Dreamer in the Final Wasteland

We just played the Dreamer in the Final Wasteland (got crushed...Bunker + Unity + Wraith seems like a great team, but they got walloped before they could set up) and I have a question about Dreamer's interaction with the Unforgiving Wasteland card. On a search of the forum, the closest thing I found was this thread.

Suppose the Dreamer has flipped and Unforgiving Wasteland is in play. The environment destroys a Projection. The Dreamer's rule card says "when a Projection is destroyed, put it under this card." Unforgiving Wasteland says, "when the environment would destroy a target, remove it from the game instead." I think - and the thread I referenced seems consistent with this interpretation - that if the environment deals enough damage to a Projection to destroy it that it would be removed, instead of placing it under the Dreamer's rule card, because Unforgiving Wasteland says would be destroyed and that happens before the target is destroyed. (Correct?)

But what if the environment destroys the Dreamer herself?

The Dreamer's loss condition says "if the Dreamer is reduced to 0 or fewer HP or otherwise destroyed, the heroes lose. Game over."

If the environment would destroy the Dreamer, and she gets removed from the game...not game over? (Assuming that the Dreamer's rule card is attached to her character card, as it would be in an oversized version.)

I am guessing that the Dreamer's reduction to 0 HP happens before she "would be" destroyed, which happens before she "is" destroyed. So her text causes the game to end before Unforgiving Wasteland removes her.

In typing that out I sort of convinced myself of the answer, but do I have that right?

Since the Dreamer's win condition is an or situation, the heroes would still lose as long as her HP would be reduced to 0 even if she wouldn't be destroyed.  Only an effect like Sucker Punch or Wrathful Gaze would get around that and Final Wasteland doesnt have any of those

Her response should trigger before destruction would occur, unless we get a ruling that hp dropping to 0 or lower is simultaneous to destruction.

Trajector: yes, I think you got that right.

Given that Final Wasteland and The Dreamer were written at approximately the same time, I expet that the designer deliberately made sure the inetraction between them didn't cause undesired effects.

On the other hand, if you fight the Matriarch in the Final Wasteland, and can get out a Horrid Skunk Ape and Unforgiving Wasteland, and then make sure that you whittle down Huginn and Muninn (when they come out) to the point that something from the environment will finish them off, you'll find you have a very, very easy game indeed…and no feedback damage when all those birdies are removed from the game because they're being removed from the game, not destroyed :D. And yes, we did this once. It was epic :D.

I believe the correct answer is actually "Players Choice"

From the Order of Operations ruling:

Any cards with "start of turn" or "end of turn" text happen in order of cards played, as before. However, anything else that acts "simultaneously" goes in whatever order the players choose, as with all ambiguous situations in Sentinels of the Multiverse. 

"if the Dreamer is reduced to 0 or fewer HP or otherwise destroyed, the heroes lose. Game over."

We do not have a ruling that cards removed from the game still process their text.

HP dropping to 0 triggers destruction, I doubt triggers and responses happen simultaneously.

But if they did you could process and cancel her destruction first, at which point she was not destroyed and no text from her card is in play to do anything about her HP that she no longer has because she isn't a target if she isn't in the game.

Largely it was a joke, we already know hp dropping to 0 isn't simultaneous with destruction/incapacitation, or you could choose to destroy Apostate or Fanatic when they drop to 0 or lower.

Thanks, all.

So Foote, does your comment about it being players’ choice for the Projections mean that “a target would be destroyed” and “a target is destroyed” are simultaneous events?

Omnitron

I'm not arguing against that. I'm saying it doesn't really matter here. The game goes in the "Lose" columb either way.

This has a ruling, the answer is yes. They are simultaneous, and they will all occur regardless of order chosen.

No. What I said is that it falls under "Ambiguous", at the very best, therefore it would get treated as if they were simultaneous (resulting in players choice of how to resolve)

Omnitron doesn't process his text from outside the game, it is triggered by his destruction, and the effect lasts on the field until the condition of all devices leaving play occurs, then heroes win the game.

It works like mistbound, or anything that uses next.

Idk if I 100% buy that line of reasoning, but I accept where you're comming from and still think it doesn't make a lick of difference. 

We know would be doesn't designate different timing, and this debate ready occurred with the rulings from the video game.

I missed these. Why did it take so long?

And how does that mean the heros don't still lose the game?

It doesn't.  The heroes do lose the game.

Unless we get a ruling that hp hitting 0 is simultaneous to destruction caused by HP hitting 0.

Because Unforgiving wasteland will never get the chance to have Dreamer destroyed.  Because her HPhits 0 and the heroes lose.

Yeah, I think we’re all cool with the Dreamer’s loss condition. I still think that “would be” comes before “is,” but maybe that’s because reading engineering requirements taught me to be very literal. Can I get a link to the ruling that they are simultaneous?

Here is a good place to start.

Ok, I agree with you.

However, for sake of petty argument, lets say that Final Wasteland did remove Dreamer from the game technically before her text could resolve.

My contention is that how could you, as a player, gamer, and fan of SotM in general, sleep at night thinking that game was anything but a loss? Knowing full well going into it that you need to save this little girl, you're gonna tell me with a straight face that allowing her to be savagley torn apart and eaten by the wasteland until there wasn't a single trace of her left in the entire game was a draw? Thats some cojones.

For the sake of petty argument is my 2nd favorite charitable cause.

It would not be a draw, it would be a win.  Because thats how any other Villain character card being eaten by the wasteland would work.  In this case nothing would tell you otherwise, so you win.

Then you write a fairy tale about little girls that dreamed big dreams and got eaten by wild creatures, as a warning to future generations to keep their dreams to themselves.

The "would be destroyed" part overrides the "is destroyed" thing with regard to the Unforgiving Wasteland triggering on-destruction effects, hence my comment on the Matriarch (you don't get feedback damage from Fowl being destroyed because they aren't being destroyed - they're being removed from the game instead).

I'm in agreement with those who say that the Dreamer reaching 0hp is a loss regardless of what does it - Unforgiving Wasteland wouldn't get to do anything because the loss condition of the Dreamer running out of hp would kick in first.

Semantic Pedantic attack!

It would be the instead that holds the important role of cancelling destruction, but the way things work now I'm not sure you can't trigger other destruction effects first, then cancel the destruction, it is all confusing.

NOT official, but based on various official rulings*, is the Damage Dealing Timing worksheet.  The linguistic distinction of "would be" versus "is" is (as far as I can tell) not as relevant as what is actually happening in the action clause.  Final Wasteland replaces destruction, so happens in step 17.  Other "triggered by destrcution" effects (such as Dreamr's Lose condition) happen in step 18.  Hence, not simultaneous.

• In hindsight, I wish we'd included reference links while this doc was being built…

There's an error in the Spreadsheet's information, at least if I"m reading the spreadsheet correctly.

The Clarifications and Decisions from from Handelabra & Christopher's Fireside Chats post (https://greaterthangames.com/forum/topic/clarifications-and-decisions-from-handelabra-christophers-fireside-chats-6773) contains the following:
Dual Crowbars works somewhat like Isothermic Transducer. The final damage dealt from the first instance of damage forms the initial amount/type/irreducibility of the second instance of damage. That means you can benefit twice from damage increases.

So Cell C22 (at least for Dual Crowbars) is incorrect … the final damage from the first attack (Step 15) becomes the starting damage of the next attack (Step 6), rather than using the initial damage of the first attack.

That change happened in the last week, before then it was understood that Dual Crowbars used the same base damage for both attacks.

Thanks for the catch, jrboegman.  After a bit of thought, I have delected the text from 22C and added more current notes to 21B (and 6C and 9C).