Can a token come back with undying?
Asked by neozzero 12 years ago
lets say i have spirit tokens. if i use Undying Evil will it com back with a +1/+1 counter? and when can i use Undying Evil? does this work with mikaeus, the unhallowed]]'s ability?
hunter9000 says... Accepted answer #2
No, tokens cease to exist when state based actions are checked. It would trigger undying when it left the battlefield for the graveyard, but then before undying resolved, it would cease to exist. Then undying has no creature to return to the battlefield when it resolves, so nothing happens. See 110.5f
February 6, 2012 7:25 p.m.
MagnorCriol says... #3
hunter9000 is correct. Additionally, Mikaeus's ability doesn't interact at all with Undying Evil.
This is because Undying is a triggered ability, which means that when a creature with Undying dies, a trigger gets put on the stack as described above.
When the first trigger resolves, it will return the creature to the battlefield, and then when the second trigger tries to resolve, it won't be able to find the creature and won't return anything (again, as described above).
February 6, 2012 9:25 p.m.
MagnorCriol says... #4
Er. Forgot a step. The scenario I described above is what happens if you cast Undying Evil on a creature when Mikaeus is out (or if you just have a creature with natural Undying out there with Mikaeus). The creature has two separate instances of Undying, which is why there's two separate triggers.
February 6, 2012 9:27 p.m.
I really do not like the current rulings on this Undying ability.
There are still abilities / ruling text that is distinctively different.
For example Goblin Sharpshooter has "when a creature is put into the graveyard".
What I am trying to get at is that Tokens die. and the ability specifically says "when the creature dies" not "when the creature enters the graveyard if id had no +1/+1 counters on it return it from the graveyard to the battlefield".
I really think Tokens should be effected by undying.
February 15, 2012 4:30 p.m.
hunter9000 says... #6
I'm not exactly sure what you're saying, but I'll take a crack at it.
The word "dies" means exactly "is put into a graveyard from the battlefield" See 700.6. So there's no difference between undying's trigger and the goblin's trigger.
And you're right that tokens do die. It's just that before they get a chance to come out of the graveyard, they cease to exist. See 704.5d. So there's nothing to return to the battlefield. This is just like if you used Thraben Heretic's ability to exile a creature card from a graveyard before it comes back from undying. Before the triggered ability resolves, the creature is gone, so nothing happens.
February 15, 2012 6:43 p.m.
@caboose - Sadly, the death of a token means 'leaves the game' (as a state-based action). As a technicality, token never enter any graveyard. They are not allowed there by the nature of what it is to be a token. For a token to come to or leave from the battlefield is to create them from nothing and return them to nothing. This is different from an exile.
August 15, 2014 5:49 p.m.
MagnorCriol says... #8
Rhagnarox - First off, necroposting. Second off, you're not correct. Tokens do enter the graveyard, and for that matter any other zone they're sent to from the battlefield. It's when SBAs are checked immediately after they do so that they cease to exist.
Rule 704.5d - "If a token is phased out, or is in a zone other than the battlefield, it ceases to exist."
That's a state based action, taken from the list of SBAs (which is what rule 704.5 is). That's what makes tokens cease to exist, and that couldn't function if tokens didn't hit the graveyard at all in the first place.
In addition, tokens do trigger effects that care about "when a permanent is put into a graveyard from the battlefield" or "when a creature dies" and the like, which again couldn't trigger if they didn't hit the graveyard at all.
The span of time that they're in the yard is so short that for many intents and purposes they might as well cease to exist between the field and the yard, but it's an important distinction that they do, in fact, hit the yard before the state-based action robots come by and clean them up.
August 17, 2014 6:05 p.m.
MagnorCriol, my apologies because after my post is when I noticed the OP timestamp. I will pay attention next time.
However, I do not think I am incorrect in what I said, and especially the first part of what you said is exactly incorrect (110.5g - Any token leaving the battlefield may not enter another zone). 704.5d works in conjunction with 110.5f/g wherein any action which targets a token and would cause it to change zones instead causes that token to 'cease to exist' and it is removed from play the next time SBAs are checked. Ex: Fiend Hunter targets a token on the battlefield, instead that token may not change zones (from battlefield to temporary exile, contingent upon Fiend Hunter leaving the battlefield). What really happens is the token ceases to exist, it never enters any other zone, and state-based actions remove that token from the game.
If there is anything that I may have missed, or something that I may have misinterpreted, please feel free to let me know. I do not think I am wrong about the tokens, but I am open to have my mind changed in light of new evidence or information you would have. By the way, it did take me a short while to find 110.5g to refresh my memory; I had only remembered reading about it from years ago. So thank you for prompting my additional research as I should have found it initially and cited the rule in my first post.
neozzero says... #1
Mikaeus, the Unhallowed
-sorry.
February 6, 2012 7:07 p.m.