Hi, All! Have been playing AH for some time now and ran into a quirky situation in today's game. Apologies if this has been addressed before...

We had a headline or environment card, an on-going effect that stated that no spells could be cast. One investigator had joined the Silver Twilight Lodge and drew a card, reading the Inner Sanctum section. THAT card said that a Lodge member was casting a spell on him!!! Since no spells could be cast, we decided it didn't happen.

Does the on-going effect ONLY affect investigators or did we rule correctly? THANKS!

playdead said:

::Laughter::

No, you cheated, ;') but good job, I was thoroughly entertained by it.

Well, I FELT like we cheated!!! But I can't find anywhere in the rules or FAQ's that shows exactly where we went wrong. Not ALL card effects are investigator-only. So is there a ruling somewhere on this?

You are confusing "fluff" with game mechanics. The Mythos card prevents mechanical casting of spells by the players; what reads on the encounter card is just fluff - the effect of the card is what's important here, not how it is described in the fluff.

That being said, some of the encounters are worded so vaguely in some regards, especially in those cases where making a check might be voluntary or not, that playing Arkham Horror often requires you to make some "house rule" decisions on what is fluff and what is strictly a game-mechanical description.

This case, however, is in my opinion clearly not one of those vague situations - you just ignore the fluff and apply the results.

-Villain

You posted over at BGG.  So I thought it would be best to repost my answer over here.  But I know you already read it.

It is probably Solar Eclipse:

• Due to interference of the solar eclipse, no spells may be cast.

However, the casting of spells is a very specific game mechanic. This Mythos is intended to prevent Investigators only from casting Spell cards.

The text on Location encounters is meant for flavor. All that should concern you on the Location card is the specific text that has some other game mechanic.

There are two Inner Sanctum encounters in the base game that deal with "spells" as part of the flavor text: 

• Carl Sanford does not trust you and at the climax of the monthly ceremony spits a spell at you. Pass a Luck (-2) check or you are Cursed.
• The Order of the Silver Twilight casts a banishment spell in their monthly ceremony. Spend 1 Sanity to make a Luck (-1) check. If you pass, claim any one monster on the board as a trophy. If you fail, nothing happens.

In both of these encounters, the key aspect is making Luck checks. But the "spell" is only for flavor and does not prevent these encounters from happening. Respectively, they boil down to ..

1) Luck (-2); Pass = Nothing happens; Fail = Cursed
2) Spend 1 Sanity, Luck (-1); Pass = Claim Monster Trophy; Fail = Nothing happens.

Since this Mythos card deals with Spell Checks, neither of these encounters are affected by the environment.

Now having said all of that, if ou prefer to houserule it that the Eclipse also affect the STL, then go for it.

Avi_dreader said:

*nods* What he said.

Villain said:

I really wished that encounters had separate sections, one describing the fluff and one describing the mechanics required to resolve the encounter. It would resolve 99% of the ambiguities. I've asked myself countless times if I play certain encounters correctly.

It's often difficult to decide what parts of an encounter are optional and which effects apply when

• deciding to ignore the encounter
• winning the encounter
• losing the encounter

The separation of fluff and crunch would also make it easier to decide when to stop reading an encounter (the way we play it, a different player reads out the encounter and stops after describing what kind of decision/check the investigator has to make, i.e. without revealing the consequences).