Konrad Klar wrote: ↑Fri Feb 19, 2021 11:40 am
May help to accept the idea that "tap" may be either active condition condition or main effect.
I can tell that you completely misunderstand what a "main effect" of a card is because tapping is NEVER a "main effect" of a resource card. I wonder if you are considering "main effect" to simply mean "card effect," as in, the effects that are declared and resolved as a card is declared and resolved. But this is not the case.
The term "main effect" comes from Annotation 5 and 6. If you read them in context, and understand the game's design, then it becomes clear what a "main effect" is.
Active and Passive Conditions
There are two types of conditions for actions in METW: active and passive.
An active condition must be in play or established when the action requiring it is declared. Typical active conditions are tapping a card and discarding a card. For example, Magic Ring of Stealth can cancel a strike against its bearer if two particular active conditions are met: the bearer must be a scout and Magic Ring of Stealth must tap. These are called active conditions because a player actively decides to invoke the action they satisfy. Active conditions serve as the price of an action. They are restrictions to the player invoking the action. In the case of Magic Ring of Stealth, the player cancelling the strike must have provided a scout and he must tap the ring, which renders the ring unable to be used again until his next turn.
Annotation 5
If an action requires an entity to tap as a condition for the action's main effect, that entity must be untapped when the action is declared; else, the action may not be declared. Tap the entity at this point; this is considered synonymous with the action's declaration, i.e., it is not a separate action. When it comes time to resolve the action in its chain of effects, that entity must still be in play and tapped or the action is cancelled.
Annotation 6
If an action requires an entity to be discarded as a condition for the action's main effect, that entity must be discarded when the action is declared; this is considered synonymous with the action's declaration, i.e., it is not a separate action.
Annotation 7
If any other active condition for an action does not exist when the action is resolved, the action has no effect; if the action were playing a card from your hand, it is discarded.
Annotation 8
An action that requires a target is considered to have the active condition that the target be in play when the action is declared and when it is resolved. An action may not be declared if its target is not in play. However, dice-rolling actions may always be targeted by other actions declared later in the same chain of effects
MECCG does not have currency or tokens or values to use for playing cards like other games. There is no mana, resource, force, energy or anything that is used to pay for playing cards. The cards do not have an explicit cost value. Instead, the "cost" of the card is a required game state and/or a change to that game state. The term "active condition" is the MECCG term for "cost." Having a particular type of card in play, discarding a particular type of card, tapping a particular type of card. These are all restrictions on the player -- they are costs to be paid. And discarding and tapping are restrictions on further actions since cards can only be untapped or retrieved through limited means, often requiring other cards, which is a restriction.
So when describing the "costs" that are paid to play the card, the term "main effect" can only refer to the desired effects that the player is paying for. A main effect of a
resource card would never be tapping or discarding because those are restrictions on the player, not advantageous effects that the player would pay for. It's possible that a hazard could have a main effect of tapping or discarding an opponent's card because that is the desired effect of playing a hazard. And while there are certain scenarios where a player would like to have their card tapped or discarded, that does not make it a "main effect."
The only "main effects" of the action of playing Tower Raided are receiving 6MP, making the site a Ruins & Lairs, and preventing the opponent from playing factions at their version of the site. Every other effect of the card is a restriction on the player, and thus not a "main effect."
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It's also important to understand that the rules on active conditions are inherently timing rules. The entire point is to set the game timing of the costs so that the costs MUST be paid.
The costs must be paid. That's why they are paid upfront at declaration without following the game timing using chains of effects. So when a card effect sets a different game timing for an action that is a restriction on the player, it's not actually an active condition because the timing is explicit.
"By the end of the site phase, tap a scout in the company" is not an active condition because the timing explicitly makes it not an active condition. But this is still not a "main effect" as this term is used in the rules on active conditions because this is still a "cost" (and thus not a main effect) even if this cost has different timing compared to active conditions.
Most (other) experienced board and card game players just inherently recognize the cost of cards and don't even need to rely on the active condition rules when playing cards in the site phase. The only questions that arise concern timing when an opponent responds during the M/H phase.
It's unfortunate that the ICE Netreps never bothered to explain this better and even more unfortunate that the CoE Netreps didn't understand active conditions.
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Konrad Klar wrote: ↑Fri Feb 19, 2021 11:40 am
I see not point in stating in text of a card that a company must bear an item if active condition is discarding the item.
Because such text requires the item that must be discarded to be borne by the company... The card could be worded differently but there is only 1 understanding that makes sense.
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Konrad Klar wrote: ↑Fri Feb 19, 2021 11:40 am
One of active conditions of Tower Raided is "discards for no effect a Stolen Knowledge card it [company] controls".
I would see no point of stating additionally in text of the card that a company must control a Stolen Knowledge card.
If the active condition would be "discards for no effect a Stolen Knowledge card from hand", there would not be a point to state in text of the card that the Stolen Knowledge card must be in hand.
You identified a difference in the wording between discarding the item and discarding the stolen knowledge -- but what is your point? There is no difference in how the discarding of these 2 cards work. They are both active conditions.