What is the interaction between Mirror Entity and Life and Limb?

Asked by JoyTheEnbySliverLover 4 years ago

I need clarification on whether the power and toughness of lands and saprolings changes when:

The ruling below could be helpful but it is confusing me. If the 'sublayers' are relevant, how do they work? Could you possibly give examples?

You apply power/toughness changing effects in a series of sublayers in the following order: (a) effects from characteristic-defining abilities; (b) effects that set power and/or toughness to a specific number or value; (c) effects that modify power and/or toughness but don’t set power and/or toughness to a specific number or value; (d) changes from counters; (e) effects that switch a creature’s power and toughness. This card’s effect is always applied in (b), which means that effects applied in sublayer (c), (d), or (e) will not be overwritten; they will be applied to the new value. (2009-10-01)

Thank you for reading. All help is much appreciated.

Kogarashi says... Accepted answer #1

Type-changing effects apply in layer 4, and power/toughness altering effects in layer 7. Both type-changing effects apply in the same layer, so you go in timestamp order. Both power/toughness changing effects set the P/T in layer 7b, so again you go in timestamp order.

In your first scenario, when you activate Mirror Entity (let's say for 5), all of your creatures, including your Forests, will become 5/5 creatures with every creature type. You apply the older effect first (the static Life and Limb ability), then the newer ( Mirror Entity ).

In your second scenario, all of your non-saproling, non-Forest creatures would be 5/5 with every creature type, while your saprolings would be 1/1 land creatures with every creature type and the Forest land type, and your Forests would be 1/1 land creatures with the Forest and Saproling subtypes.

This is because Life and Limb has the newer timestamp this time, so it will apply after the effects of Mirror Entity .

  • Mirror Entity 's ability isn't a static ability, and therefore doesn't affect anything that becomes a creature after the ability was activated. This means when your Forests do not gain every creature type because they were not creatures when the Mirror Entity activated.

  • Life and Limb changes the base power and toughness of your Forests and Saprolings to 1/1, overriding the 5/5 from Mirror Entity .

  • Life and Limb adds the Forest and Saproling types, but doesn't remove any others, so your saprolings keep all the creature types they gained from Mirror Entity 's ability.

January 7, 2020 12:06 a.m.

JoyTheEnbySliverLover says... #2

Kogarashi - That has help a ton thank you. I was so lost with the entire thing I probably missed the obvious. You explained it so well and made it ever easy to understand. I am actually happy the two cards work that way as it doesn't interfere as much as I expected with the stuff I do in the deck where the two cards are from. Thanks again and I wish you all the best.

January 7, 2020 12:32 a.m.

Please login to comment