Hi guys, I'm building a Morph/Manifest deck and am just wondering how Afflict works with Manifest. For example, if I attack with a Spellweaver Eternal and it gets blocked. Can I flip it in response to it being blocked and cause the 2 life loss?
In general, a face-down creature has no abilities — this is especially the case, in general, if it was face down due to morph or manifest (C.R. 707.2, 702.36a, 701.33a, 109.3). And if you turn Spellweaver Eternal face up after it becomes blocked, that doesn't make afflict trigger retroactively if it didn't have afflict by the time it became blocked (C.R. 702.129a) — in general, a triggered ability must exist at the appropriate place and time for that ability to trigger when its condition is met (C.R. 112.6, 603.2). (If you turn Spellweaver Eternal face up before blockers are declared, you do so without knowing whether the defending player will block Spellweaver Eternal with a creature, if they can.)
Manifest and Afflict