Just an example on how the game would work going by the opposite logic:
Greenleaf attempts to wound Freca and the opponent is using Hides to prevent it, Greenleaf can chose a new target for free. 
I doubt that they include common sense like that in the rulebook, but I hope I'm wrong, so you can have a satisfying answer.
This isn't a good example, because
Greenleaf only deals one wound per action. If the wound is prevented, no one is suggesting
Greenleaf could choose a new target for free. The wound is prevented, so the action is over. The issue is what happens when the number of cards to be discarded (or number of wounds to be dealt) exceeds the number of discards (or wounds) that can be prevented.
Suppose, for the sake of argument, that one
Greenleaf action deals 3 wounds instead of one. Obviously a single use of
Hides isn't going to prevent all 3 wounds.
It's not so much the rules having something to say, but common sense. Anytime you are choosing multiple cards for whatever purpose, the first thing you do is identify which cards you are doing it to.
That may be the way
you do it, but that doesn't necessarily mean that's the way the rules dictate it be done. Who's to say I can't point at them one at a time, even though they are conceptually all being discarded at once? Find me where the rules say you target once, and then you cannot target again, and the issue will be resolved.
The Trees Are Strong makes FP wound companions based on the number of Orcs discarded. So FP chooses, say, Gimli, Frodo, Gandalf and Aragorn. Each person is scheduled to be wounded once. Intimidate can respond to any of the wounds. If you prevent Aragorn's wound, the remaining wounds still have to be placed on Gimli, Frodo and Gandalf. You can't choose Aragorn again.
Suppose, for the sake of argument, the SP discards 8 Orcs for
The Trees Are Strong. The card dictates that 8 characters be wounded. Say you use
Intimidate to prevent a wound to Aragorn, then you wound Gimli, Frodo and Gandalf. Great! But there's still 4 more wounds incoming, and one character on the table (Aragorn) who has not yet been wounded, because you prevented the wound he would have taken. If you had just wounded him and not prevented it, he wouldn't have taken any more than that, because the card only wounds each character once. But until that happens, the effect is still trying to resolve itself with a character on the table who has not yet been wounded.
Same thing goes for Clever Hobbits. You choose which ones you want to discard, and that's it. You only make the choice once.
If that is true, it shouldn't be that hard to point to some kind of related ruling or rule that dictates all targeting for discards (or wounding) can only be done at the front of the action. So far, I still haven't seen that. So far, what I've seen is, "well, this is the way we've always done it." Bib, your sig says "All cards do what they say, no more, no less." Well, if
The Trees Are Strong says wound 8 characters, and you've still got a character on the table yet who hasn't been wounded, and not all 8 of those wounds have yet been prevented or assigned, then the card has not yet done what it says.
You're issue 3 echoes back to the wound issue. Technically a dmg +1 character who wins a skirmish deals both wounds at once, yet intimidate would only cancel 1 wound. Or as pointed out, hides would only cancel 1 wound. If someone wants to cancel the second wound they wound need to play a second copy of intimidate or remove more twilight for hides. It is likewise for conditions. Yes, they are all being discarded at once, but each condition has a separate window in which it can respond to the action discarding it.
Agreed. The issue is what happens when a condition is prevented from being discarded once, when there are still discard attempts remaining in the action, and no other conditions left on the table.
I'll go back to the
FNF example: Say
FNF has 5 tokens on it, SP only has three conditions on the table: Two copies of
Deceit, and one copy of
Final Strike. There are only 3 twilight in the pool.
FNF is activated, and its effect becomes "discard 5 conditions." SP uses
Deceit three times (taking out three twilight) to prevent his three conditions from being discarded. However, once those response actions have been taken, the original action continues. Since only 3 discards were prevented, the effect now continues as "discard 2 conditions," and three conditions can still be spotted on the table. As best I can tell, there is
no rule anywhere which says those three conditions are protected for the remainder of the action,
no rule anywhere that says I can't now target two more for discard,
no rule anywhere that says the rest of
FNF's text doesn't continue to the fullest possible extent that it can. On the contrary:
If the effect of a card or special ability requires
you to perform an action and you cannot, you
must perform as much as you can and ignore the
rest.
In this case the effect of
FNF was "discard 5 conditions," only 3 of those discards were prevented, and 3 conditions can still be spotted on the table.
To top it off, we already have a ruling (admittedly unofficial) on this issue over in Archives, made by "High King of Rules" forum administrator TheJord, who stated in no uncertain terms that
Clever Hobbits could indeed target the same condition over and over again until all the twilight is gone.
Topic: What are some anti-Gollum strategies? (Read 77568 times)
