If Mimic Vat is destroyed before the beginning of the next end step, do you still have to exile the token you made with it?
Destroying an object does not negate previous effects generated by that object. (rule 113.7a)
Once it resolves, Mimic Vat's activated ability generates 2 effects:
1) 'Create a token'
2) 'Exile that token, later'**
Once generated, those effects exist on their own. Destroying Mimic Vat won't undo them.
113.7a Once activated or triggered, an ability exists on the stack independently of its source. Destruction or removal of the source after that time won’t affect the ability. (...)
**the second of Mimic Vat's effect, since it's being set up to happen at a later time, is called a 'delayed triggered ability'.
This delay doesn't change the fact that the effect has been created, and will happen, whatever occurs to Mimic Vat in the meantime.
603.7. An effect may create a delayed triggered ability that can do something at a later time. (...)
Opponent has a Hushbringer in play. I have a Nicol Bolas, the Ravager in play. I pay 7 mana to transform him. He ends up in the GY.
I assumed he would come back as a Planeswalker since the wording says "return him to the battlefield transformed".
What am I missing?
Yep, sounds like a bug, unless there's some other card messing with things which you aren't aware of.
@Peteroupc; you seem to have misunderstood the OP's question.
It always has been able to play lands. The updated wording only makes it clearer.
N.B. You still can play only one land per turn, and still must obey sorcery/instant timing restrictions.
Did you actually mean to say I CAN trigger it multiple times?
That's impossible: players DO NOT trigger anything. Period.
Allow me to throw in some friendly advice:
Six of the most knowledgeable Magic rules afficionados are telling you this is not the way it works, including Natedogg, who is an official Magic representative and has been with this game for many, many years.
At some point, you'll have to trust us.
Instead of clinging to your mistaken interpretation, try and understand WHY and WHERE you are wrong.
Perhaps you were incorrectly taught the game. Find a Magic store: people there will be more than happy to teach you how this game is actually played.
it doesnt say that the ability is only triggered once per phase
Correct.
There is an infinity of things the rulebook doesn't say.
Rules don't talk about things that don't happen.**
Rules tell us what does happen.
For example, no rule says "Players are not allowed to draw cards at will."
Still, we know they can't.
How do we know?
Because no rule says they can.
The unwritten rule of all (but one) games is "You can't do things which are not specifically allowed by the rules."
603.2b When a phase or step begins, all abilities that trigger “at the beginning of” that phase or step trigger.
This rule tells us when Cabal Therapist triggers.
Admittedly, it doesn't say "oh, by the way, it triggers only once".
**some rules will tell us about things that don't happen. There are two reasons for this;
1) it often makes the rulebook shorter to say "can't" than to say "can, but only under the following conditions...". (example: rule 302.6)
2) to avoid common false extrapolations made by many new players. (example: rule 115.10a)
So myThunderblust has died once, and been returned to play with a -1/-1 counter (it's persist ability). I then bring in a Nova Chaser and champion the Thunderblust. When the Nova Chaser dies the Thunderblust returns to play, is it with or without the -1/-1 counter?
When Nova Chaser dies, Thunderblust comes back brand new, with no counter. (rule 122.2)
That's because Thunderblust did no die, it got exiled (by the Champion ability). (rule 702.71)
Only if it actually dies does Persist come into effect. (rule 700.4)
if manage to put a +1/+1 counter on Thunderblust does that cancel out the -1/-1, or are there now just two opposing counters on it? Thanks!
Both counters will disappear.
The +1/+1 and -1/-1 really anihilate each other. (rule 704.5q)
(as Rezzahan mentioned, these are the only counters in the game with such behavior)
Tldr - if Kudro is in play, and a human enters play triggering his exile ability, would the owner of Kudro be able to retain priority and then use removal (such as activating Kudro) on an opponents creature, and then exiling that same creature with that pending ability?
Actually, one can achieve what you describe. All one needs is to respond earlier.
The trick is to respond, not to Kudro's ability, but rather to respond before the human enters play.
If you kill some annoying creature while the human creature is about to resolve and enter play, then, when Kudro actually triggers, the annoying creature, being in the grave, is indeed a valid target for Kudro.
How is this card meant to be used then? To force an opponent to block with one of their creatures?
Although this is not a rules questions, answering it may still help you understand the game more. Provoke's most common (unique?) usage is to get rid of a nasty creature by forcing it to make an undesirable block. Plasma Elemental, for example, would keep attacking you, and never dare to block, of course... unless provoked.
can I use Provoke on an opponents creature to block another opponents creature attacking me?
As far as I can tell, there exists only one way (yet?) to have an opponent's creature block on your behalf: you must first steal that creature, and then block with it (as it has become YOUR creature now).
Reminiscing about a creature that recently went to the graveyard (or pointing to the spot it occupied on the table) is not a sacrifice. Neither is promising to move a creature to the graveyard Real Soon Now.
Just in case it's not clear for everyone, this part of Argus' comment uses IRONY. Consider yourself warned.
In Maryhainey's defense, it must be recognized that 'sacrifice' generates much confusion with new Magic players.
The reason being, as Davidb32 explained, that most sacrifice cards are not targetted, while most other aggressive spells are.
The prevalence of targetted spells trains newbies into the habit of responding to killer spells: hey, since your creature is about to die, why not make use of it, one last time, with Momentous Fall, for example?
This 'last gasp' strategy works well against targetted spells (and sweeps), but is useless against untargetted spells, such as most sacrifice cards, and new players often are not aware of this subtlety.
Magic is a very complex game; its Comprehensive Rulebook has more than 900 rules.
You might consider having a look at it, or having a look at the more palatable Basic Rulebook:
702.7a First strike (...) modifies the rules for the combat damage step.
506.1. The combat phase has five steps, which proceed in order: beginning of combat, declare attackers, declare blockers, combat damage, and end of combat. (...) There are two combat damage steps if any attacking or blocking creature has first strike (...).
If one relies too heavily on gut feelings rather than actually reading the rules, it's easy to reach the false conclusion that 'a first striker hits first whenever blows are exchanged'.
Please come back here often! People here are more than happy to help!
btw, sorceries, such as Joust, cannot be played during Combat Phase (unless some other weird card made it possible), which makes them anything but 'combat tricks'.
You get life equal to Hydra's +1/+1 counters.
Hydra enters the field WITH those counters; there never is a moment where Hydra is on the field without those counters.
Furthermore, you only get life when Verdant's ability resolves, at which time it is even possible Hydra has received (or lost) some counters, if some opponent responded with something nasty, for example.
Once it resolves, Mimic Vat's activated ability generates 2 effects:
1) 'Create a token'
2) 'Exile that token, later'**
Once generated, those effects exist on their own. Destroying Mimic Vat won't undo them.
There are ways to let the first efect resolve and then cancel the second effect.
**the second of Mimic Vat's effect, since it's being set up to happen at a later time, is called a 'delayed triggered ability'.
This delay doesn't change the fact that the effect has been created, and will happen, whatever occurs to Mimic Vat in the meantime.
@Peteroupc; you seem to have misunderstood the OP's question.
It always has been able to play lands. The updated wording only makes it clearer.
N.B. You still can play only one land per turn, and still must obey sorcery/instant timing restrictions.
That's impossible: players DO NOT trigger anything. Period.
Allow me to throw in some friendly advice:
Six of the most knowledgeable Magic rules afficionados are telling you this is not the way it works, including Natedogg, who is an official Magic representative and has been with this game for many, many years.
At some point, you'll have to trust us.
Instead of clinging to your mistaken interpretation, try and understand WHY and WHERE you are wrong.
Perhaps you were incorrectly taught the game. Find a Magic store: people there will be more than happy to teach you how this game is actually played.
There is an infinity of things the rulebook doesn't say.
Rules don't talk about things that don't happen.**
Rules tell us what does happen.
For example, no rule says "Players are not allowed to draw cards at will."
Still, we know they can't.
How do we know?
Because no rule says they can.
The unwritten rule of all (but one) games is "You can't do things which are not specifically allowed by the rules."
This rule tells us when Cabal Therapist triggers.
Admittedly, it doesn't say "oh, by the way, it triggers only once".
**some rules will tell us about things that don't happen. There are two reasons for this;
1) it often makes the rulebook shorter to say "can't" than to say "can, but only under the following conditions...". (example: rule 302.6)
2) to avoid common false extrapolations made by many new players. (example: rule 115.10a)
When Nova Chaser dies, Thunderblust comes back brand new, with no counter. (rule 122.2)
That's because Thunderblust did no die, it got exiled (by the Champion ability). (rule 702.71)
Only if it actually dies does Persist come into effect. (rule 700.4)
Yes.
Everytime it dies, a new check is made: does it have a -1/-1 counter? (rule 702.78a)
Both counters will disappear.
The +1/+1 and -1/-1 really anihilate each other. (rule 704.5q)
(as Rezzahan mentioned, these are the only counters in the game with such behavior)
The trick is to respond, not to Kudro's ability, but rather to respond before the human enters play.
If you kill some annoying creature while the human creature is about to resolve and enter play, then, when Kudro actually triggers, the annoying creature, being in the grave, is indeed a valid target for Kudro.
See here:
https://mtg.gamepedia.com/Future_Sight
Fountain's ability says it enters tapped, so it does. Nothing on Rainforest says not to.
Provoke's most common (unique?) usage is to get rid of a nasty creature by forcing it to make an undesirable block.
Plasma Elemental, for example, would keep attacking you, and never dare to block, of course... unless provoked.
As far as I can tell, there exists only one way (yet?) to have an opponent's creature block on your behalf: you must first steal that creature, and then block with it (as it has become YOUR creature now).
In Maryhainey's defense, it must be recognized that 'sacrifice' generates much confusion with new Magic players.
The reason being, as Davidb32 explained, that most sacrifice cards are not targetted, while most other aggressive spells are.
The prevalence of targetted spells trains newbies into the habit of responding to killer spells: hey, since your creature is about to die, why not make use of it, one last time, with Momentous Fall, for example?
This 'last gasp' strategy works well against targetted spells (and sweeps), but is useless against untargetted spells, such as most sacrifice cards, and new players often are not aware of this subtlety.
You might consider having a look at it, or having a look at the more palatable Basic Rulebook:
https://magic.wizards.com/en/game-info/gameplay/rules-and-formats/rules
Here are some rules you may stumble upon:
506.1. The combat phase has five steps, which proceed in order: beginning of combat, declare attackers, declare blockers, combat damage, and end of combat. (...) There are two combat damage steps if any attacking or blocking creature has first strike (...).
If one relies too heavily on gut feelings rather than actually reading the rules, it's easy to reach the false conclusion that 'a first striker hits first whenever blows are exchanged'.
Please come back here often! People here are more than happy to help!
btw, sorceries, such as Joust, cannot be played during Combat Phase (unless some other weird card made it possible), which makes them anything but 'combat tricks'.
Hydra enters the field WITH those counters; there never is a moment where Hydra is on the field without those counters.
Furthermore, you only get life when Verdant's ability resolves, at which time it is even possible Hydra has received (or lost) some counters, if some opponent responded with something nasty, for example.