RulingHall of Heroes (rules 1.0–1.4)
Gamora: Had a question about Nebula minion’s Interrupt. How does that ever resolve if its text is not active until…
Question
Had a question about Nebula minion’s Interrupt. How does that ever resolve if its text is not active until the minion is in play (assuming minion abilities work the same as ability text on an ally) and does not specify resolving from out of play?
Answer
I believe you’re referring to the rule on page 9 of the online Rules Reference, In Play and Out of Play, bullet 4: “Card abilities on all card types except event cards and treachery cards can only be initiated or affect the game while they are in play unless they specifically refer to being used from an out-of-play area.” However, according to paragraph 2 of that same rule, the window for Nebula’s ability occurs in a state where she’s neither technically in play, nor out of play: “Cards in a player’s hand, deck, and discard pile, as well as cards in the encounter deck, encounter discard pile, and **unrevealed cards in the villain deck** and the main scheme deck are out of play.” While this situation is uncommon, page 15, Reveal, paragraph 2 states: “To reveal an encounter card, a player **flips the card faceup and resolves the card**, including any keywords and “When Revealed” effects.” Under normal circumstances, she would enter play simultaneously with the resolution of her card, but her ability forces an interrupt of this process, triggering at the moment she attempts to enter play, or “would enter play” (although not interrupting the resolution of her card itself). And her ability forces this interrupt through the second Golden Rule, page 2: “If the text of a card directly contradicts the text of either the Rules Reference or the Learn to Play book, the text of the card takes precedence.” Also, just to clarify, I’ve seen some discussion about why we chose to represent her ability through a “Forced Interrupt” ability rather than a “When Revealed” ability. If we had gone the “When Revealed” route, her ability would not trigger if she were put into play through a card ability (such as Defender of the Nine Realms), and we wanted to ensure that her ability always triggers.
— Boggs