Hidden Machinations

Legend of the Five Rings card from A Line in the Sand

Card Type

Strategy

Gold Cost

0

Keywords

Kharmic, Kata, Political

Card Text

Before the Action Phase ends, you may take an additional action.
Political Open: Put this Kata into play. Discard your other Kata in play.
Open, w: Look at the top card of your Fate deck. You may put it at the bottom.

Focus Value

4

Legality

A Brother's Destiny (Ivory Edition), A Brother's Destiny (Twenty Festivals)

Deck

Fate

Story

2013 Kotei Winner - Stephen Vann

Printings

Rules Q&A

• Q: why does the active player got to choose you do the additional 1st? why not the active player do his machination 1st?
  A: Each copy of Hidden Machinations creates an effect (granting its controller an additional action before the Action Phase ends) with the same timing. According to step C of the sequence for resolving Timing Conflicts, the active player decides which of these happens first. Alex Jones, "Two Hidden Machinations", 3 Jun 2015
• Q: Previous ruling: Short Season and Hidden Machinations.
  Here, Victory through deference doesn't give you a permission to take an additional action, it just stipulates "Take an additional action."
  In that case, if Short Season has resolved, will VtD allow you to play it plus an additional action? --- Short Season Each player may take only one Limited or Open action per turn (after this Event enters play). Open: If you have not taken an action this phase, put this Event into play. Discard it after the current active player's next Action Phase begins.
  Victory Through Deference As a Focus Effect, after you win this duel, remove one to three non-Ring cards in discard piles from the game. Invest : Draw a card. Battle/Open: Remove one to three non-Ring cards in discard piles from the game. You may target a Personality and remove one of his abilities or boldface keywords (this turn). Take an additional action.
  A: Victory Through Deference gives you a window to play an additional action, overriding the normal back-and-forth action sequence. However, it does not specifically contradict Short Season's limit on the number of actions, so you may not take a second action after playing Victory Through Deference. Jon Palmer, "Victory through deference and Short Season", 1 May 2015
• Q: I didn't found an aswer (or the question like this) through search engine nor on first 25 pages of the forum so here I'll ask: - If both players have Hidden Machinations in play who has the 1st oportunity to play an action: a) active player because actions from HM goes in same order as normal limited/open actions? b) active player chooses who goes first as in every other simultaneous triggers?
  A: The active player chooses who takes their additional action first. Jon Palmer, "Two Hidden Machinations", 17 Apr 2015
• Q: Does Hidden Machinations allow a player to play a second Limited or Open action while Short Season is active?
  I think it does not, because of this point: a permission does not overcome restrictions or negations from card sources.
  Am I right?
  Short Season Each player may take only one Limited or Open action per turn (after this Event enters play).
  Hidden Machinations Before the Action Phase ends, you may take an additional action.
  A: It does not. Hidden Machinations' additional action will not override Short Season's limitation (but if you have not taken a normal Limited or Open action, you can take it during the action granted by Hidden Machinations). Jon Palmer, "Short Season vs. Hidden Machinations", 27 Mar 2015
• Q: Regarding these questions http://www.alderac.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=59&t=110880 http://www.alderac.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=59&t=110867 Hidden Machinations Before the Action Phase ends, you may take an additional action. Ambush Limited: Target your unbowed Personality and another player's Personality. Create a battlefield (not at any Province). Assign your Personality to attack there. Assign the other Personality to defend there, even if he is bowed. Other Personalities cannot move there. Fight a battle there (after this action resolves). After the battle ends, lose 5 Honor.
  The situation is: After both players pass on action phase. I use ambush and target the personalities. Since Ambush did never say take additional action/actions and ambush resolves before we fight the battle and Hidden Machinations states that after I take that additional action(Ambush) Action Phase ends. Since Action Phase is ending all actions pertaining to that phase ends/resolves. Since both personalities is in battle we take appropriate engage/interrupt actions during its engage segment, we proceed to combat segment and since ambush did not state take additional actions and the action phase has already ended we pass combat segment and go straight to its battle resolution.
  Is the situation above correct?
  A: Ambush creates a battle which happens during the Action Phase. If you play Ambush as the additional action from Hidden Machinations, the battle will happen as normal after Ambush resolves; other effects triggered "Before the Action Phase ends" will then happen.
  Ambush creates a battle. This is not an Attack Phase, and happens during the Action Phase*. See "Battles" on p38 of the Comprehensive Rules.
  As I stated below, the battle will have an Engage Segment, a Combat Segment and a Resolution Segment. The rules for the Engage Segment state that it is an Action Round for taking Engage actions; the rules for the Combat Segment state that it is an Action Round for taking Battle actions. Neither type of Action Round allows you to take Open or Limited actions (you may use Open/Battle or Limited/Battle abilities as usual, but you do so to take Battle actions, not Open or Limited ones).
  Alex
  (*) Ok, very good: Yes, it will happen during the Dynasty Phase if you play Twist of Fate. But that essentially changes nothing about my answer: the battle would still have Engage, Combat and Resolution segments, each player would be able to take Engage or Battle actions in the appropriate segment, and neither play would be able to take Dynasty actions. Alex Jones, "Hidden Machinations + Ambush", 17 Nov 2014
• Q: Hello I have hidden Machinations in play, From the additional action it grants me, i play ambush on my opponent's personality. Will he be still be able to play battle actions ? I ask because the action phase is technically over and ambush created a battle. ... well.. confused. Thanks. http://imperialassembly.com/oracle/#cardid=11674,#hashid=93c3fd09d594095e0b8849172717bc46,#cardcount=0
  A: The battle created by Ambush has Engage, Combat and Resolution segments, just like any other battle: you may take Engage actions in the Engage Segment and Battle actions in the Combat Segment as usual. Alex Jones, "Hidden Machinations + Ambush", 14 Nov 2014