Quick Thinking Experience Upgrade and Mr. Goddard

[alderdust]

In the Timber Peak Rulebook, it says:

In addition, if a Hero ever has two of the exact same Hero Upgrade card, it automatically counts as though the Boost effect has been activated. This also occurs if a Hero gets a Hero Upgrade that has the exact same name of a character ability that they already have

Mr. Goddard has Quick Thinking as a natural ability and there's now a Hero Upgrade card with that same name in BF... but they don't actually do the same thing. Does Mr. Goddard still get a free Boost if he happens to gain this Upgrade card?

The ability reads:
May discard 2 Items at any time to immediately draw a Hero Card or to take any Event (except Play Immediately or Townsfolk) out of the Hero Cards discard pile.

and the Upgrade card reads:
Anytime the Hero wounds a Zombie in a Fight, they may draw a Hero card on the D6 roll of 5+.


I took this to mean you get the boost because its very unlikely to get the quick thinking upgrades with Mr. Goddard. He would then become an exceptional quick thinker therefore boosting his abilities above and beyond that of the normal quick thinker. Even though the two cards are not identical abilities but because they have the same name?

Thoughts?

[ATOEtalGeek]

Good catch on the fact that they have the same name.

I would reason - Following the text of the rule - if Mr. Goddard obtains the Quick Thinking Upgrade it would automatically be boosted, even though the named ability on the card is different than his. The rule depends on the Name of the ability being exact.

In Mr. Goddard's case he would have two abilities to pick up Hero cards. Each of them allow him to draw off the top of the deck, one alternately allows him to go through the discard pile for Events. The combination would be powerful in his case because he could use the Upgrade to supply himself with fodder cards to re-use Events in the discard pile.

[kernunrex]

My thought over on the BGG thread was that the free Boost is a "sorry you wasted Experience on something you already have, here have this other thing" kind of deal. But, that's not really the case with the two Quick Thinkings, since they are different abilities. Sort of a letter vs spirit of the law issue.

Still, doing it by the book sounds more fun.

[alderdust]

The sorry you wasted on something you already have wouldn't fly in my group they would want the boost. I mean I guess you could scare your group into a chance they get the same upgrade and it does nothing. This would prevent a person from maybe getting all ranged upgrades and make them spread around their upgrades.