DDR#506 - Do Henzie Torre and Serra Paragon Work?

Hearing Judge Dave say "...ok, so..." triggers a pavlovian response in me for the release of high quality long lasting dopamines.

Dave: Be aware, pretty high level rules stuff ahead, and some very technical explanation Me: rubs hands

14:55 Then, I'd like to thank you, Dave, for your hard work in explaining the most complex game in the world to us. In my particular case, your channel has given me the tools to deal with cheaters and those classic "I've played for 20 years, trust me" players in Commander. Keep up the great job!

One of the cases when "reading a card explains the card" does not work until the rules are updated

That was a pretty exhaustive analysis of the situation, and from times to times it's good to get to the bottom of things like you did.

Thanks, Dave , for those deep Dive!! :) And also I really like, how you give reasons for being careful with judging "its obvious, that this card should Work Like this... Even If the Rules they otherwise. It Shows me, that you have a very deep understanding of the rules and also proper Argumentation!! Thanks a lot 🥰 And yes, I followed till the end 🙃

I want to thank Dave and the people at wizards of the coast for all the time and effort they put into the rules and regulations to let us have a great game with a good comprehensive grasp of how things work

Appreciate all the time and effort put into this. Friends and I were discussing these cards over a variety of games throughout our times together, and only two of them are 'rulesheads', if you will, like myself. It's hard to get three brains to comprehend a solution to things like these, but I'm super thankful that I had access to an understanding we can all share. :)

Seems strange that casting something "with Blitz" doesn't give the card on the field the side effects of Blitz rather than the side effects being granted by the thing that allowed it to be cast with Blitz. I feel like rather than exceptions to static abilities, it should be a change to how alternate casting cost effects and such apply their effects.

Great video! thanks for your work! Now off to rewatch your banding video lol

Fantastic video! Come for the interesting rules questions, stay for the interesting discussions on judging philosophy :)

Excellent video, Dave! Sometimes a marathon video is in order :)

The FAA publishes rules changes for pilots called NOTAMs (notices to airmen) that pilots are required to check prior to every flight. These rules are essentially tweaks that supercede comprehensive flight rules. Magic might benefit from its own standing "NOTAM" list that judges can reference prior to (and during) tournaments that would deconflict expected vs technically correct interactions. Once the official rules are amended the relevant NOTAM would be removed. Just a thought.

I... don't understand some of where the problem was. The abilities seem like they work just fine as printed, except that they rely on 'chaining' together some existing rules and being very picky about where the source of those effects is. Henzie - This grants Blitz to creature spells you cast. It can only grant Blitz to those cards as you are choosing how to cast them - making Blitz a valid choice as an alternate cost. Henzie himself is not giving the creatures those spells become the "Sacrifice this at the beginning of the next end step" effects; the fact that it was cast with the Blitz ability is doing that. Blitz says "If you do(cast this spell for its Blitz cost), Sacrifice it at the beginning of the next end step." which is the creation of a Delayed Trigger. That Delayed Trigger is independent of whether the creature the spell becomes has the Blitz keyword ability on it, or indeed whether the thing that gave it the ability to Blitz is still in play. Delayed triggers like most activated and triggered abilities, are independent of their source once they have been created. Paragon - Again, we have an 'You may(foo). If you do(foo), (bar)" kind of setup. In this case, it's "If you do(play or cast such a card), it gains (Ability)". Not it has (Ability), it gains (Ability). It's the difference between an enchantment saying "Creatures you control have haste" vs "Creatures you control gain haste" - the former is a static continuous that holds the ability in place; the latter gives the ability then has no further interest in what happens, and if a duration is not stated, that duration is 'permanent, at long as that object exists'. The effect that permitted you to play the land card or cast the permanent spell from your graveyard should, under the old rules, be able to track the object it becomes since it is that ability that makes the movement possible. Even then, the ability being granted is being granted to a card that is either being played as a land, or cast as a spell - neither of those things are permanents, so the phrase 'this permanent' can only refer to "the permanent this card or spell becomes". And in THAT case, it is the ability that Paragon grants to the spell that is now setting up a delayed triggered ability that is watching for "when the permanent I become dies, exile that permanent" - the ability that is setting that up is an ability the Land Card or Permanent Spell had, not an ability that Paragon is responsible for maintaining. In either case, it is not Henzie nor Paragon tracking objects between zones, but abilities that they grant to other objects that are doing the tracking - and since those abilities exist independent of their source and the existing rules had no trouble with an ability tracking movement of an object between zones within itself when it explicitly states it does so... I don't see the problem. To be fair, the new rules clean up the process significantly and make it a LOT clearer that what is happening is allowed to happen, so that's a good thing. Clarification is extremely important. Maybe I'm just misunderstanding something important, which is highly likely. Under the above understanding, Flickerwisp on the Wasteland would cause the Wasteland to 'forget' that it is the permanent that the land card in the graveyard became - it is now a new object, and since it wasn't the ability that put it onto the battlefield moving it, that ability loses track of it; the delayed trigger no longer has an object to apply to. On the other hand, Doom Blade on the Paragon would accomplish nothing, since the delayed trigger has nothing to do with whether Serra Paragon is in play, by a couple degrees of separation at that point.

You said: "Clap if you were able to follow..." I didn't clap... Also, congratulations on your excellent and precise video. Probably the only video I watch and then go back 2-3 mins several time during it to better grasp a concept. Thanks!

I think an interesting case of "They probably intended this card to function some other way" was Kappa Cannoneer. I think that the designers probably intended this card to not trigger when it itself enters the battlefield, since other similar cards would say "Whenever Kappa Cannoneer or another artifact...". But this is nowhere as clear as Henzie or Serra Paragon. And in my understanding, everyone plays the card as printed even though the text is very unintuitive.

Yugioh judge here: This is interesting because yugioh has a far more elegant solution. It’s simply that card effects override game rules, and objects remember how they were put into any location whether public or private. Additionally, lingering triggers are potentially at play here with Serra paragon. So in yugioh logic, henzie would override the rules to play a card. You may cast a creature spell as normal or you can use a different method of cast outlined by henzie. This additional option is only present while henzie’s ability is applying, which is while in play and it’s ability is not being removed from it (like from frogify). Then when you use this alternative casting cost, the object being cast notes how it was placed on the stack, with the keyword blitz. Blitz does 3 things. It gives a static keyword ability of haste, and it gives a dies trigger to draw 1 card, and it gives a lingering triggered ability to sacrifice itself. Now that the object has been put onto the game board with blitz added to it, the object remembers how it got it, and the game (which is managed by persons playing said game) manages the 3 abilities it gained from this rule bending granted by henzie. The object leaving play seems to be the sticking point here especially with Serra paragon. If something leaves play it should be a new object, no longer influenced by any abilities put onto it. This is where yugioh has an elegant solution. In terms of gameplay and timing concerns, this action never occurs. However, the GAME checks certain sub-actions that the player must manage since the game is not sentient. When an object is to be placed from one area to another area (lack of the word zone is because exiled or banished in ygo is not a zone. They are not placed in any particular location, as zones are specific locations in game with other rules attached to them), the game needs to determine where does the object go. So in a case where leyline of the void is in play and a creature is destroyed in combat due to a lack of toughness, the card is on the field, but marked to be removed from the field because it’s reached a condition to be moved elsewhere. The game would send the creature to the graveyard but since leyline is overwriting then game rules to exile it instead, the creature is put into exile. In the case of Serra paragon, the object is leaving the area it was in, and it remembers why and how it was put on the area. The argument that it is a new object and would have to forget how it was put there, because it has left the battlefield, is ignoring the sub action taken by the game. The object is still present on the battlefield and has its lingering trigger ability. It remembers it’s meant to be exiled, and goes there because the game recognizes it’s still on the battlefield and is the same object that was given additional effects, but when it ends up in its location, it is considered a new object. The game sort of “back tracks” where an object came from and how, to determine if there is a game rule being circumvented by a card effect, which is the case with Serra paragon. Maybe it’s because I’ve played ygo for 20 years and I’m used to the rules more intimately than magic, but this is a very simple-to-understand rule, as opposed to a very lengthy discussion we saw here. There’s also the issue of the card being placed into a private location and how that affects triggered abilities, but that’s a ygo specific ruling which was amended for maintaining new rules. Anyways there is your ygo judge’s opinion lol. I’m just a nobody anyways hahaha.

The card knows where it is at all times. It knows this because it knows where it isnt. By subtracting where it is from where it isnt - or vice versa - it obtains a reference. The MTG Rules Subset for static abilities works as follows: If a reference modifies an object that changes the zone where it is, or was - whichever applies, it cannot modify the object itself. However, the reference must also know where it is (within reason). If a reference were to modify the object in a zone where it shouldn't be, it no longer is.

2:30 I get what the intent of this section is, but shouldn't you have used an instant spell as an example instead of OG Flicker which is a sorcery? Not gonna dodge many doomblades with that card.

I am almost certainly wrong, but I thought the use of the word “gains” implies that that thing is going to have it indefinitely, because it’s been “given”? As opposed to something saying it “has” it, which to me implies it has it as long as the thing that says it has it as around.