Welcome back to the Rules Tips Blog! The recent Commander 2014 set has brought us a bunch of new cards, and like any release of new cards, it brings us a load of questions. We’re going to spend a few weeks here going over some of the interactions with these new cards, and today, I’m going to start with Aether Gale.

Let’s say that last turn, you Oblivion Stoned the board, getting rid of all of those pesky nonland cards that are always a bother in Magic. Your five opponents, not very happy about this turn of events, decide they all just want to cast their commander and pass the turn. You have an Aether Gale in your hand, and your plan is to bounce all five of your opponent’s commanders to buy yourself a turn. But can you do that?

The answer is no. Similar to an old card called Hex, Aether Gale requires exactly six nonland targets. You can’t cast a spell if you can’t choose all of the targets, so if there’s only five nonland permanents on the battlefield, you can’t cast it. Hex is similar, since it requires six target creatures, and if there’s five or fewer creatures on the battlefield, you can’t cast Hex. Note that if you really want to cast it, you can target your own nonland permanents (which may actually be a better idea, depending on what you’re bouncing).

So keep that in mind with Aether Gale: If you want to bounce things, make sure there’s six things that you want to bounce.

Today’s Rules Tip written by Nathan Long