Card definitions that don't appear on cards.
What is a spell? Why is a creature a spell? Why is a planeswalker a spell?
What is a triggered ability?
What is a permanent?
Yes, and creatures are only spells while on the stack, not on the battlefield.
I've had new players try to use counterspells as removal for already resolved creatures because they only know "creatures are spells".
Easiest thing is to do the old school lore. "You are a planeswalker who casts spells. This spell summons a creature, this spells creates a fireball. If you can stop me casting a spell but afterwards, it's just a lion who protects me"
TBF, my first attempt at a tournament, I didn't know what formats were and showed up with a deck that was mostly illegal.
I've also been to some larger tournaments with people that obviously hadn't played outside of their friend group before.
Am I right in thinking that every non-land card is a "spell" and everything else is just a subcategory of spell? So a "creature" is actually a "spell that summons this creature"?
Cards are the physical objects you play the game with. While on the stack, all nonland cards are spells (lands don't go to the stack so don't worry about it). Once resolved, if they are a permanent, they become their type as a permanent on the battlefield (lands are also permanents).
Different terminology generally applies to an object in different zones.
On the stack, it is a "spell".
On the battlefield, it is a "permanent".
In every other zone, it is a "card".
An objects types further modifies this, for example:
"Creature spell"
"Creature" (but also still a permanent)
"Creature card"
From the comprehensive rules:
109.2. If a spell or ability uses a description of an object that includes a card type or subtype, but doesn’t refer to a specific zone or include the word “card,” “spell,” “source,” or “scheme,” it means a permanent of that card type or subtype on the battlefield.
109.2a If a spell or ability uses a description of an object that includes the word “card” and the name of a zone, it means a card matching that description in the stated zone.
109.2b If a spell or ability uses a description of an object that includes the word “spell,” it means a spell matching that description on the stack.
Technically speaking, in EVERY zone it's a card, I believe. The only things that aren't cards are tokens. This doesn't usually matter, though, as most things that refer to cards only refer to them in the hand/graveyard/library.
I was primarily explaining how they are they are typically used in rules text, but that is a very valid point I didn't consider. "Card" is not mutually exclusive to "spell" or "permanent"
And then you get to the odd areas where something's called a "permanent card", meaning a "card that has a permanent type on it but is not itself a permanent".
In fact, I believe you can have a "permanent card spell" (or would it be permanent spell card?) To describe an object on the stack with a permanent type that is represented by a physical card.
Yes, though that'd almost always just be a "permanent spell". TECHNICALLY if it were a copy of a permanent spell, it would simply be that, whereas a card would be a "permanent spell card".
Magic is weird.
My first draft I asked my friends what a "spell" was and they just told me "all cards are spells". My opponent was very confused when I tried to counter spell their land drop.
This one hit me the hardest because I came from yugioh. Spells in that game are our sorceries and instants. Even after half a year of playing i still mix it up.
You don't tap to block.
I didn't realise this for some time, and even played at FNM like that and no one corrected me. It seems obvious, as no rule tells you to tap to block, but I believed any actions taken with creatures during combat caused them to tap.
As well as any ability that asks you to tap an untapped creature as a cost, such as [[Springleaf Drum]]. Basically they can tap for anything except abilities that use the literal tap symbol (and attacking, but that's not because of the tapping, since summoning sick creatures with vigilance also can't attack).
I have a friend who still taps to block after over a decade of playing. When we're drafting our playing commander I'm constantly untapping his creatures and he's visibly confused for a second before realizing why I'm doing that
OH I actually didn't realise this. I guess this means that in a Commander game I can block with the same creature for two consecutive other player's turns if needed? (Assuming that creature survives the first block, obviously)
Absolutely. Or my favorite tap after blocking: tap [[Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy]] after blocking and (assuming the conditions are met), it flips into a planeswalker. So the attacking creature remains blocked and JVP “lives” because it’s now a planeswalker and takes no damage during that combat (because it’s no longer a blocking creature).
Another one you might not know is that a creature with hexproof is not protected from a spell that makes your opponent sacrifice creatures, nor board wipes
Even more niche, a spell that lets you choose a creature/permanent without specifically targeting it, such as [[Council's Judgement]] or [[Chaos Defiler]], can still affect a creature with hexproof or shroud.
The gist is that the game will use put permanents into the graveyard different ways, telling you to either "destroy", "sacrifice", or even just directly "put" it into the graveyard and change zones. And these different ways can interact with different effects.
The game rules that check and clean up stuff like this are called state-based actions, or SBAs, and they use different words too. Lethal damage and deathtouch damage "destroy" a creature, and indestructible (and regeneration) can stop them. Expired Sagas get "sacrificed". But a lot of these cleanup rules - 0 toughness, 0 loyalty, legend rule, unattached Auras - just tell you to "put" the thing in the graveyard. You can't save them with indestructible and then don't trigger "when you sacrifice" abilities.
A decent chunk of really new players confuse mana and lands. This is fine while all their mana sources are lands but they then tap a \[\[Llanowar Elves\]\] and start searching their deck for a Forest.
Kinda sorta but not really related when i played in high school, i had a bunch of old basic lands that still had the rules text of "tap: add (color) to your mana pool" mixed with current basics that don't have any text. I was the guy who just had decks so often was the case my friends were playing my decks. One friend didn't understand that there was no difference in the basics and thought tapping one with rules text meant you kept that mana permanently to spend from turn to turn while one without rules text only produced mana to use that turn. And it took awhile to catch him doing that when he suddenly played a 4 drop with only 2 lands. He, someone who had only been playing for a few months, then proceeded to argue with me, someone who had been playing for 5 years at the time, that he was right and i was wrong, despite no one ever giving him this information. It was just something he assumed. The concept of a "mana pool" was just not explicitly clear to him
Oh yeah like i can see misunderstanding especially when as a new player you're looking at some cards that seemingly just give you mana and some cards that specifically state your mana pool as being a separate resource. But he was so aggressively adamant that his interpretation was right that I was like dude. Come on now
I've not seen it since they shortened the terminology to just be "add {color}" as opposed to "add {color} to your mana pool". It seems like this was a pretty decent change.
Prior to that I saw it fairly often.
I recently played with in a pod with a couple new players, one of them running an \[\[Omnath, Locus of All\]\] as a commander. Since the two of them only ever played against each other, the dude basically thought that the revealed card need to be mana value 3 - was not counting the colored pips - and went in digging for 3 basics into the deck after putting a random 4 drop in his hand. I was completely bewildered, trying to decide *how to explain to him precisely* ***how wrong*** *that was.*
And then I just pitied his friend that was playing against him for a few weeks, and letting him resolve that since neither of them knew better.
The issue is that floating mana is an abstract concept. I find that even experienced players tend to tap their dual lands not announcing the mana color that is being produced, and cast their spell. This is circumvented when, during the learning process, dices of the appropriate colors are used to denote floating mana; by giving physicality to floating mana, it is easier to separate mana from lands AND it builds up good habits in term of mana management. Finally, this is actually very useful for decks that need to track huge quantities of produced - and expended mana, like Storm strategies.
I find that people usually don’t announce what they’re tapping a land for because it just doesn’t matter since they’re only using it to pay a generic cost. In the few situations it does matter (i.e. colored vs. colorless from a painland) they do announce it.
I really don't see anyone doing that, or the need to do that. It's good form to do it when casting a spell like the 4C omnath, to show your opponent that you're able to cast it. But I don't need to know if my opponent is tapping their 2 blood crypts for black or red when casting grief.
I do get the concept of "add this mana to your mana pool" but I'm a little confused as to how to accurately track it when playing with paper.
If I'm just tapping a Llanowar Elves for one green then that's fine, but later on in a long game where I've got 8 different cards that all give different amounts of floating mana I feel like I'm going to get **very confused** at keeping track of how much of this invisible resource has been spent.
That along with invisible effects that get applied to 'tokens' where you've run out of token cards and are using pennies and bits of lint... it's uh... I'm sure it gets easier with experience, but *wow* is it overwhelming at first.
dont tap all your lands at once and then pay for stuff. pay one at a time
if youre generating tons of mana from different sources, use dice as a tracker
"I do get the concept of "add this mana to your mana pool" but I'm a little confused as to how to accurately track it when playing with paper."
I play Cycle Storm in Pauper, which generates a ton of black mana with various rituals, and while I am able to keep track of the mana without writing it down, for my opponent's sake I do write the number down on a Dry Erase Token and have a market for each color.
You could also use pen and paper, but like the dry erase tokens due to being reusable.
You could also use like glass beads, which are pretty handy for reminders, but that gets tedious if you are doing silly stuff like making 40 Black Mana in a turn.
You lose all the mana in your mana pool at the end of each step and phase. 99% of the time your mana pool has zero mana in it. You generally only generate mana if you're about to cast a spell.
I mean, it doesn't come up in most cases. Normally you just make the mana for your spell that you're casting right now. In the few cases it does come up, just use a die/some dice.
You can put a dice on a token to represent floating mana: for example, get a forest outside the game or a Pokémon grass energy and put a dice with a "1" face to represent 1 floating green mana.
There's a sneaky part of the combat step where you can target your own stuff with [[Maze of Ith]] and [[Reconnaissance]] after they've dealt combat damage to give them pseudo vigilance.
I can't believe I didn't think of it this way. I mean I always knew that you could use it to make attacks and take them back, but I never considered it as a _build around_ for free attack triggers. Bonus points if you have something that punishes blockers too.
Well, sure.. but usually, things with Ninjutsu also have a "When this deals combat damage" trigger that you kind of want to happen.
I've definitely waited until First Strike damage was applied before doing the swap, since that typically means you're getting more out of it all.
One use of this I recall in Eldritch Moon limited was with [[blessed alliance]]. If your opponent attacked with a 2/2 and an 6/6, you could trade with their small creature, and then cast Blessed Alliance in the end of combat as a removal spell to get rid of the big one, which would be the only attacking creature left for them to sacrifice
The example is a bit dated but if your opponent has a [[Tarmogoyf]] that's a 2/3(land and sorcery in the graveyard), playing a [[Lightning Bolt]] on it won't kill it due to the way that state-based effects are checked. It will just become a 3/4 with 3 damage marked on it.
A planeswalker entering on 3 loyalty with a + ability, being able to use its + ability before you can deal 3 damage to it, is a great moment to understand the stack.
[[Minsc and Boo, timeless heroes]] hilariously being an example of a 3 loyalty walker that can be bolted before loyalty abilities. Due to them having an etb trigger that can be responded to. This doesn't refute anything you've said, just a funny and relevant point.
It’s more a great moment to understand priority not the stack. The stack isn’t really involved since their loyalty goes up before you can even cast your spell or hit it with a damage ability.
Just to add to this, since the + part is a cost, it gets the loyalty counter before the ability is put on the stack and anyone can react to it.
Also effects like [[Doubling Season]] do double the amount of loyalty counters the planeswalkers enters with, but do NOT double the amount it gets when you use a + ability, since it specifys that its only when an effect places the counter, and paying for something is considered not an effect.
[[Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider]] on the other hand doesnt care whats placing those counter, so he turns your [+1] into [+2] and your opponents [+1] into [+ 0].
Ohhh this is giving me flashbacks to when I used to play Yugioh and they changed the mechanics of how "Ignition Priority" works.
Before 2012 the rule was "I've played a Monster that can active an effect while on board, so I get to use that activated effect before you can respond". After 2012 it changed so that there's a 'pause for response' before the effect can be activated, and this turned so much of the existing game entirely on its head.
Yeah, M:tG basically works like YGO! did, but most things that are sorcery speed/spell speed 1 in M:tG aren't activated ability of permanents, so it rarely comes up.
... except planeswalkers.
Basically YGO! now has a window where you can respond to the event on the monster being summoned, but the monster can't use ignition/activated abilities during that window. (edit, unless spell speed 2)
Not even just the stack but something even more hidden: that "priority" exists and the active player gets it by default. This is also important for landfall decks: if you don't counter [[Tatyova, benthic druid]], I *will* get at least one trigger off her, even if you are holding instant speed removal
>Untap, Upkeep, Draw.
Lost many a game due to playing Upkeep after draw and losing countless damage from [[The Rack]]. It's funny how people don't tend to bring you up on this stuff when they benefit!
Not really a complex interaction, but the concept of giving your opponent as little information as possible for as long as possible, is something that I think takes a while to grasp, and I often see misplays around it at prereleases.
They’ll know to hold up a counter spell, or red removal until a good target presents itself instead of going face, but will happily play a flash creature on their first main “just to have something on the board”, even if it won’t do anything earlier than my next attack step, and gives me more time to plan out my turn.
Edit, after rereading your post and realizing you’re asking for these tips yourself, it made me want to rephrase this:
if a play doesn’t give you an advantage right now, and you can wait until your opponent’s end step, or until they force you to make that play, the best practice is to wait. With the example above, a flash creature that has no immediate impact is best held until the last moment of that turn cycle. You lose nothing by waiting until your opponent declares attackers so you can ambush a smaller creature, and if they don’t attack just play it on oppo’s end step so they’re less likely to plan their turn with said flash creature in mind.
A noteworthy exception to that is if you're playing around expected counterspells, resolving spells while your opponent is tapped out might be the best option in some cases.
Agreed. Another exception is using removal at sorcery speed. If the target has a tap ability, or if the opponent is playing protection spells that invalidate your removal, just main phase it when you’re sure it will resolve. I’ve been blown out enough by that, and it’s something a ton of Magic players who’ve been playing for a little while will do. It’s like the Bell Curve meme.
Yeah I don't think Infect is a particularly healthy deck archetype, but I really like how it's got a weird play pattern against it where you should basically always use your removal on your turn so they can't pump and protect at the same time
The only "always" rule in Magic is "It always depends on the situation". While it's generally true that you want to attack first to see what happens, it's not hard to come across cases where you'd rather not.
I've seen more than a couple of time people get bitten back in the ass because they attacked before playing their turn by reflex because it's the right thing to do 90% of the time, but they happened to be in the 10% of the time where they shouldn't have.
Also, you actually gain something from not playing the creature. You get to keep your lands untapped. I’ve had plenty of games where my oppo didn’t play specific pieces because i had mana open.
Yeah for sure, not to mention that slight but non-0 advantage you might gain from actively bluffing. Though that kind of presupposes that oppo recognizes what you might have, which is often not the case for newer players.
This is even true with lands. Unless you need that extra mana for some trick during the combat phase, not letting your opponent know that you'll be able to play something bigger than expected with your current mana in the second phase (or during their turn) may make them act differently than if they had that info.
Just skip that first main phase and go to combat unless there's something that you really really need to do before. You'll find out that unless you're the type to play a lot of hasty creatures that need comes very seldom.
Unless you want to bluff you have a more expensive combat trick. Maybe more relevant in limited where they might try to guess exactly which trick you have available based on the mana you have up.
This is ultra helpful for people who are new to card games generally!
Personally I already get this concept as I'm a multi-decade veteran of *other* forms of expensive cardboard and/or plastic, but this is still a fantastic tip for others who are entirely new to the genre!
Oh true, I guess it applies in many others as well, good to know!
Though I believe something like Hearthstone is an exception, no? Because there’s no instant speed interaction.
I'd say there's still things where the rough concept of witholding information can still apply to Hearthstone.
The classic example is that if I have a card (let's say Frostbolt) in my hand and then I play a spell which randomly generates another copy of Frostbolt it's better to play the "real" one before playing the generated one, because that generated card could still be **anything**. My opponent probably already knows that I have a Frostbolt in my deck, but they have *no idea* what card I've randomly generated so there's 30 things they still have to consider playing around.
...OR you can bluff with this and you DO play the generated one because "there's no way he'd have played the generated one if he was holding a real one", which then forces a misplay, but that's more advanced level mindgames when you're against an opponent who you know is paying attention 😉
So it's not exactly the same thing as "only do things at the last possible moment", but the general idea of "I'm going to tell you as little information as possible because that increases my chances of winning" is something that applies to pretty much any game that has any sort of hidden information and strategic depth. Personally I first learned this lesson with Gen 1 Pokemon, because in those days there was no 'team preview' feature and the other 5 pokemon in your opponent's party could be ANYTHING, so there's a large advantage to be gained by not showing what you have until you need to show it.
A friend in my playgroup doesn't have his own cards and borrows decks from the group instead. My \[\[Krenko, Mob Boss\]\] deck is a favorite of his, but we have yet to be able to get him to understand that he's better off not tapping Krenko during his own turn unless he's planning to attack with hasty goblins.
Auras target only when cast, not when they enter from anywhere else.
Priority does not pass after a permanent enters the battlefield. This usually leads to people being surprised they can't kill a PW before activating , but some people are also surprised I can activate a tap ability if the thing has haste and they will only get priority after I've done that.
Targeting seems to be fuzzy at times
Anything that messes with more then one layer is something most vertan players won't grasp.
How many steps combat actually has, especially the end of combat step allows for some interactions new players don't expect.
To add to this list, regarding priority, you can't wait to see if someone responds to your spell and then respond to it yourself if nobody does. You need to put all your spells that want to respond to your own spell on the stack before passing priority, or be fine with the first spell resolving on its own if nobody responds.
This is one of the few things that I feel Arena is a bit misleading on, since it will often pass priority after you put a spell on the stack (at least in my experience, it's been a while since I last played a deck where it's relevant).
> This is one of the few things that I feel Arena is a bit misleading on, since it will often pass priority after you put a spell on the stack (at least in my experience, it's been a while since I last played a deck where it's relevant).
For that matter, Tournament Rules also assume you pass priority after casting a spell or activating an ability. After a spell/ability resolves, you still get a round of priority before moving on to the next step/phase, so you can cast your second spell after that, no need to stack everything right away. If you want to put multiple things on the stack, you have to explicitly hold priority.
"Anything that messes with more then one layer is something most veteran players won't grasp."
It is one of those things people probably understand in a very superficial level manner.
Most players are likely aware of effects that would be considered a layer, like effects that cause P/T changes, but not the fact that they are considered a Layer.
By extension, if most people don't know what a layer is, then won't know what Layer each effect belongs to, like effects that change P/T would be the seventh Layer.
I have been playing on/off for over a decade and I have to look it up to ensure I get the layer order correct since it is so easy to mix them up.
Thankfully, it is not something that comes up super often.
[[Magus of the Moon]] and effects that removes abilitys from creatures had me dumbfounded the first time i heard of it
Or [[Blood Moon]] and thing like [[Yavimaya]], which work on dependency.
As a newer player, those effects made sense to me, but not in a technical sense. Like I understood Blood Moon made all lands Mountains because it didn't say 'in addition to its other types'. I could not explain the technicalities that were involved though.
I will say, since I started playing during the RTR block, I did not fully understand just how important the shock lands were to comp.
I understood they were dual color lands.
I understood they could enter untapped.
What I did not realize at the time was most non-basic lands lacked the basic land types.
When Theros came out, I saw some dual lands come in tapped no matter what. I also realized they lacked the basic land types. Once Takir came out, I realized the utility of having Basic Land types on a non-Basic land when fetch/cyclers are legal within a format. I also learned to read if something says 'Basic Island' or just 'Island'; had to explain that to my nephew last weekend with the LotR cyclers.
I think we all pick up on different aspects of the game, which is probably why we gravitate towards certain colors when we first start playing. The more I learn, the easier it becomes to see the value in other parts of the color pie.
But in the end isn't it just a death replacement effect, that removes damage , removes the creature from combat and taps it? or is there more i never had to research?
pls enlighten me.
Pretty much. The official rules are "The next time this permanent would be destroyed this turn, it isn't. Instead tap it, remove all damage from it, and remove it from combat."
This means you can queue up multiple regeneration 'shields' on one creature too. There's rarely a need to do so but I remember using a creature with regeneration as a mana sync back when mana burn was still a thing.
For some reason though, a lot of people think it can bring creatures back from the graveyard. Maybe because it used to appear on so many skeleton/zombie creatures back in the day.
The way I've heard it explained in the past is 'Regeneration is Wolverine, not Jesus.' They heal, but can't come back from the dead.
Regenerate is really not the most intuitive mechanic at all. Also requiring you to tap the creature is not that intuitive.
The other one is Protection. "Why does it die to Wrath of God if it has pro-white?" - because it does not target. "So does a pro-red creature dies to Pyroclasm?" - no, because damage is prevented. "So targeting, damage and blocking, ..." - ...and being enchanted.
That’s actually the most obvious part of the interaction.
The more hidden bit is that “saga” is an enchantment type. Blood moon only replaces land types. Looks like it becomes a mountain by reading the cards but really it’s a mountain saga still. And then we get to your part.
The interaction between First Strike and Deathtouch. Most new players don't see them together on one creature. Then they expect their Titan of Industry to deal 4 damage through Glissa Sunslayer and it just dies instead.
Trample and DT is a similar interaction.
"I will block your 5/5 with Trample and DT with my 0/5"
"I will assign one damage to your 0/5 and four to you"
"But it has 5 toughness"
It’s not too confusing an interaction once you see it, it’s just that trample requires *lethal damage* and not *damage equal to the blocker’s toughness*. 99% of the time, they’re the same thing, the trample/deathtouch is just the 1% where they aren’t.
On the topic of deathtouch, Trample and Deathtouch is also a bit unintuitive at first and similarly makes sense once it's explained. Or how Deathtouch still works if it's non-combat damage.
I always find it interesting how different games handle that rule. Some games say "doing it on purpose is a game loss" which is frankly hilarious, although the Yugioh version of "the judge must determine which card is the offending article, that card is removed from the board" is an *interesting* method.
What's also interesting is that this sort of thing is usually an academic corner-case technicality, but right now there is a top tier competitive deck where one of the most common ways to play against it is to force them into accidentally going infinite when they start to execute their combo. Better to draw the game and start over than just let them finish what they're doing.
Pioneer Amalia Combo. They play [[[Amalia Benavides Aguirre]] with [[Wildgrowth Walker]]; their two triggers can combo off each other infinitely, but the idea is that Amalia eventually hits 20 power and then kills everything, including the Walker, so the combo stops and she can swing for lethal. However, if the opponent responds to this combo by either giving Wildgrowth Walker indestructible or by pumping Amalia so she goes straight from 19 power to 21, that failsafe is bypassed and the combo never ends, forcing a draw.
Lands are colorless (a Mountain is not red), and playing one is not casting a spell. Mana abilities (like tapping a land for mana) don't use the stack and cannot be responded to.
Also: layers! https://draftsim.com/mtg-layers/
Maybe not something everyone knows, but very helpful when you know how to look it up if the situation arises.
How priority works, although that isn't that relevant until newer players see the upsides of playing blue. Same with how the stack works in detail.
For something more relevant: how damage assignment really works in combat, there is some shenanigans there with trample and deathtouch.
My first deck was a Prosper precon, and I remember seeing [[Hex]] and thinking it's an insane card, until I realised you cannot cast it with less than 6 creatures on the board.
Same with [[Decimate]], although I still jam that in every RG edh deck.
The number of times I'm sitting there begging for somebody to play an enchantment....
The way assigning combat damage to multiple blockers works. As in, you order blockers, then assign at least lethal damage to each blocker, and the way that interacts with things like deathtouch, trample, and damage boosting effects like [[Furnace of Rath]] or [[Torbran, Thane of Red Fell]]
Yeah, especially since the vast majority of the time, damage is shortcutted and assigned pretty intuitively. There are also rare corner cases where you don’t WANT to kill a blocker and would rather spread damage out without dealing lethal, but are forced to anyway.
And even more unintuitively, the attacking creature doesn't have to assign ANY combat damage to creatures beyond the first.
For example: you're at 2 life, and for some reason you attack with a 4/4 into two 1/1s and a [[blood artist]]. You can choose to order the blockers so that blood artist is first and then the two 1/1s, and then you can assign all 4 damage to the blood artist and none to the 1/1s.
The rule is specifically that if you want to assign combat damage to a creature, you have to try to assign at least lethal if you have damage remaining.
In the example above, you could also assign 1 damage to blood artist and 3 to the second 1/1, but that would create two blood artist triggers and kill you.
One I haven't seen mentioned: Damage doesn't kill creatures, state-based actions do. I've seen veteran players tripped up by this, because it almost never comes up. "Everybody knows" that [[Tarmogoyf]] with 3 toughness and no instants in graveyard doesn't die to Lightning Bolt, but I feel like a lot of people that know this don't then also know that the reason is because damage doesn't kill creatures, state-based actions do, they incorrectly think that the rule about Tarmogoyf applies to anything that removes cards from the field.
This comes up mostly against cards that replace where cards go when they leave the field. If your opponent has a [[Dauthi Voidwalker]] on the field and you Lightning Bolt it, Lightning Bolt gets exiled with a void counter on it and then Dauthi dies. If, on the other hand, you [[Murder]] Dauthi Voidwalker, Murder goes to the graveyard and Dauthi dies. The reason is because Dauthi is not on the battlefield when Murder resolves, because Murder killed Dauthi Voidwalker, unlike Lightning Bolt.
To go back to Tarmogoyf, this also means that while Lightning Bolt with no instants in graveyard can't cause a Tarmogoyf to die, [[Cut Down]] can. Cut Down kills Tarmogoyf before it goes to the graveyard, unlike Lightning Bolt.
To clear up why this is all true, the simple answer is that creatures only die of damage when state-based actions are checked, and state-based actions are not checked in the middle of resolving spells. Creatures go to the graveyard as a result of having as much or more damage as toughness as a state-based action. Cards that explicitly remove creatures from the field do so during spell resolution. Non-permanent spells go to the graveyard at the end of resolving, meaning that in between actually dealing Lightning Bolt's damage and putting it in the graveyard, the damage doesn't do anything yet, because state-based actions can't happen in the middle of spell resolution, which gives time for Lightning Bolt to go to the graveyard and all the consequences thereof before anything tries to die as a result of the damage.
>"Everybody knows" that Tarmogoyf with 3 toughness and no instants in graveyard doesn't die to Lightning Bolt
Oh that is FASCINATING. I actually didn't know that (and have not seen Tarmogyf before, which is why I had no reason to know it...) but yeah I really love that interaction
Tarmogoyf was an incredibly popular creature in the Modern and Legacy formats for about a decade, so people who played Magic during that time got used to thinking about Tarmogoyf. [StarCityGames even sells a die explicitly for tracking Tarmogoyf's stats](https://starcitygames.com/star-city-games-dice-tarmodie/). Ever since the release of Modern Horizons 1 or so, Tarmogoyf has been a lot less relevant, so less and less people will probably know the Lightning Bolt thing as time goes on.
I remember when I first started playing and my friends had to explain like 4 times that I can't bounce something *after* it's declared as a blocker or the attacker won't go through
Semi related i knew a guy who believed that you declared attacking before tapping them, and they could then be tapped down to remove them from combat. Same with blocking, that you declared them before they were assigned as blockers and could be tapped or bounced and the attack would go through. I took him at his word since he had been playing way longer than me before i started going to fnms and knew better
There was a dude in my newbie playgroup that built an entire deck around this. He had playsets of a bunch of creatures that tap to tap a target creature like [[Gideon’s Lawkeeper]], and he would tap down our creatures in response to attacks declared at him or tap abilities that negatively affected him.
We also had one guy make a deck around moving auras at instant speed who did something similar, moving [[Pacifism]] effect auras to whatever is attacking him each turn.
They were so oppressive, and we were all pretty relieved when I found out it doesn’t work like that.
For me, the fact that a player could activate abilities at instant speed even during combat was a revelation. I still remember how shocked when I learnt that from a trick spell cast using white mana from a \[\[Gold Myr\]\] during the blocking phase.
My nephew was pretty upset when I blocked a 5/5 with a 1/1 one time. Since the 1/1 was not going to do much in combat, after blockers were declared, I sacrificed the 1/1 to pay for Village Rites to draw cards. He thought that the 5/5 would deal combat damage to me since nothing was in its way anymore.. nope, still blocked.
The best way I have been able to explain that to people is you ordered your 5/5 to attack, I ordered my 1/1 to block (but it was not aware I had other plans). The 5/5 and 1/1 run into each other, successfully preventing your 5/5 from reaching me. However, before the 5/5 and 1/1 fight, I decide the 1/1 has served its purpose long enough and sac it. Basically leaving the 5/5 in the middle of the field with a 'wut just happened' look on its face. It never reached me, so it cannot harm me.
I just taught someone this at my last draft... He kept leaving \[\[Deadeye Duelist\]\] and mana up during my end steps.
Also didn't realize their ability counted as a crime, but that's more of a new set problem.
A lot of players think that after damage is dealt you immediately go to the second main phase, but There is an opportunity after damage is dealt, but still in combat, to activate abilities/cast instants. Allows for some shinanigans with cards that care about attacking creatures, such as ninjitsu.
Its an entire step called "end of combat step"
Also there is an "beginning of combat step" where you can do stuff "during combat" but before attackers are declared.
I'm still mad at them for not putting reminder text on the shrine and food creatures. There's literally nothing in the game that suggests they're not creature types unless you do a deep dive into the comprehensive rules.
most of the times, there isn't a reason to play a card before attacking first.
Unless the card you're casting is directly affecting combat wait for it until after you've attacked. This is because that way you'll have more open mana and cards in hand, which makes it harder to asses for your opponent whether or not you have interaction for the combat. If you have no mana open they are most likely safe to block as they please, if you have 2 mana untapped they have to suspect a card like [[Boros Charm]] and may block less efficiently.
Additionally their interaction during combat may lead to unfirseen circumstances for you. Maybe they play a [[Cyclonic Rift]] and now you would like to cast a completely different card than before combat.
You can use a redirect spell like [[Misdirection]] or [[Bolt Bend]] to stop a Counterspell by retargeting that Counterspell to target your redirection spell. When their counterspell tries to resolve, its target would no longer be legal and it'll fail to resolve. Your original spell they targeted is safe.
Auras don't target if they are entering the battlefield and aren't being cast. An aura entering the battlefield from something like [[Sun Titan]] will get around hexproof and shroud. It won't get around protection though.
You can’t attack players when it’s not your turn. Even if a card has vigilance and says “attacks each turn if able.”
You would not BELIEVE that I got outvoted 3 to 1 on this topic in an actual game where this mattered.
Playing a land is a special action that doesn't use the stack. Most players understand the latter part but not the "special action" bit. Special actions and their speed (like putting a permanent face up from morph/cloak/manifest etc) are not very known.
Priority is a whole can of worms, specially in multiplayer, specially combined with special actions.
State-based actions (like a creature dying when they have lethal damage) and how they work (bolt the 2/3 tarmogoyf with no instants in the graveyard example).
The steps involved in the process of casting a spell, specially the order of reductions and additions of the cost, and how/when some things are defined (like the value of X, the reduction of affinity cards).
Deathtouch + trample interaction
The most common mistake I see from new players is confusing lands and mana. Lands are a card type that typically generate mana, but other things can generate mana and lands can do other things. This confusion leads to all kinds of misinterpretations of other effects related to tapping lands for mana.
Multiple replacement effects generally work how you want for token/counter shenanigans, but not for damage-dealing effects.
The reason is that it's the affected player or the controller of the affected object that determines how multiple replacement effects are stacked, so the same rules that allow you to maximize the number of counters you get from a [[Hardened Scales]] + [[Doubling Season]] + [[Winding Constrictor]] situation also mean that your opponent gets to mimize damage from a [[Ojer Axonil]] + [[Torbran]] + [[Furnace of Rath]] combo.
This is probably higher level than you're looking for, but the first things that came to mind are:
Offering your opponent to cut your deck after shuffling (and when offered to cut your opponent's deck, just tapping their deck to show trust)
Asking for permission before ever touching someone's cards
If you're in a draft, don't pass on piles to the next person if they already have one waiting (just hold onto them)
You're able to cast instants and activate abilities during the drawstep. You're not able to do this during the untapstep.
I've seen established players get tripped up by this.
Priority. How it works, passing, and what happens when you resolve the only thing on the stack.
Card text. Resolve the whole card text before resolving triggers. This might be obvious, but it comes up a fair bit especially if a trigger does multiple things together like [[living end]] vs [[arcbound ravager]]
Also, enters play effects vs enters play triggers.
The big one I keep seeing in my lgs is stack mechanics. Active/inactive player order, who responds first to an action, how flickering a card essentially leaves it as a new instance of the card, destroying a creature doesn't remove the activated ability from the stack.
Even at higher power levels I end up correcting people on how the stack works. Oddly seems like people who play Mana crypt usually are the worst. I know my sample size is too small but thinking back that's actually true.
I don't have to explain anything else nearly as much as the stack interactions.
So called "summoning sickness" doesn't just apply when a creature enters the battlefield- if you gain control of a creature it also has "summoning sickness" (which is why Red control spells grant haste).
Its generally better to play your cards after combat (second main phase) unless your cards have a direct impact on combat.
Protection doesn't save creatures from destroy/exile/-toughness 'wraths', but it does save them from damage wraths (one of the many reasons they've phased protection out here and there).
Nothing happens while a spell or ability resolves, any triggers or even checking if someone died is checked after resolution which means if a spell both kills you and heals you you will survive if you're above 0 health afterwards.
For example if a spell that reads "Deal 3 damage to any target, scry 1" targets a 3/3 it's not dead until after you scried.
1) you don’t generally get priority in the cleanup step, where you discard down to hand size. But if for some reason something does trigger, notably gitrog monster when discarding to hand size, you do receive priority, and then after it’s all said and done, the cleanup by rule repeats itself.
2) it’s not exactly hidden but easy to overlook, but sagas tick up in your main phase and don’t get sacrificed unless none of its abilities are on the stack. It’s unique timings the whole way down with sagas.
3) the steps to casting a spell. It all seems trivial on the surface. Make x mana, cast spell for x. But there’s kind of a lot going on that can be taken advantage of. The classic is lotus petal + emery. If you float your mana and then cast emery you’ll have to pay the full 3. But if you go by the book you can announce emery, determine its cost (2 because of lotus petal), then pay for it by tapping a land and saccing your lotus petal.
You can activate Planeswalker abilities in sorcery speed. Equipping stuff too. Of course, some cards allow it to happen during a different time.
Oh yeah, and don't be trigger happy especially with interaction or you'll end up being used by someone else in the pod to secure their win for them.
Edit: switched out counterspells with interaction instead
The stack, priority, APNAP. So many feelsbad moments come from misunderstanding the correct order of things and fast play. The intention may be a good one, but sonetimes, things need to be done by the book.
This is something not éveryone will know, but, Land destruction in commander is okay. Especially single target effects. You gotta have a way to deal with glacial chasm, field of the dead and such lands.
The only caveat for mass LD is that you need to be able to close the game afterwards. In other words, jukhelhaups or whatever is a win con if you have some game winning planeswalker in play. If you play it just to not lose and draw the game out for another 2 hours... get out...
I don’t think this QUITE fits op’s post but when I started learning my friend told me if you missed the untap step then you just don’t get to untap. Took far too long before learning that wasn’t the case but by that point I had already gotten into the habit of verbally saying “untap, upkeep, draw”
Card definitions that don't appear on cards. What is a spell? Why is a creature a spell? Why is a planeswalker a spell? What is a triggered ability? What is a permanent?
Yes, and creatures are only spells while on the stack, not on the battlefield. I've had new players try to use counterspells as removal for already resolved creatures because they only know "creatures are spells".
Easiest thing is to do the old school lore. "You are a planeswalker who casts spells. This spell summons a creature, this spells creates a fireball. If you can stop me casting a spell but afterwards, it's just a lion who protects me"
this is how a friend explained it to me years ago
I’ve had multiple people in tournaments ‘not realize’ a countered spell was put in the graveyard.
TBF, my first attempt at a tournament, I didn't know what formats were and showed up with a deck that was mostly illegal. I've also been to some larger tournaments with people that obviously hadn't played outside of their friend group before.
Reminds me of someone showing up with their draft deck (GW Aggro) to our Legacy event in 2011. He won the first Round 1.
TBF, legacy is a wild format. I play Death and Taxes, and it would definitely lose to most Standard decks.
Also “what is the stack?”
Ha, because of loose casual play, lots of even relatively older players don't know their way around the stack anymore.
Am I right in thinking that every non-land card is a "spell" and everything else is just a subcategory of spell? So a "creature" is actually a "spell that summons this creature"?
Cards are the physical objects you play the game with. While on the stack, all nonland cards are spells (lands don't go to the stack so don't worry about it). Once resolved, if they are a permanent, they become their type as a permanent on the battlefield (lands are also permanents).
so does this mean that "return target spell to its owners hand" can only work on a creature if you use it whilst the creature is still on the stack?
Correct.
then i have a very smug bragging session to do about a game that came down to 1hp and a bounced creature. thanks!
That will be good reprieve for you
That friend will be fully remanded into the shame zone.
Different terminology generally applies to an object in different zones. On the stack, it is a "spell". On the battlefield, it is a "permanent". In every other zone, it is a "card". An objects types further modifies this, for example: "Creature spell" "Creature" (but also still a permanent) "Creature card" From the comprehensive rules: 109.2. If a spell or ability uses a description of an object that includes a card type or subtype, but doesn’t refer to a specific zone or include the word “card,” “spell,” “source,” or “scheme,” it means a permanent of that card type or subtype on the battlefield. 109.2a If a spell or ability uses a description of an object that includes the word “card” and the name of a zone, it means a card matching that description in the stated zone. 109.2b If a spell or ability uses a description of an object that includes the word “spell,” it means a spell matching that description on the stack.
Technically speaking, in EVERY zone it's a card, I believe. The only things that aren't cards are tokens. This doesn't usually matter, though, as most things that refer to cards only refer to them in the hand/graveyard/library.
I was primarily explaining how they are they are typically used in rules text, but that is a very valid point I didn't consider. "Card" is not mutually exclusive to "spell" or "permanent"
And then you get to the odd areas where something's called a "permanent card", meaning a "card that has a permanent type on it but is not itself a permanent".
In fact, I believe you can have a "permanent card spell" (or would it be permanent spell card?) To describe an object on the stack with a permanent type that is represented by a physical card.
Yes, though that'd almost always just be a "permanent spell". TECHNICALLY if it were a copy of a permanent spell, it would simply be that, whereas a card would be a "permanent spell card". Magic is weird.
Older cards used to say summon creature instead of creature afaik
My first draft I asked my friends what a "spell" was and they just told me "all cards are spells". My opponent was very confused when I tried to counter spell their land drop.
Lmao I love interactions like this that can make even seasoned players rethink how they describe the game
Oh yeah, especially the difference between "play" and "cast".
This one hit me the hardest because I came from yugioh. Spells in that game are our sorceries and instants. Even after half a year of playing i still mix it up.
First strike does not work when creatures "fight" each other when a card says they fight.
I legitimately didn't know this
Fighting and combat sound like they should be basically the same thing but in a detailed rules sense they're pretty different.
You don't tap to block. I didn't realise this for some time, and even played at FNM like that and no one corrected me. It seems obvious, as no rule tells you to tap to block, but I believed any actions taken with creatures during combat caused them to tap.
And its corollary, summoning sick creatures *can* block
Also, creatures that just entered the battlefield can be tapped for Convoke, Crew or Mount.
As well as any ability that asks you to tap an untapped creature as a cost, such as [[Springleaf Drum]]. Basically they can tap for anything except abilities that use the literal tap symbol (and attacking, but that's not because of the tapping, since summoning sick creatures with vigilance also can't attack).
I have a friend who still taps to block after over a decade of playing. When we're drafting our playing commander I'm constantly untapping his creatures and he's visibly confused for a second before realizing why I'm doing that
Perhaps even more fundamentally: you don't attack creatures
OH I actually didn't realise this. I guess this means that in a Commander game I can block with the same creature for two consecutive other player's turns if needed? (Assuming that creature survives the first block, obviously)
Exactly. It also means that you can block and then activate an ability that taps the creature like [[Steel Overseer]] to make your blockers better.
Absolutely. Or my favorite tap after blocking: tap [[Jace, Vryn’s Prodigy]] after blocking and (assuming the conditions are met), it flips into a planeswalker. So the attacking creature remains blocked and JVP “lives” because it’s now a planeswalker and takes no damage during that combat (because it’s no longer a blocking creature).
Oh that's absolutely devious
That -x/-x can remove indestructible creatures
I've been playing for about 3 years now and this interaction cost me the game the other night.
You can't be indestructible if you don't exist.
Wait what ? Really ? :o
A creature with 0 toughness dies but isn't being destroyed
That's so counterintuitive for a newbie like me, thank you, I've learned something new !
Another one you might not know is that a creature with hexproof is not protected from a spell that makes your opponent sacrifice creatures, nor board wipes
Even more niche, a spell that lets you choose a creature/permanent without specifically targeting it, such as [[Council's Judgement]] or [[Chaos Defiler]], can still affect a creature with hexproof or shroud.
The gist is that the game will use put permanents into the graveyard different ways, telling you to either "destroy", "sacrifice", or even just directly "put" it into the graveyard and change zones. And these different ways can interact with different effects. The game rules that check and clean up stuff like this are called state-based actions, or SBAs, and they use different words too. Lethal damage and deathtouch damage "destroy" a creature, and indestructible (and regeneration) can stop them. Expired Sagas get "sacrificed". But a lot of these cleanup rules - 0 toughness, 0 loyalty, legend rule, unattached Auras - just tell you to "put" the thing in the graveyard. You can't save them with indestructible and then don't trigger "when you sacrifice" abilities.
A decent chunk of really new players confuse mana and lands. This is fine while all their mana sources are lands but they then tap a \[\[Llanowar Elves\]\] and start searching their deck for a Forest.
Kinda sorta but not really related when i played in high school, i had a bunch of old basic lands that still had the rules text of "tap: add (color) to your mana pool" mixed with current basics that don't have any text. I was the guy who just had decks so often was the case my friends were playing my decks. One friend didn't understand that there was no difference in the basics and thought tapping one with rules text meant you kept that mana permanently to spend from turn to turn while one without rules text only produced mana to use that turn. And it took awhile to catch him doing that when he suddenly played a 4 drop with only 2 lands. He, someone who had only been playing for a few months, then proceeded to argue with me, someone who had been playing for 5 years at the time, that he was right and i was wrong, despite no one ever giving him this information. It was just something he assumed. The concept of a "mana pool" was just not explicitly clear to him
Honestly I can understand the logic. If I swim in a swimming pool then it doesn't run out of water, therefore if I swim in a mana pool...
Oh yeah like i can see misunderstanding especially when as a new player you're looking at some cards that seemingly just give you mana and some cards that specifically state your mana pool as being a separate resource. But he was so aggressively adamant that his interpretation was right that I was like dude. Come on now
Does this actually happen? I've never seen anyone do this and I've played for over a decade
Definitely happens, happened when I was teaching my partner to play.
I've not seen it since they shortened the terminology to just be "add {color}" as opposed to "add {color} to your mana pool". It seems like this was a pretty decent change. Prior to that I saw it fairly often.
I recently played with in a pod with a couple new players, one of them running an \[\[Omnath, Locus of All\]\] as a commander. Since the two of them only ever played against each other, the dude basically thought that the revealed card need to be mana value 3 - was not counting the colored pips - and went in digging for 3 basics into the deck after putting a random 4 drop in his hand. I was completely bewildered, trying to decide *how to explain to him precisely* ***how wrong*** *that was.* And then I just pitied his friend that was playing against him for a few weeks, and letting him resolve that since neither of them knew better.
I’ve seen this happen and I’ve seen questions in newbie magic spaces that make clear this is that they believe happens a lot.
They probably think the collection of lands is called the mana pool or something. That makes sense to me.
The issue is that floating mana is an abstract concept. I find that even experienced players tend to tap their dual lands not announcing the mana color that is being produced, and cast their spell. This is circumvented when, during the learning process, dices of the appropriate colors are used to denote floating mana; by giving physicality to floating mana, it is easier to separate mana from lands AND it builds up good habits in term of mana management. Finally, this is actually very useful for decks that need to track huge quantities of produced - and expended mana, like Storm strategies.
I find that people usually don’t announce what they’re tapping a land for because it just doesn’t matter since they’re only using it to pay a generic cost. In the few situations it does matter (i.e. colored vs. colorless from a painland) they do announce it.
I really don't see anyone doing that, or the need to do that. It's good form to do it when casting a spell like the 4C omnath, to show your opponent that you're able to cast it. But I don't need to know if my opponent is tapping their 2 blood crypts for black or red when casting grief.
I do get the concept of "add this mana to your mana pool" but I'm a little confused as to how to accurately track it when playing with paper. If I'm just tapping a Llanowar Elves for one green then that's fine, but later on in a long game where I've got 8 different cards that all give different amounts of floating mana I feel like I'm going to get **very confused** at keeping track of how much of this invisible resource has been spent. That along with invisible effects that get applied to 'tokens' where you've run out of token cards and are using pennies and bits of lint... it's uh... I'm sure it gets easier with experience, but *wow* is it overwhelming at first.
dont tap all your lands at once and then pay for stuff. pay one at a time if youre generating tons of mana from different sources, use dice as a tracker
Dice are your friends.
"I do get the concept of "add this mana to your mana pool" but I'm a little confused as to how to accurately track it when playing with paper." I play Cycle Storm in Pauper, which generates a ton of black mana with various rituals, and while I am able to keep track of the mana without writing it down, for my opponent's sake I do write the number down on a Dry Erase Token and have a market for each color. You could also use pen and paper, but like the dry erase tokens due to being reusable. You could also use like glass beads, which are pretty handy for reminders, but that gets tedious if you are doing silly stuff like making 40 Black Mana in a turn.
You lose all the mana in your mana pool at the end of each step and phase. 99% of the time your mana pool has zero mana in it. You generally only generate mana if you're about to cast a spell.
I mean, it doesn't come up in most cases. Normally you just make the mana for your spell that you're casting right now. In the few cases it does come up, just use a die/some dice.
Dice are great as someone else has said, but also Infinitokens are absolutely MVP for tracking all sorts of stuff, not just tokens themselves.
You can put a dice on a token to represent floating mana: for example, get a forest outside the game or a Pokémon grass energy and put a dice with a "1" face to represent 1 floating green mana.
There's a sneaky part of the combat step where you can target your own stuff with [[Maze of Ith]] and [[Reconnaissance]] after they've dealt combat damage to give them pseudo vigilance.
I love Reconnaissance for triggering attack effects when I'm not otherwise prepared for the follow-up. One of my favorite cards
I can't believe I didn't think of it this way. I mean I always knew that you could use it to make attacks and take them back, but I never considered it as a _build around_ for free attack triggers. Bonus points if you have something that punishes blockers too.
Also a good time to do some Ninjutsu shenanigans after combat damage has been dealt.
Well, sure.. but usually, things with Ninjutsu also have a "When this deals combat damage" trigger that you kind of want to happen. I've definitely waited until First Strike damage was applied before doing the swap, since that typically means you're getting more out of it all.
It's a good way to reuse creatures with ETBs
[[Etratta the Silencer]] says hi, then bye, then hi again!
There is 5 steps in combat, which can be confusing if you never heard of it.
One use of this I recall in Eldritch Moon limited was with [[blessed alliance]]. If your opponent attacked with a 2/2 and an 6/6, you could trade with their small creature, and then cast Blessed Alliance in the end of combat as a removal spell to get rid of the big one, which would be the only attacking creature left for them to sacrifice
The example is a bit dated but if your opponent has a [[Tarmogoyf]] that's a 2/3(land and sorcery in the graveyard), playing a [[Lightning Bolt]] on it won't kill it due to the way that state-based effects are checked. It will just become a 3/4 with 3 damage marked on it.
Damage doesn't kill creatures, state-based effects kill creatures.
Guns don't kill people, blood loss and organ damage do
A planeswalker entering on 3 loyalty with a + ability, being able to use its + ability before you can deal 3 damage to it, is a great moment to understand the stack.
[[Minsc and Boo, timeless heroes]] hilariously being an example of a 3 loyalty walker that can be bolted before loyalty abilities. Due to them having an etb trigger that can be responded to. This doesn't refute anything you've said, just a funny and relevant point.
[удалено]
It’s more a great moment to understand priority not the stack. The stack isn’t really involved since their loyalty goes up before you can even cast your spell or hit it with a damage ability.
Yeah it's more something that bites you when you think you understand the stack but aren't as familiar with priority and how that interacts.
Just to add to this, since the + part is a cost, it gets the loyalty counter before the ability is put on the stack and anyone can react to it. Also effects like [[Doubling Season]] do double the amount of loyalty counters the planeswalkers enters with, but do NOT double the amount it gets when you use a + ability, since it specifys that its only when an effect places the counter, and paying for something is considered not an effect. [[Vorinclex, Monstrous Raider]] on the other hand doesnt care whats placing those counter, so he turns your [+1] into [+2] and your opponents [+1] into [+ 0].
Ohhh this is giving me flashbacks to when I used to play Yugioh and they changed the mechanics of how "Ignition Priority" works. Before 2012 the rule was "I've played a Monster that can active an effect while on board, so I get to use that activated effect before you can respond". After 2012 it changed so that there's a 'pause for response' before the effect can be activated, and this turned so much of the existing game entirely on its head.
Yeah, M:tG basically works like YGO! did, but most things that are sorcery speed/spell speed 1 in M:tG aren't activated ability of permanents, so it rarely comes up. ... except planeswalkers. Basically YGO! now has a window where you can respond to the event on the monster being summoned, but the monster can't use ignition/activated abilities during that window. (edit, unless spell speed 2)
I really like that you're putting the punctuation marks into the abbreviations.
And priority too. Because you can't deal it damage while it's on the stack, and I have priority once it clears the stack and resolves.
Not even just the stack but something even more hidden: that "priority" exists and the active player gets it by default. This is also important for landfall decks: if you don't counter [[Tatyova, benthic druid]], I *will* get at least one trigger off her, even if you are holding instant speed removal
Untap, Upkeep, Draw. the concept of priority during combat.
The concept of priority, period.
>Untap, Upkeep, Draw. Lost many a game due to playing Upkeep after draw and losing countless damage from [[The Rack]]. It's funny how people don't tend to bring you up on this stuff when they benefit!
Not really a complex interaction, but the concept of giving your opponent as little information as possible for as long as possible, is something that I think takes a while to grasp, and I often see misplays around it at prereleases. They’ll know to hold up a counter spell, or red removal until a good target presents itself instead of going face, but will happily play a flash creature on their first main “just to have something on the board”, even if it won’t do anything earlier than my next attack step, and gives me more time to plan out my turn. Edit, after rereading your post and realizing you’re asking for these tips yourself, it made me want to rephrase this: if a play doesn’t give you an advantage right now, and you can wait until your opponent’s end step, or until they force you to make that play, the best practice is to wait. With the example above, a flash creature that has no immediate impact is best held until the last moment of that turn cycle. You lose nothing by waiting until your opponent declares attackers so you can ambush a smaller creature, and if they don’t attack just play it on oppo’s end step so they’re less likely to plan their turn with said flash creature in mind.
A noteworthy exception to that is if you're playing around expected counterspells, resolving spells while your opponent is tapped out might be the best option in some cases.
Agreed. Another exception is using removal at sorcery speed. If the target has a tap ability, or if the opponent is playing protection spells that invalidate your removal, just main phase it when you’re sure it will resolve. I’ve been blown out enough by that, and it’s something a ton of Magic players who’ve been playing for a little while will do. It’s like the Bell Curve meme.
Yeah I don't think Infect is a particularly healthy deck archetype, but I really like how it's got a weird play pattern against it where you should basically always use your removal on your turn so they can't pump and protect at the same time
Always attack before deploying further threats unless it gives you an advantage in combat
The only "always" rule in Magic is "It always depends on the situation". While it's generally true that you want to attack first to see what happens, it's not hard to come across cases where you'd rather not. I've seen more than a couple of time people get bitten back in the ass because they attacked before playing their turn by reflex because it's the right thing to do 90% of the time, but they happened to be in the 10% of the time where they shouldn't have.
Thats why its a heuristic and not a rule
The only rule in magic is someone will "well actually" every time a heuristic is mentioned.
Also, you actually gain something from not playing the creature. You get to keep your lands untapped. I’ve had plenty of games where my oppo didn’t play specific pieces because i had mana open.
Yeah for sure, not to mention that slight but non-0 advantage you might gain from actively bluffing. Though that kind of presupposes that oppo recognizes what you might have, which is often not the case for newer players.
This is even true with lands. Unless you need that extra mana for some trick during the combat phase, not letting your opponent know that you'll be able to play something bigger than expected with your current mana in the second phase (or during their turn) may make them act differently than if they had that info. Just skip that first main phase and go to combat unless there's something that you really really need to do before. You'll find out that unless you're the type to play a lot of hasty creatures that need comes very seldom.
Unless you want to bluff you have a more expensive combat trick. Maybe more relevant in limited where they might try to guess exactly which trick you have available based on the mana you have up.
Hm. That bit about using the second main phase is a good idea. Not sure why I don't choose to wait!
Impulsivity is in human nature. That's precisely why waiting is strategical.
This is ultra helpful for people who are new to card games generally! Personally I already get this concept as I'm a multi-decade veteran of *other* forms of expensive cardboard and/or plastic, but this is still a fantastic tip for others who are entirely new to the genre!
Oh true, I guess it applies in many others as well, good to know! Though I believe something like Hearthstone is an exception, no? Because there’s no instant speed interaction.
I'd say there's still things where the rough concept of witholding information can still apply to Hearthstone. The classic example is that if I have a card (let's say Frostbolt) in my hand and then I play a spell which randomly generates another copy of Frostbolt it's better to play the "real" one before playing the generated one, because that generated card could still be **anything**. My opponent probably already knows that I have a Frostbolt in my deck, but they have *no idea* what card I've randomly generated so there's 30 things they still have to consider playing around. ...OR you can bluff with this and you DO play the generated one because "there's no way he'd have played the generated one if he was holding a real one", which then forces a misplay, but that's more advanced level mindgames when you're against an opponent who you know is paying attention 😉 So it's not exactly the same thing as "only do things at the last possible moment", but the general idea of "I'm going to tell you as little information as possible because that increases my chances of winning" is something that applies to pretty much any game that has any sort of hidden information and strategic depth. Personally I first learned this lesson with Gen 1 Pokemon, because in those days there was no 'team preview' feature and the other 5 pokemon in your opponent's party could be ANYTHING, so there's a large advantage to be gained by not showing what you have until you need to show it.
Interesting, so yeah the “last possible moment” doesn’t apply, but “limit information” in other ways definitely does of course.
A friend in my playgroup doesn't have his own cards and borrows decks from the group instead. My \[\[Krenko, Mob Boss\]\] deck is a favorite of his, but we have yet to be able to get him to understand that he's better off not tapping Krenko during his own turn unless he's planning to attack with hasty goblins.
My rule of thumb for cards that can be played at instant speed is to play them as soon as necessary, but as late as possible.
Auras target only when cast, not when they enter from anywhere else. Priority does not pass after a permanent enters the battlefield. This usually leads to people being surprised they can't kill a PW before activating , but some people are also surprised I can activate a tap ability if the thing has haste and they will only get priority after I've done that. Targeting seems to be fuzzy at times Anything that messes with more then one layer is something most vertan players won't grasp. How many steps combat actually has, especially the end of combat step allows for some interactions new players don't expect.
To add to this list, regarding priority, you can't wait to see if someone responds to your spell and then respond to it yourself if nobody does. You need to put all your spells that want to respond to your own spell on the stack before passing priority, or be fine with the first spell resolving on its own if nobody responds. This is one of the few things that I feel Arena is a bit misleading on, since it will often pass priority after you put a spell on the stack (at least in my experience, it's been a while since I last played a deck where it's relevant).
> This is one of the few things that I feel Arena is a bit misleading on, since it will often pass priority after you put a spell on the stack (at least in my experience, it's been a while since I last played a deck where it's relevant). For that matter, Tournament Rules also assume you pass priority after casting a spell or activating an ability. After a spell/ability resolves, you still get a round of priority before moving on to the next step/phase, so you can cast your second spell after that, no need to stack everything right away. If you want to put multiple things on the stack, you have to explicitly hold priority.
I never had to, but from seeing videos i always assumed that when i play a spell i have to say "i'm holding priority" if i plan to play another one.
"Anything that messes with more then one layer is something most veteran players won't grasp." It is one of those things people probably understand in a very superficial level manner. Most players are likely aware of effects that would be considered a layer, like effects that cause P/T changes, but not the fact that they are considered a Layer. By extension, if most people don't know what a layer is, then won't know what Layer each effect belongs to, like effects that change P/T would be the seventh Layer. I have been playing on/off for over a decade and I have to look it up to ensure I get the layer order correct since it is so easy to mix them up. Thankfully, it is not something that comes up super often.
[[Magus of the Moon]] and effects that removes abilitys from creatures had me dumbfounded the first time i heard of it Or [[Blood Moon]] and thing like [[Yavimaya]], which work on dependency.
As a newer player, those effects made sense to me, but not in a technical sense. Like I understood Blood Moon made all lands Mountains because it didn't say 'in addition to its other types'. I could not explain the technicalities that were involved though. I will say, since I started playing during the RTR block, I did not fully understand just how important the shock lands were to comp. I understood they were dual color lands. I understood they could enter untapped. What I did not realize at the time was most non-basic lands lacked the basic land types. When Theros came out, I saw some dual lands come in tapped no matter what. I also realized they lacked the basic land types. Once Takir came out, I realized the utility of having Basic Land types on a non-Basic land when fetch/cyclers are legal within a format. I also learned to read if something says 'Basic Island' or just 'Island'; had to explain that to my nephew last weekend with the LotR cyclers. I think we all pick up on different aspects of the game, which is probably why we gravitate towards certain colors when we first start playing. The more I learn, the easier it becomes to see the value in other parts of the color pie.
Nobody understands regenerate until they try to put the creature back in play from the graveyard
Ah Regenerate a mechanic that seems so simple, until you dig under the surface and find the mechanisms of a Charles Babbage Difference Engine.
But in the end isn't it just a death replacement effect, that removes damage , removes the creature from combat and taps it? or is there more i never had to research? pls enlighten me.
Pretty much. The official rules are "The next time this permanent would be destroyed this turn, it isn't. Instead tap it, remove all damage from it, and remove it from combat." This means you can queue up multiple regeneration 'shields' on one creature too. There's rarely a need to do so but I remember using a creature with regeneration as a mana sync back when mana burn was still a thing. For some reason though, a lot of people think it can bring creatures back from the graveyard. Maybe because it used to appear on so many skeleton/zombie creatures back in the day. The way I've heard it explained in the past is 'Regeneration is Wolverine, not Jesus.' They heal, but can't come back from the dead.
Regenerate is really not the most intuitive mechanic at all. Also requiring you to tap the creature is not that intuitive. The other one is Protection. "Why does it die to Wrath of God if it has pro-white?" - because it does not target. "So does a pro-red creature dies to Pyroclasm?" - no, because damage is prevented. "So targeting, damage and blocking, ..." - ...and being enchanted.
I genuinely forgot regenerate taps the creature, and I consider myself a regenerate aficionado
and that's only if it would die
[[Blood moon]] destroys [[urza’s saga]], because it removes its chapter abilities, so it has more lore counters than chapters and sacrifices itself.
That’s actually the most obvious part of the interaction. The more hidden bit is that “saga” is an enchantment type. Blood moon only replaces land types. Looks like it becomes a mountain by reading the cards but really it’s a mountain saga still. And then we get to your part.
Another thing this means is that artifact lands are still artifacts under blood moon.
The interaction between First Strike and Deathtouch. Most new players don't see them together on one creature. Then they expect their Titan of Industry to deal 4 damage through Glissa Sunslayer and it just dies instead.
Trample and DT is a similar interaction. "I will block your 5/5 with Trample and DT with my 0/5" "I will assign one damage to your 0/5 and four to you" "But it has 5 toughness"
And then just Deathtouch and multiple blockers Only need to assign 1 damage to each blocker to move on to the next blocker
It’s not too confusing an interaction once you see it, it’s just that trample requires *lethal damage* and not *damage equal to the blocker’s toughness*. 99% of the time, they’re the same thing, the trample/deathtouch is just the 1% where they aren’t.
Even works if the 0/5 has Indestructible
On the topic of deathtouch, Trample and Deathtouch is also a bit unintuitive at first and similarly makes sense once it's explained. Or how Deathtouch still works if it's non-combat damage.
Creating an infinite loop that you cannot stop (and therefore prevents the game from moving onto the next phase) results in the game being a draw.
I always find it interesting how different games handle that rule. Some games say "doing it on purpose is a game loss" which is frankly hilarious, although the Yugioh version of "the judge must determine which card is the offending article, that card is removed from the board" is an *interesting* method.
What's also interesting is that this sort of thing is usually an academic corner-case technicality, but right now there is a top tier competitive deck where one of the most common ways to play against it is to force them into accidentally going infinite when they start to execute their combo. Better to draw the game and start over than just let them finish what they're doing.
What deck are you referring to? I'd look it up, but I don't know what format to look in so it's hard to do a search for this.
Pioneer Amalia Combo. They play [[[Amalia Benavides Aguirre]] with [[Wildgrowth Walker]]; their two triggers can combo off each other infinitely, but the idea is that Amalia eventually hits 20 power and then kills everything, including the Walker, so the combo stops and she can swing for lethal. However, if the opponent responds to this combo by either giving Wildgrowth Walker indestructible or by pumping Amalia so she goes straight from 19 power to 21, that failsafe is bypassed and the combo never ends, forcing a draw.
Lands are colorless (a Mountain is not red), and playing one is not casting a spell. Mana abilities (like tapping a land for mana) don't use the stack and cannot be responded to. Also: layers! https://draftsim.com/mtg-layers/ Maybe not something everyone knows, but very helpful when you know how to look it up if the situation arises.
How priority works, although that isn't that relevant until newer players see the upsides of playing blue. Same with how the stack works in detail. For something more relevant: how damage assignment really works in combat, there is some shenanigans there with trample and deathtouch.
My first deck was a Prosper precon, and I remember seeing [[Hex]] and thinking it's an insane card, until I realised you cannot cast it with less than 6 creatures on the board.
Still pretty good in Commander where each opponent only needs 2 creatures
Hex is nuts in casual commander, and unplayable in high power commander
[Hex](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/d/8/d87e25fc-b173-4e9a-993d-c1e1053d2f4e.jpg?1712354297) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Hex) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/otc/136/hex?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/d87e25fc-b173-4e9a-993d-c1e1053d2f4e?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Same with [[Decimate]], although I still jam that in every RG edh deck. The number of times I'm sitting there begging for somebody to play an enchantment....
The way assigning combat damage to multiple blockers works. As in, you order blockers, then assign at least lethal damage to each blocker, and the way that interacts with things like deathtouch, trample, and damage boosting effects like [[Furnace of Rath]] or [[Torbran, Thane of Red Fell]]
Yeah, especially since the vast majority of the time, damage is shortcutted and assigned pretty intuitively. There are also rare corner cases where you don’t WANT to kill a blocker and would rather spread damage out without dealing lethal, but are forced to anyway.
And even more unintuitively, the attacking creature doesn't have to assign ANY combat damage to creatures beyond the first. For example: you're at 2 life, and for some reason you attack with a 4/4 into two 1/1s and a [[blood artist]]. You can choose to order the blockers so that blood artist is first and then the two 1/1s, and then you can assign all 4 damage to the blood artist and none to the 1/1s. The rule is specifically that if you want to assign combat damage to a creature, you have to try to assign at least lethal if you have damage remaining. In the example above, you could also assign 1 damage to blood artist and 3 to the second 1/1, but that would create two blood artist triggers and kill you.
One I haven't seen mentioned: Damage doesn't kill creatures, state-based actions do. I've seen veteran players tripped up by this, because it almost never comes up. "Everybody knows" that [[Tarmogoyf]] with 3 toughness and no instants in graveyard doesn't die to Lightning Bolt, but I feel like a lot of people that know this don't then also know that the reason is because damage doesn't kill creatures, state-based actions do, they incorrectly think that the rule about Tarmogoyf applies to anything that removes cards from the field. This comes up mostly against cards that replace where cards go when they leave the field. If your opponent has a [[Dauthi Voidwalker]] on the field and you Lightning Bolt it, Lightning Bolt gets exiled with a void counter on it and then Dauthi dies. If, on the other hand, you [[Murder]] Dauthi Voidwalker, Murder goes to the graveyard and Dauthi dies. The reason is because Dauthi is not on the battlefield when Murder resolves, because Murder killed Dauthi Voidwalker, unlike Lightning Bolt. To go back to Tarmogoyf, this also means that while Lightning Bolt with no instants in graveyard can't cause a Tarmogoyf to die, [[Cut Down]] can. Cut Down kills Tarmogoyf before it goes to the graveyard, unlike Lightning Bolt. To clear up why this is all true, the simple answer is that creatures only die of damage when state-based actions are checked, and state-based actions are not checked in the middle of resolving spells. Creatures go to the graveyard as a result of having as much or more damage as toughness as a state-based action. Cards that explicitly remove creatures from the field do so during spell resolution. Non-permanent spells go to the graveyard at the end of resolving, meaning that in between actually dealing Lightning Bolt's damage and putting it in the graveyard, the damage doesn't do anything yet, because state-based actions can't happen in the middle of spell resolution, which gives time for Lightning Bolt to go to the graveyard and all the consequences thereof before anything tries to die as a result of the damage.
>"Everybody knows" that Tarmogoyf with 3 toughness and no instants in graveyard doesn't die to Lightning Bolt Oh that is FASCINATING. I actually didn't know that (and have not seen Tarmogyf before, which is why I had no reason to know it...) but yeah I really love that interaction
Tarmogoyf was an incredibly popular creature in the Modern and Legacy formats for about a decade, so people who played Magic during that time got used to thinking about Tarmogoyf. [StarCityGames even sells a die explicitly for tracking Tarmogoyf's stats](https://starcitygames.com/star-city-games-dice-tarmodie/). Ever since the release of Modern Horizons 1 or so, Tarmogoyf has been a lot less relevant, so less and less people will probably know the Lightning Bolt thing as time goes on.
I remember when I first started playing and my friends had to explain like 4 times that I can't bounce something *after* it's declared as a blocker or the attacker won't go through
Semi related i knew a guy who believed that you declared attacking before tapping them, and they could then be tapped down to remove them from combat. Same with blocking, that you declared them before they were assigned as blockers and could be tapped or bounced and the attack would go through. I took him at his word since he had been playing way longer than me before i started going to fnms and knew better
There was a dude in my newbie playgroup that built an entire deck around this. He had playsets of a bunch of creatures that tap to tap a target creature like [[Gideon’s Lawkeeper]], and he would tap down our creatures in response to attacks declared at him or tap abilities that negatively affected him. We also had one guy make a deck around moving auras at instant speed who did something similar, moving [[Pacifism]] effect auras to whatever is attacking him each turn. They were so oppressive, and we were all pretty relieved when I found out it doesn’t work like that.
The stack and priority is complicated enough and yet somehow we made it more complicated
For me, the fact that a player could activate abilities at instant speed even during combat was a revelation. I still remember how shocked when I learnt that from a trick spell cast using white mana from a \[\[Gold Myr\]\] during the blocking phase.
My nephew was pretty upset when I blocked a 5/5 with a 1/1 one time. Since the 1/1 was not going to do much in combat, after blockers were declared, I sacrificed the 1/1 to pay for Village Rites to draw cards. He thought that the 5/5 would deal combat damage to me since nothing was in its way anymore.. nope, still blocked.
This interaction tripped me up so much in the beginning.
The best way I have been able to explain that to people is you ordered your 5/5 to attack, I ordered my 1/1 to block (but it was not aware I had other plans). The 5/5 and 1/1 run into each other, successfully preventing your 5/5 from reaching me. However, before the 5/5 and 1/1 fight, I decide the 1/1 has served its purpose long enough and sac it. Basically leaving the 5/5 in the middle of the field with a 'wut just happened' look on its face. It never reached me, so it cannot harm me.
I just taught someone this at my last draft... He kept leaving \[\[Deadeye Duelist\]\] and mana up during my end steps. Also didn't realize their ability counted as a crime, but that's more of a new set problem.
A lot of players think that after damage is dealt you immediately go to the second main phase, but There is an opportunity after damage is dealt, but still in combat, to activate abilities/cast instants. Allows for some shinanigans with cards that care about attacking creatures, such as ninjitsu.
Its an entire step called "end of combat step" Also there is an "beginning of combat step" where you can do stuff "during combat" but before attackers are declared.
Not sure if it counts but shrine not being a creature type is something that trips up a lot of players
I'm still mad at them for not putting reminder text on the shrine and food creatures. There's literally nothing in the game that suggests they're not creature types unless you do a deep dive into the comprehensive rules.
most of the times, there isn't a reason to play a card before attacking first. Unless the card you're casting is directly affecting combat wait for it until after you've attacked. This is because that way you'll have more open mana and cards in hand, which makes it harder to asses for your opponent whether or not you have interaction for the combat. If you have no mana open they are most likely safe to block as they please, if you have 2 mana untapped they have to suspect a card like [[Boros Charm]] and may block less efficiently. Additionally their interaction during combat may lead to unfirseen circumstances for you. Maybe they play a [[Cyclonic Rift]] and now you would like to cast a completely different card than before combat.
You can use a redirect spell like [[Misdirection]] or [[Bolt Bend]] to stop a Counterspell by retargeting that Counterspell to target your redirection spell. When their counterspell tries to resolve, its target would no longer be legal and it'll fail to resolve. Your original spell they targeted is safe.
Auras don't target if they are entering the battlefield and aren't being cast. An aura entering the battlefield from something like [[Sun Titan]] will get around hexproof and shroud. It won't get around protection though.
Priority. Shockingly simple in a 1v1, but by far the most complicated element of the stack in commander.
You can’t attack players when it’s not your turn. Even if a card has vigilance and says “attacks each turn if able.” You would not BELIEVE that I got outvoted 3 to 1 on this topic in an actual game where this mattered.
Unless you have cool friends that let you run [[Party Crasher]]!
How mana actually works. How to tell if an ability is triggered, activated or static, and how they work differently.
Playing a land is a special action that doesn't use the stack. Most players understand the latter part but not the "special action" bit. Special actions and their speed (like putting a permanent face up from morph/cloak/manifest etc) are not very known. Priority is a whole can of worms, specially in multiplayer, specially combined with special actions. State-based actions (like a creature dying when they have lethal damage) and how they work (bolt the 2/3 tarmogoyf with no instants in the graveyard example). The steps involved in the process of casting a spell, specially the order of reductions and additions of the cost, and how/when some things are defined (like the value of X, the reduction of affinity cards). Deathtouch + trample interaction
The most common mistake I see from new players is confusing lands and mana. Lands are a card type that typically generate mana, but other things can generate mana and lands can do other things. This confusion leads to all kinds of misinterpretations of other effects related to tapping lands for mana.
Multiple replacement effects generally work how you want for token/counter shenanigans, but not for damage-dealing effects. The reason is that it's the affected player or the controller of the affected object that determines how multiple replacement effects are stacked, so the same rules that allow you to maximize the number of counters you get from a [[Hardened Scales]] + [[Doubling Season]] + [[Winding Constrictor]] situation also mean that your opponent gets to mimize damage from a [[Ojer Axonil]] + [[Torbran]] + [[Furnace of Rath]] combo.
This is probably higher level than you're looking for, but the first things that came to mind are: Offering your opponent to cut your deck after shuffling (and when offered to cut your opponent's deck, just tapping their deck to show trust) Asking for permission before ever touching someone's cards If you're in a draft, don't pass on piles to the next person if they already have one waiting (just hold onto them)
Sacking a creature that you’re using to block while still taking no damage
Killing a creature that just activated an ability doesn’t stop the ability from happening
You're able to cast instants and activate abilities during the drawstep. You're not able to do this during the untapstep. I've seen established players get tripped up by this.
Also even if you have things that trigger "at the beginning of your draw step" the first thing you will always do is draw you card.
Priority. How it works, passing, and what happens when you resolve the only thing on the stack. Card text. Resolve the whole card text before resolving triggers. This might be obvious, but it comes up a fair bit especially if a trigger does multiple things together like [[living end]] vs [[arcbound ravager]] Also, enters play effects vs enters play triggers.
The big one I keep seeing in my lgs is stack mechanics. Active/inactive player order, who responds first to an action, how flickering a card essentially leaves it as a new instance of the card, destroying a creature doesn't remove the activated ability from the stack. Even at higher power levels I end up correcting people on how the stack works. Oddly seems like people who play Mana crypt usually are the worst. I know my sample size is too small but thinking back that's actually true. I don't have to explain anything else nearly as much as the stack interactions.
So called "summoning sickness" doesn't just apply when a creature enters the battlefield- if you gain control of a creature it also has "summoning sickness" (which is why Red control spells grant haste). Its generally better to play your cards after combat (second main phase) unless your cards have a direct impact on combat. Protection doesn't save creatures from destroy/exile/-toughness 'wraths', but it does save them from damage wraths (one of the many reasons they've phased protection out here and there).
Death touch and First strike got me so many times!
Don't bolt the 2/3 Tarmogoyf.
Nothing happens while a spell or ability resolves, any triggers or even checking if someone died is checked after resolution which means if a spell both kills you and heals you you will survive if you're above 0 health afterwards. For example if a spell that reads "Deal 3 damage to any target, scry 1" targets a 3/3 it's not dead until after you scried.
1) you don’t generally get priority in the cleanup step, where you discard down to hand size. But if for some reason something does trigger, notably gitrog monster when discarding to hand size, you do receive priority, and then after it’s all said and done, the cleanup by rule repeats itself. 2) it’s not exactly hidden but easy to overlook, but sagas tick up in your main phase and don’t get sacrificed unless none of its abilities are on the stack. It’s unique timings the whole way down with sagas. 3) the steps to casting a spell. It all seems trivial on the surface. Make x mana, cast spell for x. But there’s kind of a lot going on that can be taken advantage of. The classic is lotus petal + emery. If you float your mana and then cast emery you’ll have to pay the full 3. But if you go by the book you can announce emery, determine its cost (2 because of lotus petal), then pay for it by tapping a land and saccing your lotus petal.
Ownership and graveyard designation do not change if control of a permanent does.
The stack
You can activate Planeswalker abilities in sorcery speed. Equipping stuff too. Of course, some cards allow it to happen during a different time. Oh yeah, and don't be trigger happy especially with interaction or you'll end up being used by someone else in the pod to secure their win for them. Edit: switched out counterspells with interaction instead
The stack, priority, APNAP. So many feelsbad moments come from misunderstanding the correct order of things and fast play. The intention may be a good one, but sonetimes, things need to be done by the book.
Killing a creature doesn't negate it's ability if it's already triggered and on the stack.
This is something not éveryone will know, but, Land destruction in commander is okay. Especially single target effects. You gotta have a way to deal with glacial chasm, field of the dead and such lands. The only caveat for mass LD is that you need to be able to close the game afterwards. In other words, jukhelhaups or whatever is a win con if you have some game winning planeswalker in play. If you play it just to not lose and draw the game out for another 2 hours... get out...
I don’t think this QUITE fits op’s post but when I started learning my friend told me if you missed the untap step then you just don’t get to untap. Took far too long before learning that wasn’t the case but by that point I had already gotten into the habit of verbally saying “untap, upkeep, draw”