Self Hate
Pioneer forum
Posted on June 15, 2020, 12:52 p.m. by 9-lives
I'm looking for cards that you can use on yourself to lose defense points. I'm planning on using this with Tree of Perdition! I am also looking for pioneer equivalent cards of things like Diminish. Please don't mention Turn to Frog because that doesn't work with Tree of Perdition as it causes it to lose its abilities, so it wouldn't work in a combo. I also need creatures or cards that deal damage directly to the player, like unblockable creatures, or direct damage cards, and fog or defensive cards to protect my Jace, Wielder of Mysteries or Tree of Perdition. or something like that.
Now I need cheap damage dealing cards. Check out my deck at:
Sadomasochistic Thirst of Libraries
Pioneer*
SCORE: 8 | 50 COMMENTS | 729 VIEWS | IN 3 FOLDERS
I plan on having three combos to win.
June 15, 2020 1:25 p.m.
Startling Development isn't pioneer legal, but it would be the most ideal.
June 15, 2020 1:37 p.m.
Here's my updated deck with spots open for cheap damage dealing creatures that deal damage to the player. Also, are there any cheaper cards with regard to mana cost that are like Illusory Wrappings and Reduce in Stature? Or creatures that self-hate?
June 15, 2020 1:46 p.m.
Sadomasochistic Thirst of Libraries and Life
Pioneer*
SCORE: 8 | 51 COMMENTS | 729 VIEWS | IN 3 FOLDERS
June 15, 2020 1:50 p.m.
GoblinElectromancer says... #7
Startling Development is pioneer legal. It's from Ikoria lair of behemoths and the site just hasn't updated yet.
June 15, 2020 1:55 p.m.
GoblinElectromancer says... #8
Yes there are creatures that self hate but they are probably not worth playing. Plague Belcher,Channeler Initiate,Soulstinger,Decimator Beetle,Exemplar of Strength, ect.
Cards that are like Illusory Wrappings that are cheaper make the target lose all abilities such as Frogify.
June 15, 2020 2:05 p.m.
Nightmare Shepherd is awesome not just for its ability but also its nice 4/4! Thanks! What I need, though are damage dealing cards, especially unblockable/direct damage. If I can't do direct damage whenever my opponent has low life from my tree, or get cards in my graveyard for drawing power in Treasure Cruise, then I will need to use two or one of my other strategies. I had forgotten to keep Tome Scour for my Inverter of Truth combo, so that's there. So I'm left with few card options to keep it at 60. I could get rid of my hand control cards, but those are very useful as well, but not important to my main strategy. Low cost U/B Boardwipe or low cost U/B Fog cards would also be nice to replace my hand control cards.
June 15, 2020 3:36 p.m.
Technically, I think Turn to Frog can work as you can tap Tree of Perdition holding priority, and then cast Turn to Frog in response while the activated ability is on the stack, unless I'm mistaken.
June 15, 2020 3:55 p.m.
Dango If Turn to Frog actually worked, it would need to activate at the same time as Tree of Perdition's ability in order to have 1/1 exchange for the player's life. But it goes on the stack afterwards, which means that it denies its abilities after it occurs, which renders it pointless.
June 15, 2020 4 p.m.
I think you're misunderstanding this interaction. You first need to activated Tree of Perdition, holding priority so the ability does not resolve if your opponent doesn't have effects in response to the activation. When priority gets passed back to you, the ability will still be on the stack, allowing you to respond to its effect. You will respond by casting Turn to Frog targeting the Tree of Perdition. At this point, the stack has the spell Turn to Frog on top with the Tree of Perdition's ability below it. Turn to Frog will resolve first, turning the Tree of Perdition into a 1/1 blue Frog with no abilities. The Tree of Perdition's activated ability will still be left on the stack, but when it resolves it will see that the now "Frog" of Perdition's toughness is 1, which would change your opponent's life total to 1 as well.
Hope this helps!
June 15, 2020 4:09 p.m.
Even if the Frog activates first, and then the Tree of Perdition activates next, it would nullify all abilities that the Tree of Perdition has. It specifically says that what is turned into a frog has no abilities. It doesn't allow Tree of Perdition to work since it changes it into a frog. IF it doesn't activate at the same time, then it's also useless, but then the question would be, would it activate at the same time thus changing it into a 1/1 while being disabled?
BTW I need U/B of hexproof and/or defensive spells so that my opponent can't target my Tree of Perdition, or myJace, Wielder of Mysteries.
June 15, 2020 4:20 p.m.
Just because the Tree loses its abilities after it's turned to a frog will not cause its already activated ability to fizzle.
June 15, 2020 4:23 p.m.
DangoThen if it is already activated before the frog, then what's the point of having the frog change it into a 1/1 with no abilities?
June 15, 2020 5:39 p.m.
So that it results in your opponent having 1 life as you intend to do in your initial inquiry. I'm not sure you're understanding the sequencing here.
June 15, 2020 6:17 p.m.
GoblinElectromancer says... #19
After you activate the tree's ability there is a period of time for players to respond. As long as the activated ability is not countered by cards such as Stifle and the turn has not been ended or the game been ended it will accrue. During that period if you cast Turn to Frog the tree will become a 1/1 before the ability resolves. At that point it doesn't matter if the tree has no abilities because its activated ability has already been activated.
To put it simply: the tree will become a 1/1 after you activate the ability but before the ability has resolved then switching the tree's toughness for your opponents life total.
June 15, 2020 6:51 p.m.
TonyStark9001 says... #20
it works like this:
activate Tree of Perdition. ability goes on stack.
cast Turn to Frog. effect goes on stack.
since Turn to Frog was the last effect put on the stack, it resolves first.
Tree of Perdition resolves next. the fact that the tree no longer has an ability is irrelevant. the ability is already on the stack.
its the same way if someone tried to cast Turn to Frog in response to a Thragtusk etb. the Thragtusk player would still gain 5 life.
June 16, 2020 1:18 a.m.
So if you can’t kill your Tree or set it to 0, getting it down to 1 is your best bet, right? A card some people might brush off for that is Turn to Frog. Sure it sets the Tree to a 1/1, but it removes all abilities! The fun thing is, that doesn’t matter here. Once the ability is on the stack, it’s 100% independent of the source. It’ll still resolve, even if the Tree is now a Treefrog with no abilities. The ability will swap your Treefrog’s 1 toughness with your opponent’s life total and make them very sad.
https://blogs.magicjudges.org/rulestips/2016/07/all-about-tree-of-perdition/
June 16, 2020 12:58 p.m.
But with Frogify or Turn to Frog, why is it that its ability to change into lower P/T resolves, but not his loss of abilities?
June 16, 2020 1:18 p.m.
Casting Turn to Frog after you activate Tree of Perdition will not nullify the activated ability while it remains on the stack. Just because the face card of the creature will end up losing all abilities does not mean the activated ability will fizzle. Because the activated ability is on the stack before you cast Turn to Frog, Turn to Frog will resolve first, followed by the activated ability of Tree of Perdition because the stack follows a first in last out order of operations. I apologize that I can't put this interaction into simpler words or terminology. I think I know where your confusion is coming from though because it seems as though you think that after Turn to Frog resolves, the activated ability is negated? Basically in the sequencing I described earlier, the activated ability is already activated. When the Tree loses all abilities from Turn to Frog, the activated ability on the stack doesn't care that the card no longer has abilities because the ability has already been activated and must resolve.
June 16, 2020 3:23 p.m. Edited.
There are a few key things here:
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MtG uses a thing called "the stack". This is effectively a pile of events, however the key is that the last event to go on the pile happens first, kind of like if you had a stack of papers on your desk. To you can add papers to the pile, but to get to the bottom of the pile, you have to first deal with the papers on top. the technical term is "First in, last out (FILO)" compared to "First in, first out (FIFO)". FILO makes it possible for counterspells to exist, unlike FIFO since in FIFO, the spell would lawyas resolve before the counterspell would. It also makes interactions like this possible.
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Once an effect is on the stack, it becomes independent of the source. This means that if you tap a Gelectrode to deal one damage to something, killing the Gelectrode in response will not remove the damage ability from the stack.
So what is happening here with Tree of Perdition is that the first thing you do is put the life swap ability on the stack and then before it resolves you cast Turn to Frog. This means that turn to frog resolves first, making the tree a 1/1 with no abilites. The life swap ability however is already on the stack (and independent of the source - i.e. the tree) so that even though the tree currently has no abilities, the instance of the ability which is already on the stack will still resolve.
If you were able to untap the frog tree , you wouldn't be able to use the ability agin, since it no longer has the ability (until end of turn). However becasue of the way the stack interacts, you can use it once, prior to turning it into a frog.
GoblinElectromancer says... #2
Startling Development, Taranika, Akroan Veteran, Illusory Wrappings, and Reduce in Stature are some that do the job without making the card lose all abilities.
June 15, 2020 1:21 p.m.