Flickering Faerie Artisans?
Asked by PayOneLife 7 years ago
A new card has been spoiled today: Faerie Artisans
There's been quite a bit of buzz about whether you can flicker this card in response to its trigger in order to avoid having to exile a token.
My understanding is that you can flicker the Faerie Artificer when its trigger is not on the stack to avoid having to exile a token, but if you do it in response to the trigger being put on the stack then the token will be exiled according to rule:
608.2g If an effect requires information from the game (such as the number of creatures on the battlefield), the answer is determined only once, when the effect is applied. If the effect requires information from a specific object, including the source of the ability itself, the effect uses the current information of that object if its in the public zone it was expected to be in; if its no longer in that zone, or if the effect has moved it from a public zone to a hidden zone, the effect uses the objects last known information.
Basically the trigger will use the last known information regarding the permanent, which includes what token it created. Because of this the token will still be exiled if you flicker Faerie Artisans in response to its trigger being put on the stack.
What do others think?
PayOneLife says... #2
Yeah this is exactly what I think happens too. The current confusion is due to people thinking that if you flicker the Artisans that the original object that created the trigger no longer exists and so when the trigger resolves to create a Werebear it won't exile the Grizzly Bears. My point is that although the original object that created the trigger is no longer on the battlefield the resolving trigger can retrieve information regarding it as it says in the rule I cited.
The Runeclaw Bear triggers Artisans too, but that is the trigger from the new object so it doesn't exile any tokens from the pre-flicker Artisans, and as you say, this is also why it works if you flicker the Artisans before its trigger is put on the stack.
No one seems to want to believe me!
October 27, 2016 3:19 a.m.
Rhadamanthus says... #3
I'm not surprised they don't believe you, as the end result seems 110% weird at first glance. You are correct, though.
October 27, 2016 2:24 p.m.
PayOneLife says... #4
Great, thanks everyone. I knew the folks here would have the right answer.
BlueScope says... Accepted answer #1
You can do some flicker shenanigans, but it's a bit more complicated than that. For an example situation, let's say we already have a Grizzly Bears token from our current Faerie Artisans when an opponent plays Werebear. As soon as it enters the battlefield, Artisans trigger to produce a new token and exile the old one. This trigger is put on the stack.
If you flicker it in response to that trigger, the original trigger will still resolve, creating a Werebear token and exiling the Grizzly Bears token. This is because cards that have their own name in the rules mean "this object", rather than "cards with that name". Because of this, however, the next creature an opponent plays (clearly Runeclaw Bear) will trigger Faerie Artisans as well, however won't exile the Werebear token created earlier by Faerie Artisans, as that was another object.
And in a completely different scenario, if you flicker it before it triggers, the very same logic applies - but this time, you don't have to exile anything, as the card just entered the battlefield and didn't create any tokens yet.
October 27, 2016 2:26 a.m.