A situation came up last night during a draft that I would like some clarification on.

I played a soul tithe on my opponents creature. A few turns later he missed the trigger and drew a card. We noticed it later that turn, so my question is what is the appropriate action to take? In the JAR it states that if a required action is missed then resolve that action if within the start of the last players turn. Well at this point thats clearly the case, however the confusion I'm having is was the action that was missed the trigger or sacrificing the creature due to my opponent not paying the cost? So in other words should the trigger be put on the stack at this point and my opponent be given the opportunity to pay the cost, or should they immediatly sacrifice their creature? Does it make a difference that I am the one who controls the trigger? Thanks.
Cris Plyler

Edited Cris Plyler (Jan. 11, 2013 04:12:06 PM)

I had the exact same situation come up in my pre-release and was stuck on the same question. Luckily I had two L3s to test this situation on.

The salient point here is that you are the controller of Soul Tithe and are the controller of its trigger. Therefore it is your responsibility to put the trigger on the stack. It's kind of awkward, but essentially at the end of your turn you say, “End my turn, Soul Tithe Trigger”. This eliminates the opportunity for your opponent to quickly untap, draw.

Since we're looking at the JAR here, the trigger should go on the stack immediately and resolve normally with your opponent having the opportunity to pay.

Tough with these types of triggers, eh? They don't trigger on our upkeep, so putting a die or counter on top of our deck won't work :/. Anyone have a tip we can pass on to our players for remembering Soul Tithe/Stab Wound type triggers?

-Ben Quasnitschka, L1

The issue I have with that is that it's regular REL not competitive REL. So my thought on this is that both players are responsible for the trigger. Paying the cost is optional, as of such the action to take would be to immediatly have the player sacrifice the creature.

At a casual tournament, I see no harm in allowing the player to pay the cost when it is realized. You didnt mention that any relevant actions, or changes to the board state have occurred, so it sounds like what happened is sometime during the players first upkeep the trigger was remembered. Both players forgot about it, and it doesnt sound like anyone has any ill-intent, so the result thats going to satisfy the players and allow for an enjoyable tournament is to take care of it then.

On triggers like this though, where one players permanent (soul tithe) has a triggered ability, like an upkeep cost, on another players permanent (opponents creature), even though its the NAP's trigger, it occurs on the AP's upkeep and on the AP's creature, which increases the chances of honest play errors where your opponent controls the pace of the upkeep. That is to say the AP in that situation should have a greater than normal responsibility in remembering it, since forgetting to do so is to their obvious benefit. I understand thats not part of the actual rules though and shouldnt be considered beyond what fix, if any fix, is appropriate.

As far as who to remember triggers like that, I dont think there is any trick, you just have to stay conscious of the board and remember your triggers. At a competitive event that means there cant really be any leniency, but at regular REL accommodations should be made.

Edited Zane Mitchell (Jan. 12, 2013 04:29:38 AM)

Cris, the JAR does say "if the action was optional, assume they chose not to – and no further fix is required." However, I do not believe it's proper to apply this fix to triggers with a default action. From the players' perspective, they forgot about the entire ability. The ability itself is not optional in the way that, for example, Batterhorn's is.

In addition, I think it's bad customer service to force a player to sacrifice their Tithe'd creature because they forgot about the trigger earlier, but remembered it now. I agree that both players have responsibility to remember the trigger – and I would remind both players that it's absolutely unacceptable to deliberately ignore any triggers at Regular REL – but I believe it's correct to resolve the trigger as best as possible, which involves giving the player the choice they should have had if the ability were noticed at the correct time.

In short, I agree with Adam's interpretation.

P.S. I realize that abilities with default abilities implicitly contain the word “may” according to the Comp Rules:

117.12a. Some spells, activated abilities, and triggered abilities read, " unless you .“ This means the same thing as ”You may . If you don't, ."

Even with that, I would still argue that Soul Tithe isn't an “optional” ability in the sense being used by the JAR, as the trigger will always make the player do something. In contrast, Batterhorn can produce no result at all if you choose not to use the ability on resolution.

What about something like a pact of negation, if that trigger was missed in regular REL would you rule the same way by putting the trigger on the stack?

This is a great discussion, and at risk of dampening it, I'd like to
confirm the interpretation that Soul Tithe is not ‘optional’. There is a
choice to made.

As you were…


On 15 January 2013 15:24, Cris Plyler <forum-2539@apps.magicjudges.org>wrote:

I think there's a distinct difference that Soul Tithe is a beneficial trigger for its controller (or non detrimental if you prefer), while Pact of Negation is a detrimental trigger for its controller. While I understand at Regular both players are responsible for a trigger, I would have a problem ruling that missing the trigger has the exact opposite effect at Regular (sacrifice the creature) than it would at Competitive (missed trigger, opponent has the option of putting it on the stack).

In my opinion Soul Tithe is a very poorly designed card that's incongruent with how we would expect the card to work. Had the card been written, "Enchanted permanent gains, At the beginning of the upkeep…," its functionality would be more in alignment with what we've come to expect from Upkeep costs.

Moment of catharsis: I've a bit of a sore spot for this card. At the pre-release I judged, I ruled the creature to be sacrificed. It's kind of bothered me ever since as it had a severe impact on the result of the game and the match. But, we're all human.

Originally posted by Adam Zakreski:

I think there's a distinct difference that Soul Tithe is a beneficial trigger for its controller (or non detrimental if you prefer), while Pact of Negation is a detrimental trigger for its controller. While I understand at Regular both players are responsible for a trigger, I would have a problem ruling that missing the trigger has the exact opposite effect at Regular (sacrifice the creature) than it would at Competitive (missed trigger, opponent has the option of putting it on the stack).

I would be very careful in comparing the actions taken in regular REL vs comptitive REL. I know that in most cases the illegal actions taken in higher REL's are supposed to be more severe then at regular REL, but there may always be exceptions to that rule. Also deterimental and beneficial triggers really only apply to higher level REL's as well.

What I am trying to do here is to try to be consistant in my rulings. If two cards are functionally similar, but we apply one set of rules to one card and another set to the other then that could create an inconsistancy with the rulings.

Just as a side note, I'm not saying the way to rule it by putting it onto the stack is wrong and that I would do just that in future tournaments. Also I know it's regular REL and whatever the correct option is, a slight deviation to keep the game fair and fun is perfectly fine. I just want to bring a different point of view to this situation is all.

…but doesn't Pact of Negation contain a default action, which means that if it missed, we assume the default action, which in that case is that the controller loses the game?

Soul Tithe is different because the opponent has the option of paying the cost, but the controller of Soul Tithe is the controller of the ability. If you've made any action that would indicate that you have passed priority, and there are probably a few ways to do this, even at Competitive, I would give the Soul Tithe's controller a warning for missed trigger, and since it's “beneficial” play on.

At Regular REL, it would all depend on when the players noticed.

“Default action” appears nowhere in the Judging at Regular REL document. It only asks if the instruction was optional. Since a Pact trigger is not optional (you have to do one thing or the other), it should resolve now (meaning the controller of the trigger chooses to pay or lose the game at that point).

Also, at Comp REL, a trigger that isn't “generally detrimental” wouldn't merit a warning. It would just be “play on” unless the opponent wants the trigger to go on the stack. :)

I was more speaking in a Competitive context when I mentioned Pact of Negation, sorry for some confusion.

I understand your point perfectly.