Ensign Q wrote: ↑Tue Feb 16, 2021 12:26 pm
Welcome to 1e, where things play for free but arent free plays
Really, this was an oversight by the Rules Committee when it approved
New Arrivals, rather than a problem with the "for free" terminology in general.
In retrospect, we now know that
(1) cards entering play without using your normal card play but also not counting as "for free" is weird and unintuitive to a lot of players, and
(2) as a result, we would be answering this New Arrivals question on the boards every six months in perpetuity, and
(3) there are no other cards that care about this.
New Arrivals probably should have just said, "Discard incident if you play more than
one personnel for free two personnel cards on any turn." (Or possibly, "more than one personnel by means that do not use your normal card play.")
That was N.A.'s intention, after all -- it was supposed to be a pretty sucky starter-deck / sealed-play card, and it only caught fire after release when people asked about report-with-crew and Rules ruled that that wasn't playing "for free."
In a perfect world, I'd reword New Arrivals today to eliminate these questions... but, of course, those unintended and unexpected corner cases now are the cornerstone of the card's modern usage. The card is very popular across all sorts of decks, particularly Battle Borg and Dominion Slaughter, and breaking the card would mean harming those decks pretty badly. Rules isn't in the business of breaking decks, so we're stuck in a bit of a hard place there.
(NOTE TO BALANCE: On the other hand, if you guys happen to be thinking, "Hey, we want to punch Battle Borg in the kneecaps, and making New Arrivals work more intuitively / as intended could be a nice way to do it," shoot me a PM and we'll talk.
)
Rules Manager | Official Rulings in
blue. All else opinion. |
Rules Archive
"We pledge our loyalty to the Glossary from now until death."
"Then receive this reward from the Glossary. May it keep you strong."
~Iron Prime