Community

This thread is for discussion of this week's Feature Article, which goes live Monday morning on magicthegathering.com.

Double the four counters CIP is eight on the Tyrant, SBEs are checked and Defenses triggers eight times. Tyrant dies and triggers, move eight becomes sixteen to Ornithopter, SBEs are checked and Defenses triggers sixteen times.

These total twenty-four triggers each make two elves for forty-eight tokens.

EDIT: But technically it's a "may" ability so the answer is anywhere from zero to forty-eight.

Zinger314 wrote:

shouldn't it be 0? (The counters aren't "placed" onto Grief Tyrant; they come "with" him.)

This has been a bit of contention for the judges I hear (see the FAQ on Flourishing Defenses); basically anything coming into play with a counter on it technically is having the counter(s) put on it. The effect/ability that says "~ comes into play with N ___ counters on it" is also saying "As ~ comes into play, put N ___ counters on it." It's the same thing, really, but the wording, strictly speaking, does not say any counters are put on the Tyrant, hence the confusion with the Defenses. The same with Persist, Graft, etc. etc. etc.

As far as I can tell, it's supposed to be zero counters. I think that by the time Doubling Season or Flourishing Defenses takes a look at the Tyrant, it already has the counters on it, as the counters are put onto it as it's coming into play during the resolution of the spell.

Of course, there's always the fact that triggered abilities can trigger during the resolution of a spell or an ability, and are just put on the stack after it's done resolving (the next time a player would receive priority), so it really comes down to whether or not "Comes into play with" counts as "putting on" counters.

If it does, then Grief Tyrant would come into play with 8 counters, and Defenses would trigger 8 times. The next time a player would receive priority, two things happen: 1) Grief Tyrant dies as state based effects are checked, and its leaves-play ability would go on the stack, then 2) All eight of the Defenses triggered abilities would go on the stack, looking like this:

TOP
Flourishing Defenses Ability
Flourishing Defenses Ability
Flourishing Defenses Ability
Flourishing Defenses Ability
Flourishing Defenses Ability
Flourishing Defenses Ability
Flourishing Defenses Ability
Flourishing Defenses Ability
Grief Tyrant Ability
BOTTOM

Each of the Defense triggers resolves (technically people could play spells in between them, but I'm going to assume everyone just passes because this situation is complicated enough as it is :P), putting two Elf tokens into play thanks to Doubling Season. At this point we have 16 Elf tokens.

Then the Grief Tyrant's counter-moving ability resolves, moving the 8 counters onto the Ornithopter, which gets changed into 16 counters thanks to Doubling Season. Defenses triggers 16 times during the resolution of this ability, and the next time a player would receive priority, 1) Ornithopter dies, and 2) The 16 Defense triggers would be put on the stack.

Each of the Defense triggers would resolve, putting 2 Elves into play, for a total of 32+16 = 48 Elves.

So yeah, basically what Seeker said, assuming that "comes into play with" counts as putting counters on something. Otherwise it's zero.

Good article. I love stuff on finding the failings of a system.

Also, I remember the Library from a previous article. My thallid deck sure could use it. :P