Ah, these offers are so tempting, aren’t they? Each of the “tempting offer” cards provide a difficult choice. “See what I’m having? You can have some of that too, if you just let me have some more…” It reminds me of the selfish kid in school “sharing” M&Ms among a group of friends. One for me, one for Johnny, one for me, one for Timmy, one for me, one for Spike, and one for me. It almost sounds fair, until you realize that was 4 for me, 1 for everyone else. 😛

Thus are the tempting offers. I cast Tempt with Immortality. As it resolves, I choose a creature to return, and put it on the battlefield. Then in turn order, Johnny makes a choice and returns a creature (or not), then Timmy, then Spike. After all those choices have been made and creatures returned one at a time accordingly, it comes back to me. For each of those players that chose to return a creature, I choose another creature to return. So if each other player says “No thanks,” then I only get my one creature that I already put out, and Tempt with Immortality is essentially Rise from the Grave. If all the others chose to return something, I pick 3 more creatures to return (those last 3 enter together).

Note that the last instruction isn’t a “may” effect, so if three opponents put out creatures, you have to choose 3 creatures (or as many as you have if there aren’t that many in your graveyard), and put them out. Keep this in mind if you have something in your graveyard you’d rather not put on the battlefield, such as Phage the Untouchable or Desolation Angel!

Also remember that the word “target” doesn’t appear anywhere on Tempt with Immortality, so the choice is only made as the spell resolves. If someone wants to use Deathrite Shaman in response to the spell, they’ll just have to exile the creature they’re most afraid of, since you will still get to choose any creature remaining in your graveyard as the spell resolves. Once resolution begins, nobody can respond to any choices, and anything that triggers during the whole process won’t go on the stack until after the end of the spell’s resolution (e.g., if Johnny returns Duplicant, he could eventually target and exile a creature I return in the last step of my spell, even though it wasn’t there as the ability triggered).

Some people have noted an inconsistency in templating among the tempting offers between “for each player…” vs. “for each opponent…” While I can’t say why this stylistic choice was made, I can assure you that the spells all work the same way. “For each player…” refers only to “Each opponent…” referenced in the previous sentence, and never includes the caster.

Today’s rules Tip written by Josh Stansfield