I've been playing magic for about 6 weeks and have some questions about how the Stack works in specific instances. Specifically, I want to make sure I understand exactly how the Stack works under the following scenarios.
I picked the first scenario mostly because I've played against it and know that both cards are extremely popular right now, and I just want to understand exactly what is happening. The second and third scenarios are just something I'm curious about
This may be a bit tedious, but I've written out each discrete step in the following scenarios, and would appreciate someone letting me know if I'm correct, and if I'm wrong, pointing out the rule from the rulebook that explains why. Also, if I left something important out (e.g., if the order abilities go on the stack is actually important in my scenario), let me know as well.
For the sake of this example, assume I am attacking my opponent with a Centaur Healer , my opponent has blocked with Thragtusk , and we're at the end of the Declare Blocker's step.
Restoration Angel 's ETB ability resolves. Thragtusk is exiled. Thragtusk 's LTB ability triggers, but it not yet put on the Stack. Thragtusk returns to the battlefield, and is no longer attacking. Thragtusk 's ETB ability triggers, but is not yet put on the stack
I recieve priority
I pass priority
My opponent receives priority
Thragtusk 's LTB ability and ETB ability are put on the stack, in the order my opponent chooses, but let's say its LTB then ETB
My opponent passes priority
Thragtusk 's ETB ability resolves. My opponent gains 5 life
I receive priority
I pass priority
My opponent receives priority
My opponent passes priority
Thragtusk 's LTB ability resolves. My opponent puts a 3/3 token on the battlefield
I receive priority
I pass priority
My opponent receives priority
My opponent passes priority
The Declare Blockers step ends and goes to Combat Damage
For the sake of this example, assume I am the active player and it's currently my first main phase. My opponent has a Thragtusk on the field and I try to kill it with a Searing Spear .
Restoration Angel 's ETB ability goes on top of the stack (see rule 603.3)
My opponent passes priority
Restoration Angel 's ETB ability resolves. Thragtusk is exiled. Thragtusk 's LTB ability triggers, but is not put on the Stack yet. Thragtusk is returned to the battlefield. Thragtusk 's ETB ability triggers, but is not put on the Stack yet
I receive priority
I pass priority
My opponent receives priority
Thragtusk 's LTB and ETB abilities are put on the stack, in the order my opponent chooses, but let's say its LTB then ETB (see rule 603.3.b)
My opponent passes priority
Thragtusk 's ETB ability resolves. My opponent gains 5 life
I receive priority
I pass priority
My opponent receives priority
My opponent passes priority
Thragtusk 's LTB ability resolves. My opponent places a 3/3 green beast token on the battlefield
Thragtusk is moved to the graveyard as a state-based action (see rule 704.3 and 704.5f). Thragtusk 's LTB ability triggers, but is not put on the stack yet
I pass priority
My opponent receives priority. Thragtusk 's LTB ability is put on the stack
My opponent passes priority
Thragtusk 's LTB ability resolves. My opponent places a 3/3 green beast token on the battlefield
I receive priority
I pass priority
My opponent receives priority
My opponent passes priority
Both players have passed priority and the Stack is empty, the current phase ends
In the end, Thragtusk dies, but my opponent gained 5 life, and now has a Restoration Angel and 2 3/3 tokens on the battlefield.
Exiling a spell on the stack for Nivmagus Elemental
Sorry for the super long post, I appreciate the help. As one final question, I am curious exactly when Regenerate happens. Rule 614.8 says "The next time [permanent] would be destroyed this turn, instead remove all damage marked on it and tap it", but rule 704.5f says "If a creature has toughness 0 or less, it's put into its owner's graveyard. Regeneration can't replace this event."
There's no priority passing between the Angel entering and its ability being put onto the stack (only SBEs are done at that time). The same for between the Angel's ability having been resolved and the Thragtusk's abilities being put onto the stack.
Dispel doesn't resolve. Instead, it's countered because it has no legal targets. (I'm just saying it first checks its targets and either resolves or is countered; it doesn't start to resolve and is then countered.)
Ok I'm not going over every little step, but I do see some inaccuracies that I will discuss. First the top spell or ability on the stack resoves when all players pass in succession. In other words if your opponent casts restoration angel when they have priority, then they pass that priority and then you pass priority, it's at that time the restoration angel resolves. Your opponent would not receive priority again, and after the restoration angel resolves you would receive priority (as the active player).
Also the triggered abilities go on the stack if a player would receive priority. So when the angel enters the battlefield and it's ability triggers, that ability would be put on the stack before the active player (which in this case is you) would receive priority. Same deal when thragtusk leaves the battlefield and returns with the angel's ability, although you do have it right tha both ability would trigger before a player would receive priority and the player who controls those abilities chooses the order they are put on the stack.
As to your last question, regeneration replaces destruction, a creature with 0 toughness is not destroyed it's simply put into it's owners graveyard. Do note that spells like searing spear do not actually reduce the toughness of creatures, it just marks damage on the creature and if that damage is equal to or greater than the creatures toughness the creature would be destroyed.
When you target Thragtusk with Searing spear and he flickers it in response, when Thragtusk re enters the battlefield it is a new creature. With your searing spear with no target it would fizz out without a legal target. Just to clear that up.
Only 6 weeks, and you're diving into this level of detail? I'm impressed!
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The biggest misunderstanding i see in your steps is when triggered abilities get put on the stack. It's true that there is a delay between an ability triggering and that ability being put on the stack, but it is a very short delay. No players will get priority before the ability is put on the stack.
Also, there are some cases where you have too many people getting priority, or too few. It's hard to tell whether this is a misunderstanding on your part, or simply an error in typing out a complicated post. But in short: both players pass priority in succession before a spell or ability resolves.
For example, here's what scenario 1 should look like (i've combined some steps, so don't expect them to line up perfectly with your steps):
The stack is empty and you have priority.
You pass priority
Your opponent gets priority and casts Restoration angel, putting it on the stack
Since your opponent just played something, your opponent gets priority. He passes
You get priority and pass
Both players have passed in succession, so the topmost spell or ability (restoration angel) resolves. It enters the battlefield and it's ability triggers, but doesn't yet get put on the stack.
Restoration angel's ability gets put on the stack, targetting thragtusk.
Since it is your turn, you get priority. You pass.
Your opponent gets priority and passes.
Both players have passed in succession, so the topmost spell or ability (restoration angel's ability) resolves.
During the resolution of the ability: thragtusk leaves the battlefield, triggering it's leaves-the-battlefield ability. This ability does not yet go on the stack. Next, thragtusk enters the battlefield, triggering its enters-the-battlefield ability. This ability does not yet go on the stack.
Both abilities go on the stack in the order your opponent chooses.
You get priority and pass
Your opponent gets priority and passes.
Both players have passed in succession, so the topmost spell or ability (thragtusk's life gain) resolves. Your opponent gains 5 life.
You get priority and pass
Your opponent gets priority and passes
Both players have passed in succession, so the topmost spell or ability (thragtusk's token creator) resolves. Your opponent creates a 3/3 token
You get priority and pass
Your opponent gets priority and passes
The Declare Blockers step ends and goes to Combat Damage
Your Centaur Healer deals no damage and is dealt no damage
In the end, my opponent ends up saving his Thragtusk , gained 5 life, and now has a Restoration Angel and 3/3 token in play.
Correct.
Now, on to scenario 2. In addition to the comments about scenario 1:
33) Searing Spear resolves. Thragtusk is dealt 3 damage and is now at 0 toughness.
This is incorrect. Any time a card changes zones, it becomes a new object with no relationship to its previous existence. Searing spear is targetting the "old" thragtusk, which no longer exists. There's a similar looking "new" thragtusk, but searing spear doesn't care about that. Searing spear will attempt to resolve, but will be countered because its only target (old thragtusk) no longer exists.
Also, damage dealt to a creature doesn't technically reduce its toughness. Instead, that amount of damage is "marked" on the creature, and is compared against whatever its toughness is.
34) I receive priority 35) Thragtusk is moved to the graveyard as a state-based action (see rule 704.3 and 704.5f). [...]
These two steps would be in the wrong order. State-based actions are evaluated immediately before a player receives priority.
In the end, Thragtusk dies, but my opponent gained 5 life, and now has a Restoration Angel and 2 3/3 tokens on the battlefield.
Thragust lives, your opponent gains 5 life and has one 3/3 token.
Next up, scenario 3:
In the end, my Searing Spear doesn't do the damage I wanted it to, but my Nivmagus Elemental is now 3/4.
Looks correct to me.
As one final question, I am curious exactly when Regenerate happens. Rule 614.8 says "The next time [permanent] would be destroyed this turn, instead remove all damage marked on it and tap it", but rule 704.5f says "If a creature has toughness 0 or less, it's put into its owner's graveyard. Regeneration can't replace this event."
This is where it becomes important that damage doesn't reduce toughness (as I mention above).
If i use Searing Spear on Manor Skeleton , it will mark 3 damage on the skeleton. That 3 damage is compared against 1 toughness, and the creature is "destroyed". If the skeleton regenerates, rather than being destroyed, the 3 damage is removed from the creature (and it taps and gets removed from combat). There is now a 1/1 creature with no damage marked on it, so it survives.
On the other hand, if i use Last Gasp on manor skeleton, i now have a -2/-2 creature. Since no damage is involved, a different rule kicks in to kill it (704.5f, as you pointed out). This rule doesn't "destroy" the creature, so regeneration has nothing to replace.
Triggered abilities are put on the stack before anyone receives priority. You don't have to pass to make something trigger.
Object that leave the battlefield become a new object. Abilities can track them in the zone they moved to, but aside from that, they're a completely different object with no relation to their previous existence. In your searing spear example, Thragtusk lives because Searing Spear never targeted it.
And even though you didn't get this wrong, I thought I would mention that Nivmagus' ability exiles the spell when you activate it, not when it resolves (because it's the cost to activate it, just like paying mana is the cost to activate most other abilities. Costs are paid up front.)
Also note, you can cast Searing Spear and Exile it to the elemental before your opponent could even cast Dispel if you were so inclined and if you were so inclined, he couldn't even cast Dispel because he'd have no target for it.
Essentially
1) you annouce Searing Spear putting it on the stack and put priority aside 2) you annouce its target 3) you activate mana (if necessary) and pay its cost 4) you get priority back 5) you activate Niv-Magus Elemental's ability, putting it on the stack and put aside priority 6) you pay its cost exiling Searing Spear 7) you get priority back and pass it to your opponent
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Hello again! Thank you everyone for your replies. Sorry for my delayed response; I've been distracted by the holidays. I appreciate all the answers everyone gave. I'm going to combine my responses to some of the replies, though, since a lot of the answers address the same questions.
There's no priority passing between the Angel entering and its ability being put onto the stack (only SBEs are done at that time). The same for between the Angel's ability having been resolved and the Thragtusk's abilities being put onto the stack.
Ok I'm not going over every little step, but I do see some inaccuracies that I will discuss. First the top spell or ability on the stack resoves when all players pass in succession. In other words if your opponent casts restoration angel when they have priority, then they pass that priority and then you pass priority, it's at that time the restoration angel resolves. Your opponent would not receive priority again, and after the restoration angel resolves you would receive priority (as the active player).
Also the triggered abilities go on the stack if a player would receive priority. So when the angel enters the battlefield and it's ability triggers, that ability would be put on the stack before the active player (which in this case is you) would receive priority. Same deal when thragtusk leaves the battlefield and returns with the angel's ability, although you do have it right tha both ability would trigger before a player would receive priority and the player who controls those abilities chooses the order they are put on the stack.
The biggest misunderstanding i see in your steps is when triggered abilities get put on the stack. It's true that there is a delay between an ability triggering and that ability being put on the stack, but it is a very short delay. No players will get priority before the ability is put on the stack.
Also, there are some cases where you have too many people getting priority, or too few. It's hard to tell whether this is a misunderstanding on your part, or simply an error in typing out a complicated post. But in short: both players pass priority in succession before a spell or ability resolves.
I think my confusion on all these points comes from (misunderstanding) two rules.
Re-reading rule 603.3, the part that is confusing me is "Once an ability has triggered, its controller puts it on the stack as an object that's not a card the next time a player would receive priority." I took this to mean that if I have priority now, and an ability of trigger, I wouldn't put that ability on the stack until the next time I receive priority.
However, I either missed or misunderstood rule 116.3c that says "If a player has priority when he or she casts a spell, activates an ability, or takes a special action, that player receives priority afterward." My previous understanding was that if I have priority and cast a spell, I STILL have priority afterwards. But you're saying - and I think the rule actually says - that if I have priority and cast a spell, I receive priority AGAIN as a separate instant of having priority after I cast the spell. Is that correct?
The second rule I think I misunderstood was rule 116.4, which says "If all players pass in succession (that is, if all players pass without taking any actions in between passing), the spell or ability on top of the stack resolves or, if the stack is empty, the phase or step ends." So I was taking that to mean that when the player casts Restoration Angel, that instance of having priority doesn't count because they took action while they had priority. But if my current understanding about rule 116.3c is correct, then I think I understand how I misinterpreted rule 116.4.
As to your last question, regeneration replaces destruction, a creature with 0 toughness is not destroyed it's simply put into it's owners graveyard. Do note that spells like searing spear do not actually reduce the toughness of creatures, it just marks damage on the creature and if that damage is equal to or greater than the creatures toughness the creature would be destroyed.
If i use Searing Spear on Manor Skeleton , it will mark 3 damage on the skeleton. That 3 damage is compared against 1 toughness, and the creature is "destroyed". If the skeleton regenerates, rather than being destroyed, the 3 damage is removed from the creature (and it taps and gets removed from combat). There is now a 1/1 creature with no damage marked on it, so it survives. On the other hand, if i use Last Gasp on manor skeleton, i now have a -2/-2 creature. Since no damage is involved, a different rule kicks in to kill it (704.5f, as you pointed out). This rule doesn't "destroy" the creature, so regeneration has nothing to replace.
Thanks a lot for these responses. It helps a lot to understand the difference between toughness being reduced and damage being marked.
When you target Thragtusk with Searing spear and he flickers it in response, when Thragtusk re enters the battlefield it is a new creature. With your searing spear with no target it would fizz out without a legal target. Just to clear that up.
Thanks a lot for that clarification. I didn't realize the "old" Thragtusk ceased to exist.
Dispel doesn't resolve. Instead, it's countered because it has no legal targets. (I'm just saying it first checks its targets and either resolves or is countered; it doesn't start to resolve and is then countered.)
Thanks for clarifying that. Even if I had the right idea, I'm happy to have the precise ordering of events.
The biggest misunderstanding i see in your steps is when triggered abilities get put on the stack. It's true that there is a delay between an ability triggering and that ability being put on the stack, but it is a very short delay. No players will get priority before the ability is put on the stack.
Also, there are some cases where you have too many people getting priority, or too few. It's hard to tell whether this is a misunderstanding on your part, or simply an error in typing out a complicated post. But in short: both players pass priority in succession before a spell or ability resolves.
I think my confusion on all these points comes from (misunderstanding) two rules.
Re-reading rule 603.3, the part that is confusing me is "Once an ability has triggered, its controller puts it on the stack as an object that's not a card the next time a player would receive priority." I took this to mean that if I have priority now, and an ability of trigger, I wouldn't put that ability on the stack until the next time I receive priority.
Note that this rule says that the ability will be put on the stack the next time a player gets priority, that player will not necessarily be the player who controls that triggered ability.
However, I either missed or misunderstood rule 116.3c that says "If a player has priority when he or she casts a spell, activates an ability, or takes a special action, that player receives priority afterward." My previous understanding was that if I have priority and cast a spell, I STILL have priority afterwards. But you're saying - and I think the rule actually says - that if I have priority and cast a spell, I receive priority AGAIN as a separate instant of having priority after I cast the spell. Is that correct?
The second rule I think I misunderstood was rule 116.4, which says "If all players pass in succession (that is, if all players pass without taking any actions in between passing), the spell or ability on top of the stack resolves or, if the stack is empty, the phase or step ends." So I was taking that to mean that when the player casts Restoration Angel, that instance of having priority doesn't count because they took action while they had priority. But if my current understanding about rule 116.3c is correct, then I think I understand how I misinterpreted rule 116.4.
A spell or ability will only resolve if all players pass priority without any actions being taken in between priority passes. However if you cast Restoration Angel then pass then your opponent passes you have both passed without taking actions in between those passes so restoration angel will resolve.
Re-reading rule 603.3, the part that is confusing me is "Once an ability has triggered, its controller puts it on the stack as an object that's not a card the next time a player would receive priority." I took this to mean that if I have priority now, and an ability of trigger, I wouldn't put that ability on the stack until the next time I receive priority.
However, I either missed or misunderstood rule 116.3c that says "If a player has priority when he or she casts a spell, activates an ability, or takes a special action, that player receives priority afterward." My previous understanding was that if I have priority and cast a spell, I STILL have priority afterwards. But you're saying - and I think the rule actually says - that if I have priority and cast a spell, I receive priority AGAIN as a separate instant of having priority after I cast the spell. Is that correct?
Correct, you will receive Priority once more, after SBA & triggers have been dealt with, as stated by 116.5.
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