Immune vs. Ignore vs. Immune (makes my head spin)

[Gabe]

There was a discussion, that I believe was lost in the last purge, about immune characters in territory (via the Color Guard LS) and whether or not they could be kept from entering battle by an ignore ability.  I believe RR started the topic (brilliant idea) and nobody ever took an official stance on whether it worked or not. 

Well, this came up in a game today so here the scenario;

My opponent makes a RA with Zebulun.  He has no cards in hand and none left in his deck.  Zebulun is ignoring all evil characters with a toughness greater than 0.

I have a color guard LS in my Horman (blue site) making all my ECs immune to blue.

I have a Terrifying Beast in my territory along with some other ECs.

1) Can I block Zebulun?

2) If I can block Zebulun, what happens if I block with the Terrifying Beast who is immune to blue by means of his SA?

a) Is there a window between territory and his SA activating in battle where he's not immune so Zebulun's ignore wins?
b) Even if he stays immune to blue the whole time since his immunity in battle is from a new ability, Zebulun's ignore happened first so Zebulun is winning?
c) The beast was immune to blue and continues to be immune to blue the whole time so Zebulun's ignore cannot target him and the battle is a stalemate?
d) Is this all a moot point because an ignored character cannot enter battle even if it's immune?
e) Anything I'm missing?

Jeremiah 13:10 (‘Color Guard’)
Type: Lost Soul • Brigade: None • Ability: None • Class: None • Special Ability: While this card is in a single-color Site, Evil Characters in holder’s territory are immune to that brigade color.

The Terrifying Beast
Type: Evil Char. • Brigade: Orange/Gray • Ability: 11 / 12 • Class: None • Special Ability: Discard a Greek. Immune to blue brigade. May band to a Roman Emperor.

Zebulun
Type: Hero Char. • Brigade: Blue • Ability: 3 / 3 • Class: None • Special Ability: Draw a card. If all of your Heroes in play are Genesis Heroes, Zebulun ignores Evil Characters with toughness greater than the number of cards in your hand.

[EmJayBee83]

Just to lay out one side of the argument...

If a character is ignored, it can neither voluntarily nor forcibly enter the Field of Battle (see Ignore in the glossary).

Ignore is a special ability that protects a card from being defeated, harmed, or affected by the ignored card. It also prevents the card with ignore from harming or affecting the ignored card. An ignore card stops an ignored character from entering the Field of Battle. An ignore ability can be a successful blocking or rescuing card. Ignore is the same as “has no effect” and repel.

My answers to your questions, based on these fairly clear statements are:

1) No.

2) d.

[SirNobody]

Hey,

1) Can I block Zebulun?

Nope.  The "ignored characters cannot enter battle" part of ignore does not target anything, so characters in your territory that are ignored cannot be used to block even if they are immune.  It's the same reason you can't block Widow with King of Tyrus from hand or Eve with Sapphira via Unknown Nation.

Tschow,

Tim "Sir Nobody" Maly

[mjwolfe]

Here's  my take on this. From the REG on ignore:

A stalemate results when an ignore card is played after and against an immunity card ..... a character that is already immune continues to be immune even if ignored. 

and from the REG on immune:

Immunity protects a character from being harmed, affected, or removed from battle.


So, if the characters in territory are already immune, they can't be "affected" by the ignore. So if they aren't being ignored, they could enter battle. The trickier part of Gabe's scenario is question 2a. I'd suggest that there is no window between the Terrifying Beast being in territory and it's SA activating in battle. I would say that Beast is in territory until he is not. At the instant that he is not in territory and therefore no longer immune to blue via the Color Guard, where is he? Well he has to be somewhere, so the only place he can be is in battle (so there is no place between Territory and Battle). Once he is in battle, he loses his immunity from the Color Guard and his SA activates. This gives him a new immunity. The questionable part is if there was any time between the Color Guard immunity ceasing and the new immunity beginning. If there was no time when immunity was gone, then the ignore ability could never begin ignoring the Beast. If there was a time window between the two immunities then the Beast would have been ignored before his second immunity kicked in and he couldn't become immune if he was being ignored.

Since I think it's been said before in other scenarios and it seems cleaner for game mechanics, I would say that no time passes while a character enters battle and its SA activates which means the Beast was always immune. Therefore the Beast remains in battle and it is a stalemate.

Nope.  The "ignored characters cannot enter battle" part of ignore does not target anything, so characters in your territory that are ignored cannot be used to block even if they are immune.  It's the same reason you can't block Widow with King of Tyrus from hand or Eve with Sapphira via Unknown Nation.

Tschow,

Tim "Sir Nobody" Maly

As for Tim's point, the difference between the King of Tyrus blocking widow or Sapphira blocking Eve via Unknown Nation is that in those cases, the evil characters were not immune to being ignored. In Gabe's scenario, the characters in territory are immune and can't be affected by the ignore. So if they're not ignored characters, they could enter battle.

Mike

[BubbleBoy]

I agree with Wolfe's interpretation; this is how I would play it.

[crustpope]

Jeremiah 13:10 (‘Color Guard’)
Type: Lost Soul • Brigade: None • Ability: None • Class: None • Special Ability: While this card is in a single-color Site, Evil Characters in holder’s territory are immune to that brigade color.


I would agree that The Terrifying Beast could work as a block (unless Three Nails was also up)  because He would remain in a constant state of immunity.  Other characters that would work would be PotW and Nero because they would remain in a constant state of immunity.  Their immunity existed before Zebulun and therefore would constitute a stalemate block.

Also, I cant help but say I want this to be ruled this way because We need ways to counter pre-block ignore.  I'll admit it, Im not impartial in this case but I also think that this represents a really good case.

[STAMP]

Mr. Wolfe is correct.

[No More Sorrow]

Im not very good at enforcing rules, but Wolfe's explanation makes the most sense.

[EmJayBee83]

All this just demonstrates that we need the PTB to issue a ruling.

This is directly comparable to the Protection of Angels vs. Twelve-Fingered Giant discussion. You can look at the existing rules in place and in good faith come to hold either position. I understand the position that mjwolfe et al are presenting, and I trust that everyone understands the position Sir Nobody and I are advancing (because frankly it is just not that complicated).

Rather than stretching this one out to a dozen or so increasingly heated pages (like the PoA v. TFG discussion) with the same folk re-iterating the same points, I would much rather just have a decision made so we can move along.

[Gabe]

[RTSmaniac]

i think the EC would be allowed to enter battle but then would be ignored in battle even if immune.
Interrupt or negate the protect would need to be played or some kind of protect/shuffle/discard ls ability.
plus this ruling balances out both powers and gives the EC some chance while staying consistant in the rulings.  I actually cant see it ruled otherwise.

[SirNobody]

Hey,

In Gabe's scenario, the characters in territory are immune and can't be affected by the ignore.

When the REG says that immune characters cannot be "affected" it means they cannot be targeted.  So in Gabe's example the evil characters cannot be targeted because they are immune, in my examples the evil characters aren't targeted because they are out of play.  In both cases it doesn't matter because the "characters that are ignored cannot enter battle" part of ignore doesn't target the characters anyway.

I really think the PTB ruled on this a while ago and the answer I am giving here is the answer that was given then.

Tschow,

Tim "Sir Nobody" Maly

[lightningninja]

Similarly, can egyptians block a hero who was set aside with journey to egypt if you have a color guard in a blue site?

[mjwolfe]

In both cases it doesn't matter because the "characters that are ignored cannot enter battle" part of ignore doesn't target the characters anyway.

I can find nothing in the rulebook or REG that states that "cannot enter battle because of ignore doesn't target characters anyway". The REG states that "An ignore card stops an ignored character from entering the Field of Battle."
 Since "ignored" is not an attribute of a character itself, it can only become an ignored character by being targeted by an ignore ability. That's the only way that prior immunity could stop ignore... by stopping it from targeting the immune character. I think your two examples work because even though King of Tyrus and Sapphira are out of play they get ignored when they try to enter battle and are repelled at entry. In Gabe's scenario their immunity doesn't allow them to be targeted and repelled when they attempt to enter battle. Certainly in territory they were not ignored characters because of their immunity.

Mike

[lightningninja]

See... we get a difficult topic and Bryon is no where to be found...   

It's so nice when Rob comes in and says something... 

[The Schaef]

Here's the way I understand it.  It's a little screwy but if you think about it in the right light, it's consistent.

Protect and immune work like this: I protect my guy from your guy (immune) or effect (protect).
Ignore is sort of a mega-protect: I protect my guy from your guy, and I protect your guy from my guy, and (here's the screwy one) I protect my guy from being blocked by your guy, and if the battle ends like this, I win the battle.

This is consistent with the other protecty-type abilities because the protected guy is the target, and the opponent is just the description of "these are the types of guys I'm protected from".  It also shows why ignore played after immune doesn't win, because the immune character is protected from your guy, so he can't go, "I protect everybody from everything and win the battle", he can only protect himself back.  Lastly, it shows why even a protected character cannot enter battle if ignored.

[STAMP]

screwy

My exact opinion of how the thread transpired.

 

[SirNobody]

Hey,

I can find nothing in the rulebook or REG that states that "cannot enter battle because of ignore doesn't target characters anyway".

You are correct that the current REG does not address this issue.

In a previous thread discussing this issue (that I can't seem to find anymore) the following statement (or something very similar to it) was made and was confirmed by Bryon:

"An ignore ability has four parts: (1) an Ignore special ability grants the ignoring card immunity to all cards being ignored and (2) the ignored cards immunity to the ignoring card.  Additionally (3) Characters that are ignored and are not in battle cannot enter battle (you can not choose to bring them into battle and they cannot be targeted by an ability that would bring them into battle), and (4) characters that are ignored and are already in battle are treated as though they were not in battle for purposes of determining battle outcome.

Part one of an ignore ability targets the cards that gain the ignore status.  Parts two and four target the cards that are ignored.  Part three of an ignore ability has no target."

Tschow,

Tim "Sir Nobody" Maly

[STAMP]

Thank you for quoting Bryon.   

Mr. Wolfe, you are indeed correct.


(And here I thought the way things were going a ruling would be made that would indirectly promote the use of the new cards.  )

[The Schaef]

The language that says the ignored character cannot enter battle is assuming that the ignoring character is already in battle.  Otherwise, a character would never be able to enter battle regardless of whether the ignoring character is the one making the rescue or not.  That doesn't make sense, especially in the context of only having certain characters benefit from the ignore.

I'm going to rule that the sentence "ignored character may not enter battle" means "ignored character may not enter battle against the ignoring character".  It makes more sense to phrase it as "ignoring character is protected from being attacked by an ignored character not in battle" but I think some adjustment needs to be made to arrive at a consensus.  One thing is certain, this is not the way TGT is supposed to work, that you can't block if the named characters are in play at all.

[SirNobody]

Hey,

I'm going to rule that the sentence "ignored character may not enter battle" means "ignored character may not enter battle against the ignoring character".

So you're saying an ignored character can enter battle as long as the card that is ignoring it isn't in battle?

So you're saying I can attack with Jacob when he's ignored by Household Idols because Household Idols isn't in battle?

Tschow,

Tim "Sir Nobody" Maly

[The Schaef]

So you're saying an ignored character can enter battle as long as the card that is ignoring it isn't in battle?

No.

I'm going to rule that the sentence "ignored character may not enter battle" means "ignored character may not enter battle against the ignoring character".

Household Idols is a special case because it does not specify a character to protect with the ignore.  Therefore, it should be treated as a universal ignore and no Hero with a banding ability may enter battle at all.

[lightningninja]

Schaef specifically said "character" on both sides of the table. Artifacts are a completely different issue, and I think you know that Tim. 

[SirNobody]

Hey,

Schaef specifically said "character" on both sides of the table. Artifacts are a completely different issue, and I think you know that Tim. 

I, apparently incorrectly, thought that Schaef was referring to my previous post which does not treat Artifacts as a completely different issue.  I understand now that Schaef was intending for Artifacts to be treated as a different issue, but I don't see why we should treat Artifacts as a different issue.

Tschow,

Tim "Sir Nobody" Maly

[The Schaef]

See my above post.  We are not treating Artifacts as a different issue.  We are looking at a single exceptional case, which incidentally, does not affect my idea for ruling TGT at all.

Additionally, Bryon has ruled here that when the ignoring Hero is out of battle, the ECs may now enter, meaning that the assumption that the ignoring Hero was in battle for that definition seems to be correct.