Salsette/CtM Discussion Thread

Can we please not make this adversarial by declaring ourselves to be on “teams”? It doesn’t get us any closer to our understanding exactly how things work, and almost certainly gets us further away. I’ve presented my understanding of how things work, and I’m open to it being corrected so I understand where I’m going wrong. Instead attempting to prove yourself right by repeatedly trying to poke holes in what others say doesn’t seem hugely constructive.

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@Kesterer Yeah, ok, sorry. I edited this. Very very bad habit of mine among other things, my deep apologies.

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Yes, I hadn’t thought about it this way but it seems to make sense. Some support is offered by Gene Conditioning Shoppe: “Genetics also trigger the second time each turn their trigger condition is met.” A reading of that where every Genetics card - which are of the form “The first time X each turn, do Y” - has a single trigger condition (“the first time X”) would, strictly, mean that it does nothing, because the first X by definition cannot happen for a second time. So it does seem to imply that “the first” part in a trigger condition is in some sense a separate object to the rest of the trigger.

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Is there an official ruling to this?

To me, it stills seems like Salsette replaces the thrash into a remove, which means that no card has been trashed yet. However, Salsette has been fullfilled for this turn, since you paid the trashing cost and removed the card from the game while accessing it.
So ofc it will not trigger again.

CTM, on the other hand, should be still active, since no card has been trashed yet. A cards trash cost has been paid to remove it from the game via Salsette, but reading that card over and over again it doesn’t say " when you trash a card, remove it instead", but “pay the trashing cost and then remove it instead of trashing it” (as you would normally do when you pay the trashing cost), so it gives the Runner a new ability he/she can use once per turn, it doesn’t trigger of trashing a card.

Is it not true that a trigger condition sets up a queue of actions, and then when each item in the queue has their turn to resolve, it checks the game state again to ensure it can still resolve?

So, for instance, Femme and Tollbooth:

  • The “this ice is being encountered” trigger condition is met for the first time.\
  • Femme and Tollbooth’s effects enter the queue.
  • Femme resolves first. Femme checks “this ice is being encountered.” The answer isYES.
  • Femme’s ability is used to bypass the ice. Once bypassed, the ice is no longer being encountered.
  • Tollbooth trigger resolves second. It checks “this ice is being encountered.” The answer is NO.
  • Tollbooth fizzles.

So, imagine Sneakdoor, Security Testing, and Ash on archives:

  • Sneakdoor is used to initiate a run and sets up a constant ability.
  • The “successful run on Archives” trigger condition is met for the first time.
  • Sneakdoor’s ability and Ash enter the queue.
  • Sneakdoor’s ability resolves first. Sneakdoor checks “successful run on Archives”. The answer is YES.
  • Sneakdoor resolves. The run is now being considered successful on HQ and is not being considered successful or unsuccessful on Archives.
  • Chain reaction: check triggers for “successful run on HQ”. Those resolve, and their chains resolve.
  • Back to Ash. Ash checks “successful run on [Archives]”. The answer is NO.
  • Ash fizzles.

The access phase on Archives is never reached, so Security Testing’s trigger never resolves.

Because “successful run on Archives” triggered for the first time, the game state records this and any further runs will be considered triggering “successful run on Archives” for the second time. Even though Sneakdoor replaces that successful Archives run with a success on HQ.

Makes sense with Crisium and Security Testing on Archives, too, since the first run on Archives is not considered successful for Security Testing (as it is a card ability), but is considered successful as far as the game state is concerned.

Not sure if all of that above is actually just retreading the conversation, but it’s how I got it clear in my head. Correct me if any of that is wrong!


How am I relating that to Salsette Slums & CtM, though?

Look at the wording on Slums:

Once per turn, when you pay the trash cost of an accessed card, remove that card from the game instead of trashing it.

Look at CtM:

The first time the Runner trashes an installed Corp card each turn, you may trace4– If successful, give the Runner 1 tag (cannot be avoided).

So, going by the above I can see two ways to look at it:

  • Card with a trash cost is being accessed. On-access effects resolve.
  • Runner pays the trash cost on the card

Here’s where they diverge, though:

Situation 1

  • Runner pays the trash cost on the card.
  • Paying the trash cost puts Salsette Slums into the queue and triggers “this card is trashed by the runner” for the first time, which puts CtM into the queue, and adds “move card to archives” to the queue.
  • Slums resolves first. Slums checks “the trash cost is paid”. The answer is YES.
  • Slums removes the card from the game. The card is no longer trashed by the runner.
  • CtM resolves. CtM checks “this card is being trashed by the runner”. The answer is NO. CtM fizzles.
  • “Move card to Archives” resolves. MCtA checks “this card is being trashed by the runner”. The answer is NO. MCtA fizzles.

E: See post below about how the timing of everthing actually works. The above situation is erronious. Slums resolves immediately after paying the trash cost, and sets up another constant ability that checks" this card is trashed by the runner". This is the exact same way that Sneakdoor interacts with runs on Archives, and that example is the best companion to this.

Situation 2

  • Runner pays the trash cost on the card.
  • Paying the trash cost puts Salsette Slums into the queue and “this card is being trashed by the runner” into the queue.
  • Salsette Slums resolves first. Slums checks “the trash cost is paid”. The answer is YES.
  • Slums removes the card from the game.
  • “this card is being trashed by the runner” resolves next. TCiBTbtR checks “the trash cost is paid”. The answer is NO, because there is no longer a trash cost because the card has been removed from the game.
  • TCiBTbtR fizzles.

The question is: Does paying the trash cost trigger “this card is trashed by the runner” always, no matter what? Or, does Salsette Slums prevent the “this card is being trashed by the runner” condition from even being triggered, since it replaces the effect of paying the trash cost, rather than replacing the actual trashing of the card?

If it is the former, then using Slums triggers “the first time a card is trashed by the runner”. If the latter, then Slums bypasses that trigger completely, and the next card trashed would be the first card trashed by the runner.

The latter is also consistent with the wording on/spirit of Slums, as the “once per turn” text limits Slums to only one use, regardless of if it’s the first card trashed or not, neatly bypassing this issue:[quote=“CrushU, post:6, topic:7955”]
the next thing you trash would also trigger Slums again
[/quote]

Now the real question is, does this logic continue to hold up when you consider the ideas of Constant and Conditional triggers? Because I didn’t necessarily take those priorities into account when I initially made up these situations. If “this card is being trashed by the runner” is a Constant Ability triggered by paying the trash cost of a card, and Salsette Slums is a Conditional Ability triggered by paying the trash cost of a card, then Situation 1 would be the correct way to resolve the game state as the Constant Ability takes priority over the Conditional Ability. However, if Slums and “this card is being trashed by the runner” are both Constant Abilities, then… then… I’m really starting to confuse myself now. I need to take a mental break and come back to this later.

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To quote Jako

Anyway, to bring it all together, and hopefully clear this whole thing up once and for all:

The full break down for the first time the runner trashes an installed corp card and then uses Salsette Slums to remove it from game can be found below. (Mostly copied from up thread, but with better terminology.)

  1. The runner pays the trash cost of the card to trash it
    1.1. Salsette Slums meets its trigger condition and triggers
    1.1.1. Salsette Slums resolves and puts its replacement effect into play
  2. The card is trashed
    2.1. Both Salsette Slums and Controlling the Message care about this game event. CtM meets its trigger condition, but has not yet triggered because there is a simultaneous effect to resolve first.
    2.1.1. The constant effect from Salsette Slums is faster than triggered abilities. It replaces the card being trashed with removing that card from the game.
    2.1.2. CtM goes to trigger and can’t because its trigger condition is no longer met.

… Sometime later that turn …

  1. The runner pays the trash cost of a second card to trash it
  2. The card is trashed

And that’s it. Nothing else to record in the game log. Controlling the Message can see that its trigger condition isn’t being met by step 43 because this is the second time its trigger condition would have been met.

Also this ruling was made at gencon I think.

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Well, this just rendered my whole post moot, and in a more concise way! Looks like my Situation 1 was slightly off in the order of things and how Slums interacts with the paying the trash cost trigger, and otherwise pretty wrong, but is essentially how it works. Good ruling!

Yes. It has been ruled by Damon officially as it was already understood, both in person while judging Gen Con and in writing in the rules question mega thread.

The important thing that it seems like you are missing is that as a replacement Slums must wait until the event it replaces occurs before reaolving. The RFG doesn’t immediately happen once Slums triggers, it happens when the accessed card would normally be trashed (essentially instantaneous in practice, but an important distinction for the actual mechanism of the card).

If Slums was worded differently, say:

then the RFG would happen immediately because it would just be the effect of the ability and not a replacement. And if that were the case, then the card would never be trashed in the first place and CtM wouldn’t trigger but it would trigger the next time the runner paid the trash cost of an accessed card.

tl;dr All the words on a card are important. Instead is an essential operator to how this card works.

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So essentially this works the exact same way as Sneakdoor, and the second trash doesn’t trigger CtM for the same reason you can’t get money from Security Testing on Archives after first making a Sneakdoor Run?

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Interestingly that version:

  • is way cleaner
  • is the way most people assumed it would work
  • wouldn’t cause any difference with the other cards that react to trashing (like Hostile Infrastructure)
  • to me seems like the intent of the card (of course I have no idea what the actual intent was)

I wonder why they chose to go with the current one.

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Because pretend Slums isn’t what they intended and what we got is. I can’t speak to why they decided that’s what they wanted (maybe they tested other versions and liked this one best, who knows). But it’s all very deliberate.

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OK, this makes sense and is consistent.

So is it right to conclude that if the game state is queried after a Sneakdoor run, the answer to the question “Was there a successful run on Archives this turn?” is NO, and the answer to the question “Has there been a first successful run on Archives this turn?” is YES?

And similarly, that after a removal from the game by Slums, the answer to the question “Has the runner trashed a corp card this turn?” is NO, and the answer to the question “Has there been a first time the runner trashed a corp card this turn?” is YES?

I’m not trying to create a gotcha here, just to understand exactly how this works. I’m perfectly fine with things being unintuitive but working.

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I don’t think that’s how it works. I think the answer to both those questions is NO, but rather individual cards track their states. So, for the Sneakdoor run, when the run is successful, both ST and Sneakdoor are considered candidates for evaluation. Since Sneakdoor is constant, it fires first and replaces the run. Then, when ST attempts to activate, it fails, but it remembers that the first time it tried to activate has happened (and thus won’t try again).

I’m also not sure if my interpretation is tangibly different though; might be that both work.

Edit: ignore my rambling I’m wrong.

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I think both of those interpretations are possible (or even both!) but we’re going to need an official answer.

It’s the game state that keeps track, not cards.

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Yep I was just about to do a write up that I was wrong on this. You can’t draw > install sym > draw to proc sym, so clearly it’s game state, and Kesterer is more likely right.

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To be honest with you guys, my ego and a tiny game thing that I have to clarify prevent me to like this post. :slight_smile:

Say I run R&D. then I Sneakdoor.
Where do I have to run next to launch Apoc in clic 4 ?

The way I see it working now (after ditching my flawed understanding), it’s like a boolean flags for “first” effects. When you make the first successful run on archives, that flag gets set false after all effects relying upon it occur. Replacement effects will not reset the flag; sneakdoor won’t retroactively turn on the “first archives success” flag, despite that there was no successful archives run after sneakdoor fires.

So pretty much what Kesterer said, except instead of “was there a first successful run on archives”, I’d say “is the first archives flag set”. Difference being the later doesn’t make it sound like archives was successfully run (first or ever).

And that’s admittedly a pretty pedantic difference given the current card pool, but I feel like if there was a card that said “Play only after your first successful archives run”, you wouldn’t/shouldn’t be able to install it after a sneakdoor run (but that’s more design level than rules-querying level, and is moot for the current pool anyway).

So archives would be my answer for the apocalypse question (which lines up with the accepted answer). But this is also after hastily re-evaluating my position after proving myself wrong. Maybe that isn’t correct (WRT my reasoning; archives is definitely the answer to the question).

What I have gleaned from all of this discussion and previous rulings: Having a “First successful run on Archives” is different than having a “Successful run on Archives”.

Wat?

So, Sneakdoor replaces the successful run on Archives. But, in order to replace it, there must have first been a successful run on archives, which means subsequent runs are now the second, third, etc… successful runs on Archives. That means there is no longer a “successful run on Archives” in the game state (it has been switched to be a successful run on HQ), but there has been a first successful run on Archives, because if there wasn’t then Sneakdoor wouldn’t have anything to replace!

Therefore, using your example with Apoc, you would have to run Archives because, while there has been a first “successful run on Archives”, there has not been an actual recorded “successful run on Archives” for cards to see, since it was replaced with a “successful run on HQ”.

To put in another way, there was a successful run on Archives that turn, but it was replaced with a successful run on HQ. The game state after that says there hasn’t been a successful run on Archives, but a subsequent run won’t be the first since the first one still existed, it was just replaced.

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Ok, the full version of the (“new thing”, deeply sorry about this) that bothers me resides there :

I don’t understand what Sneakdoor’s "instead treat it as a successful run on HQ. " means now.
The wording is old, and the admitted meaning is “succesfull run (archive)” totally got replaced by “succesfull run (archive)”.

But that log memorizing archives run for archives sectest confuse me.
If it remember for archives sectest (so normal archive run #2 make sectest not working), then why it doesn’t remember for Apoc ?

And if it don’t remember for sectest, why an archive sectest doesn’t trigger run #2 after sneakdoor ?


How is it related to that Slum/CTM ruling now :
Well, Slum’s triggered perma ab, as in the @jakodrako’s point-by-point shema shows that Slum doesn’t “hide” the trash.
I dislikes this but it’s like this.
I’m not disliking this because it’s changing the result, sincerly, it is that way today and I don’t care.

Reason #1, #0, #-1 or #minus infinite I’m disliking it, is because I totally, utterly, fail to understand it.

Sneakdoor “hide” the archive successful run. Slum doesn’t “hide” the trash. Both things, run & trash, get replaced by a perma ab.
I totally don’t understand this.

I (surely wrongly) understand Slum acting there like there was a ‘,’ between trash & RTFG. To me the effect is direct, once prereq met, if no simultaneous trigger then effect take place immediatly. That’s how Sneakdoor works. Not Slum.

Sorry. Sorry and sorry again if this brings new spaghetti elements. i’m so confused now :confused: