Does, um... does anyone know what Temporal Causality Loop does? Asking for a friend.
A friend who runs rules for an old card game.
I think everybody has looked at the original Temporal Causality Loop at least once and said, "Wow, what a cool card. I need to do that to my opponent." What a great way of putting a classic Star Trekstory into the game! You hit the dilemma, you fail it, and then you're suddenly back where you started!
Specifically, you're back "two actions" before you failed the dilemma. Which means you're back... uh, where exactly? Two dilemma encounters ago? The start of the mission attempt? Back before you moved to the mission? If you played a couple of cards while facing Temporal Causality Loop, back... right before you resolved Temporal Causality Loop? If the previous dilemma involved three random selections, are you back before them or after the first random selection? Did those random selections result in deaths? Do the deaths count as actions? And how do you "undo" actions? You can't exactly un-Juggle a draw deck once The Juggler has hit it, so what's the undo button for that? If a once-per-game effect (like a special download) fired during the attempt, is that now available again, or is it still used? Is there a way to undo the most important thing that needs to be undone, the knowledge of what seed cards are beneath the mission?
Nobody knew the answers to most of these questions, including anybody in the Rules Committee, and the answers to the others were frustrating. There were theories, alright, but none were obviously correct, and the card's very thin text (and the very complex action rules) made it very difficult to make any headway with it.
The truth is, Temporal Causality Loop was the premier example of a Premiere problem: back at the dawn of CCG's, Rollie Tesh and Tom Braunlich didn't know how their game would catch on, and they didn't really expect the game to have a single comprehensive, universal rules system. They expected players to use a lot of "Trek Sense" and house rules for their games with friends, and so some ambiguities or unprinted functionality weren't a big problem. As the game grew, we all learned better, and we found ways to work around the difficulties in Premiere.
But we never quite figured out how to make Temporal Causality Loop work. We even had a discussion about banning it in 2021 for simply being un-ruleable. We didn't want someone to bring it and conceivably win a major tournament using an edgy interpretation of the card upheld by the T.D.. The card could legitimately mean so many things that this seemed like a risk.
When the Premiere Remastered project came along, then, we knew this was going to be a big topic.
Our aim for the Temporal Causality Loop remaster was to to make a card that fit Decipher's weird original vision, but which didn't allow multiple possible interpretations. We iterated through the huge space of possible interpretations of the original Temporal Causality Loop and picked one interpretation to be the Forever Meaning of this card. Which one? I'll be honest: the only one we were able to fit on four lines of gametext!
If nothing fit onto four lines of gametext, we would be forced to abandon the weird "undo two actions" concept entirely and make Temporal Causality Loop into a card that simply ended your turn. But, y'know, it's like, what's thepoint of remastering Premiere if you're just going to suck all the fun out of its off-the-wall, high-concept cards? We were hopeful that we could keep a close approximation of Temporal Causality Loop's time reset, and, with a lot of work and iterations, we found the wording that worked for this project:
Unless SCIENCE and CUNNING>35 present, returns here (re-plays) all cards in discard piles discarded from here this attempt (re-seed seed cards); turn ends. Otherwise, score points. Discard dilemma.
The curious thing about fixating the meaning of a card that previously had no fixed meaning is that it's a power level change for almost everyone, but in different directions. I recall (perhaps incorrectly) one complaint that we had nerfed the card, followed shortly by a complaint that we had boosted it. Both players were reading the new TCL the same, but they both remembered the old TCL differently, so they saw this change in different lights! I'm curious to know whether you see this as a power-up or a nerf. We were just aiming one of many plausible interpretations of the original card.
One important thing did change, though. The original card tried to "reset the time loop" so that everything was exactly the same as before. The Remastered version does not demand that everything come back the same. We did this for purposes of rules expediency (we used ALL the space on this card!), but it makes sense, when you think about it. After all, in the episode, things didn't reset exactly the same each time. They changed -- often very slightly -- from loop to loop. So, too, with the remastered Temporal Causality Loop: after you hit it, you'll find most of the pieces back where they were before the attempt started, but often in a slightly different arrangement.
This also helps patch one of the biggest "story" gaps with Temporal Causality Loop: the Enterprise crew never knew what was coming on subsequent loops. In the STCCG, you always did know, because you couldn't erase your knowledge of the reseeded dilemmas. Since the remastered Temporal Causality Loop allows some rearrangement, you won't necessarily know what dilemma is coming next anymore!
Now that Temporal Causality Loop has a single fixed meaning based on its gametext, so it is now consistently playable across different tables and tournaments. However, it is still an extremely weird card. In fact, I hazard that the old Temporal Causality Loop was the single weirdest card in the game, and the new version might still hold that distinction. Let's walk through exactly what it does and why.
This is pretty straightforward, at least. If you meet this requirement (which is not a very high requirement), score the points and mission continues.
You and your opponent must play (or, for seed cards, seed) the affected cards at this location. Take turns, starting with the player whose turn it is. For example, if Kira Nerys died during this mission attempt, take her from your discard pile and play her somewhere at this location. (This is special reporting.) If you overcame your opponent's Cosmic String Fragment this attempt, your opponent places it at the bottom of the mission's seed cards. You and your opponent can do this in any order. (Yes, the order of seed cards might change!) This is most of what the card does, and is not difficult to play out.
Since these are card plays, you must do things that happen when you play a card, like re-select Lal's skills. You or your opponent can respond to them with things like Crossover or Superior Surgical Techniques. (Watch out for that one!)
Sometimes, you'll find that youcan'tplay a card that Temporal Causality Loop instructs you to re-play. For example, suppose Temporal Causality Loop instructs you to re-play Prisoner Escort. Prisoner Escort only plays as a "just" response to capturing a personnel, which you won't have "just" done if you just failed Temporal Causality Loop. That's okay. It stays in the discard pile. In 1E, the usual rule is that, if you can't do everything a card instructs, you can't do any of it, but dilemmas are the exception. On a dilemma, you do as much as you can, so one card being un-replayable does not cause the entire dilemma to fizzle.
On rare occasions, Temporal Causality Loop will instruct you to replay a card that youcan't play for the function you originally used it for, but youcan play it for a different function. For example, say you played I Feel Youngearlier this attempt for its second function (downloading Kirk just after Spock discards). You can't replay it for its second function because of the timing, but you probably CAN play it for its first function (adding Youth to a
personnel). If you can, you must.
However, the card must be able to play "here." If you can't play the card at this location, you can't return it, and Temporal Causality Loop leaves it alone. For example, Long-Range Scan doesn't play at a location; it simply hits the action stack and then resolves without ever going to a location on the board, so you have to pick a different card to re-play instead.
Likewise, Temporal Causality Loop does not re-earn artifacts. Since you can't play an artifact without earning it, discarded artifacts will usually have to stay discarded.
Temporal Causality Loop forces you to return certain cards from your discard pile... butonlyfrom the discard pile. Cards that are no longer in the discard pile (or were never in the discard pile) do not return. Tactics, Tribbles, and Q-Icon cards usually return to side decks, so Temporal Causality Loop ignores them (unless they somehow ended up in your discard pile after all). If you special-downloaded Dig during the attempt to exchange a card in your hand for a card in your discard pile, Temporal Causality Loop ignores the card in your hand (but the card in your discard pile is replayed... and so is Dig, assuming it, too is in your discard pile).
Modern players are probably thinking, "Oh crap! Dilemmas in Modern don't go in our discard piles! We won't be able to re-seed dilemmas with this!" Not to worry, the obscure Modern Rule #2 is here to save the day. Modern Rule #2 says that, in Modern, when a card specifically instructs you to retrieve a seed card from your discard pile, you can retrieve a seed card previously removed from the game instead. (We will be slightly updating this rule to better conform to the wording on Temporal Causality Loop, as well as the few other cards that depend on Modern Rule #2.) So a dilemma sitting in your dilemma discards is still targetable by Temporal Causality Loop.
In the episode, the Temporal Causality Loop was a highly local phenomenon. Just as Temporal Causality Loop only plays cardsto this location, it also onlycares about cards that were discardedfrom this location. Did your opponent nullify a treaty during this attempt? Treaties play "on table," not at this location, so Temporal Causality Loop doesn't even try to return it.
Temporal Causality Loop cares only about cards that were discardedduring this attempt, not before it, not even just before it. Since this says "attempt," not "mission attempt" (or any equivalent), it means either a mission or scouting attempt.
After you've returned all your cards, your turn ends. Just like on End Transmission, this happens immediately. Do not draw cards, do not count down your countdowns, do not probe, do not complete scouting, do not pass Go, do not collect $200. This is a very powerful effect that is often overlooked because the rest of the card requires so much brainpower.
Afterboth players have returned all returnable cards,after you have immediately ended your turn,then discard this dilemma. (In Modern, you then remove it from the game.) Some playtesters thought that Temporal Causality Loop returned itself under the mission to be faced again and again. That is not the case! Temporal Causality Loop is faced once, then goes away forever even if you fail it.
After we finalized Temporal Causality Loop's gametext, we found a couple of ambiguous points that we felt ought to be formally clarified, so we wrote a short Glossary entry for it:
Temporal Causality Loop [Glossary]- The owner of each card must re-play (or re-seed) it (if possible). "Seed cards" means those cards that were seeded beneath this mission (either during the seed phase or subsequently). See End Transmission, card play, Rulebook 6.4: Leaving Play, actions - taking turns, Rulebook 7.2.2.0.3 Dilemma Targets, Rulebook 6.3: Reporting for Duty - Special Reporting.
The wonderful Takket generally does a really great job managing the Dilemma Resolution Guide on his own, and we in the Rules Committee try not to interfere in the DRG, since it is a play aid, not an official rules document. However, in this instance, we made an exception and wrote the Temporal Causality Loop DRG entry. You may find it useful in games to come:
Temporal Causality Loop [Dilemma Resolution Guide] -If crew meets conditions (SCIENCE and CUNNING>35), score points and place dilemma in bonus point area. ( do not score bonus points; discard dilemma instead.) Mission or scouting attempt continues.
Otherwise, players "return" their cards discarded from here during this attempt. Starting with the player whose turn it is, each player must return a card they own of their choice that can be legally played or seeded here (if they have any remaining). This alternates between players until neither player can return any cards. This includes only cards that were in play here, encountered here, or seeded here when they were discarded. Players can only return cards still in their discard piles (in Modern, this includes seed cards they own that were removed from the game).
Cards that were not discarded during this mission or scouting attempt are not returned. Cards that were discarded from your hand or from the table during this attempt are not returned. Cards played from your hand during this attempt that were not in play at this location (such as Long-Range Scan) are not returned.
Cards that are not in your discard pile (for example, because they have been shuffled back into your draw deck, or are in your point area, or are tactics in your Battle Bridge side deck) are not returned (except, in Modern, seed cards that were removed from the game when discarded).
When returning a seed card (any card that at some point during this attempt was seeded underneath the mission, including mis-seeds), seed it under the mission.
When returning any other card, play the card here. This dilemma provides special reporting for personnel, ships, and equipment. Returning a card in this manner counts as a card play. As such, it may allow or require other actions as responses (Superior Surgical Techniques, Crossover, 211th Rule of Acquisition, selecting skills for Lal, etc.). If the returning card is multi-affiliation or multi-purpose, the card's owner is not required to play it the same way it was played earlier this game. This dilemma does not re-earn artifacts, so they cannot ordinarily be re-played.
Then, ship and crew are stopped; discard dilemma. Your turn ends immediately, skipping the entire end-of-turn segment (including countdowns, end-of-turn draws, scouting completion, and anything else that should happen at the end of your turn).
We hope this helps!
So that's the new Temporal Causality Loop. It's remastered, it's no longer hovering on the edge of a ban just for being incomprehensible, but it is still an exceptionally strange card and it may still give you a headache when you encounter it. Hopefully, though, it's the good headache of "holy cow, 1E, how did that just happen?!" and not the bad headache of "I have no idea what's happening or why." As your faithful Rules Master, I will definitely be available for questions.
Also be sure to check out Coach Kev's new video, launching today, on this new card! I have not seen his video yet, but he informs me that he has already come up with some very devious new tricks using this card for you to try out in your next game!
Until next time, see you on the spaceline!
...we could have seen this spoiler a dozen times, a hundred. It's impossible to tell.
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