A topic from AEG's L5R CCG Rules forum, copied for Oracle of the Void from a copy of the forum saved in October 2015, so pages it didn't save are missing. Players' names are left out; the rules officials are named. Rulings are as they stood on these dates; later rulings, the rulebooks and the Rules Archive may differ.
A player, 31 May 2008
Obsidian Armor: "Reaction: After a Fear action performed by this Personality targets one ore more cards in a unit: Give each Follower and Personality in the unit -1F."
Shattered Morale: "Fear Battle: Target your unbowed Human Shadowlands Personality: Bow each target Follower and Personality with less Force than your Personality's Chi in a target enemy unit. Lose 3 Honor."
If my Personality has Obsidian Armor on, and I use Shattered Morale, can I lower every Follower and Personality's Force in a unit before applying the Fear bowing effect? In other words, is targetting the unit analogous to targetting individual cards? Targetting happens before the effect is applied, so if it does count as targetting a card, I would be able to reduce everyone's Force in the targetted unit, and then apply the Fear bow (which could then affect Followers and Personality's that were 1 Force above the cutoff for the Fear bow). Thank you in advance for your ruling on this.
Alex Jones (rules official), 1 June 2008
Obsidian Armor: "Reaction: After a Fear action performed by this Personality targets one ore more cards in a unit: Give each Follower and Personality in the unit -1F."
Shattered Morale: "Fear Battle: Target your unbowed Human Shadowlands Personality: Bow each target Follower and Personality with less Force than your Personality's Chi in a target enemy unit. Lose 3 Honor."
If my Personality has Obsidian Armor on, and I use Shattered Morale, can I lower every Follower and Personality's Force in a unit before applying the Fear bowing effect? In other words, is targetting the unit analogous to targetting individual cards? Targetting happens before the effect is applied, so if it does count as targetting a card, I would be able to reduce everyone's Force in the targetted unit, and then apply the Fear bow (which could then affect Followers and Personality's that were 1 Force above the cutoff for the Fear bow). Thank you in advance for your ruling on this.
Yes.
You announce Shattered Morale. You target your Shadowlands personality with Obsidian Armour attached, an enemy unit, and each follower and the personality in that unit. This meets the condition for taking Obsidian Armour's Reaction, so you announce that, declare targets (none), pay the costs (none) and resolve the effects, reducing the force of the target personality and each of his followers by 1. You pay the costs of Shattered Morale (none). You resolve the effects of Shattered Morale, comparing the performing personality's chi to the *current* force of the target enemy personality and his followers - ie, his force reduced by 1 by the Obsidian Armour's Reaction.