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Ability

An ability is game text on a card that explains what the card does (or can do). Several examples can be seen in Appendix III of this Rules Reference.

  • Card abilities only interact with cards that are in play, unless the ability specifically refers to an out-of-play area or element.

  • Card abilities on hero, alter-ego, ally, upgrade, and support cards may only be used if the card is in play, unless the ability specifically refers to being used from an out-of-play state. Event cards implicitly interact with the game from an out-of-play area, as per the rules of the event card type.

  • If an ability specifies one or more targets, that ability can only be initiated if it has at least one valid target. For example, an ability that says “deal 5 damage to a minion” cannot be initiated if there are no minions in play.

    • Examples of targets include but are not limited to: “the villain,” “a minion,” “an enemy,” “a scheme,” “a hero,” “an ally,” “a character,” “a player,” “you,” “a card.”

  • When an ability has more than one sentence of text, read the entirety of the ability to check for alteration effects that may change the way the ability resolves. Then, resolve the ability one sentence at a time.

  • An ability prefaced by a bold timing trigger followed by a colon is referred to as a triggered ability. An ability without a bold timing trigger is referred to as a constant ability. (See below.)

  • Player card abilities cannot resolve during game setup, unless prefaced by a “Setup” timing trigger.

  • The resolution of the following ability types is mandatory: constant abilities, “Setup” abilities, “When Revealed” abilities, “When Defeated” abilities, “Forced Action” abilities, “Forced Interrupt” abilities, “Forced Response” abilities, “Boost” abilities, and keywords.

    • If one of these ability types uses the word “may”, the part of the ability following “may” is optional.

  • The resolution of the following ability types is optional: “Action”, “Interrupt”, “Response”, “Resource”. The player who controls the card that has an optional ability determines whether or not to use that ability at the appropriate time. Any player can use such an ability on an encounter card, with the following exceptions:

    • Only the player who controls a player card with an attachment that uses the word “you” or “your” can trigger abilities or pay costs on that attachment.

    • Only the player with an obligation in their play area can trigger abilities or pay costs on that obligation.

Constant Abilities​

A constant ability is any non-keyword ability whose text contains no bold timing trigger defining its ability type. A constant ability becomes active as soon as its card enters play and remains active while the card is in play.

  • Some constant abilities continuously seek a specific condition (denoted by words such as “during”, “if”, or “while”). The effects of such abilities are active anytime the specific condition is met.

  • If multiple instances of the same constant ability are in play, each instance affects the game independently.

Triggered Abilities​

A triggered ability is indicated by a bold timing trigger followed by a colon and the rest of the ability text.

  • Unless prefaced by the word “Forced”, all interrupt and response abilities are optional.

  • “Forced” abilities, “When Revealed” abilities, “When Defeated” abilities, and “When Completed” abilities are triggered by the game at the ability’s appropriate timing point.

  • If the bold timing trigger of an ability contains the word “Hero” or “Alter-Ego,” the ability can only be used if the player triggering the ability is in the specified form.

  • If quotation marks are used around a timing trigger and colon, the quoted text is not itself a timing trigger, but is instead referring to other abilities with that trigger.

Simultaneous Timing Priority​

Some abilities have timing priority over other abilities. In order, the timing priority of abilities with the same triggering condition is:

  1. Constant abilities, delayed effects, lasting effects, keywords, and a, f, c, h icons.
  2. Status cards.
  3. “Forced Interrupt” abilities.
  4. “Interrupt” abilities.
  5. “Boost,” “When Defeated,” and “When Revealed” abilities.
  6. “Forced Response” abilities.
  7. “Response” abilities.
  8. Consequential damage.
See also