When is a card "affected" by an effect? (Follow-up to Allie Hensman (Exp. 1)

I’m afraid I’m gonna end up as popular as Elmore Rhine, but I have to ask, as it is now buggin’ me:

What are the rules / how do you tell if a dude is “affected” by an action?

This is, pretty clearly, a follow-up to my question re: Allie Hensman (Exp. 1) (Allie Hensman (Exp. 1): "must" vs. "does not" pay), but I’m interested in the general answer, because now I’m all confuzzled worse than poor old Henry M.

Allie Hensman (Exp. 1)'s job reads:

Noon Job, Boot: Allie leads a job that marks an opposing dude. If successful, the mark’s controller must give you ghost rock equal to the mark’s influence. If the player cannot or does not, discard the mark.

I’m specifically confused as to how I know that the second sentence,

If successful, the mark’s controller must give you ghost rock equal to the mark’s influence.

“affects” the mark?

Normally, I’d apply “common sense” (did the second sentence of the action alter in any way the mark?) and then a dictionary (affect: to produce an effect on), but both these led me to conclude the mark would not be affected.

Example of Allie Hensman (Exp. 1) job in action:

Allie Hensman’s job mark’s an opponent’s Elmore Rhine, who has 3 influence. The job succeeds.

Elmore Rhine was Pistol Whipped home, and is still in play when the shooutout ends, and his controller has 3 gr.

I understand from the ruling that payment is not optional, per sentence two. The mark’s controller (not the mark) must give ghost rock equal to the mark’s influence (3). The mark’s control can do so, and therefore must give 3 gr to opponent. Sentence three resolves without any effect.

(I’m good so far: “must” usually means “shall”, and this ruling is a clear application of that concept, plus the general principle of 'do what the card says, line by line.)

Elmore Rhine was Pistol Whipped home, and is still in play when the shootout ends, and his controller has 2 gr.

I understand from the ruling that payment is not optional, per sentence two. The mark’s controller (not the m must give ghost rock equal to the mark’s influence (3). The mark’s control cannot do so, therefore there is no effect. Sentence three resolves: because the controller cannot pay, the mark must be discarded.

(Clear to me still).

Elmore Rhine was aced by Legendary Holster during the shootout, and remains in Boot Hill through the end of the shooutout. When the shooutout ends, his controller has 2 gr.

Because the mark is not in play when the shooutout ends, the mark cannot be affected by the job’s effects, per the Rulebook, v 1.3.1, p. 25:

Now resolve the effects of a successful job as given on the card, assuming the mark is still in play. If not, the job succeeds anyway but the mark is unaffected.

(See also, Ol’ Fashioned Hanging and why it does not ace dudes discarded during the shootout.)

The second sentence results in no ghost rock payment. (Because it would ‘affect’ the mark… though in this case the controller could not pay Ghost Rock equal to Elmore Rhine’s influence in any event). The third sentence also would have no effect, because discarding mark would clearly affect that mark.

(I’m clear on this scenario, as the issue of ‘affectation’ is not relevant to the resolution of the job).

Elmore Rhine was aced by Legendary Holster during the shootout, and remains in Boot Hill through the end of the shooutout. When the shooutout ends, his controller has 3 gr.

This is where my noggin’ starts to hurt.

It is explicitly the mark’s controller, not the mark, that must do something as a result of the action (pay ghost rock from his/her stash). The mark (specifically, its influence) is clearly referenced when determining the quantum of ghost rock to be paid, but the mark’s influence is not “affected” in any way. There is no change to the mark’s stats, abilities, keywords, traits, booted/unbootedness, or location (on the board or in various game ‘zones’). There is no effect, immediate or ongoing, that is otherwise placed on the mark.

So, that being the case, I currently assume that simply referencing a card’s attribute is considered “affecting” that card, even if there is no game-state change with respect to that dude.

  • Is this correct?

  • Did I miss something that spells out what ‘affect’ means for Doomtown?

(Extraneous fluff snipped, per request below!)

I recognize this is a corner case, and can certainly play the card in line with the clear instruction given in the previous answer. It’s just the ‘why’ that is really bugging me. I apologize for overthinking this, and for the wall of text above. There’s probably a simple thing I missed, or my brain is just firing oddly today and thus is failing to grock the clarity of the current situation.

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Seen and Rules Team will review.

Thanks for the question, and detailed explanation :slight_smile:

The key thing here with AllieXP and similar Jobs, is that the mark is only affected if the job was successful, and the mark is still in play.

Taking this from the rules (pg 25, Is the job done?) Now resolve the effects of a successful job as given on the card, assuming the mark is still in play. If not, the job succeeds anyway but the mark is unaffected. If the job fails, nothing happens.

Using your example of Elmore Rhine being a the mark of an Allie Hensmen XP job, but he’s aced by Legendary Holster in the process, we can see how this applies:

Since Elmore is no longer in play, the 'if succesful" clauses of the job, that target or check against or affect Elmore (which include checking the dude’s influence, or any other stat) do not apply; assuming that AllieXP is successful in the job.

The exact same would also be true in the following successful job scenarios:
1. Valeria Better had 2 blood curses and had a mugging led against her. If she was discarded during the shootout, once we get the ‘apply if successful job effects’, those spells are not retroactively aced, even though those 2 blood curses in the discard pile were clearly attached to her.

2. Travis Moone had an ambush led against him, but he got discarded during the shootout. Once we get to the ‘apply if successful job effects’, he is not retroactively aced.

The key thing to take away from this, is that once you get to applying the ‘if successful’ parts of a job, if a the mark is no longer in play, any part that targets or affects the mark, does not occur. So with AllieXP, the mark’s controller does not check the mark’s influence in discard pile, deck, boot hill (depending on where they’re at), and does not pay based upon their influence.

I get where you’re coming from. This all may seem a little bit silly, since Elmore is in Boot Hill and Boot Hill’s contents are public knowledge between players. So it should make sense that you look in Boot Hill and see what is Elmore’s influence, and then make the owner Pay GR. Right? Where it gets really murky is when Elmore gets discarded in the shootout, and ends up getting shuffled back into the deck. Now it doesn’t become as simple as looking in the deck to check to see what influence is, since a player cannot at anytime look through their deck. What has to be stressed then is the commonality and consistency for when a dude leaves play, and is in discard pile/deck/boot hill. And that consistency is, once the dude is out of play, it is not affected by the results of a successful job.

I know you have subsequent questions within the post, but I’d kindly ask that you break them in separate forum posts. It makes answering, replying, and tracking much easier in the long run.

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