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By WeAreBack
 - Beta Quadrant
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#595763
I still struggle with this one: what happens when the thing that made one card a valid target of another changes so that the target is no longer valid?

For example, if I play Mutual Distrust on Major Rakal when she is in [1E-Rom] mode targeting her Tal Shiar, but then she switches to [Fed] mode and no longer has the skill, can I still draw an extra card when I report a personnel with, say, Klingon Intelligence?

If I play Imperial Intimidation on an I.S.S. Constitution, but then I use a bottle of '45 Dom to replace it with Starship Enterprise, does Imperial intimidation still operate? Is it discarded? Could I prevent a discard by downloading Starship Defiant and immediately downloading Terran Flagship: Predator onto it?
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By Takket
 - Delta Quadrant
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#595793
WeAreBack wrote: Sat Mar 18, 2023 9:58 am I still struggle with this one: what happens when the thing that made one card a valid target of another changes so that the target is no longer valid?

For example, if I play Mutual Distrust on Major Rakal when she is in [1E-Rom] mode targeting her Tal Shiar, but then she switches to [Fed] mode and no longer has the skill, can I still draw an extra card when I report a personnel with, say, Klingon Intelligence?

If I play Imperial Intimidation on an I.S.S. Constitution, but then I use a bottle of '45 Dom to replace it with Starship Enterprise, does Imperial intimidation still operate? Is it discarded? Could I prevent a discard by downloading Starship Defiant and immediately downloading Terran Flagship: Predator onto it?
Huh....... I always thought someone in the rules it said if a card's target is no longer a valid target, that the card gets discarded. But I can't find that anywhere. There is this under "Leaving Play":
Your card may require you to choose a long-term target (other than the card it is played on). If the long-term target leaves play, your card leaves play in the same manner. For example, if the male targeted by Assimilate Counterpart returns to hand, so does Assimilate Counterpart.
But her Tal Shiar does not "leave play". So I don't see how that is applicable. Conundrum talks about being discarded if the target becomes invalid but that is card specific.
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By WeAreBack
 - Beta Quadrant
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#595805
So the relevant glossary entry is "exchanging cards"
When a card in play is exchanged for another card (e.g., persona replacement, one Founder morphing into another, Young Jem'Hadar exchanged for a universal Jem'Hadar) or replaced (discarded) by a downloaded card, any cards already played on, placed on, or aboard the card that is leaving play transfer to the replacement card unless their results are now inapplicable. You do not re-check the conditions (or targets for playing a card) for such cards. For example, you would discard Adapt: Modulate Shields from an Equipment card that morphed into a Founder using In the Bag, or discard Reflection Therapy if the skill it was replacing did not exist on a new version of a persona just exchanged. However, damage can apply to both a Borg Ship dilemma and a Borg Cube, so any damage would transfer when Retask [link to card] is played; and when a ship is transformed by '45 Dom Perignon, its crew transfers to the new ship.
This doesn't answer the Major Rakal question and I'm not sure I understand what it means for the imperial intimidation question.
Does this mean that that imperial intimidation is not discarded because the card is still a ship, or that it is discarded because it's not a [TE] [1E-AU] ship?
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First Edition Rules Master
By BCSWowbagger (James Heaney)
 - First Edition Rules Master
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Community Contributor
#595807
When trying to remember the correct understanding of this rule, the question you must ask yourself is: "Under my understanding, if I undock my ship, does its Tactical Console immediately discard?" If yes, then you must find a new interpretation of the rule.

Takket is correct that there used to be language in the Glossary suggesting that a card must discard as soon as its target went away or became invalid. This language was intended to make it so Assimilate Counterpart would discard if its target went away... but it led people to believe that Tactical Console immediately discarded when the ship undocked, or that Staging Ground discarded if Deep Space 9 was commandeered. This language was therefore removed a couple of years ago and replaced with the current language (which Takket quoted correctly).

So, to answer the OP's questions:
WeAreBack wrote:I still struggle with this one: what happens when the thing that made one card a valid target of another changes so that the target is no longer valid?
If the targeting card is played on the targeted card (e.g. Tactical Console): nothing happens.

If the targeting card is not played on the targeted card (e.g. Assimilate Counterpart): if the targeted card leaves play, the targeting card leaves play. Otherwise, nothing happens. If the targeted card simply becomes an invalid target without leaving play (e.g. a Jean-Luc Picard targeted by Assimilate Counterpart becomes female), nothing happens.
If I play Imperial Intimidation on an I.S.S. Constitution, but then I use a bottle of '45 Dom to replace it with Starship Enterprise, does Imperial intimidation still operate?
This one is easy: Yes. (This answers your subsequent questions in this example as well.)
For example, if I play Mutual Distrust on Major Rakal when she is in [1E-Rom] mode targeting her Tal Shiar, but then she switches to [Fed] mode and no longer has the skill, can I still draw an extra card when I report a personnel with, say, Klingon Intelligence?
Mutual Distrust is the single hardest card for this and always has been, so good job on pressing the point to its hardest conclusion. It doesn't target a card, it targets a skill. Rules broke its collective brain trying to make this card work, so you can imagine the disappointment I personally felt when nobody ever really played with it, but only brought up up to ask really hard rules questions! :)

My interpretation is that, if the personnel Mutual Distrust is played on loses her Tal Shiar skill (due to Rakal's affiliation switching, or Frame of Mind, or whatever), Mutual Distrust does not discard. It is not targeting a separate card and so the long-term target rule simply does not apply to it.

However, Mutual Distrust stops functioning until the Intelligence skill is regained, because you can no longer say that a personnel with Klingon Intelligence is a personnel with "different" intelligence. That's not the target rule, that's just Mutual Distrust's own gametext.

There is no official ruling on this, I can already hear JeBuS typing an alternative perspective, and I'll save him the keystrokes my admitting that his rebuttal is plausible, but simply not my view of a close question.

Other examples are much easier:

Assimilate Homeworld bounces to hand if Locutus bounces to hand, but remains in play if He Will Make An Excellent Drone converts Locutus to a drone.

Assimilate Starship discards if the target ship blows up for some other reason, but remains in play if you commandeer it with A Fast Ship Would Be Nice.

Rescue Personnel doesn't discard the moment you beam up the target Away Team, but sticks around until you get them home.

And so on for Build Interplexing Beacon, Eliminate Starship, Harness Particle, Establish Tractor Lock, Reassimilate Lost Drone, and so on. But Mutual Distrust is a toughie.
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Director of Operations
By JeBuS (Brian S)
 - Director of Operations
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1E Deep Space 9 Regional Champion 2023
#595812
BCSWowbagger wrote:There is no official ruling on this, I can already hear JeBuS typing an alternative perspective, and I'll save him the keystrokes my admitting that his rebuttal is plausible, but simply not my view of a close question
Would it surprise you to hear that I don't have a rebuttal? I think too much of the game wouldn't work if it was interpreted any other way.

(That's not to say that if we went back in time, we couldn't do it better.)
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First Edition Rules Master
By BCSWowbagger (James Heaney)
 - First Edition Rules Master
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Community Contributor
#595839
JeBuS wrote: Sun Mar 19, 2023 9:35 amWould it surprise you to hear that I don't have a rebuttal? I think too much of the game wouldn't work if it was interpreted any other way.
Genuinely yes! In future, I will refrain from attempting to read your mind.
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