If I sacrificed an animated specialist to bring back an artifact and an enchantment, could I bring back the animated dead that was on the specialist before I sacrificed it? Will the animate dead be in the yard in time to be a valid target?
No, that doesn't work. You choose targets for an activated ability before you pay the costs. So at the time that you are choosing targets for Restoration Specialist's ability, Animate Dead is still on the battlefield. (Even if it were the other way around, Animate Dead wouldn't go to your graveyard until you were done activating the ability and state-based actions put it there.)
For this to work you would need two copies of Animate Dead so you could target one in your graveyard while the other is on the field.
All targets for spells and abilities are declared before costs are paid, at that point the Animate dead is still on the battlefield attached to the REstoration speicalist so won't be a valid target for the specialists ability.
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If I sacrificed an animated specialist to bring back an artifact and an enchantment, could I bring back the animated dead that was on the specialist before I sacrificed it? Will the animate dead be in the yard in time to be a valid target?
Edit... wrong card name
For this to work you would need two copies of Animate Dead so you could target one in your graveyard while the other is on the field.
- H.L Mencken
I Became insane with long Intervals of horrible Sanity
All Religion, my friend is simply evolved out of fraud, fear, greed, imagination and poetry.
- Edgar Allan Poe
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