Does Final Evolution deal damage during setup?

I ask because I'm not sure whether Heroes have hit points at that stage of setup.

I believe it does.

Interestingly, the Quick Reference suggests that villain setup comes after character cards are in play and before drawing initial hands.

The Setup section makes no direct reference to the villain setup instructions, but says to setup the villain and environment decks before choosing heros.

Personally, I would setup the hero characters and draw my initial hand before doing any villain setup instructions.  (Though I don't think your hand matters for any of the setup instructions on existing villains).

This came up in a game today and we decided to have the damage be dealt. Interestingly, we had actually chosen some but not all of the heroes before the person running the villain went ahead with the setup!

 

Just my intuition, but I think that thematically, it makes sense for villain setup to occur before the heroes arrive, but mechanically it makes sense for heroes to be chosen and be in play before the villain does setup. *shrug*

I don't have my cards on me right now, and so I'm functioning under the understanding that Final Evolution deals everyone 1 toxic when it enters play. I agree that the damage should still be done if it's revealed during setup, but I would probably wait until the game actually starts to deal that damage. The way I picture it is that the heroes have their team assembled and are making their dramatic speech about how they are going to defeat them, but IL interrupts and backhands them and then immediately starts fighting.

I was able to kill IL thanks to tactical shotgun and hollow points being drawn for expat first round, and the ongoing that kills ongoings for visionary. It always astounds me how necessary visionary can be. 

For me personally, the game does not "Start" until the begining of the first round.

So I set up all of my Heros, do all of my Villain set up, shuffle, draw hands, and the game only begins with the "Start of Villain Turn".

If you want Iron Legacy to be harder than he already is, go ahead and deal yourself damage before the game even properly begins. As for me, I do not think he needs your help haha

I think it's clear that it does damage the heroes if among the initial ongoings.  I hold this conviction not due to some supposed expertise about the order of setup, but merely due to percieved intent.  The card does damage when it comes out.  Why would you short it that damage just because it comes out first?  Yeah, Iron Legacy is hard.  Why should this card be any different?

A better question: Does the damage it deals get boosted by a Galvanized or Demoralizing Presence dealt in the initial setup?  Does it matter if the boost card was revealed after Final Evolution?

I say the damage gets dealt, and, with the question of Galvanized and others, the cards are played in revealed order, and, while playing Final Evolution, it's damage only gets modified by cards which are currently in play, not the cards soon to enter play.

The way I've been playing it is I take the damage. It will be boosted by cards that came out before it, but not its own boost or boosts revealed after it. This is based on nothing but intuition. AFAIK, there's no official tightly defined start-of-game order to go off, and I usually tend to rule in favor of allowing things that seem cool. And IL hitting you before the game even begins is coolmax.

Actually, from what I can tell looking at the setup instructions, you first reveal cards until you have H Ongoings, and then put the Ongoing cards into play. The order isn't specified, so I presume you can put them into play in whatever order you want.

In cases where a deck reveal cards until x of a certain type are shown, I play them in the order drawn. That seems to be the spirit/intent to me. Exerting control of their play order doesn't strike me as fair. Hey, we're the heroes. We're supposed to set an example. :slight_smile:

Ok, so there seems to be a general concensus here that the Villain setup is actually a part of the game proper?

I was totally doing that wrong haha. I will from now on.

if the setup happens before cards are drawn, then Apostate becomes a LOT more terrifying on advanced.

This. Very very this.

Could this be why soooo many of us find Apostates advanced mode sort of lacking any teeth??

This is a game changer

I think we can be pretty sure Advanced Apostate isn't intended to play 16 cards on setup.

A hillarious thought though, surely

Answered in the KantCon rulings (https://greaterthangames.com/forum/topic/answers-to-debated-questions-3871)

 

14. Does Final Evolution trigger during setup?

Yes it does.