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Q: If I have Weed and the Mooch on my turn, and my Weed goes to another player, can I give them the Mooch at the same time as the Weed?

…If we have a draw 1 play 1 situation and I play Exchange Keepers, trading my Weed to another player, can I give the Mooch along with weed? Or must I wait until my next turn?

A: Yes, it’s true that you can only get rid of the Mooch on your turn, but even if the rules are at Play 1, your turn is not technically over until you have taken (or declined to take) any Free Actions available to you (like moving the Mooch to someone else who has Weed). We’d recommend doing it as two steps so that it doesn’t seem confusing, or invite challenges:

1) You play Exchange Keepers and trade your Weed for someone else’s Keeper.
2) The Mooch realizes that there’s Weed somewhere else, and goes there.
3) Are there any other Free Actions you have yet to take? (like, for example Goal Mill, Get On With It!, Great Idea, or It’s 4:20 Somewhere!)
4) Done taking them or decided not to take them?
5) Now you commence things like taking care of Hand or Keeper Limits
6) NOW your turn is REALLY over.

Here’s a chart we made about when certain things happen in a Fluxx turn (it gets complicated, we know)

Just as a side-point, note that if you have Weed, and someone else also has Weed, you can move the Mooch away from your Weed to their Weed on your turn. They may, of course, move the Mooch back to you on their turn, but at least you’ll be Mooch-free for a little while.

Q: When a Keeper/Creeper (or Rule) says I can do something if I discard or move something, can I do that as a Free Action or do I have to do it based on some other card, like an Action or Rule that lets me do these things?

Some cards say things like “If you discard one of your Keepers, you can move this Creeper to another player,” or “You can discard an opponents Keeper, but you have to move your own Keeper to them,” or “If you discard X cards from your hand, you can draw some more cards and play them immediately.” Do those moves or discards need to be caused by an Action or Rule, or are they part of the card’s stated function?

A: You do not need some other means of moving or discarding the cards in question in order to utilize the function stated. The movement or discard is part of the function itself. Usually there is some benefit, and the move or discard is part of the “cost” or “sacrifice.” It would be far too limited if these moves or discards had to occur organically through some other mechanism in the game.

See also: If a Creeper says I can get rid of it if I “discard a Keeper.” Does this mean voluntary discard…
And also: If I have a Keeper which says I get some benefit from discarding or moving it…

Q: Must you complete an Action before using an optional Free Action allowed by a Rule? What about Keeper powers?

A: Yes, you must complete your compound Action (Draw Two and Use ‘Em, Draw 3 Play 2 of Them, Fizzbin, or Team Up) before you opt to take any optional Free Actions allowed by the Rules.

And, just to preemptively respond about Keeper powers as well, Andy rules that those should also be held until after any compound Action is resolved.

Example: If you could win with the current Goal if you had a Crew Member you don’t have, and you Draw 2 and Use ‘Em, receiving the Captain and some new Goal, you can play the Keeper The Captain (who’s special power lets you steal a Crew Member), but you can’t use his power before you complete the compound Action by playing the second card: the new Goal that you can’t win with. Them’s the breaks sometimes.

Q: When I use a free power on a Keeper (or Creeper), is the Keeper destroyed?

A: Keeper powers do not usually destroy or take the Keeper out of play to use them – unless they specifically say they do.

A couple say you’ll have to pick the Keeper up and put it back in your hand when you use its power, and one or two say to insert the Keeper into the middle of the draw pile. Only a couple will cause destruction of the Keeper being used. In any case those requirements will all be specified on the Keeper in question.

Q: How should one handle duplicate Keepers with powers, if, for example, we want to play with a double-sized deck?

…for example, if we wanted to mix two Batman Fluxx decks and there are two BatComputers in play… or even just putting in multiples of a promo card, like the Ugly Sweater. And how should duplicate New Rules be handled?

A: Well it might seem like a basic question but I don’t think we’ve ever really answered it before. The truth is, we prefer each Fluxx as a standalone experience and don’t really encourage combining decks. We certainly don’t recommend combining multiple copies of the same deck. In almost all cases, each card in a Fluxx deck is unique.

Mixing two Batman decks together creates numerous illogical situations. Sure, there’s the question you’ve asked directly, about two BatComputers, but there will also be two Batmans, two Bruce Waynes, etc. Given that you have to discard Bruce if Batman shows up, then it would seem impossible to have two Batmans in play at once as well. And so on. The deck becomes too big to shuffle as well. We just can’t see a good reason to combine two of the same deck — if you want to play with a big crowd, you’re better off splitting into two smaller groups each playing their own game with their own deck.

That said: Nothing is forbidden. Fluxx is a very accommodating system. There’s no rule against having two copies of the same Keeper, unless you add one as a house rule. The Batman/Bruce Wayne restriction is one example of such a rule. So, unless there’s a New Rule or other fine print requiring some action, redundant Keepers can happily co-exist. As for ability stacking, again, barring a New (or Meta) Rule that provides restrictions, each redundant Keeper would have its full ability.

See also When combining decks, how should I treat redundant New Rules?
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Q: How does the in-turn action of You Can’t Take This Guy From Me interact with the power of Stolen Goods?

A: Well, this is really a doozy! Just to recap, the in-turn action of You Can’t Take This Guy From Me (YCTTGFM) is to copy the power of any Keeper on the table as though you had it. The power of the Keeper Stolen Goods is to be able to forcibly trade it for any other Keeper in play (except Serenity). Let’s say it’s your opponent’s turn, and they’re trying to use YCTTGFM to copy the power of your Stolen Goods.

So, there are two ways the person using YCTTGFM might be trying to have this scenario play out:

They could be trying to use your Stolen Goods as though you had it, and were forcing Stolen Goods to be traded with themselves (or a third player). This would look like you ending up with some other player’s Keeper, either theirs or that third player’s, and whoever you were forced to trade with would end up with your Stolen Goods. It’s most likely they’d want to make you trade your Stolen Goods with them, so that they would get some benefit from the play.

OR

They could have been trying to use Stolen Goods as though they had the Stolen Goods to give to a third player and then they’d take back the “exchanged” Keeper from the third player, leaving the third player with your Stolen Goods, and you down a Keeper?

I couldn’t figure this out on my own, so I consulted with Andy, and the correct way that should be played is the first option.

Q: Can the Stop That! Surprise counter the “free action” provided by some Rules or Keepers?

A: Those are not considered “Actions” in the sense that they are not Action cards, and Stop That (or Belay That) is intended to cancel out Action cards specifically. Nor will Veto! which cancels Rules stop this type of free action.

More broadly worded Surprises might prevent some of these, however. For example, Skullduggery, It’s A Trap and You Can’t Take This Guy From Me are designed more broadly, so that they can prevent “any game action” which can include the results of Action cards, Free Actions from Rule and Free Actions from Keepers or Creepers. The first two can be acquired in the More Surprises pack.

There might be some confusion on Let’s Keep Doing That, since there is an Action card permanently in play, but it is intended to act as if it were a New Rule, so we would rule that it’s no longer stoppable by the Stop That! Anti-Action Surprise.

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.

Q: What counts as a “special power” that might be impaired by an attaching Creeper?

any of these?
Card text (paragraphs)
Card title or name
Card Type (special symbols)
Doom/anti-doom hourglasses

A: The special powers referred to on Creepers that can be canceled out are found in the paragraphs describing any special actions or abilities related to having a given Keeper in play. There’s nothing special about a card being a Keeper, or about the name (there are no “names” of cards that give you any abilities are there?) Doom/anti-doom counters are also a separate concept, unaffected by Creepers: Doom is a quality, not an ability.

Q: When a card says to “pick up your hand and continue with your turn” does that mean that it didn’t count as one of my plays?

Exactly two cards say “then pick up your hand and continue with your turn”: Draw 3 Play 2, and Draw 2 And Use Em. We have a player who thinks that because those cards say to continue with your turn, those Action cards are a free play, and they still have a play left, even if it’s Play 1.

Since there are 20 other Action cards that do not say “continue with your turn”, he cannot be convinced that these two Action cards are the same as the others (in that they are not free plays).

A: The reason that those two cards say, “…then pick your hand up and continue with your turn,” is that those two cards require you to “Set your hand aside.”

The point that needs to be made to this player is that, just because you “continue with your turn” does not mean you have any plays left. Sometimes you do, and sometimes you don’t. If it is only Play 1, then you used your Play to play that Action.

“Continuing with your turn” means –>evaluating the current rules and seeing what you might have left to do. Sometimes you might have nothing left you can do, and your turn is over.

One thing that should be kept in mind is that all of the cards played as a result of one of those actions counts as a single play. These cards both say that, and this might be the better evidence for your argument, that, while they only count as ONE play, they do count as one PLAY (no more, but also no LESS than one play!)

Hope this is helpful. The reason these are the only two cards that have this wording is because of the way they ask you to set your hand aside, and they need to tell you that when you’re done PLAYING that Action, you do get to pick up you hand again. Luckily, they also have the caveat about how many plays that Action counts as.

Q: What does it mean when a card says its action is a “free play” or a “free action”?

Does it count as one of your plays for your turn to do this thing?

A: No. That’s the whole point of it being “free”. It does not use one of your plays. Depending on the game we’re talking about (there are cards like this in Chrononauts and Back To The Future, in addition to many in Fluxx editions), you might only be getting one play per turn, and whatever this thing does won’t use up your play for the turn.

Q: Many cards state you can do something “on your turn”. When does one’s turn officially begin and end for these purposes?

Many New Rule cards allow for the opportunity to optionally do something “once per turn”. Many Keepers also have special abilities which can be invoked “once per turn”. Is there an official start and end to one’s turn? How do we know when a person’s turn is over unless they specifically state it?

A: A player may utilize any optional Free Plays as early as before their first Draw to after their last Play. Yes, officially a person’s turn is not over until they have taken, or declined to take, any optional Free Actions available to them, but it’s easy to forget one of these opportunities and let the next person start their turn.

Once the next person has started their turn, your turn is officially over, and you have lost the opportunity to use those. You can’t force them to undo cards they’ve drawn, played, or utilized. For very nitpicky players, using an official turn token can be useful. Your turn ends when you pass the token to the next player.

(However, we would rule that if you were playing with a Turn Token, and were lax about remembering to pass it, it’s up to you to enforce not letting the next person start their turn before they’ve received the Token. In other words, if you’re going to be rigid about the Turn Token, you have to actually remember to pass it. Otherwise, you fall back on the good old “Once the next person has started their turn, it’s too late…)

Keep in mind that if you forget to take a Free Action, it’s not the other players’ responsibility to remind you. Someone could be nice and remind you but they don’t have to. They might even pointedly ask “So are you done with your turn?” without specifically reminding you, though you might realize the significance, and double-check your opportunities…

Here’s a great chart with an official description Order of events in a Fluxx turn.

Q: If you play a Keeper/Item that lets you take another Keeper/Item, can you immediately use that power to take the target card?

For example, in Star Fluxx, can you get the Captain and immediately use him to take the Scientist. Can you then immediately use the Scientist’s special power to steal, say, the Energy Crystals?

In Firefly Fluxx, can you use Zoe to take Wash, then Wash to steal Serenity, then Serenity to get Stolen Goods?

In the Back to the Future Card Game, can you play the Dust Jacket, and immediately use it to steal the Almanac?

A: Yes, you can chain Keeper/Item stealing-powers like this. It is a thing that can happen. While some feel this is overpowered, we don’t feel that it breaks the game, though. Not all of the cards are always out at the same time, and, of course, sometimes you might get screwed over mid-chain by the Surprise It’s A Trap (in Star Fluxx), or You Can’t Take This Guy From Me (in Firefly Fluxx). In the Back to the Future Card Game, of course, there’s only one Item that lets you steal another in this way.