Community

noviceuser wrote:

And again it doesn't say like Sacred Foundry that you choose which one you want.

The text on Sacred Foundry that outlines how its mana-production works is actually reminder text, not rules text.

Rules text is the text on your cards that makes the card work-- Air Elemental has the flying ability because its rules text includes "Flying".

Reminder text, on the other hand, never changes how the card works--it just explains how the rules already make the card work. For example, Skill Borrower 's ability has reminder text that says: "(If any of the abilities use that card's name, use this creature's name instead.)" The Borrower's ability would work exactly the same as it already does if that reminder text wasn't there--the reminder text doesn't define how the card works, just explain how the rules already make it work.


You can tell what's reminder text because reminder text is always in parentheses and italics; any text that's in italics will never change how the card works.

Quite often, there will be text printed on a card that is redundant: although the card would work the same without it, they still print it because they think the text will help people understand it more quickly and with fewer disputes.

In the modern era, such text is usually printed as "reminder text." Reminder text is in parenthesis and italics. It is always true that reminder text has no rules significance. That is, if the reminder text were left off a card, it would still do exactly the same thing. Sacred Foundry is an example of this. The fact that it taps for either or is already true because it IS (always) both a mountain and a plains. That reminder text is just there to help people who didn't know that a Mountain Plains automatically (by the rules) has two separate abilities, one which taps for and one which taps for .

In the olden days of Magic, reminder text was often printed as part of the card's text. For example, look at the Antiquities Sage of Lat-Nam or the Revised Clone versus their current Oracle text. Taiga is an example of this. If you look at its Oracle text, you will see that it is empty(!), because it doesn't need any. The fact that it has two land types gives it two abilities, either one of which can be played as long as the cost () can be paid.

So if the card did not specify then what would you THINK you get? For me I would say both because it says that it is both and when you "activate" one BECAUSE it is both it activates BOTH by proxy.

This sort of thinking is very common for people learning the game or moving from a very casual to a more technically correct way of playing. Many people think that the action of tapping is what causes the ability to fire off, so that multiple abilities can fire off when you tap it once. It can be counterintuitive to realize the actual order of things: you choose one ability and announce that you are going to play it, and then you only pay the cost () once you have determined that the ability costs . In a sense, playing the ability is what causes you to have to pay the cost for it.

Don't get me wrong... I'll go with it but I don't agree with it and would love for the rules to be more specified to specifically say that it CANNOT BE ALL THREE AT ONCE or something to that extent because like I said the card says it.

Such a rule would be technically wrong, so you won't see it anytime soon. What the card says is true: A land can "be" all 3 land types at once, without adding all 3 colors of mana to your mana pool. Taiga is both a mountain and a forest, and it has no card text (in the Oracle) that tells you what to do about that, but it still only produces one or the other color.

Say you control a Zombie Trailblazer and a Master Apothecary , along with a Zombie Cleric such as Boneknitter . Boneknitter is a zombie and a cleric, both at once. However, it can only be tapped to pay for the cost of one of the two abilities. Being both things at once does not let it activate both abilities just by tapping once.

Also maybe it's a big problem of WotC and the magic community to alienate new players with their not wanting to put "reminder" text on cards such as this. I would love to ask 100 non-magic players what they thought this card meant.

To some extent, you have to expect people to read the rules of the game they are playing. Non-magic players also wouldn't know what a Forest meant, since it has no rules text at all. If you are playing a game, there's a certain expectation that you are willing to read and understand the basic rules, and apply the cards within that framework, looking up anything that doesn't seem to be covered in the basic rulebook.

There will always be a balance of keeping cards brief (by having their behavior in the rules) or having them be more understandable to someone who just picks them up. I would expect this card to confuse a new player once, at which point they would ask a friend, ask rules q&a, or look up in the rulebook what happens when you give a new land type to a land. After that, since it's a pretty simple rule, I'd expect that they remember it and carry on even though it isn't written on the cards.

As far as newbie-confusing card text goes, there are worse examples than this, so I'm not going to be the first on the "change Lush Growth's text" bandwagon. (Loads of new players don't understand that Wild Growth provides additional mana rather than replacing what the land provides, for example.)

zammm wrote:

To bring back up the vending machine analogy again, in case it helps: It's not one machine with one button for all three flavors of pop; it's one vending machine with three different buttons, one for each flavor.

Vending Machine :D

Gerdef