Advanced Cards
Truth is the strangest story.
Advanced
While the four regular types of hero cards -- red, green, blue, and yellow heroes -- are powerful and essential to winning the game, they aren't always useful for interrupting your opponents.
There are two types of special advanced cards which increase your storytelling options:
SKALDS (PURPLE)
Masters of eloquence - Skalds hold a special place in every family tree. Any time a skald is added to your ancestry, you can immediately perform an embellishment for your audience!
Just make sure you don't accidentally inject skalds into your opponents' stories...
Recessive heritage - Skalds have no dominant trait, but they can help you inherit a recessive trait if paired with an appropriate hero.
Also, because there are no purple embellishments, try to avoid playing a skald as your youngest hero (you). Remember -- you're already a skald!
GHOSTS (BLACK)
Haunted souls - Ghost cards can't help you inherit traits... but they can be played on any player's family tree! Use them to change your opponent's stories and curse their most powerful heroes.
Doomed to repeat history - Ghosts provide access to the group of black embellishments. These powers are potent, but they come with a price. Think twice before resorting to them... or granting them to your enemies.
FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS
Q: If a skald is played into the youngest hero's spot on my family tree, can I use an embellishment?
A: Yes... but there are no skald embellishments, so unless your youngest hero (the skald) has another color which does feature embellishments, the ability will be wasted.
Q: If multiple skalds come into play at once, how do we figure out what order to resolve their abilities?
A: Queue up their abilities and resolve them in turn order.
For example, it's currently player 1's turn. Player 1 uses a (nonexistent) embellishment which causes 4 skalds to enter play: one on player 1's family tree, two on player 2's family tree, and 1 on player 3's family tree. Queue and resolve the embellishments like this:
- Player 2 is next in turn order, so they use an embellishment first.
- Player 3 uses one next.
- Player 1 uses one next.
- Finally, player 2 uses another embellishment.
If, as part of any of these embellishments, more skalds get played, continue to queue up their abilities after the already-queued ones.
If you run into these scenarios, odds are good that it's because of either the level 3 craft (infiltrate) or level 3 yellow (martyr) embellishments!
Q: Can I play ghosts onto my own family tree?
A: Sure!
Q: Can ghosts only be played on top of existing heroes?
A: No, you can play ghosts onto any spot of any family tree, whether or not there's already a hero in that spot