Published on 07/26/2021
Dungeons and Dragons and Beholders, Oh My!
By Carsten Haese, Nathan Long, Justin Hovdenes, and Andrew Villarrubia.
This Article from: Justin Hovdenes
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 Information in this article may be out of date due to subsequent Oracle and/or rules changes.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.
I have a feeling we aren't in Kansas anymore.
A dungeon can be a dangerous place. We should recruit some companions as there is safety in numbers. May I suggest a axe wielding construct, a canine full of courage, a brainless straw filled golem, and full maned cowardly leonin. With this group, I feel we can now venture deep into a dungeon of questions.
If you have any Magic questions for us to behold, please send short questions to us via our Twitter account at @CranialTweet, and you can send us longer questions at moko@cranialinsertion.com .
Q: I'm currently a level 2 Cleric. If I attack with a Owlbear that has a Lifelink counter on it and a Steadfast Paladin and my opponent blocks the Owlbear with two 1/1 goblin tokens and the paladin with two different 1/1 goblin tokens, how many +1/+1 counters can I put on my Owlbear from my Cleric Class?
A: You can place two +1/+1 counters on your Owlbear. Each creature that has lifelink will cause a separate life gain event. However, the Owlbear dealing damage to two goblins and one opponent from trample is one event, and the Paladin dealing damage to two goblins in a single second event.
Q: During my last turn, I put Grand Master of Flowers up to 7 loyalty. Its no longer a planeswalker, can I still use either of its +1 Loyalty abilities?
A: As strange as this sounds, yes you can. Loyalty abilities can be activated by any permanent that has them, even if it is not a planeswalker. A loyalty ability of a permanent can only be activated if no loyalty abilities it has have been used earlier this turn and only at sorcery speed. Yes, that means Grand Master's loyalty counters will likely continue to increase every turn with no normal way for them to decrease.
Q: I attacked my opponent with Iymrith, Desert Doom, my opponent then targets it with Doom Blade. In response, if I use Bull's Strength to untap Iymrith, will my opponent's Doom Blade get countered if they can't pay
?A: It will not. Untapping Iymrith after it has already been targeted will not cause it's Ward ability to trigger.
Q: My opponent controls Trickster's Talisman which is attached to their 3/3 beast token. I steal the creature using Price of Loyalty and it goes unblocked this turn triggering the Talisman's ability. Can I use the ability to make my own copy of the beast?
A: You can not. The ability does trigger, but since you don't control the Talisman you can't sacrifice it to make the token.
Now fly! Fly! Fly, my pretties!
Q: I attack with Zalto, Fire Giant Duke and my opponent blocks him with five 1/1 goblin tokens. How many times will I "venture into the dungeon" because of the way my opponent chose to block?
A: You will only Venture into the dungeon once. Although 3 different creature will deal damage to Zalto, the damage is simultaneous so he only triggers once.
Q: I control Chaos Dragon and move to combat on my turn. Do I also roll a D20 for the Chaos Dragon's trigger?
A: Yes, you also roll a D20. If you happen to roll higher than all other players, your dragon will have no restrictions on who or what it can attack.
Q: I cast Danse Macabre and one of my opponent's sacrifices their commander. Can I successfully reanimate their commander, or will they get to put it into their command zone instead?
A: You may choose to steal their commander this way! Putting a commander that died into the command zone is a state based action that happens each time a player would get priority. Between when the commander died and when you choose to reanimate a creature, no player gains priority, so there is no chance for your opponent to move their commander back to the command zone.
Q: Attached to my 3/3 beast is Fiendlash and it just got blocked by Scourge Servant and dies for having 0 toughness. How much damage if any will it deal because of the Fiendlash trigger?
A: It will deal 2 damage to a player or planeswalker of your choice. Infect is still damage, so the fiendlash ability still triggers. The trigger will use the power of the beast as it last existed on the battlefield (aka Last Known Information) which it was a 2/0 because of the three -1/-1 counters it got from the infect damage.
Q: I activate my Immovable Rod targeting my opponent's Terravore. It was a 3/3 because there are 3 lands between all graveyards. Did I just kill it?
A: You did. Immovable Rod removes its Power & Toughness defining ability in Layer 6 before it can take affect in Layer 7a. Because no ability defines its power and toughness it default to a 0/0 and gets placed in the graveyard.
Q: I target my Radiant Solar with a kicked Rite of Replication. How many times will this cause me to "venture into the dungeon"?
A: Only 5 times. You will have 6 Radiant Solars, 5 tokens plus the original. The original won't trigger for any of the copies because it doesn't trigger for tokens. Each token copy won't trigger for the other 4 copies because those are tokens as well. However, each token will trigger once for itself.
Q: In a 3 player game, I attack Malcolm with my Acererak the Archlich. As Acererak's trigger resolves my opponent's Malcolm and Nancy begin squabbling. Neither opponent wants to say whether they are sacrificing a creature or giving me the zombie token until they know what the other player is going to do. How do we resolve this?
A: So I have good news, the rules cover this. When the game asks for multiple players to make choices simultaneously, these are done in APNAP order (Active Player Non-Active Player Order). This means usually the player whose turn it is, makes their choices known, then the next player in turn order does the same with the knowledge of the choices the previous player has made, then the next player after that, and so on and so forth until each player has made their choices known, then those actions are performed simultaneously for each player involved.
Lets assume Malcolm's turn is next, followed by Nancy's turn.
Because only your opponents are making choices with this trigger and Malcolm's turn is next, he must say what he will do before getting to know what Nancy's choice will be and is locked into the decision and Nancy will know what Malcolm's choice is when she make her choice. Then both opponents will simultaneously sacrifice a creature or let you create a zombie token.
Q: My opponent has eight Mountains and Den of the Bugbear. She uses the mountains to animate the Den two times and then attacks. She claims she gets to create two attacking goblin tokens instead of one when it attacks, is she right?
A: She is right. When she activates the "animate land" ability a 2nd time, the land creature will gain a 2nd copy of the ability "Whenever this creature attacks, create a 1/1 red Goblin creature token that's tapped and attacking."
Q: I heard that copying Pixie Guide with Delina, Wild Mage's attack trigger could lead to a drawn game. Is that true and if so how does it?
A: This is something they caught and fixed in the Oracle Changes attached to the release of the Forgotten Realms set. Delina now has oracle text saying "you may roll again" instead of "roll again" on her 15-20 result.
With out this change, if you had say 6 copies of Pixie Guide, you would roll 6 D20, ignoring the 5 lowest results, which if that left the highest result at 15 or higher, you create a 7th pixie, then roll again, but this time with 7 D20 ignoring the lowest 6. Which likely means make another pixie, and then roll 8 D20, and so on and so forth. The worst part is, technical this wouldn't guarantee a infinite loop, its just each new cycle becomes vanishingly less likely to end then the cycle before it. But alas, by adding two words, we don't have to worry about this at all, the cycle ends when its controller either fails to get a final result of 15 or higher or they want to stop rolling.
I am Oz. The great and powerful!
Q: I control a Owlbear with two +1/+1 counter on it and it has a Paladin's Shield attached. After attacking with the Owlbear but before blocks, my opponent phases it out with Divine Smite, what happens? I really don't understand phasing out.
A: A phased out permanent is treated as though it doesn't exist. It will naturally return the next time it's controller has an untap step. While phased out, they can't be the target of spells or abilities, their static abilities have no effect on the game, their triggered abilities can't trigger, they can't attack or block, and so on.
When a permanent phases out, so do all objects attached to it. With our Owlbear, its shield will phase out with it.
Counters on phased out objects stay with the phased out object even though they too are treated as though they don't exist. When the Owlbear returns it will still have two +1/+1 counters, but while phased out if a spell or ability cares how many +1/+1 counters you have, it won't notice these two.
A phased out token continues to be, even though it too is treated as though it doesn't exist. If your Owlbear was a phased out token, it would still be around, we would just treat it as though it didn't exist until your next untap step.
Phasing in and out doesn't cause "enter the battlefield" or "leaves the battlefield" triggers to trigger. In the case of our Owlbear, you won't get to draw a card when it phases back in.
When an object that was attached to something when it phased out, phases back in, it will still be attached to that same object if it still exists. In your case the Shield will phase back in simultaneously with the Owlbear and still attached to it.
Q: I cast Dragon Turtle targeting one of my opponent's two Sepulcher Ghouls with the triggered ability. In response, my opponent sacrifices the one I targeted to the one it didn't target. Does my Dragon Turtle still get tapped?
A: It does not. The Dragon Turtle trigger had only one target, and that target disappeared, so no part of the trigger will resolve from loss of all targets.
However, if the Dragon Turtle had been cast with no available targets, or having chosen no targets, it would become tapped and not untap during your next untap step.
Q: If my opponent blocks my Grazilaxx, Illithid Scholar with a Underdark Basilisk, can I save Grazilaxx with its triggered ability or will it already be dead from the Deathtouch?
A: You can chose to save it. The trigger to return Grazilaxx will resolve before any combat damage will happen.
Q: I attack with Minion of the Mighty and 6 more power worth of creatures. All of my creatures are currently attacking the same opponent. If I use the Minion's trigger to put Adult Gold Dragon onto the battlefield, does it have to attack a opponent I'm currently attacking? Can it be attacking a planeswalker?
A: It doesn't have to be attacking an opponent your already attacking, and can be attacking any planeswalker an opponent controls. You choose as you put it onto the battlefield attacking.
Q: Is controlling both Ochre Jelly and Doubling Season as silly as I think it is?
A: It is defiantly silly. A Ochre with an even number of +1/+1 counters on it that dies, will create two token copies with the same number of counters at the beginning of the next end step. If you have a sac outlet like Phyrexian Altar you can double the number of Ochre you have each player turn! Its worth noting this is not an infinite sacrifice outlet, as you don't get the new copies until the next end step. Also, if you have an odd number of +1/+1 counters on a Ochre when it died, you will get two token copies with one less +1/+1 counters, and if it died with one or less +1/+1 counters you won't make any token copies at all.
Q: Earlier in the game I had a Rogue Class exile three cards my opponent controlled. Later that card got bounced back to my hand with my opponent targeting it with You Come to A River's first mode. I later recast the same Rogue Class and leveled it up to level 3. Can I still cast those first 3 cards it exiled early in the game?
A: You can not. Even if the exact same card exiled those cards, as far as the game is concerned, once it left the battlefield its a whole new object with no connection or memory that it removed those first 3 cards.
Q: In a game of commander, if I cast Wish what cards can I cast because of it?
A: In a normal game of commander, "wish" cards do not function and can't grab you cards at all.
However, commander is casual game, and your play group can choose to alter the rules how the group sees fit. If your group agrees before playing to allow for a 8 card "wish" board, then more power to you. If your group goes full casual and lets you grab any card you have handy, go for it. The important part is to know the default is "wishes" don't work in commander, and if you would like to use them, you need to get permission from the people you are playing with before beginning to play. If you can't get agreement, then you will want to be able to move out "wish" cards and replace them with acceptable cards in a timely manor.
That's all the time I have for the land of Oz, . . .um . . I mean the Forgotten Realms, join us next week for more Questions and Answer about Magic Cards.
- Justin Hovdenes AKA Hovey
Level 2 Magic Judge
Rapid City, SD
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