Question re: fellowship pool

[Slippy]

Hello everyone,

I have a quick question regarding using the fellowship pool to replenish a player's hope points.

In our last session, just before beginning the fellowship phase, a player asked me (LM) whether he could use the fellowship pool's one remaining hope point to replenish his own hope level. There was no roll or attribute bonus invocation; the player simply wanted to top up his hope score before going into the fellowship phase.

This gave me pause because the rulebook makes it seem like you can only dip into the fellowship pool by spending your own hope, then you immediately replace that spent hope point with one from the fellowship pool. Put another way, the way I read the rules is that you can only use the fellowship pool to replace a point of hope that player spent immediately before.

So, my question is: can players use unspent fellowship pool points to replenish their own character's hope level at any time? Or is the only use of the fellowship pool points to replenish a recently spent point of hope?

Thanks!

-Slippy

[Tar-Palantir]

I don't know for sure, but I read like your player. Fellowship points not spent can be used at the end of the session to replenish you own hope pool (like the point you get when your fellowship focus did not receive a wound or become miserable at any time during the session).

[aramis]

I don't know for sure, but I read like your player. Fellowship points not spent can be used at the end of the session to replenish you own hope pool (like the point you get when your fellowship focus did not receive a wound or become miserable at any time during the session).

My read, as well, with the caveat that using them without group consensus is still a source of shadow.

[atgxtg]

Yes, you player can use Fellowship points from the pool to top off his Hope according to Page 132:

Players may recover any number of Hope points up to their
maximum Hope score, as long as there are Fellowship
points left. A player may tap into a company’s Fellowship
pool at any time.


But, like aramis noted:
To do so, a player must get permission from at least half the
other members of the company:
If this consensus cannot be found, he may either agree not
to spend any points, or spend them anyway and gain a
Shadow point for each Fellowship point used.