by and large we don't play X-Babies unless I have new homemades that I think are tournament level that I want to test against some old school tourney staple deck. (Otherwise most of our games tend to center around actual popular heroes and fun characters).

With Vertigo I never it felt was too powerful. I certainly don't think it needs to be one-per-deck. On its own with normal characters Vertigo is certainly a very strong card for a non one-per-deck, but its not broken. Heck if both players have a perfect draw then as much as I can shift with Vertigo I'm taking one hit somewhere since you have an 8th card that I can't block I can only move. And since a lot of Vertigo decks were built around that card chances are it may duplicate once or twice too making the team two cards short if the opponent has a perfect draw. And of course it can always be negated and/or lil ice-man'd away. I actually think a better solution would have been to create a few more heroes with shifting cards and then an equal number of heroes with anti-shift cards ala Brass so that it would just be one more strategy element to consider during hero selection.

It's only with X-Babies that it becomes abusive, but I tend to find (pre-erata) X-Babies broken on their own, let alone with Vertigo. I think the more sensible solution is just to ban them (and probably likewise Grunge, those types of inherants are just poor character design choices from the start). Certainly it's a better solution than running around errating 19 other cards just to accommodate them (see Veritigo, Image Inducer, even the dead is dead rule is an ill-fit vs. just banning the little brats since it unnecessarily weakens a perfectly innocent Deadpool just because the X-Babies and Grunge are poorly designed).

So that's my two cents.

...
The image inducer didn't have its own errata, it simply fell under the duration meta rule, which works.
...

-BBH

Is this to say that the Image Inducer only lasts a single battle, since it's not a OPD? That makes me kind of sad  

Can it be played defensively? I feel like it cannot... that also makes me sad  

[BigBadHarve]

You are correct on both counts.

Inducer can neither be played defensively, nor is it remainder of game.

The inducer is still useful and will save your butt.

-BBH

[thetrooper27]

Image inducer only last for remainder of battle?  It seems like I saw it used over multiple turns in Buffalo, but I don't have the best memory...