Was playing a game last night when my opponent used this card, but I don't know if they were using it correctly?
I had a mayor of avabruck out and transformed.
My opponent played pithing needle to try and counter his ability to create wolves at the end of my turn. Now they tried to argue that with their needle, his my mayor's passive ability to apply +1/+1 would also be blocked? I figured because it's a passive ability on all the time, it's technically not an activated ability? Also, how does this card work pertaining to the transform aspect of the werewolves? Transforming is an ability, so would that be nullified and he would be stuck a 3/3 instead of reverting back to a 1/1?
Anyway, to answer your question, an activated ability is anything that requires a cost to perform, such as tapping or mana. Pithing Needle will never work against Mayor of Avabruck because his wolves come from a triggered ability and his +1/+1 effect is a static ability.
an activated ability is anything that requires a cost to perform, such as tapping or mana.
This is an oversimplificaion, that can potentially lead to wrong conclusions.
An activated ability is always written in the form [cost]:[effect], and everything that has this template is an activated ability. The colon is a sure give away, if there is a colon separating costs and effects, you are dealing with an activated ability. If there is none, it's not an activated ability.
But paying costs is not limited to activated abilities. For example, paying morph costs to turn a face down creature face up also requires the paying of a cost, but this is not an activated ability. Likewise, many triggered abilities have costs associated with them, like the extort ability, and it doesn't make them into activated abilities.
I had a mayor of avabruck out and transformed.
My opponent played pithing needle to try and counter his ability to create wolves at the end of my turn. Now they tried to argue that with their needle, his my mayor's passive ability to apply +1/+1 would also be blocked? I figured because it's a passive ability on all the time, it's technically not an activated ability? Also, how does this card work pertaining to the transform aspect of the werewolves? Transforming is an ability, so would that be nullified and he would be stuck a 3/3 instead of reverting back to a 1/1?
Anyway, to answer your question, an activated ability is anything that requires a cost to perform, such as tapping or mana. Pithing Needle will never work against Mayor of Avabruck because his wolves come from a triggered ability and his +1/+1 effect is a static ability.
Second you are right: the +1/+1 wouldn't be affected.
Werewolf transforms are triggered abilities so the needle wouldn't work on them
This is an oversimplificaion, that can potentially lead to wrong conclusions.
An activated ability is always written in the form [cost]:[effect], and everything that has this template is an activated ability. The colon is a sure give away, if there is a colon separating costs and effects, you are dealing with an activated ability. If there is none, it's not an activated ability.
But paying costs is not limited to activated abilities. For example, paying morph costs to turn a face down creature face up also requires the paying of a cost, but this is not an activated ability. Likewise, many triggered abilities have costs associated with them, like the extort ability, and it doesn't make them into activated abilities.
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