MTG Magic The Gathering Ask A Judge -「 F R I D A Y I ' M I N L O V E 」

Can I use curse of vengence in a multiplayer game to basically Mulligan

If a card says "choose a creature your opponent control" can you choose a creature with shroud/hexproof?

I'm not sure what you mean by "basically Mulligan". It does what it says; when the enchanted player loses the game, you get 1 life and 1 card for every Spite counter on the card.

Can you clarify your question?

If it says 'choose', yes. Choosing does not target.

Teysa, Envoy of Ghosts deals combat damage to a player who controls pic related. Would Teysa not be destroyed by Dread's ability due to it being creature ability or would it still be destroyed?

Protection from Creatures means that Teysa cannot be Damaged by creatures (or abilities from creature sources), Blocked by creatures, or Targeted by abilities from creature sources (the "E" part of DEBT doesn't apply because creatures already can't be attached to stuff)

Dread does not attempt to Damage, Block, or Target Teysa, so protection doesn't stop it. She is destroyed.

does text like this mean your next turn or the next upkeep trigger?

Your next upkeep, f your opponent takes another two turns, you won't lose until they are over

say i put a counter on magosi and skipped my turn. did the trigger pass with my turn, or is it still waiting for the next upkeep?

waiting for the next upkeep

If my opponent has an unwashed asscrack, and keeps expelling gas that is foul-smelling at frequent intervals, can I call a judge for unsporting conduct?

Or will I be found to have unsporting conduct for discriminating against him?

With this card, if there are no creature cards in any graveyards, can I still activate the ability?

No, there's no target.

Sorry, meant to include the oracle text

0: If Eater of the Dead is tapped, exile target creature card from a graveyard and untap Eater of the Dead.

Would it still work?

I gave the answer after i look at the oracle text. There's no target. You can't activate the ability if there's no target.

It triggers at the beginning of your next upkeep. Usually that's gonna be the first upkeep of the next turn, but if that step gets skipped (Eon Hub), it'll keep waiting around until you HAVE an upkeep.

It's still waiting for your next upkeep. It's not "The upkeep of the next turn, if that turn is yours", it's YOUR next upkeep.

If there's not a legal target for the ability, you cannot activate it.

I have stranglehold on the battlefield. I activated mindslaver on my opponent, he then flashed in a card which let him take an extra turn. Is the turn that I would take control skipped?

If you misdirection the card hex, do you choose six different targets or just one

No. The extra turn your opponent would take (the one their spell created) is skipped. You take control of their normal turn.

Again, "next" means in Magic what you'd expect it to in English. When something says "control their next turn", it means "control the next turn of theirs that happens". The extra turn WOULD have been the one you controlled... but it was skipped. It never happened. So you've still got that effect waiting for their next turn.

Hex has 6 targets, so it is not a legal target for Misdirection.

Does this card reduces the cost of objects with generic mana costs or only the cost of objects with devoid?

What signs do you look for if a card is dependent on another

If my opponent has an old school Eldrazi and I can mill them infinitely, around how many emrakul triggers can I get hit with before i get called for slow play?

It reduces cost of colorless spells.

It reduces the cost of colorless spells.

That'd be 'normal' colorless things like Sol Ring or Sword of Feast and Famine, as well as things like a second Herald of Kozilek (which is colorless because it has Devoid). It doesn't do anything for, say, Incinerate- that spell has a generic mana in the cost, but is not colorless.

Cards are not dependent on each other, continuous effects are. A dependency exists when, between two continuous effects:

1) Both are applied in the same layer or sublayer
2) Applying one would change the text or existence of the other, or change what the other applies to, or what the other DOES to any of the things it applies to
3) Neither are from a CDA, or both are from a CDA

If all three of those criteria are present, then one effect is dependent on the other.

There is no such thing as 'infinite' in Magic. If you can mill their deck indefinitely but they have an Emrakul, you'll get Slow Play pretty quickly because you're just repeating the same set of actions without actually advancing the game state.

Can I cast this while my opponent is tapping mana negating anything he might be casting? or do I have to cast this before he taps the mana? Sometimes people are a bit too fast with their untap phase and all that stuff for me to properly cast this, also I feel like there is some advantage to waiting until they're about to cast something to screw them over.

Magic is a game of priority, not a game of reflexes. You can't windmill slam your spell in the middle of them doing something because that's not how it works. Likewise, your opponent can't just rush into their turn and go "UNTAPDRAWPLAYLANDCASTTHISSPELLATTACKPASSTURN" and then tell you that their turn is over when you have a response.

You can absolutely cast a Mana Short during your opponent's upkeep to pre-emptively fuck them up, but they can respond to it. You CANNOT use it as a pseudo-counterspell.

so take conversion and blood moon. So conversion is dependent on blood moon because conversion effects what blood moon applies to?

Other way around. Conversion is dependent on Moon because Moon changes what CONVERSION applies to.

in the last round of a pre-release event, Player A says he'll concede to player B if he gets a rare from player B's pool.

Obviously Player A is guilty of bribery and will be DQ'd. But how much time does player B get to respond before he's DQ'd in complicity?

My L2 said he gives player B 3 seconds to say no before throwing them both out. I applied that maxim and was then DQd myself by the owner/TO.

There's not really a 'time limit'. The annotations for the IPG say that the offered player needs to call a Judge regarding the issue IMMEDIATELY.

That said, I'm not gonna stand there and wait to see how a player responds, especially at a prerelease. I'll just immediately step in myself and DQ the offending player, explaining why what they did is okay. It's absolutely abysmal customer service to wait and see, because your presence and your silence can imply "this is okay" and the player may accept the offer THINKING that's fine, since if it wasn't you obviously would have said something.

Ah. I was told that unless the offered player IMMEDIATELY refuses or calls you, I have to DQ them both.

It really sucked because the guy being offered the bribe was a kid at his first pre-re, and had to give up his foil dovin baan.

Technically they need to call a judge immediately, but that's really more for "if you're not right there". Like I said, a player might think that the offer was 100% fine because you're standing -right there- and didn't step in, so to get DQed for that would be awful.

Yeah. Looking back at it I should have realized the kid didn't know that he was being offered something illegal and only DQd the guy asking.

Certainly the worst call I've made so far. I'm at risk of losing my cert because I've been banned from the 3 shops in town for that stunt.

So, I want to make sure I understand the situation:

You snap DQed both of them, because that's what you understood to be the correct thing to do based on what your L2 had told you. As a result of this, every store in town has banned you.

My suggestion would be to try to talk to the store owners and explain why you ruled as you did, possibly get your RC to back you up. Failing that, get ahold of your RC anyway and explain the situation, see what they can do to help.

>You snap DQed both of them, because that's what you understood to be the correct thing to do based on what your L2 had told you. As a result of this, every store in town has banned you.
Yes. I was also removed from the pre-release, though it was mostly immaterial as I wouldn't have made prize cut anyhow.

The owner of the store I was judging at said what I did was "unacceptable customer service and quite possibly cost the store thousands of dollars in future sales." and relayed to the other owners that I was not to be trusted or otherwise employed unless they "want [me] to scare off players"

Oh, and the store where I issued the DQ, the owner filed a restraining order against me. I'm not allowed within 20 feet of the property.

So not only did you dq them, you also evict them from the premise? On a regular rel event? Sounded like you're on a power trip.

I would write that one off entirely because that is an unbelievably irrational response to a ruling you don't like, and the kind of store that probably would have 'fired' you mid-event somewhere down the line for giving a Game Loss to a 'valued customer'.

As for the other two, it's entirely possible that the Asshole Store gave them a rather... colorful version of those events, and speaking to them candidly can clear the air.

Either way I highly suggest contacting your RC; do you mind if I ask what region you're in?

I did not throw the players out personally. I administered the DQ, and then I was escorted out when I told the owner "no I'm not letting them back into the event just because they spend lots of money here"

I'm in Lebanon Indiana, so Midwest I think.

If I have a Chalice of the Void X=1 can I cast an Engineered Explosives X=1

Yes you can. It will then be countered by chalice.

If you want engineered explosives to have only one charge counter and still resolve, simply pay 2 (or more) mana of the same color.

You can. You shouldn't, but you CAN.

All i can say is brush up on your people skills. Being a judge isn't just about understanding rulings.

Alright i know this has been answered gere before but if i activate scion of the ur dragons abilitiy twice can i turn into a firebreathing dragon, pump it, and then allow it to turn into the second dragon while retaining the pump?

Sure! It won't "lose" the ability to tutor up a dragon until it becomes a copy of something else, so you can activate it once, hold priority, and activate it a second time.

Second activation resolves, dig for a firebreather (usually Moltensteel Dragon). With the first activation on the stack, pump up the firebreathing. Allow first activation to resolve, find second dragon, swing.

And with that, bedtime!

Thanks! Goodnight ga

An aura put on the battlefield doesn't target a permanent right? It's just put on the battlefield enchanting said permanent? So does this mean odd things like Eternal Scourge having an aura on it that is brought back by a Starfield of Nyx when the Eternal Scourge would normally be exiled?

yes

Does panharmonicon let you double the charges on chalice of the void, I dont see a reason why not I just want to know for edh.

Correct. Auras only target when cast as spells; if put directly onto the battlefield, they simply enter attached to your choice of things they can legally BE attached to. Nothing about that targets, so you can duck Shroud and Hexproof and Scourge's trigger.

It does not, because Chalice of the Void does not cause a triggered ability of a permanent you control to trigger when it enters.

Entering with counters isn't a triggered ability, it's a replacement effect that modifies how that permanent enters the battlefield. If counters were a trigger, most Hydras would enter as a 0/0, trigger, and then die as a state-based action long before they ever GOT their triggers.

A triggered ability will always contain the words "when", "Whenever", or "at".

If Mycosynth Lattice and Titania's song are on the battlefield, song is dependent on lattice so lattice is applied first then song, then power and toughness checked and all lands are binned?

I wanna say this is an easy question but I dunno.

Say I have Mizzix of the Izzmagus out and I have no experience counters so I try to stack some.

I play Gitaxian Probe which triggers Mizzix and respond before Mizzix resolves with a Brainstorm, triggering her again. I would get two counters. What happens if one of those were to be countered though? Does countering nullify the notion of being cast or does it just prevent the spell from resolving allowing Mizzix to still get an experience counter from the cast card countered?

>gitaxian probe
>Mizzix trigger
>Brainstorm in response to Mizzix trigger
>Mizzix trigger
>Opponent counters either Probe or Brainstorm.
>fizzled mizzix trigger?

Correct. Since applying Lattice first changes the set of objects that Song will apply to, that's how we MUST do it.

Mizzix's trigger literally CAN'T care whether the spell resolves, because the trigger will be on the stack above the spell that triggered it.

>There is no such thing as 'infinite' in Magic. If you can mill their deck indefinitely but they have an Emrakul, you'll get Slow Play pretty quickly because you're just repeating the same set of actions without actually advancing the game state.
Mostly out of curiosity: If I have an infinitely repeatable combo that mills one card per repetition and my opponent has exactly one copy of Emrakul in their deck, is "until the only card left in your deck is Emrakul" a valid number of times to declare I'm repeating the combo?

Nope! To shortcut a repeatable combo, you have to tell me the exact end state we're shortcutting to, AND the exact number of iterations it'll take to get there.

I can shortcut Kiki Jiki + Pestermite because I know that each iteration gives me one more Pestermite, so I can say "Repeat 10,000 times, I have 10,000 Pestermites". You can tell me the end state you want, but not how many iterations of your loop it'll take to get there.

The trigger will still happen unless an opponent somehow counters Mizzix's triggered ability.

Thanks. Always thought you just needed one. So, given that situation, is there any legal way to proceed to get the opponent's deck empty except for Emrakul other than getting lucky on one of the first couple passes?

In a non-tournament setting, fuck it, just skip ahead. You'll get there eventually.

In a tournament setting, you probably can't even do it manually. You're going to be repeating the same set of actions without actually moving the game-state forward, so you'll get pegged with Slow Play before long.

Awesome, thanks, dudes. Also thanks for not stopping making these threads, GA. Hope you dudes have a nice Christmas

Say in a tournament setting you explain the situation to your opponent ("I could mill you until the only card in your deck is Emrakul and then you'd lose on your draw step to Dictate of Kruphix"), not mention that attempting this would get your tagged with slow play, and ask them to concede. I understand it's kind of a scumbag move, but I'm wondering is it legal?

Happy to help, and I hope you do too!

That sounds an awful lot like knowingly proposing an illegal set of actions.

Don't do that.

Alright, thanks gA. Merry Christmas mate.

What is the order which players choose their "targets" with this card? And what is the order said creatures enter the field?
Let's say i'm the active player, there are no creatures on the field and i have a phantasmal image in my graveyard. Can i use it to copy whatever my opponent reanimates?

Don't put targets in quotes. This card doesn't target, so don't think of it as 'kinda targeting'; you simply make a choice.

Each player makes their choices in turn order, starting with the Active Player, then all the cards are put onto the battlefield simultaneously. Your Image will not ever be able to copy whatever your opponent chooses to put out.

Can you ignore a trigger like this and just choose to not a draw a card?

there is no trigger and you can't ignore this effect because it doesn't say "may"

1) You can only choose to decline using an optional trigger (IE, one that says 'may'). For mandatory triggers, they're... well, mandatory. You don't get a choice.

2) This does not have a triggered ability, it has a replacement effect. You can tell because instead of saying When/Whenever/At, it says "If THING, instead OTHER THING"

3) You can't ignore this replacement effect either.

If someone asks this at an event, how do you deal with it? Obviously answering the way you did on here would be considered outside assistance. Do you just say "yes" and step in again after the spell isn't countered?

I have tree of perdition and wound reflection on board. Before the end step of my opponent turn I activate tree of perdition targeting my opponent who is at 40 life. Do they lose at the end step

Proliferate and Radiate. Nonbo or can I make something work here? Was thinking I could get stupid with it but then I realized it's a keyword and probably wouldn't work.

Yup.

You have to cast a spell to radiate it, but if you radiate something like volt charge then you can proliferate by as many creatures and players in the game and it'll work how I assume you want it to. You can't radiate the effect "proliferate", so if you use a creature ability that proliferates, you can't do that

Yeah I figured. I knew Volt Charge would work because it targets for damage but I was wondering about Steady Progress and it's interaction. Thanks for cementing what I thought though.

How exactly do "exchange control" effects work? If I play a Vedalken Plotter and exchange my untapped Crystal Vein for an opponent's land, can I still sac it for 2 mana on the way to him and grab his land, or will the act of saccing it inevitably make it an illegal exchange?

My opponent only has one vanilla 4/4 creature on the battlefield enchanted with dead weight. I activate an ability that makes target creatures power and toughness 1/1 until the end of turn. He responds with a dromoka's gift. Everything resolves.

Does his creature die?

You can radiate steady progress but radiate won't make any copies because steady progress doesn't target anything

This is more of a general knowledge question, but what was the last alternate win condition card printed so far?

Exchange goes both way. If you sac it then there's no trade.

no it doesn't die.

Including reprints? Felidar Sovereign.

Hedron Alignment came out in OGW. However, it's very likely that it has never once been used to win a game of magic anywhere in the world yet.

Also there was Triskadekaphobia, of course.

That's true but i've actually won a game with it when Starfield of Nyx was in Standard.

If I overload a Blustersquall and my opponent controls a pair of Phantasmal bears, would they die?

No, because Overload says "You may cast this spell for its overload cost. If you do, change its text by replacing all instances of "target" with "each." "

Spells only target if they use the word "target".

That's a lose condition, not a win condition.

Bump