How does double blocking work?
Asked by Elizabeth_the_Dragon 13 years ago
Straight forward here, a 7/7 creature attacks, I have two 4/4 creatures and I block the 7/7. Do both those creatures die because they both take 7 damage or does 1 live because 4 is dealt to one and the remaining 3 is dealt to the other?
Rhadamanthus says... #2
When multiple creatures block an attacking creature, the attacking player decides what order the attacking creature will assign damage to its blockers. The attacking creature assigns as much total damage as it has power. It has to assign at least lethal damage to the first blocker before it can assign any to the second one, and so on down the line. "Lethal damage" is either enough to make the total damage marked on the creature equal to its current toughness, or 1 damage if the attacking creature has deathtouch.
In this situation, after the attacking player decides the "blocking order", he can assign anywhere from 7 to 4 damage to the first blocker, and the rest of the damage to the second one. Only one of your blockers will die.
April 27, 2011 4:17 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #3
The attacking creature has 7 power. That equates to 7 damage, which must be distributed in some way amongst the blocking creatures.
The attacking opponent chooses how he/she wants to deal that damage. Only 7 damage can be dealt from that one creature, so (likely) 4 will go to one of your blockers and 3 will go to the other. The one that receives 4 damage will then die because it's a 4/4, while the other one will be alive, but within 1 damage of dying until the end of the turn. Your defenders, with a total power of 8, will kill the attacking creature in the process.
Alternatively, the opponent can choose to deal all 7 to one creature, or 6 to one and 1 to the other, or any other combination that totals 7 damage.
Tl;dr: The attacking creature can only deal a total of 7 damage because that is its power. It does not deal 7 to everything, but 7 overall.
April 27, 2011 4:19 p.m.
SeriousBologna says... #4
Now what would occur if the attacking creature has trample? would the damage just trample over the first creature and kill the creatures below it?
March 15, 2016 10:34 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #5
@SeriousBologna: Please read the post dates before commenting. This question is five years old. In the future, please ask a new question instead.
Trample does not affect this situation in any way. The 7/7 doesn't deal enough damage to kill both 4/4 blockers. Trample only matters if there would be damage left over after assigning lethal damage to all blockers.
Minathia says... Accepted answer #1
Short answer: one lives one dies.
You declare two blockers, attacking player gets to pick the order of damage. He has to select one blocker, and deal damange until it is dead, then he can select the next blocker to assign damange to. This continues until you run out of blockers or he runs out of damange to assign.
So your situation would look like this:
Player A declares attacker
Player B declares blockers
Player A assigns 4 damange to the first blocker, it will be lethal
Player A assigns the remaining 3 damage to the next blocker, it is not lethal.
Damage is dealt, attacking creature and one of the blockers are delt lethal damage and die, one blocker gets 3 points of damage and lives... for now.
April 27, 2011 4:15 p.m.