Hi,
in my recent game. I had a hermit and multiple other creatures on board one of which had more than 3 hp when plaguebearer triggered.
The result was rather surprising and dare I say counter intuitive. The hermit awarded its buff to a creature whos HP were reduced to 0 or less and not as I hoped to the living creature. The one that got the buff still died, though.
This seems like plaguebearer had his cake and ate it, too.
Probably a bug, as that doesn’t make any sense. I doubt it was intended to work this way.
But good find. ^^
Yea I thought so. But I was unsure abut labeling it as a bug.
IMO it’s already wierd that hermit can grant its effect to a creature that dies at the same time as himself. Apperantly it does not die at the same time. Even though the damage was coming from the same source.
That’s why I named it a bug. 
If they all take damage and the ability triggers at death, no creature with lethal damage should be a legal target anymore, as they already died.
That’s not a bug, but that is indeed a weird behavior :
The damage with AoEs are distributed sequentially : from the first creature to have entered play to the last one.
Thus, when hermit died first, the other creature was still alive and was a good target.
The other thing is that effects also happen sequentially, so the boost is awarded after the effective death of the creature. It’s the same thing that makes Kobold warlord able to buff himself before dying.
At least, that’s how I view it. And, yes, it’s really weird, and very surprising the first time it happens ! 
Ok see you are not adressing the problem though:
Hermit awards its buff that would prevent the death to a creature that is already flagged as dead. You would assume that either the creature is dead and can’t get buffed anymore or that the creature is not dead yet and the buff saves it.
We have a counter-intuitive game mechanic followed up with something that might quite possibly be a bug.
Yup and I must say, I couldn’t care less if it’s called a bug or weird behavior, point is, it shouldn’t be this way, no matter what and I’m still pretty sure it’s not intended as is.
But even if they wanted it this way, it would be very bad, as you can’t see the timestamp and even then it would just be complicated. Let them all die at once and do it the Magic way and trigger them once they died. Everything else feels awkward.
The first mechanic (sequential targetting from order of arrival on board) is not a weird behavior, and it’s perfectly acceptable in the game I think. The second one (combat effects resolving after death) is more troublesome I think (It’s what makes Kobold Warlord a card which I would never play for instance). This one is truly counter-intuitive and bad design as well, what’s the point of buffing a dead creature anyway ?
However, until they change it, we’re stuck with what’s going on, that’s why I explained it (hoping I made no mistakes in my interpretation), so that you wouldn’t be surprised if that happens again with something else (but that certainly doesn’t mean that I like it)
“The first mechanic (sequential targetting from order of arrival on board) is not a weird behavior…”
I, too, got used to it because of hearthstone. That doesn’t mean it is not counter-intuitive. Especially with animationsand cardtext suggesting a simultanous targeting. Board clears read something like: “deal x dmg to all creatures” and not “deal x dmg to all creatures in the order they appeared on the board”. Thus you would assume simultanous targeting making the mechanic counter-intuitive or “wierd”.
I’m not familiar with the code, but I think it is reasonable to assume that changing this would require too much work. And changing the card text to the longer version wouldn’t be a good idea either imo. Maybe the tutorial could clear up hidden information like this. Because people will be mad, when their carefully crafted plan doesn’t work, because of a mechanic that is never explained.
You keep comparing the 2nd mechanic to the kobold, which is just not a good comparison, since the buff of the kobald applies no HP and is therefore unable to raise the dying kobold’s HP above 0. It’s not only that a creature got buffed that died at the same moment. The creature that got a buff still died even though it only got 2 dmg and recieved 4 HP.
In conclusion: I agree with H8Man, the optimal solution would be the MTG way, as this is the exact behavior that the cardtext suggests. A reasonable workaround could be an ingame learning tool (tutorial, codex, or whatever) that clears up cases where the rules of the game overrule the cardtext. None of these solutions can be implemented quickly and will therefore most likely never happen, thus leaving new players open for nasty surprises. Probably resulting in a smaller playerbase than otherwise possible.
Well, let’s take Sagami Warrior instead, if Kobold doesn’t fit for you. in a fight with a 5 attack creature, he’ll die, even if he buffs himself afterwards.
Anyway, I don’t think it’s possible to explain in the tutorial every shady or weird mechanic that happens in a game where there are a lot of interactions between cards, which can all possibly end in such a troublesome way. And even if you did, who would remember any of it while learning of all the non-shady mechanics that are already pretty complex ?
I believe it’s good enough to experience it, or see someone experience it once, you remember better events than rules anyways.
Not to mention that modifying these interactions have a cost, so a modification is unlekely to happen as there are other priorities for the dev team right now.
And now you know how it works, teach others (mentioning your example, of course) so that they don’t fall prey to the weird behaviors
Actually, there is already a guide for beginners that collects a few of these behaviors, but you’re free to add your own content ^^
I looked it up. It still doesn’t compare. Hermits buff is applied on death and not on “combat”. From my understanding Sagami Warrior does not die if it attacks a 5 attack creature. If it does, this is another wierd mechanic and also worth reporting. In fact, it would be beyond wierd since combat reads: “Does something whenever this creature fights another creature” and not “Does something after this creature fought another creature”
Oh come on. Noone said explain every mechanic. Just explain those instances were cards do something different than their one line of tooltip suggests. If that exceeds a 5 min tutorial, you should consider reworking either the cardtext, the tooltip or some cards themselves.
So to clear this up:
We are talking about a buff triggered on death of hermit being applied to another creature who died to the same effect. The problem is NOT that it is applied to the creature who also suffered fatal damage. That’s wierd, too, but it is okish if properly communicated. The problem is that it is both applied to this creature (as in not applied to another creature) and not applied to this creature (as in not having any effect, even though it would make a difference). At this point Faeria should be called Quantunamia and Elderwood Hermit should be called Schroedinger’s Hermit.
[quote=“LoWang, post:11, topic:777, full:true”]
I looked it up. It still doesn’t compare. Hermits buff is applied on death and not on “combat”. From my understanding Sagami Warrior does not die if it attacks a 5 attack creature. If it does, this is another wierd mechanic and also worth reporting. In fact, it would be beyond wierd since combat reads: “Does something whenever this creature fights another creature” and not “Does something after this creature fought another creature”[/quote]
Well, bad news, the ability of the Sagami Warrior indeed does apply afterwards. xD
And I agree, it’s not what you would expect.
With that being said, I can see his point, as both effects take place afterwards. Away from that, buffing an already dead creature is still different, so yeah, I agree once more.
Anyway, everything has been said, there’s no reason to quibble about it. It’s up to the devs to deceide and all I can do is to hope that they change it the way both of us are looking for, as everything else is just terrible and confusing.
