When you don't have enough food on Christmas, what happens when you choose thumbs up?

Question

In our game, we ran into the Christmas crossroads card while there was only 1 food in our supply:

Thumbs up: Spend 5 food. Gain 1 morale. If Forest Plum is in play [snip: the survivors get an extra 4 items].

Thumbs down: Nothing happens.

(We also had Forest Plum in play.)

What would happen if we give thumbs up? We can't pay 5 food, but we can totally follow instructions to take free stuff. Would we get our stuff and lose just our 1 food, or would nothing happen because we can't do the first part? Is there a clear answer sourceable from the rules or the developers?

Other games have a "do as much as you can" rule, but Dead of Winter doesn't seem to employ one. The food thing isn't listed as a prerequisite to the rest of the actions taking place. I've googled around but it seems others aren't sure either.

Answer 1

Step back from the rules and think about it for a second. You don't get to feel good about giving out food if you don't give out the food!

"Do as much as you can" applies to effects (benefits), not costs (requirements). "Spend 5 food" is really a cost here. I would not permit that option to be picked since the result would make no sense.

Answer 2

Voting to have the group spend food (when they don't have the food to spend) thematically won't work. In this case, I'd discard the Crossroads card and move on because it couldn't take effect fully (much like other Crossroads cards...I've drawn many cards that couldn't fully take effect because none of the conditions were met). Considering that there's a condition, or an implication of owning five food, this card can't be used. Hope this helps!