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The Archangel of “OMG, that's a lot of counters!” - SILVER

Adam and Netta are playing in a Standard GPT. Netta is at 6 life, and Adam is at 3. Adam has an Archangel of Thune in play with no +1/+1 counters on it. Netta has a tapped Lord of the Void and seven tapped lands in play.

Adam taps his Archangel of Thune and six lands then declares “Attack, and Sphinx's Revelation, put 3 counters on - I win!” Netta says, ”I'm not sure that's how that works, hold on a second," and calls a judge. How do you rule?

Archangel of Thune triggers once per instance of life gain, not per life gained. It should only get one counter from Sphinx's Revelation. Adam has committed GPE-GRV and will receive a Warning. The error was in the resolution of Archangel of Thune's ability, and was caught in more than enough time and is quite simple, so we back up to before the triggered ability resolved, removing the counters, then letting the ability resolve, putting one counter on the Archangel. Play continues from there.

Is Adam still attacking with the Archangel of Thune?

Given that he said “Attack, and Sphinx's Revelation” I would say yes, as that implies that the Revelation was cast after he attacked, which means the Archangel's trigger I would rewind to happened after he attacked, so he is still attacking.

(side note: I'm new, how do you link cards in this forum?)

Given that he said “Attack, and Sphinx's Revelation” I would say yes, as that implies that the Revelation was cast after he attacked, which means the Archangel's trigger I would rewind to happened after he attacked, so he is still attacking.

(side note: I'm new, how do you link cards in this forum?)

Edit: Argh, please ignore the double post.

Edited Ian Groombridge (Nov. 13, 2013 10:17:45 AM)

I'm new, how do you link cards in this forum?

(1) put the word “card” inside the square brackets, the card name, then another pair of square brackets with /card inside them.

(2) type the card name, then highlight it with the mouse cursor and click the icon that looks like a plain Magic card back.

(3) type the card name, highlight it, then press Ctrl+M.

(Note that 2 & 3 require using the web interface; the first option works whether replying via e-mail client or in the interface.)

Edited Scott Marshall (Nov. 13, 2013 10:22:09 AM)

Since Archangel of Thune is tapped, then it has been declared as an attacker. Additionally, six lands were tapped for Sphinx's Revelation so X is 3. Assuming no cards were drawn, then Netta refused the shortcut the resolution of the spell and the resulting triggers. The game state is before blockers are declared with Sphinx's Revelation on the stack with X at 3.

Since Adam tried to do something illegal (put too many counters on a creature from its trigger) he gets a warning for GPE-GRV. There's no failure to maintain game state as Netta called for a judge immediately. There is also no need to back up the game state, as Netta refused the shortcut, the game still has Sphinx's Revelation on the stack (or Archangel's trigger if cards were drawn). The game proceeds from there.

There is some follow up here, as Netta would probably be upset – she's now likely to lose the game on her next turn. It's important to not apologize for the ruling – the rules are the rules, you have done nothing wrong. However, that doesn't mean you don't acknowledge if the player is upset. Simply saying something along the lines of, “I understand if you're upset, but the rules are firm here.” If I'm not the head judge, then I remind her of her right to an appeal. In my experience players turn down opportunity to appeal, but still feel better knowing they have someone else to turn to. Of course, if they do appeal, then that's fine, too.

The big question for me is whether the counters were put on during declare attackers, or during the beginning of combat phase. So I'd explain something like “you can't do these two things at once”, can you tell me what order things went in? If the Sphinx was done before attackers, then I'd confirm which step it happened in. The order matters for a potential rewind, so I'd want to establish that without hinting at how things will end up.

My natural interpretation of his actions at this point is that he declared attackers, and before passing priority cast Sphinx to gain life. But I wouldn't resist too heavily on him going the other way, depending on how he's saying it. (For this exercise, I'm assuming he's tapping mana in same step as the Sphinx). I don't get the sense this guy knows the IPG well enough to understand the rewind policy enough to try to game it at this point, but it's something to be ware of as always.

The GRV is actually putting the wrong number of counters on Angel. Regardless of which order the actions were in, things are simple enough to rewind. (of course, get the head judge involved here)

GRV-Warning for Adam, no F2MGS for his opponent since he called as soon as he could.

Attack then Sphinx? We rewind to just before the counters were put on, then do it correctly. Adam now has an Attacking creature with 1 +1/+1 counter on it.

Sphinx then attack? We do the same rewind, except we've also untapped and gone before the declare attackers step. Adam gets to choose whether to attack or not.

In neither case do we protect him from his misplay by rewinding before the Sphinx. Players should benefit from having superior rules knowledge.

I feel there is value in understanding the snippet below of section 4.2 and whether it affects this ruling.

“if a player wishes to demonstrate or use a new tournament shortcut entailing any number of priority passes, he or she must be clear where the game state will end up as part of the request.”

I do not believe Adam is “clear where the game state will end up” and as such I do not believe this is even a valid shortcut request, thus rolling back to before the offer seems to be correct.

Edit to add the section 4.2 reference is to TOURNAMENT RULES, not IPG.

Edited Christopher Melson (Nov. 13, 2013 10:57:30 AM)

Netta has tapped all possible visible resources, so I do not think it unreasonable of Adam to simply act with an assumption that his opponent has no responses. While it is true that we are technically bypassing priority passes, we also have another section in MTR 4.2 that seems to make it clear that Netta could not reasonably hold priority in this situation to alter Adam's actions in any significant way:

A player may not request priority and take no action with it. If a player decides he or she does not wish to do anything, the request is nullified and priority is returned to the player that originally had it.

So I am not sure this is an improper shortcut in any meaningful sense. Adam's intent is clear - attack you, give my guy enough counters that the attack is lethal, win the game. That is itself his desired end state.

Unfortunately for him, he has made a fundamental error in how the ability works, but we cannot initiate a do-over for that kind of mistake. Stating “attack, and Sphinx's Revelation” seems to indicate to me that he has advanced to the declare attackers step, designated attacking creature(s), and then cast a spell when he had priority in the declare attackers step.

The point of error is when the triggered ability from Archangel of Thune is meant to resolve - this occurs after Sphinx's Revelation has already fully resolved and moved to the graveyard. We should be able to simply rewind to the triggered ability being on the stack and then resolving it properly. I believe any further back would be deviating, and too disruptive besides; multiple cards were drawn and game actions taken with a particular understanding of the game rules. Altering the bulk of these actions gives Adam significant opportunity to reconsider his play decisions.

If Netta's complaint were one of not being given a chance to respond to his actions, we may be looking at it differently, but since the actions up to the point of error were all legal I don't see a need to go back further.

Adam gets a GRV-Warning. Netta gets no penalty since it was called to attention immediately. “Rewind” (insofar as the triggered ability probably hasn't been visibly resolved yet when looking at the gamestate, but has technically been brought to resolution by Adam's comments) to the Archangel of Thune's trigger on the stack, and continue playing.

Mr. Melson, I respectfully disagree with your interpretation. Adam was very clear what the game state would be in the shortucut: "Put three counters on - I win."

What else Adam would have to do or say for this to be a valid shortcut?

I'm unclear: has Adam actually committed a GRV in this situation? My understanding of the current game state is that Adam has attacked with Archangel of Thune, tapped 6 lands, and put Sphinx's Revelation onto the stack. I'm not given the impression that Sphinx's Revelation has resolved, just that Adam has expressed a shortcut he'd like to take to get to +3 counters and winning the game.

Now, obviously Adam can't put those 3 counters onto Archangel, but if he hasn't actually performed that action, has a GRV really occurred? The language in the IPG suggests to me that this is not the case.

Happy to be wrong, so long as the possibility is explored and someone (presumably me) learns something from the result.

My reasoning was this - We would not allow a player to: Cast a Lightning Bolt on a Pro-Red Creature; Counter a Creature Spell with Dispel; or take any other illegal action. So why would we allow a shortcut to be proposed that results in an illegal game state?

This thought process is how I came to find the snippet above, and it led me to wonder: If the game state can't end up as Adam states in his shortcut, then how does he have a clear understanding of the end of shortcut game state?

Originally posted by Nathaniel Lawrence:

The point of error is when the triggered ability from Archangel of Thune is meant to resolve - this occurs after Sphinx's Revelation has already fully resolved and moved to the graveyard. We should be able to simply rewind to the triggered ability being on the stack and then resolving it properly. I believe any further back would be deviating, and too disruptive besides; multiple cards were drawn and game actions taken with a particular understanding of the game rules. Altering the bulk of these actions gives Adam significant opportunity to reconsider his play decisions.

The scenario doesn't indicate that Adam has drawn cards for the Sphinx's Revelation. Does this change how you approach a fix for the situation?

Originally posted by Vincent Roscioli:

Nathaniel Lawrence
The point of error is when the triggered ability from Archangel of Thune is meant to resolve - this occurs after Sphinx's Revelation has already fully resolved and moved to the graveyard. We should be able to simply rewind to the triggered ability being on the stack and then resolving it properly. I believe any further back would be deviating, and too disruptive besides; multiple cards were drawn and game actions taken with a particular understanding of the game rules. Altering the bulk of these actions gives Adam significant opportunity to reconsider his play decisions.

The scenario doesn't indicate that Adam has drawn cards for the Sphinx's Revelation. Does this change how you approach a fix for the situation?

Ah, I got ahead of myself with the card draw there.

It doesn't extensively change my answer, just the minutiae. In this case we resume with Sphinx's Revelation on the stack, prior to the Archangel of Thune trigger. I still don't believe there is any reason to rewind further than that, even if there is a perceived shortcut being offered here - casting Sphinx's Revelation is legally timed and doesn't need a shortcut. It is the resolution of Sphinx's Revelation and the subsequent Archangel of Thune that are being skipped, so those are the things we need to back up and get right.