Published on 11/01/2021
November Rain
By Carsten Haese, Nathan Long, Justin Hovdenes, and Andrew Villarrubia
This Article from: Carsten Haese
Cranial Translation
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Note: This article is over two years old. Information in this article may be out of date due to subsequent Oracle and/or rules changes. Proceed with caution.
Nothing lasts forever
Even cold November Rain
Even cold November Rain
As always, if you have questions for us, you can email them to us at moko@cranialinsertion.com or tweet short questions to @CranialTweet. One of our authors will respond to you, and your question might appear in a future episode next to a pun or maybe some song lyrics.
Q: How does Laelia, the Blade Reforged work with cascade? Does she get one counter for each card I exile, or just one counter total? Is the answer different with Tainted Pact?
A: In both cases, Laelia gets one counter per card. What matters is whether the cards are exiled one at a time or all at the same time. Both cascade and Tainted Pact tell you to exile cards from the top of your library until some condition is met. The game can't know in advance how many cards it'll take to meet the condition, so you can't exile all cards at the same time. You exile one card after another, and each card triggers Laelia's ability separately.
For an example where Laelia only gets one counter, look no further than Leveler. Its enter-the-battlefield ability is just one instruction to exile all cards from your library. All cards are exiled at the same time, so Laelia's ability only triggers once.
Q: Speaking of cascade, can I cast Stomp off a cascade from Bloodbraid Elf? Someone told me that the rule changed and this is no longer possible.
A: The cascade rule did change, but cascading from Bloodbraid Elf into Stomp is still possible. Before the rules change, you'd cascade until you exile a card whose mana value is less than that of the spell you cast, and then you cast that exiled card any which way you wanted. Since the rule change, the game only lets you cast the exiled card if the resulting spell's mana value is also less than the mana value of the cascade spell. Stomp's mana value is 2, which is less than Bloodbraid Elf's mana value of 4, so there's no problem there.
The person who told you that this no longer works was probably thinking of cascading into Valki, God of Lies and casting it as Tibalt, Cosmic Impostor. This doesn't work anymore, but that's simply because Tibalt's mana value of 7 is too high.
Q: Does Teferi, Time Raveler stop storm?
A: Teferi does many things, but he doesn't stop storm. When you cast Grapeshot, its storm ability tells you to copy it a certain number of times. You're not casting the copies, so your opponent's Teferi has no objection to this.
Q: Let's say I Clone a Bird Admirer and it becomes night. The rules say that the Clone must transform, but it can't. Does this cause an endless loop of the game trying and failing to transform the Clone, forcing the game to end in a draw?
A: That's an interesting idea, but it doesn't quite work like that. The rule says this:
Quote:
|
702.145c Any time a player controls a permanent that is front face up with daybound and it's night, that player transforms that permanent. This happens immediately and isn't a state-based action. |
Because your Clone is just a regular card with a Magic card back, it doesn't have a front face or a back face. It can't be "front face up.", so this rule doesn't apply to your Clone. The game never tries to transform your Clone and the game simply continues.
Q: My opponent controls Notion Thief and I use a Sword of Fire and Ice trigger to kill it. Who draws the card for the Sword's card draw effect?
A: Your opponent does. The Sword's trigger doesn't actually kill Notion Thief; it only deals 2 damage to Notion Thief, and the Notion Thief isn't destroyed until state-based actions happen. Those only happen after all of Sword of Fire and Ice's ability has finished resolving, including the card draw. At the time the draw happens, Notion Thief is still on the battlefield, albeit mortally wounded, but that doesn't stop its ability from applying to the draw.
Q: How does Jeska, Thrice Reborn's "0" ability affect a creature with double strike?
A: Jeska's ability creates a replacement effect that applies any time that creature would deal combat damage to one of your opponents until your next turn. If the creature attacks and goes unblocked, it'll deal combat damage to your opponent twice because it has double strike, and each time Jeska's replacement effect kicks in and triples the damage. Basically, the creature will deal six times its power to your opponent, in two installments of three times its power.
You can use your illusion
Let it take you where it may
Let it take you where it may
A: Just once, from entering the battlefield. Phantom Steed's ability puts the token onto the battlefield tapped and attacking, so the token is an attacking creature, but it was never declared as an attacker, so it never attacked for the purpose of the "whenever it attacks" trigger condition.
Q: If my opponent puts an Aura on my creature, can I replace it with an Aura of mine? For example, if my opponent enchants my creature with Kenrith's Transformation, can I get rid of their Aura by enchanting the creature with Mantle of the Wolf?
A: No, it doesn't work like that. There is no limit to the number of Auras that can be attached to a creature. In this case, your creature will simply have both Kenrith's Transformation and Mantle of the Wolf attached to it, and both Auras will affect it, so it's a 7/7 green Elk with no abilities.
Q: If I control both Teleportation Circle and Call for Unity, do I choose which of them triggers first?
A: Kind of. You control both abilities, and both of them trigger at the same time, at the beginning of your end step, so you get to choose the order in which they go on the stack.
Q: Okay, so can I use Teleportation Circle's ability to "turn on" Call for Unity's ability?
A: Sadly, no. Call for Unity's ability has an "intervening if" clause that acts as an additional condition for the ability to trigger in the first place. If the condition isn't already true at the time your end step begins, it doesn't trigger at all. This check happens before Teleportation Circle's ability even triggers, let alone resolves, so Teleportation Circle can't help you create the condition that allows Call for Unity to trigger.
Q: I control Kozilek, the Great Distortion and my opponent casts, say, an Ornithopter. Can I discard a land to Kozilek's ability in order to counter the Ornithopter?
A: Sure. Ornithopter is a spell with mana value 0, and a land has no mana cost, so its mana value is 0 as well, so it's a card with mana value 0.
Q: In the Runestone Caverns room of Dungeon of the Mad Mage, can I play the exiled cards forever?
A: No. The triggered ability of this room creates two one-shot effects. One instructs you to exile the top two cards of your library. The other one allows you to play them, and since it doesn't give a time frame for this permission, it means now, during the resolution of the ability. For each of the two cards you decide whether to play it now. Any of the cards that you don't play remain exiled indefinitely.
Q: I control Lorcan, Warlock Collector and wipe the board with Damnation. Does Lorcan's ability trigger for my opponents' creatures that die at the same time as it?
A: No. Unlike "leaves the battlefield" or "dies" triggers which look back in time and trigger based on the game state before the event that triggered them, Lorcan has an ability that triggers when a creature card is put into an opponent's graveyard from anywhere. Such a trigger does not look back in time, and it triggers based on the game state after the event. In the game state after the event, Lorcan is in the graveyard itself, where its ability doesn't work, so the ability doesn't trigger.
Sweet child, sweet child o' mine
A: Yup! Once upon a time you had to choose to put the Child in the graveyard to get its effect, but that rule changed a while ago. (It actually feels pretty recent to me, but I'm almost 50 years old. Even the Nineties feel recent to me.) Under current rules, when your commander goes to the graveyard (or into exile), it actually goes there and triggers any applicable triggered abilities on the way. Then, a state-based action notices that your commander went to the graveyard since the last state-based action check and lets you move it to the command zone.
Q: Can Nightmare Shepherd create a copy of my commander when it dies even if I put it into the command zone?
A: Yes, if you do it correctly. As we explored in the previous question, when your commander dies, it actually goes to the graveyard, where it triggers Nightmare Shepherd's ability. Simply choose to leave it in the graveyard, and then Nightmare Shepherd's ability does its thing. Part of that thing is to exile your commander. Once your commander is in exile, the aforementioned state-based action kicks in and allows you to move your commander back into the command zone.
Q: My commander is Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker and it's equipped with Commander's Plate. Is it protected from Ghostfire?
A: No. Commander's Plate gives Kiki-Jiki protection from each color that's not red, which means Kiki-Jiki has protection from white, blue, black, and green. Colorless is not a color, so Commander's Plate does not provide protection from colorless.
Q: If I cast Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer from the command zone for its dash cost, do I still have to pay the commander tax?
A: I'm afraid so. The commander tax is an additional cost that applies any time you cast your commander from the command zone. If you're using an alternative cost to cast your commander, the additional cost will be applied on top of that alternative cost.
Q: We're in my main phase and I say "move to combat." If my opponent casts a spell, does the game go back to the main phase?
A: Probably not. By offering to move to combat, you're offering to pass priority until the game is in the beginning of combat step. Unless your opponent specifies otherwise or their action is affecting whether a beginning of combat ability triggers (e.g. destroying a Goblin Rabblemaster), they are assumed to act in the beginning of combat step, so the game has moved on from your main phase.
And that's all the time we have for this week. Thanks for reading, and please come back next week. Until then, stay warm!
- Carsten Haese
About the Author:
Carsten Haese is a former Level 2 judge based in Toledo, OH. He is retired from active judging, but he still writes for Cranial Insertion and helps organize an annual charity Magic tournament that benefits the National MS Society.
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