Got a couple of queries on the Shinobi Assassins from the Temple of Zhu Long, as something came up in a game with them recently.
So, if an Assassin is on top of someone's deck, it will enter play if it would be played, drawn, discarded, or revealed. However, if that hero is incapped, they have no deck for the Assassin to be on top of. I decided it would therefore go into the environment trash as that seemed the best location for "a card whose current location has just ceased to exist". Is there some official ruling for this or is that the right way to do it? It didn't seem right to just have the card "floating" and part of no deck (like you would if, say, the target of one of Skyscraper's links was destroyed) since then there would be no way for anything to happen to it since it wouldn't be in play to be able to be destroyed and would just sit there forever doing nothing...
Something else came up in the same game and I just want to make sure we did this right - we were playing against Deadline. When he flips and does his "destroy Catastrophes and remove environment cards from the game" thing, he then checks the environment deck and if there are no cards there, you lose. A Shinobi Assassin on top of a hero deck is therefore not in the environment deck and can therefore still trigger a game loss if the rest of the deck has been removed from the game. Correct?
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I agree with your thoughts in that the Shinobi would go to the environment trash when that hero is incapped and that Deadline only cares what is left of the environment deck not what environment cards may still be out there. I'd have to do some digging to see if the rule books cover that.
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As a side note, I love how the Shinobi Assassins work. They're only dangerous when you can't see them...
But, anyway, I like your interpretations of those situations, Ameena.
I'm pretty sure it's not correct, but I would be amused to find that the Shinobi Assassin does, indeed, stay in the hero's deck, which is now otherwise empty. That hero no longer has play or draw phases, but if an affect caused that hero to, say, draw a card, the Assassin would be revealed.
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Or it just stays in that deck for the next time that hero is in a game.
This will come up for the Season 2 Preview Pack, so we will check with Christopher. I would assume they go to the environment trash, until I know for sure =)
In the Deadline case I think they would not be considered, because Deadline specifically mentions the environment deck. Environment cards under Savage Mana, etc similarly wouldn't count.
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Okay, sounds like I played it right then. Cool :).
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Now that's an interesting way to delay Deadline. I wonder if there's a creative use of Savage Mana that could forestall him entirely. Hmm, you would have to trigger a power use in the middle of Deadline's sequence...
On Deadline's Remorseful Ecovandal side, it says that at the end of his turn, he destroys all environment cards.
Wouldn't that destroy the environment cards under Savage Mana as well?
Yes, yes it would. I was actually just about to point that out but got distracted. Yay for distractions!
If you can manage to get two points of damage to a hero target (then via Smoke Bombs to a Dynamic Siphon), anything is possible. I'm not sure there's anything in the game yet for this instance though. Dominion can make Haka draw a card when the environment card is destroyed. Omnitron can react with Interpolation Beam and do some damage, but of course Omnitron is not in this game.
Lead Bit Flipper, Handelabra Games
Developer of Sentinels, Bottom of the 9th, and Spirit Island
Can bee bot deal damage to heroes?
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I think so - I think Bee Bot's damage is just applied to "a target", so a hero could be said target.
I hadn't thought of Deadline taking out the cards under Savage Mana...I suppose that would also apply to stuff like Omnitron's Terraforming and Akash'Bhuta's Disrupt the Field...
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Made for a rude awakening when I was playing the app. No Environment cards in play (and Visionary made it so the next one out would destroy itself), so I thought it was safe to let Terraforming come out and then it took out three or four from under Savage Mana. Ouch.
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There are also hero cards that say "Destroy an environment card" without a "You may..." in front, in which case if there are no environment cards in play you'd have to eat into Haka's stash.
I spent a little time last night trying to figure out if there was a way to get Deadline's Remorseful Eco-Vandal damage to hit a Dynamic Siphon, and then manipulate the environment deck/trash such that he would not remove any cards from the game and there would always be cards in the deck when he does his check. I couldn't come up with a way to do it, because I think that manipulation would have to come between the removal and the deck check.
I think Sarabande of Destruction lacks a "may" on its effect (though it doesn't just destroy environment cards, but still...). I'm trying to remember if Bio-Engineering beam also lacks it but can't remember.
I don't think you could get Deadline to remove no environment cards...well, maybe you could but it wouldn't help you - if he flips to his "destroy Catastrophes and environment " side, he will destroy and shuffle the environment, destroy all his Catastrophes, then hit everyone and remove environment cards from the game (total equal to Catastrophes destroyed). Regardless of how many that is, he then checks the environment deck to see if there are any cards in it. If there are none, you lose. So if he removes any number of cards from the game and leaves the deck empty, game over, but if you manipulate things so that you somehow play or discard the last remaining environment card after being hit but before he removes it from the game, you still lose because that card isn't in the deck, which is all he checks. That's why having a Shinobi Assassin on top of someone's deck still results in a game over if he's removed all the other cards ;).
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They both lack may. But why try and remember when you can check on the awesome spreadsheet of cards!
I think the best you could do with Deadline is have them flip and then take out all the Catastrophes before Deadline kills them at the end of the turn (thus removing 0 Environment cards too). I think you would need someone to ping one of Captain Cosmic's Dynanmic Syphons to get extra power uses/card plays... possibly easiest on Argent or maybe on Super Scientific Tachyon and get two Blinding Speeds from her power use (with Chrono-Ranger Ultimate Targeting to get a power use, used on Temporal Grenade to both ping the construct and destroy a Catastrophe).
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Yeah, destroying Catastrophes (or preventing them from being played in the first place) is the only way you can stop him removing environment cards from the game, so that he never flips - if he does flip, it's 'cause he's got three or more Catastrophes in play at the end of his turn, meaning he'll destroy them all and then take out that many environment cards (along with destroying them first and hitting everyone, I mean) right after that.
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