So I understand that when you use Good Samaritan's text to play the top card of Spite's deck, you have to then resolve the played card's text before you move GS under the Safe House. But in that order, why? Don't effects that trigger on "playing" a card typically resolve before the text of the played card (since they are supposed to be two separate actions)? or is it different somehow for GS or villain cards?
This became especially confusing for me while playing a Gloom Spite game, when Lab Raid came out on a Good Samaritan play. The character card specifies that when "Lab Raid would enter play, discard that card instead" and then deal damage. According to fireside chats, this means "no villain card was actually played" and Good Samaritan stays in place. Thus, confused. Lab Raid never enters play yes, but the playing part definitely still happened, right? Which means, what? What am I missing...
Lab Raid with Agent of Gloom Spite is a weird one. I understand why it needs to do something else because he has no drug cards in his deck but I agree a card was still played even if it's affects were altered.
I’ll go with: Good Samaritan works this way because that his how it is intended to work. I don’t know how else to make sense of it, since its function seems to break one of the game’s core timing principles without rational justification in the text (again, unless I’m missing something). I don’t play the video game though, so I’ll probably just do whatever feels right.
Random question - if Spite was, for whatever reason, unable to play cards and you decided to save a Good Samaritan, would that work (ie Spite plays no cards and the Samaritan is still saved), or does a card have to actually be played in order for the Samaritan to be saved? The thought just occurred and I thought I'd ask in case it ever comes up ;). Maybe it will result in a Samaritan actually being saved for once instead of being left sitting there waiting to be murdered :D.
Regarding Good Samaritan and prevented card plays - Good Samaritan is saved when you choose to play a villain card. But you can't make choices to do impossible things. So just like you can't pay a discard cost when you have no cards in hand, you can't choose to play a card when card playing is prevented. So he can't be saved.
I disagree with the Lab Raid ruling, because Good Samaritan's wording is about choosing to play a card. And you choose to play a card. The fact that that card wasn't played isn't relevant, because you still made the choice to play the card.
Regarding the original question about why the played card resolves before Good Samaritan is saved - Good Samaritan's salvation isn't a triggered effect, which is triggered by the playing of a card. If it was, then as you said, it should resolve before the played card does. But I see it as more of a branched effect. "Choose 1: Either play a card and put Good Samaritan under Safe House, or do nothing." That sort of wording would be awkward, but I hope you see what I mean. If you want to regard it as a triggered effect, look at it this way. The triggering effect is choosing to play a card, which then triggers both playing a card and saving Good Samaritan. Of those two effects, playing a card happens first, and then finishes resolving before the saving of Good Samaritan. Does this sound reasonable?
Not to be pedantic, but I was under the impression the game let you do things like discard your hand when you have no cards in hand. For instance, two Maintenance Levels at the start of the environment turn cause everyone to shuffle their trash into their deck, and then shuffle nothing into their deck. Might not be the same thing, but it comes to mind.
You can discard your hand of zero cards for an effect, but if you need to discard a certain number of cards (not your hand), you need to actually discard that number of cards.
The timing is because the put under the safehouse clause isn't a static effect. You choose to play the card, resolve any reactions to a card entering play (which is not the text on good samaritan) then resolve the effects of the card you played. Then you go back and finish the text of Good Samaritan. Did you play a villain card? if yes move Good Samaritan.
The "If they do. . ." portion refers to playing a villain card, not the choice to do so. Not the cleanest of wordings, but that's what you get with limited space for words on the cards.
The Gloom Spite/Lab Raid interaction is because of the rule that you do as much as you can, and the wording on Spite's card.
"Whenever a Lab Raid would be played, discard it instead. . ."
Similar to Buffer Overflow:
"When a villain card would enter play, you may discard it instead. . ."
With either of these effects activating the card will not enter play. it is picked up off the top of the deck (not official terminology), you look at it, and decide if it will enter play or discard it accoring to the specific effect (is it Lab Raid for Gloom Spite, Parse's player's choice for Buffer Overflow)
If the top card is Lab Raid and you choose to play the top card for Good Samaritan's effect you would attempt to play the card, and when the card was seen to be Lab Raid it would be discarded instead. Your playing of the top card of the villain deck failed. Good Samaritan stays in play.
An interesting experiment is to have Buffer Overflow in play and use Good Samaritan to play Lab Raid, to see if you get the option to discard it via Buffer Overflow and play the top card instead, and what would happen if you did.
Ok! that makes sense—I wasn't thinking about the difference between "triggered" effects (when x happens…) that remain static on cards and, I guess I'll call them "enabled" effects (if you do x, then…) that occur sequentially in the text, depending on a choice you make at a specific moment. That reasoning works for me.
The Gloom Spite/Lab Raid interaction is because of the rule that you do as much as you can, and the wording on Spite's card.
"Whenever a Lab Raid would be played, discard it instead. . ."
With either of these effects activating the card will not enter play.
This though: not sure. I understand the argument according that wording, but in the physical game, the wording on Gloom Spite's character card has been changed to: "Whenever a Lab Raid would enter play, discard it instead," which should change the timing of the effect. When Lab Raid is played, it remains having been played, and all the requirements for GS's effect have been met (the text says nothing about whether or not the played villain card enters play) to then save the Good Samaritan.
In the case of Buffer Overflow: the earlier wording on Gloom Spite should make it impossible to use, I think, since Lab Raid would never reach a point where it "would enter play" (since the undoing/discarding triggers at the playing stage) and Good Samaritan stays put, but with the new altered wording, you could argue that when Lab Raid "would enter play," you could either choose to activate Spite's text or Buffer Overflow's first—e ither way, I think the Samaratian should still be saved, since the playing part still happened, and whatever happened, happened—I mean unless the game says it didn't—which it didn't, I think. Yes.
Yeah, I know I’m resurrecting a nearly four year old thread, but this just happened to me in the game, two rounds in a row, in fact, and I quit the game in disgust. The first time it happened I thought maybe I’d imagined it, but when it happened again I carefully followed the action to see that, in fact, the Good Samaritan didn’t get put under the Safe House. I assumed I’d found a bug, and sent feedback to that effect. Then I did some searches and came across this thread.
It is certainly an irritating interaction, but it is working as intended. The 'if they do' clause refers to the act of playing the top card of the Villain deck. Unfortunately, since Lab Raid cannot be played with Spite Agent Of Gloom, the 'if they do' will always return false if it attempts to play a Lab Raid.
