In Magic, there is a “Golden rule” that you should always remember. Basically, it says that “can’t” overrides “can”. So lets explore what happens when Narcissa controls , and Annabelle casts . Sphinx’s Revelation says to gain X life, while Havoc Festival says players can’t gain life. Can’t > Can. No life will be gained. […]
Category: Effects
Sphere of Safety vs. Volatile Rig
loves attacking. It fact, it has an ability that says it has to attack each turn if able. But what if your opponent has a out? Does that mean I have to pay every turn to make it attack? The answer is no. Sphere of Safety adds a cost to creatures that are declared as […]
Sundering Growth can populate a token your opponent stole with Spirit Away.
You had an 8/8 elemental token, but your opponent stole it with ! What happens when you destroy the enchantment with ? When resolving a spell, you follow the instructions of that spell in order as written in the text box. In the case of Sundering Growth, the first thing is to destroy the enchantment. […]
Rootborn Defenses’ interaction with creatures changing control or entering later.
IMPORTANT UPDATE: This article has been updated as of the prerelease of Magic 2014 on July 13; Please refer to the revisions below. is a nifty common from Return to Ravnica that was made famous when it was (allegedly) accidentally included in a booster pack of Magic 2013. For us, it’s also interesting due to […]
Pillar of Flame vs. Regeneration (regeneration wins)
and are great for getting rid of creatures that you really don’t want to hit the graveyard, such as or . When they would be put into a graveyard as part of being destroyed by lethal damage, the replacement effect kicks in and they get exiled instead. Anything that looks for a creature to “die” […]
You can search for Temple Garden with Farseek, but it will be tapped even if you pay 2 life.
Fun fact: The reprinting of led many people to (correctly) believe the ‘shocklands’ were coming back. Now, onto how they interact: Farseek nabs any Plains, Island, Mountain, or Swamp card you want out of your library and puts it onto the battlefield tapped. Prior to us Returning to Ravnica, you were only going to find […]
How Corpsejack Menace interacts with Unleash.
Even with the Guild Packs making it much easier that usual to go into your two preferred colors in Limited, there were a lot of people splashing a third color for some fun stuff. For example, some people ran Black/Red/Green to keep a Corpsejack Menace around for Unleash. But does that do anything? Unleash doesn’t […]
Prevention and Replacement Effects, Resolving spells and abilities, State-Based Actions, Static Abilities, Zones
The different ways Dryad Militant interacts with removal spells.
! This little tree-girl seems like lots of fun in Limited and Constructed both, but the most common question I’ve seen regarding her is how she works with removal. When does the spell go to the graveyard? Does she exile it or not? A spell does not go to the graveyard until it has fully […]
Return to Ravnica Preview Week: Unleash
This week, in celebration of our Return to the beloved plane of Ravnica, I’ll be previewing each of the new mechanics! Tuesday is Tournament day, so I’ll be cramming two abilities onto Friday’s post. Today, Unleash! Unleash is the Rakdos mechanic, and it really helps capture the hedonistic, thrillkilling attitude of the Cult of Rakdos. […]