What does the word "Ability" in Blackened Heart refer to?

[plo]

With regards to this question we have been given 2 official answers:

Heya,

Blackened Heart refers to ability cards only. It does not apply to opposing ally's activated abilities. As such, ability cards like crippling blow, fireball, assassinate, and retreat will trigger Blackened heart's effect but activated abilities such as Jasmine's or Death Mage Thaddeus' will not.

Hope that helps!

And:

Originally Posted by plo
And about Blackened Heart, shouldn't we change his ability from:

Attach to target friendly ally. That ally has immunity to abilities activated with shadow energy. When an opposing player targets that ally with an ability, their hero loses 2 shadow energy.
To:
Attach to target friendly ally. That ally has immunity to abilities activated with shadow energy. When an opposing player targets that ally with an ability card, their hero loses 2 shadow energy.

This way it would be much more clear to people that it does not activate by ally and hero abilities, wouldn't it?

It does actually mean to include ally and hero abilities. If it's not coded like that then it's a bug.

Which should I take as official?
Thx

[Gondorian]

Thanks for pointing this out. Clearly the card is ambiguous and it got interpreted in different ways by different folks! We'll get back to you on the definitive behaviour!

[Mojumbo]

Heya,

The term "ability" as used in blackened heart will refer to both activated abilities and ability cards. In the future, we will use "activated ability" when referring to just an ally's activated ability and "summoned ability" when referring to just an ability card.

Hope that helps!