Toby, I'm a little dissatisfied with how that topic was left in light of what we're talking about now. In particular, there seems to be no good answer to whether we would also back up an explicit “I'll bolt myself and re-direct to Jace.” I see little justification for why we would back up the cast of Lightning Bolt in such a situation and not also back up the cast of Spell Queller from this thread.

Honestly, the given reasoning of “you can't target your planeswalker with Bolt, GRV for an illegal target, and we'll rewind to before the spell was cast” isn't terribly compelling when the caster has specified a legal target of themselves for the spell and mentioned a desire to use the ‘planeswalker damage redirection effect’ in error. Especially since we do want players to be able to make tactical errors (shriekmaw, spell queller), why are we treating this situation differently? I understand not wanting to ‘gotcha’ players who don't know exactly why they can or can't do that, but we need a better basis of reasoning if we're going to seriously claim this situation as an exception to the rule of not backing up the ‘legal cast’ part of an illegal shortcut.

We shouldn't back up legal but strategically bad plays. Casting spell Queller is a legal play, as is bolt targeting myself. Those spells were cast correctly and I can't see justification for reversing them. At competitive REL, players are expected to have a good grasp on how their spells work.

I think we have to stop looking at it as “Was this a good play” or “was this what the player thought would happen” and take an objective stance of “was this a legal play”. If it was a legal play, it should stand. A backup should only take the game back to the last legal action made.

I've let this discussion roam around, mostly because it's an important one, and there have been some interesting ideas floated. However, I think we've kind of surrounded the topic, and now is a good time for an ‘O’fficial answer and conclusion.

In my view, the analysis of shortcuts and careful or even clever wording are obscuring the real issue - which is, when we do back up, it's only to the point of the error.

As many have stated, playing Spell Queller was legal. The error was attempting to target a spell with CMC > 4 - so that's where we'll back up to (if we back up).

There are times when players will feel bad about a judge's ruling. That doesn't invalidate a correct ruling - not even when the judge also feels bad. (Be careful about investing too much sympathy into your rulings!)

d:^D

Scott, I'm wondering if you could clarify why we handle the “bolt my planeswalker” situation differently. Is it only because targeting a planeswalker with bolt is an illegal action, where if they were more explicit by saying “bolt myself, redirect to my planeswalker” we would hold them to bolting themselves?

We handle it differently mostly because it's different. :)

And, of course, pretty much what you said; also, as was pointed out, the “Bolt your Jace” is defined as a shortcut, but “Bolt my Chandra” can't be a shortcut, since it's illegal. And yes, if someone says “Bolt myself, redirect”? We back up the illegal play - i.e., the redirect. Whoops…

d :^D

Thanks, that's what I was looking for.