Hi!

This is a situation that happen a few days ago on a PPTQ, and I want to know what you guys think

JNA(NAP) Flips avacyn and says trigger
JA(AP) Pays 5 mana, remove an energy counter using aether hub, sacrifice a creature and emerge Elder Deep Fiend, choose targets and choose to remove kozilek's Return from the graveyard to make 5 damage to all creatures.
JNA (NAP)taps the permanents choosen with elder deep fiend, put all the creatures in graveyard and says “you take 3”
JA (AP) Says “I played everything without avacyn flipped”

what do you do?


Thank you so much!

Just added NAP and AP on the explanation, I used Jugador No Activo (JNA) and Jugador Activo (JA) And I really never thought I was not using english on it =), sorry for the confusion

Edited Cristian Sanchez (Nov. 23, 2016 11:47:35 PM)

I would rule that all of this was done in response to flip trigger and instruct players to communicate clearly in next time.

AP should allow NAP answer to flip trigger, and while card is physically already flipped, I would assume that it's OOOS there. NAP stated that all his actions are done in response to flip trigger.

Edited Bartłomiej Wieszok (Nov. 22, 2016 02:13:38 AM)

I feel like this is just poor player communication.
JNA only announced Avacyn, the Purifier's trigger, but not the trigger of Archangel Avacyn.

JA made it clear he wanted to respond by taking actions, but by making no note of when he wanted to do so complicated things, and makes it seem like he is fine with proposed shortcut JNA put into place by ‘skipping’ the archangel trigger resolution and moving straight to the transform trigger of Avacyn the Purifier.

JA has ever right to react to AA avacyn's trigger, and both players should be communicated there intentions more clearly.

I would investigate with the players to make sure that things transpired exactly as you said they did, and that JA didnt just make a mistake by letting AA Avacyn flip and only realizing he needs to react before the transformation, after the fact. You can pull the players aside one by one to get the stories if you need too.

If you feel comfortable that JNA simply moved past his transform trigger too quickly, I would consider a backup to when Archangel avacyn's transform trigger is on the stack.

If the stated scenario is all that happened with no other communication, then I see no real issue here. JA clearly allowed Avacyn to transform and then did that stuff with the “deal 3 damage” trigger on the stack. If he wanted to do it before the Avacyn transformed, then he should have stated that.

Originally posted by Cristian Sanchez:

JNA Flips avacyn and says trigger

This strikes me as a bit of a shortcut, similar to a player who might put Fairgrounds Warden onto the battlefield, taps 2W, and say "Targeting your Cowl Prowler." While the desire might be to exile Cowl Prowler, there are steps to get to that point, and I would hope that we would let the opponent have the opportunity to cast Revolutionary Rebuff even without stating explicitly when they were responding.

The OP situation might seem a bit more complicated, given the two different cards involved, but it strikes me as very much the same kind of situation. I'd want to make sure I understood the context of the flip trigger itself and how we got to that point. Did JNA just physically flip Archangel Avacyn and saying “Trigger” right after someone untapped? I presuming that it's JA's upkeep? (The “JNA” and “JA” is slightly confusing to me.) Because it strikes me that JNA just resolved the flip trigger and presumed they were getting Avacyn, the Purifier and that trigger. Especially if JA had available mana sources.

I agree with both of Bartlomiej's and Jarrett's lines of thought here, and the kinds of questions to ask to make sure I understand the sequence of events. But while JA is not being explicit about the timing on Elder Deep Fiend, it strikes me as odd to presume it was being cast in response to Avacyn, the Purifier's trigger.

As I said to Cristian before, off the record, maybe the idea of the player is to wait and look if the Avacyn controller forget the damage trigger. Due that he didn't forget the trigger, he is answering now.

As it was said before, just a few words are needed to know where is the player is answering, I'll like to ask him away from the table what he was trying to do, if he answer me that he don't know how to work the trigger works (the damage due to transformation trigger), I will solve the doubt or if he says me that he was trying to catch his opponent with the trigger, I'll tell him that is a bad idea because this isn't Magic: the gotcha, and it's better to be clear when you answer to triggers and abilities.
Definitely I'll not do a back up or something.

This reminds me a lot another situation:

AP: “attack with this” and turns a creature sideways.
NAP resolves a removal spell on that creature.
AP goes in postcombat main phase, and casts a “raid” spell.
NAP claims he *of course* had cast his spell in Beginning of Combat.

{O} ruling is: sorry NAP, you had to tell explicitly (I cannot find a reference, but trust me)

Edited Francesco Scialpi (Nov. 23, 2016 10:19:06 PM)

Francesco, I disagree with that ruling strongly. The “Combat” shortcut
explicitly says that if NAP does not indicate when they are acting, they
are acting in the Beginning of Combat:

>A statement such as “I’m ready for combat” or “Declare attackers?” offers
to keep passing priority until an opponent has priority in the beginning of
combat step. Opponents are assumed to be acting then unless they specify
otherwise.

Actually declaring your attackers is no different from indicating you want
to declare attackers.


—
Rob McKenzie
Magic Judge Level III
Judge Regional Coordinator USA-North
Minnesota

In the case of whether Signal Pest had triggered, the ruling seems to be indeed “NAP needs to be more explicit”, so turning sideways does not have to be treated the same as the combat shortcut
http://apps.magicjudges.org/forum/topic/18229/?page=3#post-119634

In the scenario with raid, it seems the ruling could go both ways (with the extra info from the first thread)
http://apps.magicjudges.org/forum/topic/14839/?page=1#post-95714

Edited Toby Hazes (Nov. 23, 2016 11:38:42 PM)

Those are debates about casting the spell in Beginning of Combat or in the
Declare Attackers step. There is no debate there that NAP is attempting to
cast a spell during the main phase. The situations discussed there are not
the same as what Francesco talked about here.



—
Rob McKenzie
Magic Judge Level III
Judge Regional Coordinator USA-North
Minnesota

Even though this is not a conventional shortcut, I see one player offering a shortcut and another player moving the game forward in front of a shortcut without saying something about the shortcut presented. under that premise, I would thought that the shortcut has being accepted, since having avacyn flipped on the battlefield is something clear and not ambiguous at all.

I would have ruled to allow avacyn to make 3 damage, but I understand the arguments on to not allowing it, I just think that the AP should be clear since the visual state of the battlefield while everything is happening clearly states that avacyn is on the rage spot purifying everyone.

@Christian: going with MTR:

Originally posted by MTR 4.2:

Most tournament shortcuts involve skipping one or more priority passes to the mutual understanding of all players; 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 don't think AP agree on non-verbally proposed shortcut. Having Avacyn flipped on battlefield is not enough for me, since Magic is not a dexterity game.

But the quoted statement doesnt mention the need to verbally propose the shortcut. Just that the player is clear on where the game state will end. And flipping Avacyn is, in my opinion, quite clear

Originally posted by Bartłomiej Wieszok:

@Christian: going with MTR:

MTR 4.2
Most tournament shortcuts involve skipping one or more priority passes to the mutual understanding of all players; 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 don't think AP agree on non-verbally proposed shortcut. Having Avacyn flipped on battlefield is not enough for me, since Magic is not a dexterity game.

This was not fast at all, AP played a lot with avacyn flipped, he sac a creature, plays the elder, exile a kozilek's return for the graveyard and then, when NAP says “you take 3”, he states that he meant to play everything with archangel avacyn not flipped.

this is not a “dexterity” case

Originally posted by Cristian Sanchez:

Bartłomiej Wieszok
@Christian: going with MTR:

MTR 4.2
Most tournament shortcuts involve skipping one or more priority passes to the mutual understanding of all players; 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 don't think AP agree on non-verbally proposed shortcut. Having Avacyn flipped on battlefield is not enough for me, since Magic is not a dexterity game.

This was not fast at all, AP played a lot with avacyn flipped, he sac a creature, plays the elder, exile a kozilek's return for the graveyard and then, when NAP says “you take 3”, he states that he meant to play everything with archangel avacyn not flipped.

this is not a “dexterity” case

So, just to be clear, you're suggesting that AP should have uttered the phrase “Before Avacyn flips” before taking any action whatsoever to be clear they were interrupting the proposed shortcut? So that NAP's moving the game forward in AP's upkeep step to Avacyn, the Purifier's trigger being on the stack (with Archangel Avacyn's delayed trigger implicitly resolved) is reasonable in this situation absent an explicit statement from AP?

Because it seems here that we have NAP resolving one trigger (without being clear that it ever went onto the stack) via the physical representation of Avacyn, then announcing the second trigger, even though we normally have held that AP is in control of the flow or pace of their turn. NAP's advancement of the active player's turn is… unorthodox.