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Rules Q&A » Post: Declaration in stone on a commander

Declaration in stone on a commander

March 1, 2018 08:36:09 AM

Àre Maturana
Judge (Level 5 (International Judge Program)), Scorekeeper

France

Declaration in stone on a commander

Hello,

If I cast Declaration in Stone on my opponent's Commander and he choses to move it to the Command zone, why does he get a clue when the card wasn't actually “exiled this way” ?

Thank you,
Àre

March 13, 2018 02:09:25 AM

Callum Milne
Forum Moderator
Judge (Uncertified)

Canada - Western Provinces

Declaration in stone on a commander

Because the card *was* “exiled this way”. This specific type of case tends to trip people up because ‘exile’ has two related, but distinct meanings–it's both a keyword action and the name of the zone that action normally sends things to.

When Declaration in Stone says " exiled this way“ it does not mean ”that were put into the exile zone this way“. It means ”That Declaration in Stone successfully performed the action ‘exile’ upon." Declaration in Stone did perform the action known as ‘exiling’ upon the commander. That Commander may not have ended up in the zone that that action normally results in the card moving to, but that doesn't change the fact that the action was indeed performed upon it.

This distinction can be seen more clearly with a different keyword action that's used in a similar manner: “destroy”. Compare Declaration in Stone to Fumigate. If you use Fumigate to destroy a commander, and its controller chooses to put that card in the command zone instead of letting it go to the graveyard, you still gain a life for it, because Fumigate destroyed it. It didn't go to the graveyard as a result of that destruction, but it was still destroyed. The same goes for Declaration in Stone, only with different, slightly more confusing terminology.

If an effect cares about where the cards it's performing actions upon ends up, it will say so–see Terastodon for an example.