Wanted to ask a question about what people think certain cards interactions are for this commander since he is.....unique to say the least.
While I can probably think of a few, specifically this ruling on the gatherer...
"If Volrath, The Shapestealer copies a creature with an ability that can be activated only once each turn (such as Chainer, Nightmare Adept), you can activate that ability once. If Volrath, The Shapestealer then becomes a copy of that same creature, you can activate that ability another time, and so on."
what other, perhaps similar but not the exact same interactions does this work with.......for example (a bad one I know because of legend rule) Muldrotha.
in Muldrotha ruling "if you play a card from your graveyard and then have a new Muldrotha come under your control in the same turn, you may play another card of that type from your graveyard that turn."
Would Volrath, The Shapestealer ruling interact with this in a similar way? or what about Faerie Artisans Trigger? We know that each one triggers/tracks its personal copy individually (if more than 1) and you can obviously bounce or flicker it to try and get more but how would it interact with Volrath, The Shapestealer as he turns into various copies?
I would assume he avoid losing his old token if he stops being the Artisans and no longer has the triggered ability to exile the old one but if he transforms out of Faerie Artisans and then back later, does he "remember" the old token and exile it or would he create a new one?
I would think he would exile it but the ruling about Chainer and i know it is calling out an activated ability, not triggered ability, but since the ruling is talking about just transforming into him again the same turn, despite the fact that the individual card has already used the ability once it lets him use it again, which is kinda like saying (not exactly I know) that he doesnt "have memory" of the previous transformation which makes me think the Faerie Artisans MIGHT....key word might, be a plausible ruling.
So yea I wanted to throw out some odd interactions given that particular ruling and see what others think cause I can see an argument for either way even though it seems too good to be true and the rulings on the gatherer are not comprehensive enough to fully clarify this for me.
Maybe it would be more appropriate, to be fair first post and there are a million sub forums and the intent of getting these answers (and potentially new cards to add for a commander deck) for a deck I'm brewing. And he is a more or less commander only card so it isn't completely inappropriate.
While FeelsGoodIsGood has a point they should have just reported it and let a mod move it. The Rulings forum exists to ensure rules questions can more easily be found. Both by players who have the same questions *and* the people answering those questions. The fact that this thread has gone on 3 days without an answer is a testament to the importance of putting this in the right place. I have reported it so it gets moved.
As to your questions:
Volrath would work the same with Muldrotha as it does for Chainer. The limitation of being able to play one card per type is built into the ability itself. If the object receives a new instance of the ability, it gives another set of permissions to play more cards. So, if Volrath copies Muldrotha and you play some cards with it, and then it copies something else, and then gets the ability again, it is a new instance of the ability and you can play more cards.
Artisans is a bit different. You are correct that if it loses the ability it won't exile any other tokens because exiling the tokens is built into the trigger. No trigger; not exiled tokens. However, if it copies Artisans again, those tokens *would* get exiled. This is because the Artisans ability simply states "exile all other tokens created by ~" where '~' means 'this object'. It is not a linked ability since there is only one ability so it just does what it says it does: it finds any other tokens the current object has created (and Volrath is still the same object) and exiles them.
Interestingly, this means that if you use Volrath to copy Artisans and get a token, then copy something like Krenko, Mob Boss and create tokens, and then copy Artisans again and have its ability trigger, it will actually exile the Krenko tokens too.
While I can probably think of a few, specifically this ruling on the gatherer...
"If Volrath, The Shapestealer copies a creature with an ability that can be activated only once each turn (such as Chainer, Nightmare Adept), you can activate that ability once. If Volrath, The Shapestealer then becomes a copy of that same creature, you can activate that ability another time, and so on."
what other, perhaps similar but not the exact same interactions does this work with.......for example (a bad one I know because of legend rule) Muldrotha.
in Muldrotha ruling "if you play a card from your graveyard and then have a new Muldrotha come under your control in the same turn, you may play another card of that type from your graveyard that turn."
Would Volrath, The Shapestealer ruling interact with this in a similar way? or what about Faerie Artisans Trigger? We know that each one triggers/tracks its personal copy individually (if more than 1) and you can obviously bounce or flicker it to try and get more but how would it interact with Volrath, The Shapestealer as he turns into various copies?
I would assume he avoid losing his old token if he stops being the Artisans and no longer has the triggered ability to exile the old one but if he transforms out of Faerie Artisans and then back later, does he "remember" the old token and exile it or would he create a new one?
I would think he would exile it but the ruling about Chainer and i know it is calling out an activated ability, not triggered ability, but since the ruling is talking about just transforming into him again the same turn, despite the fact that the individual card has already used the ability once it lets him use it again, which is kinda like saying (not exactly I know) that he doesnt "have memory" of the previous transformation which makes me think the Faerie Artisans MIGHT....key word might, be a plausible ruling.
So yea I wanted to throw out some odd interactions given that particular ruling and see what others think cause I can see an argument for either way even though it seems too good to be true and the rulings on the gatherer are not comprehensive enough to fully clarify this for me.
Edit: Added Card Tags
As to your questions:
Volrath would work the same with Muldrotha as it does for Chainer. The limitation of being able to play one card per type is built into the ability itself. If the object receives a new instance of the ability, it gives another set of permissions to play more cards. So, if Volrath copies Muldrotha and you play some cards with it, and then it copies something else, and then gets the ability again, it is a new instance of the ability and you can play more cards.
Artisans is a bit different. You are correct that if it loses the ability it won't exile any other tokens because exiling the tokens is built into the trigger. No trigger; not exiled tokens. However, if it copies Artisans again, those tokens *would* get exiled. This is because the Artisans ability simply states "exile all other tokens created by ~" where '~' means 'this object'. It is not a linked ability since there is only one ability so it just does what it says it does: it finds any other tokens the current object has created (and Volrath is still the same object) and exiles them.
Interestingly, this means that if you use Volrath to copy Artisans and get a token, then copy something like Krenko, Mob Boss and create tokens, and then copy Artisans again and have its ability trigger, it will actually exile the Krenko tokens too.
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