Sacrifice victory

Frequently Asked Questions

General Play

• How do you score a sacrifice victory?
  You can either score it as a victory, or subtract 5 points from your score.
  (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Sacrifice victory, Scoring
• What creates a sacrifice victory? What do you finish evaluating before deciding whether you have won or lost?
  You finish evaluating the current action - for instance a Power, or a Ravage in a single land - until you are not in the middle of an action, and have no triggered actions left to resolve. If you meet both a win condition and a loss condition, it is a sacrifice victory (p. 12).

  For instance, if Pillar of Living Flame does enough damage to destroy the last needed Invader and then adds the last Blight to the island, that is a sacrifice victory. If a Ravage in a land adds the last Blight, but then the Dahan retaliate and wipe out the last Invaders for the current victory condition, that is also a sacrifice victory.

  However, Ravages are evaluated land-by-land (in an order you choose), so a Ravage in one land can cause a victory before a Ravage in another land can add the last Blight and cause defeat.

  You only check at the end of the action tree, so, for instance, Confounding Mists can prevent loss against the Kingdom of England by pushing out a building the moment it is built.

  The loss condition of The Kingdom of France (Plantation Colony) is based off of "try to add a Town and fail" rather than the game state. If you try to add a Town and fail, note that you've done so; you will lose (or get a Sacrifice Victory) at the end of the action tree.
  (Discussion elsewhere) (Discussion elsewhere) (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Sacrifice victory, Timing, Victory and Defeat, Effect, 1 more...
• What is the timing of Victory / Defeat?
  Check Victory/Defeat after each action tree is entirely complete – i.e., when you're not in the middle of an action, and there are no pending triggered actions. Example: if a Ravage action destroys a Spirit's last Presence, you still finish the Ravage action (which might involve a Dahan counterattack), plus any actions it triggers (eg: Blood Draws Predators), but you do not resolve any further Ravages from the same Ravage Card.

  This is a slight rules change; the intent is that it be formally published in a future expansion, but FAQs will treat it as true starting immediately. (The core game rules say to check after each and every action, which could be in the middle of a tree of actions - eg, between the Ravage action and Blood Draws Predators.)

  For loss conditions which key off of "you try to do something but can't" (e.g: The Kingdom of France's loss condition, when you are unable to add a Town), the loss is noted as soon as that happens, but you may play out the rest of the action tree to see if you achieve a Sacrifice Victory. Other loss conditions, like The Kingdom of England, are only checked when the tree is complete.
  Tags: Victory and Defeat, Sacrifice victory, Changed rulings, Ravage, 2 more...

Power Cards

• What happens if you destroy the entire island with Cast Down into the Briny Deep?
  You win a Sacrifice Victory (p. 12). You have won (since all the Invaders are destroyed) but you have also lost (since there is no Spirit presence left on the island).

  Thematically, it's also something of a Pyrrhic victory - but some Spirits of water and deep earth would survive.
  (Discussion elsewhere)  Tags: Sacrifice victory, Cast Down into the Briny Deep