Keeping with the long tradition of there needing to be some kind of white board wipe somewhere in Standard, M15 gave us back Mass Calcify, a 7-mana potentially one-sided board wipe originally printed in Shadowmoor. Conveniently, Mass Calcify goes pretty well with another card from M15 (as far as what we’re discussing today, anyway): the green common, Hunter’s Ambush. Both of them have one thing in common (besides being in M15 and being Magic cards, I mean!): they both do something to all creatures not of a certain color. Mass Calcify destroys all nonwhite creatures, and Hunter’s Ambush prevents the combat damage of all nongreen creatures that turn.

So, let’s take a look at that. I’ve seen many new players misunderstand what things like “nongreen” mean. For example, a multicolored creature. Is Xenagos, God of Revels “nongreen” because he’s red? Is Daxos of Meletis ‘nonwhite’ because he is also blue? The answer to both of these is no! “Nonwhite” does not mean “Black, blue, green, or red,” it means “Not white.” If the answer to the question “Is that a white card” is “yes”, then it’s white. The fact that it also happens to be blue doesn’t make it NOT white. So, Mass Calcify will not hit Daxos – he’s white, so he’s fine. Hunter’s Ambush will let your Xenagos break some faces, because he’s not nongreen – he’s green AND red.

Today’s Rules Tip written by Trevor Nunez