Does the 2nd part of Too Great And Terrible prevent wounds or prevent an action?

[sgtdraino]

There has recently been considerable debate over the way Too Great And Terrible currently works on gemp. You can view this discussion here:

Too Great and Terrible Rules Discussion

The card reads as follows:

Maneuver: Spot a Nazgul to wound Gandalf twice. The Free Peoples player may discard two cards from hand to prevent this.

The disagreement is over what the second part of the game text does: "The Free Peoples player may discard two cards from hand to prevent this." There are those who believe this text is preventing wounds, and thus wouldn't work at Steward's Tomb. Others believe this text is preventing the action as a whole, not specifically wounds. What do you think?

[Ringbearer]

I am against such a poll as you shouldnt anyone letting it enter, becasue it will just be whomever shouts the most will get an agreement, or just people voting for what they will like.

I can tell from my DGMA days that it prevents the action.

[Merrick_H]

While I don't object to the poll, I am going to assert that it will not be binding, regardless of how the poll turns out.  How many people here really read, know and understand the rules and their subtle nuances to the extent required to make a decision on this?

[dmaz]

I am against such a poll as you shouldnt anyone letting it enter, becasue it will just be whomever shouts the most will get an agreement, or just people voting for what they will like.

I can tell from my DGMA days that it prevents the action.

Please enlighten the community then. So far there is no actual proof from the rules or otherwise that it's not talking about wounds being prevented (whether in the context of the action being stopped or not). All we've seen so far is mostly conjecture, however logical.

[dmaz]

While I don't object to the poll, I am going to assert that it will not be binding, regardless of how the poll turns out.  How many people here really read, know and understand the rules and their subtle nuances to the extent required to make a decision on this?

This is true too...I guess more the discussion to follow the pool when combined with each person taking a stand on one side or the other, would have more weight.

[Ringbearer]

I am against such a poll as you shouldnt anyone letting it enter, becasue it will just be whomever shouts the most will get an agreement, or just people voting for what they will like.

I can tell from my DGMA days that it prevents the action.

Please enlighten the community then. So far there is no actual proof from the rules or otherwise that it's not talking about wounds being prevented (whether in the context of the action being stopped or not). All we've seen so far is mostly conjecture, however logical.

I dont have a rule example but a ruling that kept with me was about Too Great And Terrible, lady Redeemed and Stewards Tomb (ROTK). Apparently it cancels the effect, so it was ruled during a Premier Series.

[dmaz]

I am against such a poll as you shouldnt anyone letting it enter, becasue it will just be whomever shouts the most will get an agreement, or just people voting for what they will like.

I can tell from my DGMA days that it prevents the action.

Please enlighten the community then. So far there is no actual proof from the rules or otherwise that it's not talking about wounds being prevented (whether in the context of the action being stopped or not). All we've seen so far is mostly conjecture, however logical.

I dont have a rule example but a ruling that kept with me was about Too Great And Terrible, lady Redeemed and Stewards Tomb (ROTK). Apparently it cancels the effect, so it was ruled during a Premier Series.

Thanks!

While it was tough to discern from the rules, a lot of us knew this must have been ruled on from the "experts" before in competitive play.

While, personally, I still think there's more card examples, and examples in the rules that point towards it being actual prevention, a competitive ruling is probably the closest thing we can get to a definitive answer.

[Eukalyptus]

I am against such a poll as you shouldnt anyone letting it enter, becasue it will just be whomever shouts the most will get an agreement, or just people voting for what they will like.

I can tell from my DGMA days that it prevents the action.

Please enlighten the community then. So far there is no actual proof from the rules or otherwise that it's not talking about wounds being prevented (whether in the context of the action being stopped or not). All we've seen so far is mostly conjecture, however logical.

I dont have a rule example but a ruling that kept with me was about Too Great And Terrible, lady Redeemed and Stewards Tomb (ROTK). Apparently it cancels the effect, so it was ruled during a Premier Series.

You mean Terrible as the Dawn?

[Ringbearer]

Yes

[Carl333]

I think I am not quite understanding what you mean.  Even if it were to discard 2   cards in order to negate the card itself, it would still prevent the wounds.  The card would also be discarded because its an event, so it cant be re-used.  You would still have to discard the two cards so negating the   card part would be useless.  I would say either way works.  It doesn't really matter.

[sgtdraino]

Tournament directors don't always make the right call.

[dmaz]

Tournament directors don't always make the right call.

Yeah....like I said, I still feel like we have the right of it. It makes much more sense according to what the rules actually say, and it doesn't require a bunch of assumptions about the rules that aren't there.

Though I think I'm just going to have to accept conceding to the big-noses here, I'd still like to know why they think prevent means something else in this specific circumstance only...

Bib has already violated his own rule of "Cards do what they say. No more, no less." more than once

[dmaz]

I think I am not quite understanding what you mean.  Even if it were to discard 2  cards in order to negate the card itself, it would still prevent the wounds.  The card would also be discarded because its an event, so it cant be re-used.  You would still have to discard the two cards so negating the  card part would be useless.  I would say either way works.  It doesn't really matter.

Yeah that's also what we're saying here....you still prevented wounds. It's more of a stretch to try and argue that it somehow means that "this" means the card so you're not preventing, and since it doesn't say "response" it's not the same....it sounds more like trying to fit a square peg into a round hole.

[Merrick_H]

If this was at a Decipher Premier Event (not a PSQ which is run by local tournament directors) it would have had Trevor McGreggor or Enrique Huerta or one of the Rules committee members there at the time, not just some local person.

There is a BIG difference between a PSQ and a PSE.  PSEs were run by Decipher staff, not by volunteers and had a lot more resources available to make high level decisions such as this type of interaction.

[sgtdraino]

I dont have a rule example but a ruling that kept with me was about Too Great And Terrible, lady Redeemed and Stewards Tomb (ROTK). Apparently it cancels the effect, so it was ruled during a Premier Series.

Can you tell us more? What was the context? Was this ruling made during a game you were participating in, or did you just hear about it from somebody?

They said it "cancels the effect," but it can't be doing that, because it says "prevent' not "cancel." Did you mean that it prevents the effect? And if you did, that should mean that it's not preventing the action, it's only preventing the effect, which is the same thing as preventing wounds (the wounds are the effect).

What was the end result of the ruling? Was it possible to prevent the wounds from Terrible As The Dawn at Steward's Tomb?

Ugh, I dislike hearsay.