Originally posted by Mackenzie Stratford:

I disagree. In fact I'd go as far as to argue that without the body (flying and flash too), the card wouldn't be nearly as playable, or even see play at all, as a significant proportion of the time you just cast it as a 3/4 Flying during combat, or at EoT for no value on the trigger.

I guess this brings up the discussion point: are we looking at how valuable a trigger is on a particular card (in terms of the card's playability or any other criteria) or are we looking at the trigger itself (in this case: Flicker).

According to Toby's article he cites “if the trigger didn’t exist, would the card be played?” as a guideline for determining a trigger to be “detrimental”. However, what do we do in cases like this one where the trigger and other aspects of the card are of equal value (or close to)?

In the case that we do look at the trigger in a vacuum, how do we, and by what criteria do we classify Flicker (or any other trigger for that matter)?

Here is another way to look at it then, is there a spell that is only this ability (there are obvious exceptions i.e roaring primodox)? Most of this time if this is true then its likely going to be beneficial.

Just as a plug, this Thursday at 7 PM British Summer Time I'll be going
over the new triggered rules in this week's Magic: the Judging episode
(Twitter @MagictheJudging). You can watch the live stream on ustream.

I'll be discussing this exact scenario as one of my examples :)

~David Lyford-Smith
L3, Reading, U.K.

On 3 October 2012 11:55, Gareth Tanner <forum-1509@apps.magicjudges.org>wrote:

Originally posted by Joshua Andrews:

Very detailed answer

Brilliantly put, Joshua.

Here is another way you can think about the trigger:
Do you think having that triggers makes the angel a better card or a worse card ?
Considering that most people playing that angel try to abuse it with come into play effect, and that situations where you wish the trigger was not there are quite rare, the answer is clearly yes.
I think you should not think too much about whether or not the card is playable without the trigger. While there are obvious cases of cards that would be too good without their beneficial trigger (most “Champion” cards), and of cards whose casting cost can only be justified by their trigger (Farhaven Elf, Fierce Empath, who would want to play a 1/1 for 2G), you also have cards that are constructed playable with of without their trigger and cards that are crap even though they have a powerful trigger.

I think that we can safely consider optional abilities without a default action to be “beneficial” in the context of assessing Missed Triggers. In situations when the ability would harm the player using it, he may simply opt not to, so the worst case scenario for such abilities is they do nothing, with the best case being wringing some advantage from it.

So since the range runs 0 -> positive value, it can never be detrimental. These optional abilities are not the type that a player would gain advantage from repeatedly “forgetting”, so we need not penalize them as such. As far as I understand it, this is the philosophy behind assessing the warning for missed triggers in the first place.

I have a question regarding the duration of the current wording of “within a turn.”

My orginal understanding of this duration is from a player's beginning phase (as he or she untaps) to the same player's end phase (as he or she ends the turn). Or should I treat the duration as from a player's certain phase/step (i.e. upkeep) to the same phase/step of the next turn (regardless of whose turn it is)?

Originally posted by Zhaoben Xu:

I have a question regarding the duration of the current wording of “within a turn.”

My orginal understanding of this duration is from a player's beginning phase (as he or she untaps) to the same player's end phase (as he or she ends the turn). Or should I treat the duration as from a player's certain phase/step (i.e. upkeep) to the same phase/step of the next turn (regardless of whose turn it is)?

I was also initially unsure of what “within a turn” meant, but it has been clarified that it follows the same logic as a turn cycle, but for half as long–i.e. it is from the beginning of a step or phase to the end of the next same step or phase (regardless of whose turn it is).

Originally posted by Zhaoben Xu:

I have a question regarding the duration of the current wording of “within a turn.”

My orginal understanding of this duration is from a player's beginning phase (as he or she untaps) to the same player's end phase (as he or she ends the turn). Or should I treat the duration as from a player's certain phase/step (i.e. upkeep) to the same phase/step of the next turn (regardless of whose turn it is)?

Robert Hinrichsen
I was also initially unsure of what “within a turn” meant, but it has been clarified that it follows the same logic as a turn cycle, but for half as long–i.e. it is from the beginning of a step or phase to the end of the next same step or phase (regardless of whose turn it is).

To tie this into the example we've been given, if the game progressed past Neil's End Step (specifically not just the Ending Phase), it would no longer be “within a turn” for the purposes of our ruling, seeing as the trigger was missed in Andy's End Step.

Edited Josh Andrews (Oct. 6, 2012 12:01:07 AM)

Wow, lots of excellent discussion on this one! Thanks to everyone who participated, with special props to Callum Milne for his near-instantaneous accurate and succinct answer, and to Joshua Andrews for his very thorough analysis.

As we were reminded, even a “may” ability must be placed on the stack and target something (if applicable), and the choice of whether to use the “may” ability is made on resolution. This is why we can't just assume that Neil chose not to use the ability by failing to announce or acknowledge it, so we can determine that he missed it (this is a change from previous policy!). Be careful not to “coach” the players here by explaining how bad this will be for Neil. While Andy probably knows the consequence of the trigger going on the stack and that's why he called the judge, we shouldn't assume anything. As we're within one turn since the trigger was missed, we simply ask Andy, “Would you like Neil to play the trigger?” If he says “yes,” we instruct Neil to put the trigger on the stack and choose a target. He cannot choose the Delver because he didn't control it at the time the trigger was missed. This will ultimately result in the sacrifice of the Illusionary Sun Titan.

That leads us to the question of whether to assess a Warning penalty. While the trigger results in a negative outcome for Neil in this specific situation, we should not be using the game state to determine whether a trigger is “generally considered detrimental,” as pointed out by Patrick Vorbroker. Rather than trying to strictly read Toby's short set of guidelines for evaluating a trigger, just look at it and ask yourself, “Is this trigger something I normally wouldn't want to happen?” Also remember that we're not looking for “generally beneficial,” but rather “not generally detrimental.” It would be hard to justify calling the Angel's trigger “generally detrimental” when it's a “may” ability that so rarely has any kind of negative consequence.

As a point of clarification, Toby and Scott have authorized this blanket statement: “A ‘may’ trigger is *never* detrimental.” That makes it pretty simple to determine that the Angel's trigger is not detrimental, and there is no Warning assessed for Neil (and of course Andy is never responsible for his opponent's triggers).

Mitja Bosnic raised a valid point that we as judges should not intervene when we see a missed trigger unless we intend to issue a Warning, which we should only do in the case of a generally detrimental trigger. Of course, a player called us in this particular case, so we certainly should respond to the call and handle it according to the policy.

Thanks again, and we'll see you at the next installment of the Knowledge Pool!

Thanks Josh for this answer. :)

I have an issue with the fact that the judge should simply ask to Andy if he wants Neil to play the trigger, without pointing that Neil will not be able to chose the Delver as a target.

I agree that the judge should never say that choosing the Image as a target will lead to its sacrifice, as the “may” is decided at the resolution of its ability, and by then the trigger of the Phantasmal Titan will already have resolved. That's pure rules stuff, and we ask players of Competitive Tournaments to know Magic Rules and Tournament Rules, and expect them to be rewarded for having a superior rules awareness. As such, judges should not fill the blanks for players and provide strategic informations.

However, my understanding is that we don't expect players to know the IPG - we want them to play the game and call judges without bothering about the penalties and remedies (and we even frown when they try to game them). The fact that the only legal target is the Image is only stated in the IPG, a document we don't expect players to know (in fact, we don't even expect new level 1 judges to know it!), and not in the MTR, which is a document we expect players to know.

So when we ask Andy “Would you like Neil to play the trigger?”, we ask him a question without expecting him to know the implications of his response. That seems quite a poor service to me, as it's basically a coin-flip, as Andy shouldn't have the ability to make an informed decision. It's not rewarding a superior rules knowledge, it's rewarding a superior IPG knowledge, and it conflicts with the philosophy stated above about not expecting players to know the IPG. Players should never feel like they are “punished” for not knowing a document we don't ask them to know, and taking a bad decision because we don't provide them the information they need will surely feel as such.

So I'd be totally fine with something more complete, like “Would you like Neil to play the trigger? If so, only choices that were legal when it had triggered will be allowed.” (or any better phrasing you would come with that doesn't include any information relative to the Comprehensive Rules and the Magic Tournament Rules, but provide relevant information from the IPG).

An alternative would be to add a sentence about that in the section 4.4 of the MTR (along with the obligation for an opponent who wants a missed trigger ability to be played to call a judge, as the actual wording just ask them to "point out"). That would prevent us to use an ugly, potential confusing, question, and put back the responsabilities to know what to answer in the players hands.

- Emilien