Mafteechr's Classroom: Precursor Golem Revisited
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mafteechr
26 April 2012
3662 views
26 April 2012
3662 views
Some of you may or may not be aware, but I wrote an article over a year ago (view here) about Precursor Golem and Rite of Replication. I thought about this article lately, and determined that I made some big errors, and I need to fix it.
Namely, my understanding of triggered abilities and the stack at that point in time was flawed. The math I did was under the assumption that the copies of Rite of Replication just targeted the original golems on the battlefield, and this is incorrect.
Let's look at the following situation: I have 3 Precursor Golems and some amount of golem tokens on the battlefield. If I target a Precursor Golem with an unkicked Rite of Replication, it will go on the stack. Then, each of the three Precursor Golems' abilities will trigger, and they will go on the stack. It will look like this:
(Bottom) Rite of Replication -> copy the spell for all other golems ability -> copy the spell for all other golems ability -> copy the spell for all other golems ability (Top)
So, when the first ability resolves, it will copy Rite of Replication for all golems on the battlefield (except the one originally targeted). Once each of those copies resolves, we will have a bunch of new golems on the battlefield. Then, the next ability resolves, and we create copies of Rite of Replication for the same golems as before, but also for all the golems that were just placed on the battlefield by copies of Rite of Replication. My mistake last time was ignoring this fact. Thus, we're going to get a whole hell of a lot more golems.
We need to make one assumption: we want to maximize the number of golems we have. Now, Precursor Golem's ability creates copies for each golem on the battlefield except the one that was originally targeted. If we want the most amount of golems, then we need the Precursor Golems to be copied as many times as possible, since they spit out two tokens. Therefore, we will target a golem token with the original Rite of Replication.
I am not going to post the mathematics behind this. It's simply multiplying, adding, and accounting for everything. It takes basic math, but a mastery of the stack and what carries forward. If anyone doubts my math, I will attempt to upload my notes.
If we start with 1 Precursor Golem and 2 golem tokens, then cast a kicked Rite of Replication targeting a golem token, we will end up with 6 Precursor Golems and 22 golem tokens.
If we start with 2 Precursor Golems and 4 golem tokens, we end up with 72 Precursor Golems and 344 golem tokens.
If we start with 3 Precursor Golems and 6 golem tokens, we end up with 648 Precursor Golems and 4,326 golem tokens.
If we start with 4 Precursor Golems and 8 golem tokens, we end up with 5,184 Precursor Golems and 43,638 golem tokens.
Since a kicked Rite of Replication is most likely to occur in EDH, I decided to play out the following scenario:
I control a Precursor Golem and 2 golem tokens. I cast a kicked Rite of Replication targeting a golem token. In response to Precursor Golem's triggered ability (before copies are created), I cast Twincast on Rite of Replication, changing the target to Precursor Golem.
In the end, I will have 36 Precursor Golems and 127 golem tokens.
I hope you all enjoyed this article. I feel better knowing I have corrected a mistake of mine.
Personally, I would, for the lolz. But then again, I play for the lolz.
April 26, 2012 9:52 p.m.
Ohthenoises says... #4
So did I really. Ill add it in and see what happens.
April 26, 2012 10:15 p.m.
Goblin_lord says... #5
It happened to me once in EDH, fun thing is i didn't played Precursor Golem in that deck but had Sundering Titan, Sakashima the Impostor copying titan (i know i was a bad person then, i've changed ;) ) and Solemn Simulacrum, i stole a lonely Precursor Golem of my opponents and Twincasted a Kicked Rite of Replication on it.
As a reminder: Sundering Titan is a golem.
That was nasty.
April 27, 2012 1:07 a.m.
BrokenZygoma says... #6
This is definitely something to do for the lulz. Do it with 4 golems and watch your opponent's jaw drop as you 48822 3/3 golems.
April 27, 2012 3:36 a.m.
i thought i was harsh stealing someones Frost Titan with Sen Triplets and the nstealing the other persons Rite of Replication and kicking it to get a total of 6 without using a single card from my own hand lol
April 27, 2012 5:47 a.m.
Ohthenoises says... #8
My favorite target for rite is Sovereigns of Lost Alara in an aura based deck...swing once with my general and go hunting for 6 auras and he gets +6/+6 for swinging alone.
April 27, 2012 7:03 a.m.
haha that is a nice target. my favourite targets for it is casting it on Magmatic Force that is horrible and game ending especially if they have haste at the time!
April 27, 2012 7:51 a.m.
Unfortunately between three golems or 48,792 golems a Doom Blade still kills all of them :(.
April 27, 2012 9:43 a.m.
Sollisnexus says... #12
This would be great with an enchantment/instant that gives Hexproof to all the golems
More protection, more killing ftw!
April 27, 2012 9:53 a.m.
Old school options: Fountain Watch, Hanna's Custody, Spectral Guardian
April 27, 2012 9:58 a.m.
LOL, then someone plays a Terminate and you have a sad face... you also wonder how exactly the creatures are supposed to do battle in a field full of golem corpses.
April 27, 2012 10:38 a.m.
I'm a fan of the Vapor Snag option, btw.
Also you get more golems in the last example mafteechr by waiting for the first triggered ability to resolve and put in a copy of the Precursor Golem, THEN Twincast'ing the Rite?
April 27, 2012 6:51 p.m.
SupremeAlliesCommander says... #22
Kicked Rite of Replication + Chancellor of the Forge
6 Chancellors and 120 hasty goblin tokens.
April 27, 2012 10:10 p.m.
In my example, if you Twincast the Rite of Replication before the copies are created, then you have an additional 5 Precursor Golems and 10 golem tokens, and then a kick copy of Rite of Replication for your original golems and all the new golems. If you wait until after the copies of Rite of Replication are created, only the original golems will get a copy, not the new ones. You end up with far less golems.
April 27, 2012 11:15 p.m.
Ohthenoises says... #24
On the subject of favorite targets, try this one that someone did to me. Kicked Rite of Replication which is then Twincasted on Serra Ascendant, needless to say I lost that game...
April 27, 2012 11:26 p.m.
BrokenZygoma says... #25
I personally love Kicked Rite of Replication on Primeval Titan not only do you have 5 or 6, 6/6 trample creatures, you get to pull at least 10 lands out of your deck leaving you with only a few left in the deck.
April 28, 2012 6:58 p.m.
metalmagic says... #26
Spectral Guardian doesn't protect them. Noncreature artifacts.
April 29, 2012 1:19 a.m.
lol it would be funnier if they Gut Shot then used Massacre Wurm..lool
April 30, 2012 4:21 a.m.
So I wrote it out, then realized Precursor Golem only copies when the spell is CAST, so the copied spell off Twincast won't trigger it...
Rite of Replication on bottom, trigger on top. Twincast in response to trigger, changing target to a precursor. Copy resolves, total is 6 Precursors, 12 Golems. Trigger because of Rite resolves, rites copied to all golems, quintupling those earlier amounts: 125 new golems, 65 new precursors making 652 new golems... 36 precursors, 132 golems.
Did I miss anything...?
April 30, 2012 5:59 p.m.
Ince_Velus says... #34
....in response to your vapor snag, I give thee a ranger's guile, ascetasism, or even priviliged position
May 1, 2012 1:10 p.m.
This number still seems high.
Considering that we have a Precursor golemn and his two golemn tokens on the field... we resolve the first Rite of Replication with kicker and the Twincasted one:
Bottom > Twincast mimicking kicked Rite of Replication > Triggered effect to copy and target all golemn tokens > triggered effect to copy and target all precursor golemns > top.
So we resolve the first copy and generate 5 additional precursor golemns which generate 10 additional tokens (total 6 Precursors and 12 tokens)
Then we resolve the second RoR on the token and generate 5 more tokens (total of 17).
Second resolution produces identical results because the triggered effects only happen when the golemn becomes the target of a spell or ability.
So the triggered effects for the original Rite of Replication will still only effect the original set of golemns that was out there to begin with. Your final number should be 32 tokens and 11 Precursor golemn s
HOWEVER
If you resolve Rite of Replication completely and then cast it again you get far more than you've calculated for.
Golemns Post RoR #1: 6 Precursors, 17 Tokens
Resolution of RoR #2 (all golemns are IN PLAY when this is cast):
Bottom > Original RoR target Token 1 > Copy Trigger targeting token 2 (Six Resolutions) > Copy Trigger targeting token 3 (Six resolutions ... > Copy Trigger targeting Precursor 1 (Six Resolutions) .. > Copy Trigger targeting Precursor 6 (Six resolutions) > Top
The Rites of Replication targeting tokens should produce on their own 510 new golemn tokens (30 X 17) while we should then end up with 180 new Precursor Golemns (30 X 6) which generate 360 new tokens for a total of 870 new tokens and 180 new precursors.
This leaves us with 186 Precursor golemns and 887 tokens.
BUT LETS BE EVEN MORE SILLY
Let's say that you're a master of the stack and you do this:
Bottom> Rite of Replication targeting Token 1 > Triggered effect copying Rite of Replication targeting Token 2 > Triggered effect copying Rite of Replication targeting Precursor golemn . > Top
Allow the first triggered copy to resolve. Then, before the resolution of the second triggered ability, cast Twincast targeting Rite of Replication which targets a token...
UH OH.
Now your stack looks like this:
Bottom > Rite of Replication targeting Token 1 > Triggered effect copying Rite of Replication targeting Token 2 > Rite of Replication mimicked by Twincast targeting Token 1 > Rite of Replication targeting token 2 (six resolutions) > Rite of Replication targeting token 3 (six resolutions) ... up to token 14 > Rite of Replication targeting Precursor golemn 1 > ... up to Precursor 6. > Top
In this fashion you end up with the largest number of precursor golemns (186) and tokens (~800) without allowing the first rite of replication to completely resolve.
SEE NEXT POST.
May 1, 2012 3:13 p.m.
What if we take the absolute nightmare scenario?
Four Precursor golemn , with 8 tokens, and four Rite of Replications?
Well, it gets kind of stupid:
Starting Values: 4 Precursor Golemns, 8 Golemn Tokens
First RoR Creates: 80 Golemns (which spawn 160 tokens) and 140 tokens...
... which leaves us with 84 Golemns and 308 tokens
Second RoR creates: 35280 Golemns (which spawn 70560 tokens) and 128940 golemn tokens...
... which leaves us with 35364 Precursors and 199808 golemn tokens.
The Third RoR Creates (oh boy!): 6,253,062,480 Precursors (which spawn 12,506,124,960 tokens) and 35,329,873,740 golemn tokens...
... which leaves us with 6,253,097,844 Precursor Golemns, and 47,836,198,508 Tokens
Our Final RoR (Headache yet?) resolves and creates: 1.96 X 1020th golemns (which spawn 3.92 X 1020th tokens) and 1.50 X 1021st golemn tokens...
... which leaves us with 196,000,000,000,000,000,000 (approximate) golemns and 1,890,000,000,000,000,000,000 (approximate) tokens.
For reference, our final RoR left us with 196 quintillion Precursors and 1.89 sextillion tokens.
This, to my knowledge, is the largest numbers achievable in Magic: The Gathering which is finitely limited to 2 cards. Talk about silly...
May 1, 2012 3:34 p.m.
xD
No, seriously, read Precursor Golem carefully. It triggers when an instant or sorcery spell is cast targetting a single golem. Now read Twincast. It copies a spell, but does not cast it. Thus, Precursor does not trigger when you twincast a spell.
May 1, 2012 4:12 p.m.
Twincast specifically states that you may choose new targets for the copy. In doing so, Precursor golemn becomes the target of the spell copied via Twincast and will copy the copy and distribute it to the other Golemns on the field (even ones your opponent controls)
May 2, 2012 11:03 a.m.
You have made the judge sad.
Here is Precursor Golem's triggered ability:
Whenever a player casts an instant or sorcery spell that targets only a single Golem, that player copies that spell for each other Golem that spell could target. Each copy targets a different one of those Golems.
The bold part is the requirement that must be met in order for the ability to trigger. The underlined part is what you are not doing by changing the target with Twincast.
Specifically, Twincast creates a copy that targets a single golem. However, the spell that targets a single golem must be cast.
May 2, 2012 11:19 a.m.
For an example of a card that DOES cast a copy: Isochron Scepter
May 3, 2012 6:30 p.m.
TylerJohns says... #41
@Oh the noises, its actually very viable.
You should read my mtg q and a I uploaded yesterday about what I did.
Ohthenoises says... #2
I for one have a hard time believing you made a mistake. Also, how viable is this for edh? I ask because I have an edh deck with rite of replication and I have a precursor golem now. Would he be worth a slot on the off chance it could come up?
April 26, 2012 9:44 p.m.