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Q: Does the Librarian have the powers of the Necronomicon to move Creepers around?

A: No. The Librarian card states that it “Counts as the Necronomicon for purposes of Actions and Rules if the real Necronomicon isn’t on the table.” The power on the Necronomicon Keeper is not an Action or Rule, so the Librarian doesn’t get to do that stuff. Neither does he get to count as the Necronomicon for purposes of meeting Goal conditions, obviously.

There are only two Actions (Revelations of Azathoth, and The Yellow Sign) and one Rule (Miskatonic Studies) which mention the Necronomicon, and these are the cards for which the Librarian can stand in for the Necronomicon.

Q: Attaching Creepers say “both cards stay together until discarded.” Are there exceptions to this rule?

A: While one of the most obvious ways to get rid of a Creeper attached to one of your Keepers is to destroy them both (or move them both), there ARE ways that you can destroy the Creeper while still retaining the Keeper. The key things here are 1) explicit wording, and 2) thematic appropriateness.

In Star Fluxx*, the exceptions are the Doctor, who can cure Brain Parasites, and the Engineer*, who can fix a Malfunction. In both cases they detach the Creeper, and the Keeper is left, good as new. Creeper Reassignment also specifically states that you detach the Creeper to move it. In Cthulhu Fluxx, the Dreamer states that he can detach Nightmares and discard it. Meanwhile the Sanitarium logically can cure an afflicted Keeper of Nightmares or Insanity. In Anatomy Fluxx, special actions allow you to “cure” yourself.

Some examples where the Creepers DO stay attached would be, in Star Fluxx, the weapons Laser Sword and Laser Pistol, which, again, quite logically, destroy the Keeper in order to destroy the attached Creeper. And while the Phaser in Star Trek or TNG Fluxx targets just the Creeper, it doesn’t say anything about detaching the Keeper either, so if you use it to get rid of an attached Creeper, the Keeper it’s attached to will also be destroyed. The Teleporter will move a Keeper… and its attached Creeper. If a Keeper or Creeper goes into the trash, then it’s attached card goes along.

In Cthulhu Fluxx, The Feds are pretty much the equivalent, though they also destroy themselves in the process. The Necronomicon lets you move any Creeper… and says nothing about detaching it, so you’d have to move any attendant Keeper (and extra Creepers if more than one is attached).

Trash Something is the generic Action version of what the weapons allow you to do. You could trash a Keeper, and it’s Creeper will go along, or you could trash a Creeper, and it’s attached Keeper would go along. There’s no logical reason or explicit wording that lets you detach connected Creeper-Keeper combos for this Action.

*In various Star Trek Fluxxen, there are specific Engineer analogues: Scotty, Geordi, O’Brien that work the same way with respect to Malfunction.

Q: Does having the Librarian in play let us draw & play an extra card for Miskatonic Study Group?

A: Well, as the Librarian card states, if the Necronomicon is not on the table, then the Librarian card counts as the Necronomicon for Actions and New Rules. Miskatonic Study Group is a New Rule. So, yes, players get to draw and play an extra card on their turn if the Librarian is out. The person who has the Librarian can take the extra bonus of ignoring Hand Limits – again, only if the real Necronomicon is not on the table. If the real Necronomicon is out, everyone will be able to take the general bonus, but only the person with the real Necronomicon gets to ignore Hand Limits.

See also: Does Animator count as the Finger Of God for smiting…

Q: With a multiple Play in place could I use the Necronomicon repeatedly to move a Creeper, then put it back in my hand, replay it and use it to move another Creeper?

It appears that with Play All, I could effectively do this an unlimited number of times, moving all the Creepers in the game to wherever I wanted them. Is this correct?

A: This is an unfortunate loophole with the card as written in the first several printings. It was intended that you could only use it once per turn to move a single Creeper. We updated this wording as of approximately September 2016 (but there are a lot of decks out there with it open-ended like this). If you’ve been playing it over-powered like this, you’d be within your rights, since it does not technically say “once per turn”. Now that you know the intended usage, you could still choose to use it as written, however, we’d prefer that it be nerfed as follows:

Our official ruling would be to play it as if it said “…once during your turn you may move any Creeper from one player to another, then put this card back in your hand.” Of course, if there were a multiple play situation, you might subsequently play it again to the table, but would not then be able to use it to move a Creeper again on your turn.

As always, “once per turn” means once per YOUR turn, not once on every person’s turn.
See For special Keeper (or Item) powers or Rules that say “once per turn”, does that mean…

Q: Grand Theft Biblio says “if the card is not in play”. Does that mean I can’t take the Necronomicon if another player has it in play?

A: The only reason that it says “if the card is not in play” is that your very FIRST option is to just take it from in play in front of any other player: the first words are simply “Put the Necronomicon in front of you.”

Only then, “if the card is NOT in play” i.e. obvious on the table (emphasis added), THEN you can go looking for it in various places, first in other players’ hands, then the discard pile, then the draw pile.

The Grand Theft Biblio card is supposed to almost always simply give the person playing it the Necronomicon. The only things that would prevent this would be if someone countered the Action with the Surprise The Stars Are Wrong, OR, if the Necronomicon was in the only place not mentioned as searchable: face down in front of a player waiting to be played due to Dreams & Omens (See If the Necronomicon has been distributed by Dreams & Omens…

I suppose it would be clearer to start with “Take the Necronomicon from wherever it is on the table, and put it in front of you,” and then go on to your options if it’s not in play, but it gets hard to fit all the important information onto cards sometimes.

Q: If the Necronomicon has been distributed by Dreams & Omens, can it be found with Grand Theft Biblio?

Similarly, can a face down Cosmic Instructions or The Stars are Right be found by Strange Aeons?

A: You would get to look in all of the places mentioned (people’s hands*, the draw pile, and the discard pile) for the pertinent item/s, and, if you did not find them, you’d just have to conclude that they were one of those face-down cards*. Since that is not called out as a location you can recover a card from, you are not allowed to look at or take one of those face-down cards. They’re sort of in their own separate world outside reality, aren’t they? Very Lovecraftian.

*If someone tried to get sneaky and lie about having one of those cards in their hand, figuring it would be concluded that the card sought was face down, remember that everyone will see those face down cards as they come into play, so if the card DOESN’T come up, then somebody was cheating… or you’re missing a card in your deck. Contact us, and we’ll replace it.

Q: Can the Elder Sign or the Necronomicon protect themselves from unattached Metamorphosis?

If I draw (and play) Metamorphosis while I control The Elder Sign, do I have time to put The Elder Sign on top of Metamorphosis before Metamorphosis can attach? What about the reverse order? Suppose I have Metamorphosis but no Keepers (so Metamorphosis is unattached). Can I play The Elder Sign on top of Metamorphosis?

Similarly, with the Necronomicon, do I have time to use its special power to move Metamorphosis away before it attaches itself to the book?

A: Just for the record, it’s not so much that you play the Elder Sign on top of a Creeper, as it is that you hide a Creeper under it after both are on the table. After discussing this with Andy, his ruling was that Creepers attach instantly to applicable Keepers they share the table with (in front of a given player). It doesn’t matter which order you play Metamorphosis and the Keeper; Metamorphosis would attach instantly, and the Keeper would lose its special ability before it had a chance to use it to get rid of or neutralize Metamorphosis.

Q: Please explain how Metamorphosis and Madness impair Keepers in Cthulhu Fluxx.

A: The Keepers in Cthulhu Fluxx that have special powers (meaning there is some ability which could be impaired) include:

The Dreamer (cure Nightmares anywhere on the table, whether attached or not)
The Reanimator (steal The Body, if in play)
The Socialite (steal The Poet, if in play)
The Sanitarium (cure Nightmares or Madness if attached to your Keepers)
The Elder Sign (hide, i.e. neutralize any one unattached Creeper)
The Necronomicon (move any Creeper from player to player, then put the Necronomicon back in your hand)
The Ghoul (discard The Body, if it is in front of you)
The Cultist (win if in play when The Dunwich Horror Ungoal causes everyone else to lose)

Here is a flavor-text interpretation:

Regarding Madness (which only affects Investigators)
The Dreamer, Reanimator and Socialite can’t do any of that nifty stuff they do if they have gone Insane. Easy. Remember that Nightmares, however, don’t impair the Keeper, so The Dreamer can still get rid of them, even if he’s the one who has them.

Regarding Metamorphosis (which can attach to ANY Keeper)
If a Keeper starts to Metamorphose, it just can’t function the way it should. A Metamorphosed Sanitarium probably isn’t going to cure your Madness or your Nightmares (in fact, it will probably make them worse) and neither will a Metamorphosed Dreamer. The Socialite just isn’t going to be particularly attractive to The Poet once she starts turning into a frog-person.

There are some other theming issues that are raised with Metamorphosis, however, because it is so far-reaching (attaches to any Keeper).

For example, does it really make sense that Wilbur Whately wouldn’t win if The Dunwich Horror occurred, just because he was Metamorphosed? I thought a main quality of this personage was that he was pretty darn metamorphosed to begin with. Also, somehow I thought a Metamorphosed Ghoul would still eat Dead Bodies.

I consulted Andy on this, however, and he had to conclude that, while it does not necessarily make the best thematic sense, the rule with regards to gameplay, is quite clear: those special abilities are lost if that Keeper is Metamorphosed. Maybe they start morphing into something NICER than they were before!

Ghoul: “My tummy feels funny! That Dead Body just doesn’t look that appetizing anymore…”

Wilbur: “OMG where are my abdominal tentacles?! Dad’s* totally not going to recognize me without them! I am SO toast…”

* For those less familiar with The Dunwich Horror, Wilbur Whately is the abomination of a son resulting from a human woman bearing the child of an Elder God. Wilbur is trying to summon his father, Yog Sothoth, to the Earthly plane.