Secrets with "Reveal Immediately"

[loremasterstl]

My games have hardly ever exposed a "Reveal Immediately" Secret possessed by a Town Elder. This makes me consider that we've been playing the game wrong. So I'm going to go through the possible circumstances where (in the basic game, no expansions) a player can see a Secret, and in which cases the Secret MUST be revealed:

1. As an action, player pays 2 Investigation, and looks at the Secrets of an Elder.

2. As an action, player pays 1 Investigation and possess a "Book of Town History" Item card, and looks.

3. At the beginning of the game, Thomas the Courier's "Delivery" ability states, "At the start of the game, may peek at the Secrets of one Town Elder without revealing them."

4. The Event cards "Intuitive Hunch" and "Brilliant Deduction" include the option, "Play to immediately peek at the Secrets of one Town Elder without revealing them."

5. The Event card "Gossip and Rumors" reads, "Play at any time (except during a Fight) to immediately peek at the Secrets of one Town Elder without revealing them...."

6. The Manor card "Whispered Rumors" reads, "Make a Spirit 5+ test. For every 5+ rolled, you may look at the Secrets of one Town Elder."

7. The Windmill card "Broken Spectacles" reads, "Make a Cunning 5+ test... If you roll at least one 6, you may also look at the Secrets of Doctor Manning."

Of course, an Accusation (Rules, page 19) provokes the effects of all Secrets cards possessed by a Town Elder.

My expectation is that those cards that say to "Reveal Immediately" only do so in situations 1, 2, 6 and 7. The others say specifically that they do not provoke the revealing. I also consider that the player may CHOOSE to reveal the Secret at that time when not forced, and have the card play out its usual effects.

Does this fit your interpretations of the rules?

[bachslaugh]

This fits how I play it and have been interpreting the rules... so I hope that's right.

[jpower]

Hey everyone.

I also have a question about the whole secrets system. The way I am interpreting how the whole system works seems to be a little weird. Please correct me where I am going wrong.

So the game starts and all these elders have a secret. Now the point is to try and get elders to fight alongside you against the villain. Thanks to your summary above I was wondering when exactly the secrets are supposed to be revealed. Lets say that player A discovers that one of the elders is working with the villain. Why would player A want to reveal that secret? As soon as he reveals it that means the elder joins the villain, therefore making the showdown that much tougher for himself, let alone everyone else.

Another thing I thought was kinda dumb is the way the hunting party works. The manual reads that a player can choose the two elders he wishes to take with him, but if it turns out that they're cowards, or they're evil elders, then they immediately join the villain. I'm thinking "why the hell would someone choose to take an elder that he hasn't investigated? Isn't the whole point to investigate the elders BEFORE you decide who to take?"

In relation to that, the whole accusation system sounds kinda pointless. The rules state that player B could accuse one of the elders that player A has decided to take with them on the hunting party, but if player B makes a wrongful accusation they will be punished. I'm thinking "why would player B accuse a town elder and risk being punished??" I would only expect player B to accuse IF player A didn't investigate the elder in the first place, which again would be stupid on player As behalf, because they should have investigated their elders BEFORE taking them on the hunt to begin with.

Am I making any sense, or am I completely interpreting this wrong?

[mqstout]

"Why would player A want to reveal that secret? As soon as he reveals it that means the elder joins the villain"
Exactly! When one of the other players starts a showdown, you reveal the villainous elder to make the fight harder for the other guy. Remember, the game is not cooperative.

You DO have something wrong. the other players can accuse elders of being evil who are NOT chosen to be part of the hunting party! If player A picks Elders 1 and 2 to go with him (who are not evil), player B could accuse Elder 3 of being evil, pay the cost, reveal him, and... So investigating the elders isn't just so you can pick neutral or good ones; it's so you have ammunition against your fellow players.

Your other two beefs have to do with random chance:
* It's a calculated risk worth taking sometimes to ask an elder to join your hunting party if you haven't investigated him and someone else is obviously close to fighting him and you want to beat him to the punch. If you've seen a couple others, and they're evil, chances are decent the one you take isn't evil.
* Same thing in reverse. If someone's doing a showdown and you think a villain might just push them over the edge towards losing (maybe weakening them so you can win later in the round!), you might make the accusation and pray. If you've investigated a bunch of other ones and they weren't evil, maybe that one is [by the odds]. Or if you're low in investigation and just want to play "kingmaker", you have less to lose on a false accusation...

Or, just maybe, you think you can read the other players' poker faces from when they investigated the elders.

[jpower]

Ok I was not aware that you could accuse one of the elders that a player DID NOT decide to take with them on the hunting party. That makes more sense, however, I still think it would be dumb to make the accusation without investigating ahead of time. UNLESS you were desperate for time and you just wanted to see if you could screw the player over who is about to fight.

I'm going to copy your response down and use it for reference purposes. Bottom line is for this system to really work well for you is you have to investigate and hope the others do not. With that said then y es this system makes a little more sense. I'll try it out a few times and see how it works out using your information you provided. THanks.