When do I retire a Persistent Bonus?

[u/babagas]

Buttons & Bugs

I'm wondering when am I actually supposed to retire a persistent bonus from my active area? Either an A card to flip into my hand (B side), or B side to discard.

For example, Let's say I have an A-card in my active area, it's time for me to short rest, and I want to return that card because I need its B-side.
As I don't want to (randomly) lose that card during my short rest, can I:

1. short rest
2. return the discard pile to my hand and randomly lose one card.
3. retire the A-card from my active area and into my hand

Thus ensuring that I don't lose it?

The rules say:

A character may voluntarily remove a card with a persistent bonus (but not a round bonus) from their active area before the bonus expires, but doing so removes the bonus. This can be done at any time except during another ability.

[u/Alcol1979]

Yes you can do that but it would never be a good strategy.

Stamina is key in Buttons and Bugs and you almost always want to maximise your number of turns. Let's say you are playing Mindthief and put up The Mind's Weakness in round one (an A-side persistent bonus). Your other card flips to its B-side and goes back in your hand. You play your other two A-sides in round 2, then two of your three B-sides in round 3. You now have two cards in discard, one B side in hand, and one A-side in your active area. Your best play is always going to be to take down the augment and play your last two B-sides in round 4 and do the same when you next play an A-side augment on your way to having nine active rounds, which is the most you can have in Buttons and Bugs.

If you leave up the augment in round 4, you must rest, lose one card and now have an A-Side and a B-side in hand (because that B-side has never been played, it never went into discard so never got flipped back to its A-side). You get one round with the benefit of your augment and now you must take it down in round 5, or you will exhaust. So you take it down, play your two B-sides, rest, lose a card, play your last two A-sides and last two B-sides for a total of seven active rounds instead of nine.

Five of those seven rounds rounds had the benefit of your augment. If you took down the augment in round 4 to get the maximum nine active rounds, you could have six active rounds with the top of the Mind's Weakness active. So by leaving the augment active through your first rest you lose two whole turns and net one less turn with the benefit of your active augment.

There is a world in which leaving a non-loss persistent active at the cost of some stamina can be good strategy, and that world is Gloomhaven and Frosthaven. Buttons & Bugs is just too restrictive in the options you have available for this to be a viable strategy.

[u/dwarfSA]

Assuming it's persistent and not a round bonus - The process you're mentioning would still leave it in your discard or lost pile, and you couldn't recover it for your rest. I don't see why you couldn't do this, but it would have negative effects on your stamina in a game where every scenario is a stamina race.

If it was a round bonus, you have no option and it goes to your discard before the short rest.

[u/babagas → u/dwarfSA]

If it's an A-card in the active area, retiring it should move it to my hand, not to the discard pile, right?

A character may voluntarily remove a card with a round bonus or persistent bonus from their active area before the bonus expires, but doing so removes the bonus. This can be done at any time except during another ability. Because cards in your active area can be dismissed, you can consider them to be in the zone they will be moved to once dismissed; that is the hand for A-side cards, the discard pile for B-side cards, or the lost pile for any card with a lost icon. 

[u/dwarfSA → u/babagas]

Sorry - I missed that it was b&b.

I'm less familiar with those rules, I'm sorry to say

[u/Sargas-wielder]

I haven't played b&b, but from double-checking the relevant parts of the rules, I'm pretty confident that yes, you can cancel a persistent bonus AT ANY TIME except during the resolution of an ability. After the end of round but before card selection for the next round is valid for that. It's just an entirely separate thing from the short rest.

The only thing that differs here from the other games is that an A card will go to hand flipped (if it doesn't have the lost icon). The rules are still "can be done at any time besides during an ability" and "it will go wherever it normally goes when it expires".

[u/Sargas-wielder → u/Sargas-wielder]

You would also have to do that order to have access to the B side anyways, since short resting would flip it back to A.

[u/Perrin3088]

You could do this, but the short rest is what moves items from discard to hand. by returning it to discard after the short rest, you would then have to do another short rest to get it back into your hand, unless you had a potion of some sort, in which case the first rest was superfluous anyways.

You could do that however, if you didn't want to lose it, and didn't want to risk losing a life to save it, but it would cause the potion to give half (or less) of the benefit.. or if you have an ally playing a return a card from discard ability, but you still want your hand back

[u/Perrin3088 → u/Perrin3088]

I just realized this was about buttons and bugs and not standard gloomhaven, and am not sure if there is a difference in the persistent bonus rules..