The not Anarch Barons

Can Baron Diedonne play e.g. Chameleon? (2.1) Can Baron, The play e.g. Chameleon? (2.2) If we look at Menele, we can see that a cards name is a part of the cards rule text. Both those cards say they are a baron. References Text on Menele If Helena is ready, minion cards cost Menele 1 less blood. chameleon +1 stealth action. Requires a baron. Take control of a younger vampire with capacity of X who entered play since your last minion phase. That vampire becomes anarch (and independent).

> Jesper wrote: > Can Baron Diedonne play e.g. Chameleon? (2.1) > Can Baron, The play e.g. Chameleon? (2.2) > > If we look at Menele, we can see that a cards name is a part of the cards rule text. > > Both those cards say they are a baron. > They are not "a" baron, they are "Baron Dieudonné" and "The Baron". "baron" refers only to the title. Prince of Paris, France Ratings Coordinator, Rules Director

> Ankha wrote: > > > Jesper wrote: > > Can Baron Diedonne play e.g. Chameleon? (2.1) > > Can Baron, The play e.g. Chameleon? (2.2) > > > > If we look at Menele, we can see that a cards name is a part of the cards rule text. > > > > Both those cards say they are a baron. > > > They are not "a" baron, they are "Baron Dieudonné" and "The Baron". > "baron" refers only to the title. > Correct.

Could I get a native english speaker to confirm this? I was under the impression that I was "a Jesper" e.g. "Could you find a Jesper in the crowd" which would make perfectly good sense if a crowd have severl Jespers and you only need one of them? Also I am a "Jesper Bøje" there might be more then just me. Therefor I cant understand why "Baron Diedonna" aint a Baron? ----References---- dictionary.reference.com/browse/a a certain; a particular: one at a time; two of a kind; A Miss Johnson called.

Baron in the game is a Title for an anarch vampire. Thus you must become a Baron in that sense to play Chameleon.

> Jesper wrote: > Could I get a native english speaker to confirm this? > Confirmed.

Even difficult problems require simple solutions: The vampire formerly known as Baron, The www.facebook.com/groups/vtes.belgium/

> Jesper wrote: > I was under the impression that I was "a Jesper" e.g. "Could you find a Jesper in the crowd" which would make perfectly good sense if a crowd have severl Jespers and you only need one of them? > You can use any of the barons you have to play the card, yes. A vampire whose name is Baron is not the same as having a baron, any more than naming your firstborn Pope will let him wield papal infallibility. > Jesper wrote: > Therefor I cant understand why "Baron Diedonna" aint a Baron? > Baron is defined as a title that can only be held by independent-and-anarch vampires (Rulebook, 10.5). Baron Dieudonne is a Camarilla Prince. By your reasoning, he has two titles, including one he can't hold. Along similar lines: - Eze, the Demon Prince cannot play Second Tradition, Third Tradition, or Parity Shift. - Lucinde, Alastor and Tatiana Stepanova, Alastor can be the target of the "Alastor" vote. Its card text says "A vampire may have only one Alastor." and they can have an Alastor card even if they already have an Alastor in their name. - Roland Bishop is not a bishop.

Chamelon dosent specife that you require a baron title, just a baron. And we all know the golden rule Ill just shut up for now. Even Im still sure that you are using sloppy gramma to get your point right. At least I found out that im no longer a Jesper according to the v:tes community. / no-longer-Jesper

> Jesper wrote: > I was under the impression that I was "a Jesper" e.g. "Could you find a Jesper in the crowd" which would make perfectly good sense if a crowd have severl Jespers and you only need one of them? > The Baron is not "a Baron", he's "one instance of the card that has 'The Baron' as its name". "Baron/baron" is a title a card can have. > Jesper wrote: > Could I get a native english speaker to confirm this? > You can get anyone's answer to this question. However, any answer not according to the Rule Director's answer would happen to be incorrect. None of the cards you mention say the vampires they portray are barons. Eze is not a Demon. Eze is not a Prince. Blood Brother Ambush is not a Blood Brother. Carlotta Giovanni who changed clan with Clan Impersonation is no longer "a Giovanni" (though the card's name remains the same). Some cards do mention others in their text. That happens.

If someone plays Jorge de la Muerte would I contest myself with him?

> BenPeal wrote: > > > Jesper wrote: > > Could I get a native english speaker to confirm this? > > > Confirmed. > except yhis is wrong and Baron Dxxxxx is a "baron". He may not be game "special text" baron "title" but by his name his is a baron. I think what Jesper is trying to highlight the dangers of games with adequate keytext! He remains, a Jesper.

> Squidalot wrote: > > > BenPeal wrote: > > > > > Jesper wrote: > > > Could I get a native english speaker to confirm this? > > > > > > > > Confirmed. > > > except yhis is wrong and Baron Dxxxxx is a "baron". He may not be game "special text" baron "title" but by his name his is a baron. > It could be his first name. Was Francis Bacon a tasty slice of bacon / Was he a "bacon"? Prince of Paris, France Ratings Coordinator, Rules Director

> Ankha wrote: > > > Squidalot wrote: > > > > > BenPeal wrote: > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > Jesper wrote: > > > > Could I get a native english speaker to confirm this? > > > > > > > > > > > Confirmed. > > > > > > > > except yhis is wrong and Baron Dxxxxx is a "baron". He may not be game "special text" baron "title" but by his name his is a baron. > > > It could be his first name. > > Was Francis Bacon a tasty slice of bacon / Was he a "bacon"? > Yeah it could be his name, but that still makes him "a baron". Just like I am "a jesper". I havent said at anypoint he is "he have a baron title which is defined in v:tes rules". But Chameleon dosent state "Requires the title of baron". It just says "Requires a baron". Francis from your examepel is "a bacon" - and yeah you can have a "slice of bacon" eating him. I dont know if it would be tasty - and proberly illegal in most countries. In most games you could argue and just say that the name is not part of rules text. Except you cant in this game. And yeah, we had this happening in a tournement where a new player was kinda dissapointed when he figured out the deck he brought dident work. And there is really no explanation other then some card designer used a sloppy gramma and no I cant tell you rulewise why this is so, so yeah you had no way to know the fact.

> Jesper wrote: > I havent said at anypoint he is "he have a baron title which is defined in v:tes rules". But Chameleon dosent state "Requires the title of baron". It just says "Requires a baron". > It wouldn't change anything, because baron is a title in real life, and in the game. So your player would have make the same mistake. But then, he would probably play an unnamed deck trying to be immune to cards that say "he or she", since unnamed is a "it". Or he can learn from his mistake, or ask first when in doubt. Prince of Paris, France Ratings Coordinator, Rules Director

> Jesper wrote: > Yeah it could be his name, but that still makes him "a baron". Just like I am "a jesper". > > I havent said at anypoint he is "he have a baron title which is defined in v:tes rules". But Chameleon dosent state "Requires the title of baron". It just says "Requires a baron". > > Francis from your examepel is "a bacon" - and yeah you can have a "slice of bacon" eating him. I dont know if it would be tasty - and proberly illegal in most countries. > > In most games you could argue and just say that the name is not part of rules text. Except you cant in this game. > > And yeah, we had this happening in a tournement where a new player was kinda dissapointed when he figured out the deck he brought dident work. And there is really no explanation other then some card designer used a sloppy gramma and no I cant tell you rulewise why this is so, so yeah you had no way to know the fact. > As Pascal said: > Eze is not a Demon. Eze is not a Prince. Blood Brother Ambush is not a Blood Brother. Carlotta Giovanni who changed clan with Clan Impersonation is no longer "a Giovanni" (though the card's name remains the same). > Something was not clear in the rules, so you asked for a ruling. You got a ruling. You are rejecting the ruling because it's not clear in the rules. Now what?

> Ankha wrote: > But then, he would probably play an unnamed deck trying to be immune to cards that say "he or she", since unnamed is a "it". > But that's covered in the intro that all methuselah's are "She" and all vampire's are "He" for the purpose of the vtes rules.

Pascal wrote: > Jesper wrote: > Could I get a native english speaker to confirm this? > You can get anyone's answer to this question. However, any answer not according to the Rule Director's answer would happen to be incorrect. > Well I know you are powerfull but I was asking for an interpetation on the wording here, since there was no rule and we coulndet agree on the meaning. And I belive you still dont define the english language ;o) > BenPeal wrote: > As Pascal said: > > > Eze is not a Demon. Eze is not a Prince. Blood Brother Ambush is not a Blood Brother. Carlotta Giovanni who changed clan with Clan Impersonation is no longer "a Giovanni" (though the card's name remains the same). > > > Something was not clear in the rules, so you asked for a ruling. You got a ruling. You are rejecting the ruling because it's not clear in the rules. Now what? > [/quote] Now it get adds to the rulings of every vampire in wich there could be a misunderstanding ;o) At least I hope. So people do have to find random rulings on random web posts.

> Jesper wrote: > So people do have to find random rulings on random web posts. > No. Thinking a little and not trolling should be enough. In doubt, they can ask or do a little search, as always. Prince of Paris, France Ratings Coordinator, Rules Director

Stephen King is not a king. Ozzy Osborne, prince of darkness, is not a prince. A Sabbat Cardinal, is not a catholic cardinal. There are names, nicknames and titles. Consider "The Baron", to be a nickname and only titles in the card text to be an actual title with in game meaning. > Jesper wrote: > At least I found out that im no longer a Jesper according to the v:tes community. > Henceforth thou shalt be known as Bob. -1 Strength

> GreyB wrote: > Consider "The Baron", to be a nickname and only titles in the card text to be an actual title with in game meaning. > Sure, but this should be added to the rulebook because stating it after when a new player built a deck and acting all high and mighty about how stupid they are for not realizing The Baron is not a Baron is rude and uncalled for. This is lacking in the rules. Everything claims Prince and Baron as keywords yet when Baron is on the card The Baron it's suddenly not a keyword? Nowhere does it explain this and the best they can come up with is deal with it. Fine if the answer is deal with it then it should be in the rulebook. Edit; also, cardtext should be defined because I consider every letter on the card card text.

I am taking the bait, since *blush* I've actually had the same confusion with "Requires a Baron". I quit VTES back in the 90s around Bloodlines and started playing again 2 years ago. I had missed the whole anarch release (and more) and when I saw a "Requires a baron" card, I also though you needed "The Baron" and suchlike cards... I got sorted though and am less stubborn about it 1.5. Overview of Crypt Cards Each crypt card (the amber-backed cards) has a set of elements that describe the vampire: his name, blood capacity, clan, Disciplines (powers), group and any special abilities or political title he has. Name, special abilities and political title are listed separately in the rulebook, so we can deduce the name does not equal a political title. However we also have non-political titles in the ability box (ie. Blackhand, Seraph etc.) and VTES players have taken it for granted as they've been prepped on how to interpret it with political titles. I can see how new players can become confused. For clarity, the 1.5 rule can certainly be expanded to clarify that the name contains no title and any titles a vampire has is listed in the ability box, perhaps even clarify exact areas of a crypt card (might actually be in the original rulebook, I can't recall). 1.6.1. General 3. Requirements for Playing Cards. Each library card has symbols on the attribute bar (the marble stripe on the left side) for the card type (except for master cards), the clan or Discipline (if any) required to play the card and the cost (if any) of playing that card. Some cards will have other requirements (such as capacity or title) stated in the card text. Only a minion who meets the requirements given on a minion card can play it... I have to agree the text "Requires a baron" is ambiguous and requires an interpretation deducing it's meaning from similar cards, for example cards that say "requires a prince" which has worked out perfectly fine for the last 20 years, but is confusing to new players. In the same mind set, I still get confused about what a classifies an Ally as "mortal". Even though we "classify" Jesper as a troll, I am not sure the classification is just. The greatest threat to new players are experienced players that have no patience and think you're stupid in "not getting it". I don't think Jesper is trolling, he's playing the devil's attorney, asking question a new player might ask, either that or he's a confused new player. -1 Strength

Proposed addition to section 1.5 in the rulebook (draft) 7. Abilities: Each Vampire/Imbued can have abilities and titles listed at the bottom of the card. Titles (political and non-political) and sect designations are printed in bold text and are used to satisfy possible requirements listed on library cards. Special abilities (non-bold text) are (re)actions a vampire/imbued can perform or additions to generic abilities (ie. +1 strength) or a special keywords used for library card requirements (ie. flight). Tbh. since the ability box is such an important feature in the game, I was surprised it wasn't described properly in section 1.5... -1 Strength

Oh.. I overlooked something in section 1.5 1.5. Overview of Crypt Cards Each crypt card (the amber-backed cards) has a set of elements that describe the vampire: his name, blood capacity, clan, Disciplines (powers), group and any special abilities or political title he has. These elements are described below. Some advanced expansions include other types of crypt cards. Details for these types can be found on the web site. See More Information. More information links to: vekn.net/rulebook/11-special-terms#moreinformation Which isn't really the "more information" that satisfies the teaser "Some advanced expansions include other types of crypt cards. Details for these types can be found on the web site." in fact, it feels very raffled... The glossary above "more information" is a good hint however for what constitutes a "baron" I'm spending too much time on this... -1 Strength

> 2wayspeaker wrote: > Sure, but this should be added to the rulebook because stating it after when a new player built a deck and acting all high and mighty about how stupid they are for not realizing The Baron is not a Baron is rude and uncalled for. This is lacking in the rules. Everything claims Prince and Baron as keywords yet when Baron is on the card The Baron it's suddenly not a keyword? Nowhere does it explain this and the best they can come up with is deal with it. > From what I can see - and I've checked rec.games.trading-cards.jyhad - this is the first time in the twelve years since Bloodlines was released that anyone asked the Rules Team or LSJ this question. And as was pointed out by Pascal, nobody thought Roland Bishop could play Bishop cards, nobody thought Carlotta Giovanni was still a Giovanni after Clan Impersonating, and nobody thought Eze was a Demon or a Prince. One person found something to be unclear and did the totally normal thing thing of asking the Rules Team for a clarification/ruling, which was provided. What has followed is an amount of outrage that doesn't match the size of the problem. I understand that we should be treating card rulings and rules rulings as potential bug fix requests, and that the cards and rules should be as clear as possible. It makes the game easier to play, more fun to play, and minimizes the need for rulings. The Rules Team is doing a lot to try to fix the wording problems in the game. Here is where the Rules Team is tracking all of it: vekn.net/output-changes It takes a while to load. There's a lot.

yeah be great if some of their stuff made sense "can" v "may" for instance And it'd be better to focus time on stuff we can actually enact like removal of junk cards from the system

> Squidalot wrote: > And it'd be better to focus time on stuff we can actually enact like removal of junk cards from the system > I've appreciated the work they've done to improve card text templating, as it helps write a card properly in the first place. That said, I agree that there are too many cards that have wording that should render them mechanically non-functional, but there's been a historical resistance to banning cards. LSJ and the Rules Team have ended up having to bend over backwards to re-write cards, write lengthy clarifications, or outright issue fiat rulings to make some cards work. Cards like Rewind Time, Seeds of Corruption, Lay Low, and Orun are mechanically unsound.

Don't forget Mask of 100 Faces and of course Winged Second. I'd ditch the lot we have plenty of cards we could afford to lose 100-220 without any material [5%] deck attrition and it'd actually open up space in other areas [well these ones less so but there are problem cards that lock design space] I'd be happier on the templating if for each subtype of card there was a firmed up templates you could pick and lock your sub-clauses [like a drop down excel model] instead i have some useful parsing and a load of stuff that is grammatically not the best [can v may, use v play] I've come across far worse in boardgames it's just disappointing as this game is very language dependant which is essentially Jesper's point that language inconsistency with non-defined key terms can cause misconceptions on how cards are used

> BenPeal wrote: > And as was pointed out by Pascal, nobody thought Roland Bishop could play Bishop cards, > TBH, this is the only "Bishop" card in the game: > > Inquisition > > Requires a ready Sabbat vampire. +1 stealth action. > Choose one or more bishops. Each of the chosen bishops loses his or her title and takes 2 unpreventable damage. The controllers of the chosen bishops may attempt to block in addition to the normally eligible blockers. > This has little to do with Roland Bishop: nobody thought that any vampire could play that

> One person found something to be unclear and did the totally normal thing thing of asking the Rules Team for a clarification/ruling, which was provided. What has followed is an amount of outrage that doesn't match the size of the problem. > Outrage? We are discussing clarifying the rules of a card game about fictional vampires. That's all people are doing here. I think we need to keep that in perspective. I respect the hell out of everything you and the rules team have done and continue to do. But, cmon. It is not fair to suggest people are treating the rules team unfairly by posting harmless comments about the rules. Is the rules team really that sensitive?

> BenPeal wrote: > Cards like Rewind Time, Seeds of Corruption, Lay Low, and Orun are mechanically unsound. > Just out of curiosity what is the problem with Orun?

> Whisker wrote: > > > BenPeal wrote: > > Cards like Rewind Time, Seeds of Corruption, Lay Low, and Orun are mechanically unsound. > > > Just out of curiosity what is the problem with Orun? > It's a funny one. Here's the problematic sentence: > A Laibon gets an additional vote for every three Orun he or she has. > We know what LSJ meant, but mechanically, each copy of a card should create its own effect. So, each copy of Orun should provide an additional vote for every three Orun on a vampire. Three copies of Orun on a vampire would mean three additional votes. Fixing the problem would require more text and Orun's other effects eat up a lot of text space. LSJ opted for a fiat ruling instead.