Weird, convoluted question regarding Admonition Angel's landfall and the stack.
Asked by banchs 14 years ago
Suppose I have an Admonition Angel and a fetch land (any fetch land) on the battle field. Its my opponent's turn and he decides to attack with Primeval Titan . The titan's ability goes on the stack. In response, I crack the fetchland. My question is, does the landfall ability of the angel resolve so as to exile the titan and counter its ability? Or does the ability resolve and THEN the titan gets exiled?
Now, I could be wrong but the only phase/step's that an opponent can't do anything at the end of is the clean up step and the untap substep of a phase.
September 3, 2010 2:21 a.m.
hmm yeah that clarifies a lot. That was my initial line of thought but it gets a bit confusing sometimes. Thanks a lot!
September 3, 2010 2:23 a.m.
Even if he jumped straight to his attack phase, you can actually say, "Hey, before you end your MP1, I'm going to crack this and exile your primveval."
September 4, 2010 6:13 p.m.
Aye, but some folk will try and pull a blinder on ya by saying that they offered you a chance to respond but you didn't take it or some crazy crap...
This isn't directed at casual magic players, but I remember the time when during a tourney match a player was asked if he was doing anything, the player answered no, and the opponent went, ok, then thats the end of your turn... The player hadn't even the chance to attack as yet, and the opponent successfully managed to trick the player into going straight into the end of turn because he said he wasn't doing anything else... Even though all he needed to do was to attack for the win!
Stuff like that really annoys me. and thus why I said the above guff. I'm all for fair and honest playing, and cheating is all well and good amongst friends, but doing something like that or trying to rush folk into making mistakes during a tourney is too often something that some folk will try on.
September 4, 2010 6:41 p.m.
merubhanot says... #6
Whoa, the accepted answer is definitely very misleading. Once he has declared his attack, his ability will happen regardless of what happens to his Primeval Titan . You are not allowed to respond to someone declaring an attack. You are, however, allowed to use an ability "at the beginning of their combat step". If you crack the fetchland then and exile the primeval titan, he will never get a chance to attack with it. This is relevant because it may change his other attacks, since he will know before declaring other attackers that his Primeval Titan has been exiled.
September 5, 2010 1:06 a.m.
This action Needs to happen at the end of the first main phase.
When the beginning of the attack step begins, it begins with the attacker declaring attackers... The opponent can't do anything unless there is a triggered effect during the declaration of attackers. By which stage the Primeval Titan 's ability will have triggered.
So the Admonition Angel needs to trigger the effect before the attack step begins.
So in effect, I'm not being misleading with my answer.
If you play Magic The Gathering Online it teaches you things like this :)
September 5, 2010 1:17 a.m.
merubhanot says... #8
I'm pretty sure that what cardcoin said isn't true.
After the first main phase ends, you enter the combat phase. Each player (starting with the active player) gets a chance to play something. At least, this is my understanding
Active player declares: entering attack step Active player casts spells (has priority) Active player passes priority, opponent casts spells
All responses can happen here. All spells played must be instant speed
Once both players have passed priority here (usually you just skip this), then attackers can be declared.
Please tell me if I'm wrong.
September 5, 2010 1:21 a.m.
Ok, seems I have been slightly mis-leading there... I blame me from playing old school (pre-Magic 2010 rules) lol.
It used to be (and to a lot of old skool players it still does!) that at the end of 1st Main phase these actions would take place, but now they indeed happen at the beginning of the Combat stage. It's the first of 5 steps in the stage that is taken. So ultimately whilst I have been a bit misleading, the premises still remains that before combat is declared, the defending player has a chance to tap/play instants or effects to enhance/desrupt the combat stage.
The major difference is that mana would be emptied from the mana pool and the combat step would begin officially before this all begins.
Most folk though would be doing stuff at the end of the 1st main phase, then this step is skipped for the combat to start taking place.
Like I stated before, once Primeval Titan is declared as an attacker, the effect still goes on the stack, so you still need to crack the ability BEFORE it declares attack.
I'm telling you your right in that you can act at the beginning of combat, but you still can't do it in response of attackers being declared, and thus any actions need to be taken before attackers are declared.
September 5, 2010 1:34 a.m.
And by my last paragraph, I mean in that Admonition Angel 's ability stopping Primeval Titan 's ability from triggering once it's declared as an attacker.
Thanks for pointing out that it could be done though at the beginning of the attack step merubhanot
September 5, 2010 1:37 a.m.
merubhanot says... #11
Yep, that's right. That's what I said in my first post, though in less detail :-)
September 5, 2010 1:37 a.m.
@ cardcoin, merubhanot: technically you're both right. you can crack the fetch either at the end of the first main phase or during the "beginning of combat" step. generally you would do it during the beginning of combat step, however, to prevent them from playing sorcery-speed things afterwards. however, once the titan attacks, only Stifle can save you from the Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle .
cardcoin says... Accepted answer #1
What happens in this example is the following...
The Primeval Titan declares the attack.
It's effect goes on stack.
You crack the fetch land
admoninition-angel's effect goes on stack.
Nothing else happens to stack so it resolves.
Primeval Titan get's Exiled, but the effect stays on the stack.
the effect resolves and the user goes ahead and gets his lands into play.
This is why you crack the fetch land at the end of the oponents first main phase (which you will have a chance to do) before he attacks. If he doesn't give you the chance and attempts to declare the attack before you can action anything at the end of his 1st main phase, then you can ask him to step back, and if he doesn't (in a tourney scene) then it's time to call a judge. If it's a FNM or something of that type, then kindly explain that at the end of a phase in a turn the opponent gets a chance to play instants or effects before you go to the next phase.
Hope this clarifies this issue. :)
September 3, 2010 2:19 a.m.