Date: Tue, 25 May 1999 16:59:46 -0700 From: dcijudge@WIZARDS.COM Subject: Urza's Destiny FAQ *Magic: The Gathering*(r)--_Urza's Destiny(tm)_ FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS GENERAL QUESTIONS Q: What does "converted mana cost" mean? A: This is the new term for what was previously called "total casting cost." It's the total amount of mana in a card's mana cost, regardless of color. For example, if a card's mana cost is 2UUU, its converted mana cost is 5. Q: What does "reveal" mean? A: If a cost or effect instructs you to reveal one or more cards, show the cards to all players. Once they've all had a chance to see the cards, put them back where they came from (usually your hand). If an effect instructs players to play with their hands revealed, the cards stay revealed until the effect ends. Q: If my hand's already revealed, can I get any effect from spells and abilities that depend on how many cards I reveal (such as the Scents and Seers)? In other words, can I reveal cards that are already revealed to generate an effect? A: Yes. Q: What does "haste" mean? A: A creature with haste can attack the turn it comes under your control. Also, you can play its activated abilities that have ocT in the activation cost. On older cards, this ability was stated as "unaffected by summoning sickness." CARD-SPECIFIC QUESTIONS Bubbling Muck Q: Does it affect only the swamps in play when it resolves, or will it affect a swamp I play later in the turn? A: Bubbling Muck reads, "Until end of turn, whenever a player taps a swamp for mana . . . . " This phrasing means the spell affects _players,_ not swamps, so it doesn't matter when a particular swamp was played. Q: Will it affect dual lands that are swamps, such as Badlands? A: Yes. For example, if you tap Badlands for R after playing Bubbling Muck, you'll get BR. Carnival of Souls Q: Is this optional? A: No. Each time a creature comes into play--even your opponents' creatures--you lose 1 life and add B to your mana pool. Covetous Dragon, Emperor Crocodile, Tethered Griffin Q: What if I don't control a permanent of the appropriate type for just a brief moment (such as during the resolution of Living Death)? A: The creature's ability will trigger if at any time you don't control a permanent of the appropriate type--even for a moment. False Prophet Q: When it goes to a graveyard, will it then remove itself or other creature cards in a graveyard from the game? A: No. False Prophet only removes creatures in play from the game. Because the Prophet itself is already in a graveyard by the time its triggered ability resolves, it will not be removed. Fledgling Osprey, Metathran Elite Q: What does "enchanted" mean? A: A permanent is enchanted if it has a local enchantment (such as an enchant creature card) attached to it. Flicker Q: What happens to counters, local enchantments, and changes to a permanent's characteristics (such as its color) when it's removed from the game and then returned to play? A: Flicker essentially "resets" the target permanent. All counters are removed. Local enchantments are left in play with nothing to enchant, so they're destroyed. All characteristic changes (such as color or word changes) are removed. The permanent returns to its base characteristics, and any "comes-into-play" abilities will trigger when the permanent returns to play. Goblin Festival Q: When do I have to flip the coin? A: Flipping a coin is part of the ability's resolution. Q: Let's say I activate the ability several times in a row. Then the last one played resolves and I lose control of Goblin Festival. What happens? Do the rest of the coin flips and damage occur? A: Yes. Even if you lose control of Goblin Festival when the ability on top of the stack resolves, the other abilities waiting to resolve will do so normally--the damage will be dealt, you'll flip a coin, and so on. If you lose the coin flip while you don't control Goblin Festival, an opponent of your choice will gain control of it (which means nothing happens in a two-player game because you have only one opponent). Lurking Jackals Q: If my opponent's life total goes back above 10 after Lurking Jackals becomes a creature, does it revert to being an enchantment? A: No. Lurking Jackals has an ability that triggers when an opponent has less than 10 life. Once this ability resolves, the Jackals becomes a creature; the card doesn't have an ability that enables it to become an enchantment again. Mark of Fury Q: Let's say I enchant a creature with Mark of Fury, then the enchanted creature is destroyed (Mark of Fury goes to my graveyard). Will Mark of Fury still return to my hand at end of turn? A: No. The triggered ability that returns Mark of Fury to your hand can't trigger while it's in your graveyard. Mask of Law and Grace Q: If an effect makes the Mask a red or black card, or if the word "black" or "red" in changed to "white" by an effect like Sleight of Mind's, will the Mask destroy itself? A: Yes, because it doesn't have the clause that prevents the protection it grants from destroying it. Multani's Decree Q: Will I still gain life if one of the enchantments is a creature and it regenerates? A: No. Under _Classic(tm)_ rules, regeneration generates a replacement effect--it _replaces_ a creature's destruction. Because a regenerated permanent isn't ever really destroyed, you won't gain any life. Opalescence Q: Will it cause enchantments to lose their abilities, like Titania's Song does to artifacts? A: No. Opalescence says nothing about removing abilities. Q: Can I attack with an animated enchantment during the turn in which Opalescence comes into play? A: Yes, provided you controlled that enchantment at the beginning of your turn. Plow Under Q: Who decides in what order the lands go back on top of their owner's library? A: The lands' owner decides. Powder Keg Q: Is this card miswritten? Shouldn't it read, "equal to or less than"? A: No. Powder Keg destroys only artifacts and creatures with converted mana cost _exactly equal to_ the number of fuse counters on it. Quash Q: Won't the spell being countered end up in its owner's graveyard, not removed from the game? A: No; the countered spell will be removed from the game. Because the first clause on Quash is "Counter target spell," the spell will be countered and put into its owner's graveyard before the rest of the effect occurs. Rayne, Academy Chancellor Q: Can I draw two cards if a single spell targets me and one of my permanents, or two of my permanents? A: Yes. Rayne's ability triggers each time you or a permanent you control becomes targeted, even if one spell or ability has more than one target. If your opponent targets two creatures you control with Sick and Tired, for example, you may draw up to two cards (or up to four if Rayne is enchanted). Q: Does Rayne's ability let me draw as many cards as I want? It reads, "Whenever you or a permanent you control _is_ the target of a spell or ability controlled by an opponent," which means the ability triggers countless times, right? A: No. Rayne's ability should read, "Whenever you or a permanent you control _becomes_ the target of a spell or ability controlled by an opponent . . . . " This wording prevents the ability from triggering countless times. Replenish Q: Who chooses the target for local enchantments returned to play with Replenish? A: Replenish's controller chooses. Q: If the only legal target for a returning local enchantment is an opponent's permanent, can I just leave it in my graveyard? A: No. You must return each enchantment to play that can be returned, even if it means enchanting an opponent's permanent. Scents of Brine, Cinder, Ivy, Jasmine, and Nightshade Q: When do you choose which and how many cards to reveal? A: It's part of the resolution, so you both choose and reveal when the spell resolves. Note that this applies to the Seers' abilities as well. Storage Matrix Q: What exactly does it do? A: Its effect replaces the untap action of each player's normal untap step. The player chooses one of the three permanent types and only untaps those permanents. No other permanents untap during the untap step as long as Storage Matrix is in play. Thorn Elemental Q: Can I divide the Elemental's damage between its blockers and the defending player? A: No. When you get to the combat damage step, you must choose to deal the Elemental's combat damage to either the blockers or the player, but not both. (If you choose blockers, you're free to divide the damage among them.) Q: Can I still have the Elemental deal damage to the defending player if all creatures blocking it have left combat before to the combat damage step? A: Yes. Treachery Q: Do the errata to Cloud of Faeries, Palinchron, and so on apply to Treachery? A: Yes. Treachery should read, "When Treachery comes into play, if you played it from your hand, you may untap up to five lands." Trumpet Blast Q: What exactly does it affect? A: It works like Giant Growth and not like Orcish Oriflamme. In other words, each creature attacking when Trumpet Blast resolves gets a "You have +2/+0 until end of turn" bonus. Urza's Incubator Q: What can I choose as a creature type under _Classic_ rules? A: You may choose any single word that doesn't have another technical meaning in the *Magic*(r) rules. If a creature you're thinking of playing has more than one creature type (such as Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary, which is an Elf legend), you can only choose one of them. Q: Are multiple Incubators cumulative? A: Yes. They're also cumulative if each of a creature's two types match an Incubator. For example, if two Incubators were in play, one set to "Elf" and one set to "legend," Rofellos--who is an Elf legend--would cost o4 less to play. Wake of Destruction Q: If I destroy a forest, will this destroy a dual land that's a forest, such as Bayou? A: No. Wake of Destruction's effect depends on only card names, not land types. Wizards of the Coast, *Magic: The Gathering*, *Magic*, _Classic,_ and _Urza's Destiny_ are trademarks of Wizards of the Coast, Inc. (C)1999 Wizards of the Coast, Inc. *** *** *** *** DCI Judge Certification Administrator, Organized Play Wizards of the Coast When alone in the fields, with no one to see them, they would hop, skip and jump, touching the ground as lightly as possibly and crying 'We are bubbles of earth! Bubbles of earth! Bubbles of earth!'