Savage Mana vs. Explosives Wagon

Let's look a bit more into the new "cards under cards" ruling.

We have a ruling that a card under another card has no text, and that that does not stop destruction response triggers that move under another card.

So let's look at Explosives Wagon.

our ruling on it is that it stays in play to deal its damage, but that ruling is now being altered by the new ruling.

Now wagon can go under Savage Mana and still act.

So we get interactions like:

1.  Is the static bonus to damage still in effect?  That used to be a simple ruling that yes, it was in effect because the card is still in play.  Now the card is still in play, but it has no text, is it still boosting damage?

2.  Is it still a target?  It has no text, it is not a target, right?  So now Environmental Allies, Grease Gun, cards like that no longer affect it.  What about Stun Bolts?  Throat Jab?  They both specify that the Target cannot deal damage, but that target has left play, if a bounty was on the card it would trigger, Wrest would leave play, and effects that affect targets would no longer affect Wagon.

But it is still dealing damage.

I personally find these 2 rulings to be ridiculous, because they create interactions like this as valid play options.

And thematically, What the heck is going on that Haka just ate something, and then it explodes?  that is absurd.  We are in Bugs Bunny territory.

Oh, I see.  This is all Guise's fault!

More seriously, one patch that would address at least this set of objections might be:

"Cards underneath other cards lose their text as soon as they have finished processing all other effects caused by their destruction (if any)."

It's not as elegant as I'd like... Any other suggestions?

I always had the impression he was just "absorbing" the mana of his defeated foe (not the actual foe), using that energy later to damage an opponent. Mechanically, it could have been represented by a mana counter (like Setback's luck pool) or something like that, but this creates entertaining situations like having all the Pike Industrial Complex rats under Savage Mana when the Experimental Mutagen comes out or having all the Chairman's Thugs - their mana/energy isn't available, so they can't come back into the fight.

And don't forget the ease with which you can eat Ambuscade's Cloaking Device - he really didn't think things through when he decided to go after Haka as his chosen prey, did he? ;)

Can someone post a link to the specific new ruling in question?

About 2/3s of the way down:
https://greaterthangames.com/forum/topic/clarifications-and-decisions-from-handelabra-christophers-fireside-chats-6773

“If there are multiple cards interested in a card’s destruction, they all happen (in player decided order) even if the card gets put under another card. For example, if Haka destroys Pterodactyl Thief with Savage Mana in play, Pterodactyl Thief can go under Savage Mana and then the thief’s cards return to the owners’ hands.”

I could see the app asking players "which card acts first?" And you could choose to click on Savage Mana to put the wagon underneath, or click the wagon to deal damage.

Isn't the whole point of the ruling so that you can't escape the destruction effect by putting the wagon under savage mana right away.  All this says is that even if you put it under there you need to deal with its destruction effect. The result is that whether you do the explosion and then put the wagon under savage mana, or you put it under savage mana and then do the explosion you end up in the same position at the end baring some specific interactions.

Now for all those specific interactions with all the other cards that might not work with it suddenly, fine then do the explosion first so that those things work the way you want them to.  Do it in which ever order you want, but you will have to trigger the explosion either way, thats the point.

The official ruling being "just don't choose to do it that way" isn't really viable.

Those interactions are in the game, and are going to need to be run properly in the app and have official rulings.  I'm pointing it out because we now need clarifications on exactly how it works.

Ignoring a problem isn't a solution to the problem.

That ruling exists because of Omnitron. If you destroy Omnitron with Haka, and choose Savage Mana to go first, you put Omnitron under Savage Mana. Without the ruling, Omnitron would not be removed from the game, and you would win even if devices are in play. That's not what is intended to happen, and so the ruling was made.

AFAIK, it applies to Explosives Wagon in the same way. The card text remains in play during the destruction, even if it's going to go under Savage Mana. I'm not 100% sure about what would happen right now if, say Dynamic Siphon was hit by Explosives Wagon and allowed Haka to use Savage Mana.. =)

That's a good one.

I've tried to find a problem with having the self-destruct text just go first, and I haven't been able to think of one, it just seems like a much simpler option.

But didn't we (separately) get a ruling that Omnitron's win condition of "kill all devices" remains in play even though Omnitron himself (and all his text) had been removed from the game?  Wouldn't that same logic apply if Omnitron was under Savage Mana?  (Goes and looks…) OK, not an official ruling, just a board consensus.  But the reasoning behind that consensus did show up in your recent clarification post: "Card effects that have an expiry date (e.g. “until the start of your next turn”) survive the destruction of the originating card. Effects that do not have an expiry date go away after the card is destroyed."

The one case that I'm aware of where this ruling solved an actual problem was Savage Mana vs. Pterodactyl Thief.  If you chose to let Savage Mana go first, the question of what happens to the stolen cards (do they count as underneath Savage Mana, for example) was unclear.  I feel that one does need to be addressed, but I'm not sure the current paradigm is the best way to do that.

What MigrantP is saying is the ruling that on destruct text happens after the card goes under savage mana.

Otherwise you could put Omnitron under Savage Mana before activating his text that then stays in play.

But that text is *always* in play.  Or could easily be interpreted to be so, anyways.  "The Heroes cannot win until there are no Devices in play."  That sentence establishes a condition, and is present when Omnitron comes into play.  One might argue that it ceases for a micro-second while he flips, but is then immediately re-established.  Unless there was some way of putting him under Savage Mana in mid-flip, the condition is always in play.

Now, one *might* argue (as I believe most people are assuming) that the Device-condition only triggers subsequent to the previous sentence, about Omnitron being destroyed.  But I don't see that that is necessarily true, either from a logical perspective or from a game-design one.

You also have the issue of removing Omnitron from play.

True, Omni wouldn't then be removed from play.  But I view that as a minor issue.

Actully, I think it is a huge issue, especially, as you are trying to suggest, that we don't need the ruling for the line about not winning. Let's say we don't have the new rule, and we have your explanation that it wouldn't change how the win condition is played. 

Haka eats Omnitron, but the heroes haven't won yet because the alternate win condition is still in play, but Omnitron is under Savage Mana and not removed. Now, if Savage Mana is destroyed or used, Omnitron would then go to the trash, possibly being able to be played again like the Chairman. Having Omnitron come back with 100 hp would not be a good thing.

The effect only stays in play if it has been triggered.  If we treat Omnitron's text as separate from his reaction to destruction text then it is a static effect like The Operative has and it leaves play with him and would be pointless.

Therefore the effect must trigger to stay in play after Omnitron's card leaves play.  Because we have a ruling that all destruction effects are simultaneous we need a ruling that prevents savage mana shenanigans.  We have that ruling, it just also creates other questions.

MigrantP:  All of the card text remains?  While this seems to violate savage mana's ruling, it would solve a lot of the issues.

As for using savage mana while wagon was under it  it still acting I would draw from other rulings to say:

1.  Destroying wagon a second time does not affect wagon in any way, is would continue after mana resolves.

2.  The text is in play so mana would count wagon as being destroyed for its damage and add the +1 to the damage. 

3.  The card would remain under mana until it finished its action then go to the trash.

Unless

3.  The card retaining its text retains its status as a target, in which case destruction by savage mana would put it back under savage mana, in which case it would finish its damage effect and remain under savage mana.

OK, good arguments that I was wrong about how to handle Omnitron.  I concede that point.

MigrantP's comment at #11 seems to me to be supporting my wording at #3: "Cards underneath other cards lose their text as soon as they have finished processing all other effects caused by their destruction (if any)."

Regarding phantskipp's suggestion above: "The card retaining its text retains its status as a target, in which case destruction by savage mana would put it back under savage mana, in which case it would finish its damage effect and remain under savage mana."

It seems to me that if a card has its text, then it also has its HP, so would still be a target.  On the other hand, the same ruling that keeps the Explosives Wagon from starting to explode while already exploding (I don't have exact wording, but approximately "Things can only be destroyed once at a time") would seem to me to apply to Savage Mana as well.  That is, if a given card has already been grabbed by Savage Mana during its initial destruction, then Savage Mana cannot trigger that grabbing effect again. 

Hm.  Thinking about this a bit more...  On the third hand, using Savage Mana's power counts up the cards destroyed by the power use.  In this scenario, although EW was under SM, it would NOT be destroyed by SM, because it was already "being destroyed" and couldn't be "double-destroyed".  So at the end of this weird interaction, SM would have destroyed all the cards that had been solidly under it before, but EW would remain under SM.  It wouldn't "go back" under, but it never got to leave in the first place.

The wording of the comment on double destruction was that it wouldn't change anything, not that you couldn't destroy it a second time.

At present, all the card text remains. In the app, the card is basically "scheduled" to go underneath Savage Mana, and doesn't actually go underneath until all is said and done. That means that if you could use Savage Mana's power during the destruction (e.g. by Dynamic Siphon), it would not get destroyed again (because it's not underneath it yet).

Not saying that's an official ruling - it's just how it works right now in the app.

Well the app counts as official unless stated otherwise, so that's how I'm going to run it.

That works almost exactly how I normally resolve it.  I treat all other destruction effects as pending until the self destruct text resolves.