At first glance, Second Guess doesn’t seem too exciting, but it is not as narrow as you might think. It only needs you to use it correctly, and maybe some shenanigans involving other spells.

As you may know, Second Guess can counter a spell if it was the second spell cast this turn, but it doesn’t care about who cast the first spell. We can take advantage of this if we use other instant spells. For example, let’s say that you have a Think Twice and a Second Guess in hand, and your opponent has no cards in hand. If you cast Think Twice during his upkeep, any spell he tries to cast that turn will be the second spell (since Think Twice was the first), and you will be able to use Second Guess to counter it. Nice miracle! 😛

Note that you can’t ‘respond’ to someone’s spell by trying to cast your spell first. Once a player has priority in his or her main phase, they get the first chance to cast anything before you can respond. This is why you’ll want to cast something during that player’s upkeep, before they get a chance to cast something in the main phase… or you can just hope they cast two spells of their own so you can counter the second one. 🙂

Today’s Rules Tip written by
Jorge Pinto, Level 1 judge from Santiago, Chile