A few of you may remember the card Sanguine Bond from Magic 2010. It has a very interesting interaction with Exquisite Blood a new card from Avacyn Restored. Exquisite Blood triggers whenever your opponent loses life, and it gains you that much life. Sanguine Bond is the other half of that; whenever you gain life, your opponent loses that much. So combine the two, and you have an ‘infinite’ loop. If, at any time, you gain life or your opponent loses life, they’ll loop by triggering each other repeatedly.

So, say you gain 2 life for any reason. Bond will trigger and your opponent will lose 2 life. Since your opponent lost 2 life, Blood will trigger and you’ll gain 2 life, which again triggers Bond to make your opponent lose 2, and so on. In most situations, this’ll keep going until your opponent hits 0 or less, and the game will end in your favor.

However, if your opponent has something like Platinum Angel or Phyrexian Unlife, or some other way to avoid losing for having 0 or less life, the triggers will just keep going forever, and the game will end in a draw (unless any player has the ability and desire to end the loop by getting rid of one of the enchantments or whatever is preventing the player from losing).

Today’s Rules Tip written by
Trevor Nuñez, Level 1 judge from Roswell, NM