It is 2020, and I have a rules interpretation question

Games Sentinels of the Multiverse
1

Hi everyone! I haven’t been here in what feels like forever, hope everyone’s good!



We all know Sentinels is often “Exact Wording: The Game”, and I felt that, now we’re about a year and a half past Oblivaeon’s release, everything had been clarified. We all know the differences between playing a card, and putting a card into play. Yes, cards that fire on destruction apply when Haka puts a card under Savage Mana, and when he then uses SMs power. Absolutely, get Jackhammer and Dual Crowbars in play, but it gives you two attacks to everyone (with increased damage on the latter), not a ridiculous loop. But something’s come up and, while I know the usual answer now is “it does <x> in the videogame, so that’s how it works”, this feels like maybe it’s something so obscure, something that I’m reasonably sure no-one’s questioned before, that maybe it’s just a certain way in the videogame because it’s the obvious way, not because it’s the literally correct way.

So.

Does Overdrive let Mr. Fixer use “Strike” twice at any point in his turn?



We know that if he has only one power to spend and uses it elsewhere, he still gets to use Strike twice on top of that, so it’s not directly tied to having a power to “spend” on it. There are other cards that let you use a power when you play the card, so a card saying “you get to use a power” doesn’t necessarily mean you have to wait until the power phase to do so. So, nothing on the card says you have to use Strike in the Power phase, we know being able to use powers in other phases (especially the Play phase, but also Start Of Turn and End Of Turn) is pretty common, and we know you don’t necessarily need a Power use handy to use those strikes.



In particular, I’m thinking of Wager Master’s “Breaking The Rules” here. Here, you use your power (and we’ll say Fixer either skips, or has another power to use to use), and THEN, you get to play a card. If you play Overdrive, well, it’s still your turn, and the card says you can use Strike twice this turn after all, so… should I get to Strike now, or not?

I had a quick look round, and I couldn’t see anything about this exact question. I DID get to a thread from way back in 2012 on the card, asking about out-of-turn card plays, in which Rabit responded with:

Overdrive says “this turn” - it doesn’t say when in the turn. So I suppose in those situations, it’s just sometime before the end of that turn.

And Christopher responded a couple of times, not directly commenting on this specifically that I saw, but agreeing with the spirit of the thread in general, so this seems to be the intended way this works when given plays on other turns (I’m not sure if the videogame does this); I’m scratching my head why it wouldn’t work that way on Fixer’s own turn.



Thoughts?

2

I would think in the situation described that you get to use "Strike" twice after the card play.  Even if "Strike" had been used during the power phase before your card play it should still allow one more use of "Strike".  

3

Yeah, that's how I would intuitively handle that as well. Currently, the videogame doesn't do that: if you play Overdrive during the Play a Card phase while Breaking The Rules is in play, it just adds the effect "Mr. Fixer can play Strike twice this turn", finishes the turn, and immediately removes that effect again.

I wanted to see if that was consistent with the physical game or not, and it looks like perhaps not, so I may submit this as a bug report, let Handelabra have a closer look. Thanks, Powerhound :)

4

I vaguely recall this being addressed before. One shots that grant additional powers that are played on the Hero's turn modifies their power phase, while played on another hero's turn it the power(s) must be used immediately.

5

This ruling feels like the most applicable from Fireside chats.  

It certainly makes it seem like you should get the power use immediately off Overdrive based on the scenario described as the power phase has already passed.  

6

Ah, there was a clause for after power phase. My age must be getting to me.

7

Here's a variation: if Mister Fixer has an Augmented Ally and discards a card at the start of his turn to use Strike, then in his play phase he plays Overdrive... He gets to use Strike once in his power phase, right?

8

I would expect that you get one more use of Strike. 

9

Agreed. :-)