When you sacrifice a Necropede with Throne of Geth, what is the order of abilities resolving?
Asked by jamblock 14 years ago
So when necropede hits the yard, it gives something a -1/-1 counter, and throne of geth proliferates. Is that -1/-1 counter placed before or after the proliferation?
xeratheenigma says... #2
heres what happens you sacrifice necropede to pay the cost of ToG's activated ability necropede goes to the graveyard and it's triggered ability goes on the stack then ToG's ability goes on top of the stack so ToG's proliferate goes off first then necropedes -1/-1 counter is put on a creature.
so the simple.answer is that the -1/-1 counter is placed after proliferate occurs.
please correct me if I'm wrong.
November 8, 2010 3:01 p.m.
The key here is the wording on Throne of Geth . Note that there is a colon following "Tap, Sacrifice a creature", the colon marks the end of the cost for activating the ability and adding it to the stack. Thus when you choose to activate Throne of Geth you must sacrifice a creature and tap it to add its ability to the stack.
Now if you choose to sacrifice Necropede as part of the Throne of Geth 's activation cost it will hit the graveyard and it's triggered ability will activate before the Throne of Geth ability resolves.
The net result is that the Necropede ability will resolve first putting a -1/-1 counter on a creature of your choice. Then the Throne of Geth ability will resolve second allowing you to duplicate the counter just added.
As an important note, proliferate DOES NOT require you to target those permanents you are effecting and as such you do not need to declare targets when you activate an ability that proliferates. Instead when the ability resolves you make those choices.
Hope this helps =)
November 8, 2010 4:57 p.m.
@xeratheenigma,
You're correct that the Necropede hits the graveyard before the Throne of Geth ability hits the stack, but triggered abilities like that of the Necropede are not checked immediately upon the triggering event occurring, but instead are checked whenever a player would receive priority.
The result is that the Necropede waits in the graveyard until the Throne of Geth finishes adding its ability to the stack and then when a player would receive priority the state-based actions and triggered abilities are checked. Since the Necropede hit the graveyard since the last time triggered abilities were checked it will trigger and add it's ability to the stack at that point.
November 8, 2010 5:18 p.m.
Oops, it seems I made a mistake there myself! =/
The Necropede actually does not hit the graveyard before the throne of geth ability hits the stack. The first step in activating an activated ability is actually adding it to the stack (see 602.2 and 602.2a).
Other than that my ruling(s) above are still valid.
Sorry for the mistake.
November 8, 2010 5:24 p.m.
In any case, the Necropede ability resolves before the proliferate. So, simply put, yes.
Kalani says... #1
I'm pretty sure that's after proliferation. The 'pede goes to the yard after the sacrifice resolves.
November 8, 2010 2:50 p.m.