Magic the Gathering rules

[Mr. President]

If the ability doesn't require you to tap the creature, you can use it while the creature is tapped.

[Ben Kenobi]

obiwan18, I think you should be moderating this thread to make sure it stays on-topic (this time)

Sorry. Sundays I'm in church.

Just getting caught up now.

Panda:

He's right about the priority.

Sloppy writing on my point to convey the idea that counterspells have much more flexibility under the new system than the old.

I don't see how this is off-topic, so hereuntoforthwith

I declare your comment off-topic.

[Ben Kenobi]

UR:

Suppose you have the Sliver Queen, a few colourless slivers, and the following:

Would paying 2 mana to sacriface a colourless silver token activate all these effects?

No. For each effect to trigger, you must sacrifice a creature. Therefore, you must decide which effect triggers since the same creature cannot be sacrificed twice.

[Ben Kenobi]

loinburger:

-Do Enchant World cards still work as originally intended, or have the rule changes buggered around with them?

Answered.

Question 1:
if I bring Lotus Vale into play while Celestial Dawn is in play, then am I exempt from the land sacrifice?

No. Celestial Dawn only triggers once the land is in play. The land sacrifice is part of the casting cost of Lotus Vale. Essentially, your combo turns Lotus Vale into a plains that forces you to sacrifice two other lands.

Question 2:
-If I Donate a Celestial Dawn (or some other similar enchantment) to my opponent, then does Celestial Dawn take immediate effect for my opponent and immediately lose its effect for me?

Celestial Dawn is a global enchantment so its effects will continue to affect you even after your opponent gains control of Celestial Dawn.

Question 3:
I ask specifically for the hypothetical when I've got a Gloom and Donate in my hand and have a Celestial Dawn in play -- if I cast a Donate and then a Gloom on the same turn, then does the Donate resolve first, or do they resolve at the same time?

No. Here's the deal. You cannot cast a sorcery on top of an enchantment spell on the stack. The sorcery spell must go on another stack. Therefore, whichever one you cast first will resolve first.

Question 4:
-By the same token, if I've got a land in play that produces more than one mana when tapped (e.g. Lotus Vale or Everglades) but also have a Celestial Dawn or Blood Moon in play (which causes my uber-land to produce only one mana), and I then tap this land for one mana and subsequently destroy the Celestial Dawn or Blood Moon, then am I then subject to mana burn?

No. Tapping for mana is faster than an instant. Therefore, when you destroy the enchantment, your mana is already in your pool, well before the instant can be cast, and your lands revert.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by obiwan18
Celestial Dawn is a global enchantment so its effects will continue to affect you even after your opponent gains control of Celestial Dawn.

Celestial Dawn affects only the controller. Otherwise it'd be like a super powerful version of Blood Moon,

[Urban Ranger]

What does "phasing" do?

Anybody want to take a guess what "storm" does?

[Mr. President]

Celestial Dawn says "you", which means its controller.

What does "phasing" do?

Anybody want to take a guess what "storm" does?

I couldn't honestly say I fully understand phasing. I think during your upkeep, you remove the creature from the game with all enchantments, counters, whatever still on it. During your next upkeep, it comes back into play, still with all those enchantments, counters, whatever on it.

Storm is almost as confusing. Suppose I want to play Dragonstorm, which lets me search my library for a Dragon and put it into play. If the Dragonstorm is the first spell I play on my turn, I search for one Dragon and put it into play. No problem.

But if, at the beginning of my main phase, I instead cast a Phyrexian Walker and Tormod's Crypt, and then cast Dragonstorm, the Storm ability counts how many spells were played before Dragonstorm this turn - two. It then makes two copies of Dragonstorm, which go on top of the stack. Each one resolves in turn, and I get to search my library for three Dragons and put them into play.

[Ben Kenobi]

I read that as a global enchantment.

Yes, as soon as you lose control of Celestial Dawn, you lose all the benefits.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by obiwan18
No. Celestial Dawn only triggers once the land is in play. The land sacrifice is part of the casting cost of Lotus Vale. Essentially, your combo turns Lotus Vale into a plains that forces you to sacrifice two other lands.

But the land sacrifice is only mentioned in its card text (not in the casting cost), and doesn't the card text no longer exist if it's a basic plains? Otherwise that would essentially mean that Celestial Dawn (and Blood Moon and any other "turns a land into a basic (blank)" card) causes you to suffer all of the ill effects of your non-basic lands, while gleaning none of their benefits...

If a land is turned into a basic (whatever), then wouldn't that land lose all of its special abilities and penalties?

Besides, even if the card text does exist, it wouldn't apply to the Lotus Vale, since I wouldn't be bringing a Lotus Vale into play (I'd only be bringing a basic Plains into play)...

[Mr. President]

That is way too confusing.

[loinburger]

It just seems to be that the two most likely resolutions to the Blood Moon / Celestial Dawn followed by Lotus Vale (or Scorched Ruins or whatever) followed by Disenchant (or whatever) combination are that either a. the land sacrifice is completely ignored or that b. the land sacrifice occurs when Blood Moon or Celestial Dawn (or whatever) is removed. Blood Moon and Celestial Dawn do not cause Lotus Vale to act as a mountain/plains in addition to being a Lotus Vale, they cause Lotus Vale to act as a mountain/plains in lieu of being a Lotus Vale, so it just doesn't make sense that the land sacrifice would have to take place despite the presence of Blood Moon or Celestial Dawn.

[Mr. President]

Oh, I see.

I guess when you play, you can just choose whichever one you like best.

[Urban Ranger]

However, the wording on the cards are different. Blood Moon says "All non-basic lands are Mountains." That clearly leave no room for interpretation - regardless if the lands are in play or in your hand, they are all mountains for the time being. The only sticky part is, when Blood Moon is removed, do you consider these non-basic lands just coming in to play or not?

For Celestial Dawn, it's a bit more complicated. IIRC, it affects lands "you control." Okay, so if you manage to steal some lands, they become plains. However, are lands in your hand (not in play) under your control?

[Panda]

< digs out his Magic Rulebook >
also found at www.wizards.com
edit: stupid parsing or URLs. Direct link is http://www.wizards.com/magic/comprul...les_043003.doc

410.10. "Trigger events that involve cards or permanents changing zones are called “zone-change triggers.” Many abilities with zone-change triggers attempt to do something to that card after it changes zones. During resolution, these abilities look for the card in the zone that it moved to. If the card leaves the specified zone before the ability resolves, the part of the ability attempting to do something to the card will fail to do anything. (This rule applies even if the card leaves the zone and returns again before the ability resolves.) The most common types of zone-change triggers are comes-into-play triggers and leaves-play triggers."

410.10a "Comes-into-play abilities trigger when a permanent enters the in-play zone. These are written, “When [this card] comes into play, . . . “ or “Whenever a [type] comes into play, . . .” Each time an event puts one or more permanents into play, all permanents in play (including the newcomers) are checked for any comes-into-play triggers that match the event."

410.10b "Continuous effects that modify characteristics of a permanent do so the moment the permanent is in play (and not before then). The permanent is never in play with its unmodified characteristics. Continuous effects don’t apply before the permanent is in play, however (see rule 410.10e)."
Example: If an effect reads “All lands are creatures” and a land card is played, the effect makes the land card into a creature the moment it enters play, so it would trigger abilities that trigger when a creature comes into play. Conversely, if an effect reads “All creatures lose all abilities” and a creature card with a comes-into-play triggered ability enters play, that effect will cause it to lose its abilities the moment it enters play, so the comes-into-play ability won’t trigger.

Therefore, the land comes into play as basic land. All text is blanked, so no costs are paid. If the enchantments controlling the static ability leaves play then there are still no costs to be paid because the land has never left play, and changing type or controller does not trigger the CIP ability.

[Panda]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
For Celestial Dawn, it's a bit more complicated. IIRC, it affects lands "you control." Okay, so if you manage to steal some lands, they become plains. However, are lands in your hand (not in play) under your control?

This is the distinction between "ownership" and "control" of a card. You "own" a card if it was originally in your deck, so cards which read: "return >this< to owner's hand" are important. Whereas you can "control" only permanents in play. If the card is in your hand, graveyard, or removed from play you still "own" the cards, but do not control them. There are multiple ways to exchange control of permanents, but ownership is unchanging.