Hot answers tagged magic-the-gathering
27
According to Magic Head Designer Mark Rosewater's "Drive to Work" podcast on the subject, Wizards used "B" for Black and "L" for Land, leaving "U" as the next reasonable choice.
Blue we represent with the letter U. Oh, real quickly. Why do we do that? I’ve talked about this in my column, but for those that haven’t heard me say it, when first Richard made ...
17
Short answer
Yes. You should take cards out to keep a 60 card deck size.
Medium answer
Yes. It's always legal to play more than 60 cards. But when you design a deck, you don't - you keep it to 60 as much as possible. When you sideboard, you're redesigning your deck on the fly - and the same reasons that you kept it to 60 cards in the first place still ...
12
Those two spells Destroy. Regeneration replaces destruction, which means the destruction doesn't happen, which means it doesn't cause anything to go to the graveyard. If you cast the regeneration mode of Golgari Charm in response to Doom Blade or Supreme Verdict, your Hydras will be safe. They will not lose counters, enchantments, or equipment; they don't ...
11
Sure you can.
With Supreme Verdict on the stack, you respond by activating Varolz's regenerate ability. This resolves.
Supreme Verdict now resolves, destroying all creatures. Varolz's regeneration shield protects him, and he becomes tapped and survives the Verdict.
Obligatory comp rules citation:
614.8. Regeneration is a destruction-replacement ...
9
The creatures die in all of those cases. If a creature's toughness is reduced to zero (or less), it is immediately put into the graveyard. It doesn't matter if at the end of the turn its toughness would become positive again; it died long before then. There's no coming back from the dead (not without playing a card like Unburial Rites, anyway). In the third ...
8
Your friend is right, though he should let you do it anyway outside of a tournament.
You cannot be forced to produce mana to pay for a spell.
117.3c Activating mana abilities is not mandatory, even if paying a cost is.
And if a spell becomes uncastable, its casting is undone.
601.2 [...] If, at any point during the casting of a spell, a player ...
8
I know I add 1 loyalty counter at my upkeep.
huh? no. Outside of the effect of a spell or ability, you only add loyalty counters onto Sorin when you place it on the battlefield, and when you activate its +1 Loyalty ability.
Can I play the -2 ability twice or only once per upkeep?
No, for two reasons.
You can't play it during your upkeep at all. ...
7
Short answer: all your opponent has to do is declare attackers. As soon as they do that, they lose the life. Blocking and dealing damage come later. And yes, it triggers separately for each creature your opponent attacks with.
Longer answer: You're confusing terminology a bit here. "Target" has a specific meaning (spells and abilities can have targets), and ...
7
To piggyback on top of Jadasc's explanation: not only do the names go all the way back to Magic's dawn, we know that they do because of a number of misprints in Alpha that featured the actual letters for the colors on the cards! For instance, if you look at the Alpha printing of Phantasmal Forces, the text reads 'Controller must spend U during upkeep to ...
7
Bloodrush is an activated ability that you can use from your hand. You are not casting the card when you use it. Thus, bloodrush is unaffected by any effects that modify casting costs.
Cards that affect abilities, however, do affect bloodrush — as long as they can affect cards in your hand. E.g. Suppression Field will make all bloodrush cards more ...
7
Player A loses.
Eighteen instances of Valakut's triggered ability will go on the stack.
Divine Deflection is cast and eventually resolves.
Trigger #18 resolves. It deals no damage and Divine Deflection deals three damage to Player A.
Trigger #17 resolves. It deals no damage and Divine Deflection deals three damage to Player A.
Player A loses the game for ...
7
Tynam's answer covers the general case very well: the minimal deck size is optimal, and there are very few good reasons to deviate from that.
Nonetheless, here are some examples of corner cases where you may legitimately want to deviate from making one-for-one substitutions when you sideboard.
Storm-style combo decks
Unlike a more "traditional" two- or ...
7
Short answer: the creature created by Talrand, Sky Summoner counts for Massive Raid.
Long answer:
The result would depend on the wording, There isn't a general rule.
Spell are cast and then, after players have had the chance to play spell or abilites in response, resolve.
When a spell is cast, it is put on the stack, its total cost is paid and targets ...
7
The popularity of the different formats is a tricky subject. First, it's very difficult to define. You could go by total number of players (is there a strong community?), number of tournaments (is it competitive?), available prize pools (is it serious?), size of tournaments (there's a difference between 10 tournaments of 8 people and 1 tournament of 80 ...
6
If the card is in the graveyard, you have the mana to pay the flashback cost, and priority to play the spell, you can play it. Note that you have to wait for the spell to resolve before you can play it again, because that's when you put the card in the graveyard.
There is no rule specifying that you have to wait until your next turn.
6
The bladed bracers remain attached to the creature and will continue to confer the bonus as long as they remain attached, but you are still their controller. Next time you have an opportunity you could use the equip ability to move them to another creature you control. (Note there is no "unequip." You need to have another creature under your control to ...
6
I think the confusion stems from a belief that regeneration causes the creature to leave the battlefield, but come back(like persist does).
But the rules just says to remove the damage and remove the creature from combat Instead of destroying it(it's a replacement effect). It is continuously on the battlefield during the entire process.
6
The answer is in the rulings at the bottom of the page inside the Gatherer entry for Talrand, Sky Summoner
Rulings
7/1/2012 You'll put the Drake token onto the battlefield before the spell that caused the ability to trigger resolves. However, that Drake token isn't on the battlefield when you choose targets for that spell.
7/1/2012 The ...
5
In response to the comment, it is true that combat damage no longer goes on the stack. However, the fact that combat damage no longer goes on the stack does not affect the answer to your question. Assigning the order of blockers is part of the Declare Blockers step:
509.2. Second, for each attacking creature that's become blocked, the active player ...
5
If you want a fast glimpse the unthinkable deck, then the best you are going to do is definitely going to be cutting those wall of frost, and some of the mill enchantments. play 4 ghost quarter (think of it as a 0 mana spell that mills them for 1 card, you can also kill your own land for more hedron crab triggers), and 4 Archive Trap, a spell that does a lot ...
5
From the rulebook:
Unlike other types of permanents, creatures enter the battlefield with “summoning sickness”: a creature can’t
attack, or use an ability that has {tap} in its cost, until it has started your turn on the battlefield under your control.
You can block with a creature or activate its other abilities no matter how long it’s been on the ...
5
The word to look for is may. For example, the rules text for Bred for the Hunt says:
Whenever a creature you control with a +1/+1 counter on it deals
combat damage to a player, you may draw a card.
If a triggered ability says "may", It's up to the owner of the ability to draw a card. If he forgets, that's too bad for him.
The rules text for ...
5
You on a card always means the cards controller, or owner if it has no controller.
109.5. The words “you” and “your” on an object refer to the object’s controller, its would-be controller (if a player is attempting to play, cast, or activate it), or its owner (if it has no controller). For a static ability, this is the current controller of the object ...
4
If a triggered ability has a target, you have to choose the target when it goes on the stack. The target has to be valid both when the ability triggers, and when it resolves. From the rulebook:
114.1d A triggered ability is targeted if it identifies something it will affect by using the phrase “target [something],” where the
“something” is a phrase ...
4
The short: Yes any creature that suffers leathal damage 'dies' including those with Defender.
A wall as they were previously known, is a creature with defender.
If it takes 5 damage it is destroyed.(Dies)
Rule 119 all parts but this one in particular:
119.5. Damage dealt to a creature or planeswalker doesn't destroy it. Likewise, the source of that ...
4
You can only equip the Ring of Valkas as a sorcery (so, only during one of your main phases) but once it is equipped, the Ring stays on the equipped creature until it is moved or the creature dies. So, you put it on your creature this turn and it starts getting counters on it during your next upkeep, assuming it's still alive.
Edit: Looks like I missed part ...
4
Yes, you can, for the same reason you can in other formats.
The first Golden Rule:
101.1. Whenever a card’s text directly contradicts these rules, the card takes precedence. The card overrides only the rule that applies to that specific situation. The only exception is that a player can concede the game at any time (see rule 104.3a).
They'd have to ...
4
WotC has a page with basic explanations of the different sanctioned tournaments formats. You can refer to this page to learn more about the various tournament formats.
Constructed formats
"In a Constructed format, you build your deck in advance, using the cards in your collection. A Constructed deck must have a minimum of 60 cards, with no more than four ...
3
As you noticed, rule 717 seems to be applicable here.
717.1. If a player realizes that he or she can’t legally take an action after starting to do so, the entire action is reversed and any payments already made are canceled.... The player may also reverse any legal mana abilities activated while making the illegal play, unless mana from them or from any ...
3
If you want my 2 cents:
If you want to make a glimpse the unthinkable style of deck, than you're really making a sort of burn deck, except your opponent's life-total is somewhere between 45-50 life.
With that in mind, imagine all of your cards in the context of a burn deck. Does your burn deck want wait until turn 7 to play those keening stone? Do you ...
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