Negating Costs

Ok this situation came up in a game the other day.

Player A has The Badgers Live Out. Player B is attacking and player A has an non-shadowlands human personality at the battlefield defending. Player A uses the Ring of Fire to try and destroy player B's attacking personality, using the non-shadowlands human personality. Assuming player A's personality had high enough chi to fulfill the chi requirement to use the ring of fires effects, could player A use the ring of fire while the The Badgers Live was in effect?

I would assume not because the badgers live stops the cost of the ring of fire from being paid. Also as a follow up, if the badgers live does stop the ring of fire from working, can player A play the action based off of the good faith rule?

Relevant cards: The Badgers Live: All Crane Clan players gain 2 Honor and before the next time this game a non-Shadowlands Unaligned Human Personality is destroyed, negate his destruction.

Ring of Fire: (text) Battle: Bow this card or discard it from your hand, and destroy your target Personality: Destroy a target enemy Personality with lower Chi.

Referring to this thread and the interaction of the Good Faith Rule and a known, triggered negation effect:

I fail to see why The Badger's Live would make it impossible to declare an action with the destruction of a (qualifying) personality as a cost. The Good Faith Rule requires that mandatory costs must be payable. And "[a]spects of the game state" that "prevent costs from being paid" are "taken into account". But in this case, the cost is payable, albeit briefly. If an effect were in place such that the Personality in question "will not be destroyed", for example, then the Good Faith Rule unquestionably would prevent the declaration of an action destroying it as a cost. But The Badger's Live does nothing like this. In fact, the event's negation triggers only after such a Personality is destroyed (and so seemingly constitutes a interference with mandatory costs). The destruction cost is paid, and only then is the payment of the cost negated.

As an aside, the CE rules regarding interference with mandatory costs state that, in the event that payment of a cost fails, "If the action was on a Strategy card, the card is discarded normally." The same is probably true of Rings being played from the hand.

Bleh. I'll blame some combination of illness and holiday food for my apparent inability to read cards today.

I still don't think the pending negation constitutes a violation of the Good Faith Rule. "The intent of the Good Faith Rule is to prevent players from abusively attempting actions...". Examples specifically noted elsewhere in the section include declarations that would be facially impossible: announcing the attachment action without a Personality in play, for example, or announcing the attachment action but then choosing an unquestionably illegal target (like "pretending" to attach a spell to a non-shugenja). In all such cases, the game state is not advanced. The "action" declared is a nullity, and it is those types of situations that are contemplated by the Good Faith Rule.

In the case of The Badgers Live, that is not the case. The game state changes (because the event's trigger occurs, and the ends). Additionally, negation itself is not immutable. I don't believe there are currently any cards that prevent the negation of costs (Determination prevents only the negation of effects or interference with targeting, for example) or the effects of ongoing events (at least with timing and prerequisites that are applicable here; Balance in Nothingness would apply if The Badgers Live targeted, but it does not), but there is no reason why such a card could not exist. Alternatively, a Reaction to the announcement of the Ring of Fire might itself destroy a qualifying personality, causing the event's negation to be applied to a different personality than the one ultimately chosen as a cost for the Ring's action.

EDIT: In fact, it does appear to be possible for someone else to die before payment of costs, causing the event's shield to trigger elsewhere and allowing the Ring of Fire's cost to be paid normally. For sake of clarity, everyone's a Ronin player today; all personalities would qualify for The Badger's Live, which is active. Player A has a single personality at the current battle (and, thus, a single possible choice to pay the cost of Ring of Fire). Player A announces that action. Player B, perhaps expecting some funny dishonor tricks (or helpfully illustrating a point), reacts to that announcement to play Distractions at Court. He pays the cost of bowing his Courtier, but before the action can resolve, Player A plays Enough Talk!. Player A wins the duel. As a result of the duel, Player B's Courtier would be destroyed. But because it was a non-Shadowlands Unaligned Human Courtier, The Badger's Live negates the destruction (Distractions at Court is still negated). We now return to the original action, already in progress. The Ring of Fire's costs are paid, and Player A's personality (and some poor victim on the Player B's team) die in a gout of flame.

The Good Faith Rule's knowledge of the game state does not seem as though it should have certainty that the event's negation will itself be successful.