Magic the Gathering: Ask a Judge

[Lord Hosk]

Before I go making a fool of myself in a broader context I will ask here. these were both in magic origins.

In play I have a Chandra, Fire of Kaladesh and I enchant her with Call of the Full Moon.

I swing my opponent blocks with Llanowar Empath.

I do 2 damage to the creature, three damage to the player. chandra should transform right? she has delt 5 which is more than 3.

I also did a play where I had chandra down facing my opponents Eyeblight Assassin.

I attack, then before blockers I cast twin bolt to kill the assassin. So chandra is now untapped and deals two to my opponent, I then tap her doing a third damage. but she doesn't transform.

[korvys]

Nope in the first case. Her transformation is part of her tap ability. She will only tranform if, when her tap ability is resolving, she has done 3 damage this turn (though some or all this damage can come from her attacking, etc).

The second should, but you might have tapped her before you dealt combat damage, in which case, same as above. When her ability checked, you'd only done 1.

[JackSlack]

OK, I think I have this right, but I want someone to confirm for me.

Frontier Siege + Sigil of the Empty Throne.

Sigil is on the battlefield, and I cast Frontier Siege, naming Dragons. (Which I believe is an Out of Order Action.)

The Sigil triggers on cast, not resolution, and an angel enters the battlefield. Then, assuming it resolves, Siege enters the battlefield and I name dragons officially.

The end result is one angel, but it does not fight.

Correct?

[phlip]

Correct on all counts.

[JackSlack]

Yay! (It's still a REALLY good combo though. )

[chetoos]

A couple related questions, all regarding totem armor, and them being destroyed between combat damage steps

Firstly, if a creature enchanted with Hyena umbra loses said umbra between the first strike and normal damage step, does it deal normal damage as well?

Secondly, if battle mastery and umbra mystic are out at the same time, and the battle mastery creature swings and has the aura destroyed between the damage steps, what happens? I guess this is the same thing that happens if something enchanted by battle mastery blocks something, and a trygon predator destroys the aura because it has first strike somehow.

[phlip]

The creatures that deal damage in the first-strike damage step are: creatures that have either first strike and/or double strike.
The creatures that deal damage in the second damage step are: (a) creatures that didn't have a chance to deal damage in the first-strike damage step, and (b) creatures with double strike (ie that still have double strike in the normal damage step).

This means that if a creature doesn't have double strike, it will deal damage in exactly one of the two damage steps... no amount of making it lose or gain first strike mid-combat can make it deal damage twice, or miss its chance to deal damage. And for a creature with double-strike to actually deal damage twice, it needs to have double strike during both damage steps.

(Technically it's possible to engineer a situation where a creature has first strike during the first damage step and double strike during the second, and if you did that it'd deal damage twice too. But that's the only edge case.)

[ElFuzzy]

JUDGE! I have a question relating to how Sphinx's Tutelage works. Does it's triggered ability trigger on each instance of a card you draw or is it just if you draw cards at all regardless of number? So if I treasure cruise do I get one trigger or 3? Or if I Fascinate for 8 do I get 1 trigger or just win?

[phlip]

You get a separate trigger for each card drawn. So if you resolve Treasure Cruise you'll get 3 triggers, which will resolve separately, each one milling 2 and potentially recurring.

[SixFootTurkey]

A small elaboratio, this is due to the rules on drawing; they specify that if you are to draw more than one card, you do so one card at a time. If it weren't for this, Tutelage would have to specify 'for each card drawn' to work as it currently does.

[phlip]

Not necessarily... for comparison, if I attack with 3 creatures, and have something that says "whenever a creature attacks", it'll trigger 3 times. Or if I cast Mind Rot, and have something that says "whenever your opponent discards a card", it'll trigger twice. Both of those are things that happen all at once. You can get multiple triggers off one event, if that event satisfies the trigger condition multiple times.

The difference is that you can make a trigger that says "whenever you attack with one or more creatures", or "whenever your opponent discards one or more cards", to only trigger once... compare to KTK Sidisi for example. But you couldn't make a trigger for "whenever you draw one or more cards" since the draws are separate events.

(In case you're wondering, as I understand it the main reason draws are separate events is that it gives them more flexibility with making replacement effects that change draws into other things. Like, Dredge would work weirdly if you drew all the cards at once.)

[chetoos]

Sorry to all the judges in this thread, but I was rewatching the James and Serge MTGO academy draft, and Serge was talking about the sylvan library/chains of mephistopheles hate spot of judges, and I was just wondering what happened with them together. I understand that you'll mill 2 instead of drawing, but about the library, do you get a chance to put the cards back on top of your library, or do you have to pay life, or what?

[korvys]

Ok, lets do this step by step. For brevity's sake, SL is Sylvan Library, and CoM is Chains of Mephistopheles

At the beginning of my draw step, I draw a card, and SL triggers.
Assuming I choose to draw cards (it's a may ability), I will attempt to draw one card, and then attempt to draw another card.
For each of these cards, I apply the CoM effect, and choose to either discard a card and draw a card, or mill a card.
Now, as per SL, I have to choose 2 cards I drew this turn, and for each, put it back, or pay 4 life.

The weirdness is in the SL wording. It says you have to choose 2 cards you drew this turn, and then for each card chosen, which is normal 2 but could be more or less due to other effects, do something. Because of this, if you can't choose 2, you don't have to pay life or put a card back for the second one. But people kinda assume you are paying 4 life to draw the card, so if you can't put it back you have to pay, but that's not true.

So if you discarded the cards you drew, or milled instead, you'll only have 1 card you drew this turn.

[phlip]

For each of these cards, I apply the CoM effect, and choose to either discard a card and draw a card, or mill a card.

Technically, not a choice - you have to discard if you can, and you only mill if you can't discard.

But yeah, other than that what you say is right.

[korvys]

Ah, my mistake, misread. This is the other reason Judges hate them - lots of words.

[ElFuzzy]

Judge! Would I be disqualified from an FNM if I made custom cardsleeves that have the Yu-Gi-Oh cardback? Alternately, does anyone know where I could get said sleeves pre-made and fit to MTG cards?

[JackSlack]

ElFuzzy: No, so long as they are identical and have a solid border at the edges. And at FNM, you're probably going to be fine with just the first fact.

[illbane]

Just got done playing a Khans/Fate draft and came across a possible play I'm not sure would have worked. If I cast Grim Contest, targeting my Humble Defector and my opponent's X/1, then while that is on the stack, use the Humble Defector's ability to draw cards, therefore giving him to my opponent...does the Grim Contest fizzle? When Grim Contest checks on resolution for legal targets, does it still count?

I understand i can just do this in the reverse order and avoid the issue (use defectors ability, respond with grim contest while on stack) but im curious now. Thanks

[Atifexe]

As per Grim Contest's rulings:

If either target is an illegal target as Grim Contest tries to resolve, neither creature will deal or be dealt damage.

Since it requires that one of the creatures be yours and the other be your opponent's, one of the targets is an illegal target when it tries to resolve and neither will be dealt damage.

[SixFootTurkey]

While that action doesn't happen (the creatures don't fight), I believe the spell still resolves. (I'm not sure when it would come up, but it's possible that it might.)

[Tacos_yay]

Im pretty sure the answer to this will be yes, but i just want to make sure. If my opponent attacks me with two endrazi, Annihilator 4, and I flash in Dictate of Erebos, and sacrifice 4 creatures do to annihilator, will she be forced IMMEDIATELY to sacrifice her eldrazi and drop out of combat? So will the eldrazi do combat damage, or will they die before then?

[Atifexe]

If you flash in anything in response to the Annihilator trigger, it will be in play before the Declare Blockers step. If that means that the attacking Eldrazi are destroyed, sacrificed, or exiled before the Combat Damage step, then they will deal no damage. Because the stack must be clear and both players must pass priority to proceed to the next step, your Dictate technique will prevent the Eldrazi from dealing damage.

Short answer, yes, this works the way you want it to.

[chetoos]

Some complete monster plays both march of the machines and bludgeon brawl, let's say off of a genesis wave just for complete fuckery. Wat do?

[Asthanius]

Let's look at this in two ways:

1) Bludgeon Brawl goes into effect first. Your Sol Ring becomes an Equipment with equip 1 and "Equipped creature gets +1/+0." March of the Machines sees that it's not a creature and turns it into a 1/1 with the same ability. Bludgeon Brawl sees that Sol Ring is now a creature and stops making it an equipment.
End Result: Sol Ring is a 1/1.

2) March of the Machines goes into effect first. Your Sol Ring becomes a 1/1. Bludgeon Brawl sees that it's a creature and doesn't turn it into an equipment.
End Result: Sol Ring is a 1/1.

Either way, March of the Machines overrides the effect of Bludgeon Brawl by turning the artifacts into creatures.

[SixFootTurkey]

ALrighty, I'm going to take a stab at this.

Multiple effects in the same layer (in this case, changing (sub)types) would normally be held in timestamp order (oldest applied first). With Genesis wave, the AP would determine which timestamp was older, as they are entering play at the same time (613.6g).

Regarding MM and BB specifically, BB is dependent on MM. (MM changes which permanents BB can affect, while BB doesn't change which permanents MM can affect.) (613.7a) This means that BB will wait until after MM to be applied.

In short, BB is an Enchantment for 2R with an ability that will never change the board state.