If you would put one card from the top three cards of your library into your hand, are opponents meant to know which card?
Asked by Yesterday 6 years ago
Say you have a Tomorrow, Azami's Familiar and a Goblin Spy on the battlefield under your control, and a card you want is revealed on the top of your library (say Lightning Bolt).
You would draw a card, but instead you instead pick one of the top three cards of your library to put into your hand. Are opponents meant to know if you've put the Lightning Bolt into your hand or not? And if you didn't, are they meant to know whether you've put the card at the very bottom of your library or if you've put it second from the bottom?
chosenone124 says... #2
Why would Tomorrow turn off Goblin Spy's ability? Are you not allowed to look at the top card of your library while it is revealed?
May 2, 2017 6:58 p.m.
Gidgetimer says... #3
BlueScope, actually since as you said the cards are still in your library and the Lightning Bolt is still considered the top card even while you are making the decision, it must remain revealed. Goblin Spy does not allow you to unreveal the top card if you are making a decision involving it for some reason. It tells you to play with the top card of your library revealed, even when you physically move the cards off of the library to look at them the lightning bolt is the top card of your library and so it remains revealed.
May 2, 2017 8:53 p.m.
@Gidgetimer: The card is technically still revealed, but there's no have it face-up while you hold the other two cards in your hand covered up, since physically putting them in your hand is just a helper for you not being able to look at cards that are on top of your library without turning them over. Since at the end of the effect, all cards will end up in hidden zones (the bottom of the library and the hand), there's no need to reveal them, as there's only two states the cards are ever in, as far as the rules are concerned:
- on top of your library, with Lightning Bolt on top
- in your hand or on the bottom of your library
In case you're making the argument that since you knew the top card before, you knew where it would go - the rules make it clear that specific positions aren't being revealed when re-ordering cards (which is more or less what happens here):
401.4. If an effect puts two or more cards in a specific position in a library at the same time, the owner of those cards may arrange them in any order. That librarys owner doesnt reveal the order in which the cards go into his or her library.
As a somewhat corner-cased note, this would be different in a Commander game, when your Commander would be part of the top three cards of your library. Since Commander-ness is a quality of the card, players are always supposed to know which card your Commander is. This means that in the scenario given, you would know if the card second from the top is someone's Commander, and by abstraction what card it is (because you know what their Commander is). You would also know if they put that card in their hand or on the bottom of their library, and in the latter case, at which position - but not because the rules make an exception for Commanders, but simply because you would also normally know the position of a Commander inside a library or hand.
@chosenone124: If that didn't help you understand it, please ask again, and I'll try to explain it in greater detail.
May 2, 2017 9:47 p.m.
Gidgetimer says... #5
See this is where it gets sticky, because it says you don't have to reveal the order in which the cards go to the position in the library, but it doesn't say that you can hide where in the library it originated from. In 99% of cases it is no new information that say the top and second card were put on the bottom (in an undisclosed order) and the third was put in the hand. But if the top card is revealed through any number of effects, or if you had just cast Unexpectedly Absent =2 it can be important information.
I did a bit more reading in the rules and can't find a definitive answer either way and I don't think it is clear from 401.4 that you don't have to tell which cards are going to which zone. I only see it clearly stating that the order of the 2 going to the bottom does not have to be disclosed.
I have a feeling that this is one of the very limited grey areas that is going to be up to judge discretion in organized events and playgroups are going to have to come to a consensus on. I can't find anything that gives a definitive answer and it is my gut instinct that you would need to specify which of the three cards is going to which zone, even if once they reach that zone you don't have to reveal what order they are in now.
May 2, 2017 10:53 p.m.
Rhadamanthus says... #6
The only situation where the rules require a player to indicate exactly which card is being chosen from a set of cards in a hidden zone is when multiple players are making such a choice simultaneously (101.4a). Only one player is making a choice in this example, so that means they don't have to specify which cards are going where. This situation came up rather often when Courser of Kruphix and Dig Through Time were both legal in Standard, and this was the established ruling.
@BlueScope: The principle of knowing exactly where a Commander card is at all times (even in a hidden zone) isn't an official rule of the format. It's an opinion/preference held by certain members of the Commander Rules Committee and other players, but it isn't part of the current set of rules.
BlueScope says... Accepted answer #1
Looking at the top three cards of your library doesn't remove those cards from the zone they're in. In other words, while you look at the top three cards, they're still part of your library, and their order is still what it was before you started looking at it.
While you're looking at it, you don't have to show which card was the top card at the time you physically moved them off the top of your library - instead, you simply take the top three cards off of your library (not revealing the card below!), shuffle them in your hand if you want to conceal which card is the Lightning Bolt (which is still considered to be the top card of your library), then put one in your hand and the rest on the bottom of your library. Your opponents won't know whether this card is the revealed card or not, and also not in which order you put anything else on the bottom of your library, unless you choose to tell them.
That's the moment when those cards are actually removed from the top of your library rules-wise, so now you'll reveal the top card of your library again because of Goblin Spy.
May 2, 2017 9:14 a.m.