Will a Lifelink blocker keep me alive versus Splinter Twin combo?
Asked by Psychonautical 9 years ago
So an opponent creates infinite Deceiver Exarchs and proceeds to attack with all of them.
First, you never go to negative life, right? I would be brought down to zero and stay there until I gained more?
Second, if I block ONE of the Exarchs with Vampire Nighthawk then would the result be that I go to zero and then gain two with lifelink, thus staying for one more turn?
Or does my opponent choose who gets damaged first?
not only that but bc of state based actions, as soon as your life hits zero. game over. doesnt matter whats on the stack or any life gaining affects. its over
November 22, 2014 10:58 p.m.
FancyTuesday says... #3
You can be brought to a negative life total unless some effect is preventing it, like Worship.
Lifelink can save you from lethal damage because it does not use the stack. It is a static ability that gives you the life the same time the damage is done. This is different from triggered life gain abilities such as that seen in Spirit Link.
November 23, 2014 12:45 a.m.
zyphermage says... #4
Yeah lifelink is like indestructible it just is, and lifelink just happens. You can't respond to lifelink. Yeah this isn't really a good example, but the attacker does divide the damage after blocks however they want.
November 23, 2014 12:53 a.m.
zyphermage says... #5
Before the third combat step, assign damage, you could Skullcrack.
November 23, 2014 12:54 a.m.
FancyTuesday says... #6
They assign damage, and order that assignment if there are multiple blockers for a single attacker, but the important thing is that it's all done simultaneously and they cannot choose to do damage to the player before doing damage to the creatures blocking.
In this case it would not save you, as has already been pointed out. But if you're at 1 life and have a Vampire Nighthawk and your opponent attacks with two Grizzly Bears you can block one and survive with 1 life. They cannot assign damage to you first unless they give the unblocked one first strike. All damage is done at once and all static effects relating to that damage are handled at the same time, before anyone would receive priority or the game would check state based effects.
November 23, 2014 1:01 a.m.
Couple small things:
1/ @zyphermage Indestructible is no longer something which 'just is' they changed it to be a regular old keyword ability which can be Sudden Spoiling'd and everything.
2/ @swkelly89 With lifelink, there are actually two abilities still in current Oracle usage which handle life from combat damage. "Lifelink" the keyword ability modifies how damage is dealt and causes life to be gained simultaneously to the damage being dealt. If you were at 3, attacked by two 3/3s and had one 3/3 lifelink blocker, you would both lose and gain 3 at the same time, and be left at 3 life. The other ability is "Whenever this creature deals combat damage, you gain that much life"
Most of the sources of that ability now have lifelink, but there are still a bunch, such as Flash Conscription, Noble Purpose, Sunhome Enforcer etc whose oracle text still has the triggered ability rather than the static ability. In those cases, the ability goes onto the stack, and state-based actions will be checked before you gain the life. In that case, if you were at 2, attacked by a pair of 2/2s, and you blocked one with Sunhome Enforcer you would go to 0 with its ability on the stack, and lose before you gained the 2 life.
3/ @zyphermage The attacker doesn't assign damage 'however they want' in combat. After blockers are declared, each player will designate their 'damage assignment order' for each creature involved in combat. Lethal damage MUST be assigned to each creature in the damage assignment order before moving onto the next one. They can choose that order, but they can't choose, for example, to deal only 1 damage to each of three 2/2s with their one 3/3 attacker, just because they know later, they're going to cast a bunch of Crushing Pains.
November 23, 2014 10:10 a.m.
zyphermage says... #8
For all intents and purposes I was just trying to make a point. I wasn't saying anything hard and fast set in stone. In this case you can assign combat damage however you want because it has deathtouch, lethal damage is 1 damage.
November 23, 2014 1:07 p.m.
zyphermage says... #9
Well since in this case it is blocking and not attacking so not exactly. Anyway my point is the attacker assigns the damage after blocks. I didn't mean however they want in the sense they could literally do it however they want. Obviously if your creature is blocked you can't assign damage to a planeswalker. Then again you are going to come back probably with a card that allows you to so I am wrong in saying anything.
November 23, 2014 1:10 p.m.
@zyphermage Okay, I'm sorry if my post came off jerkish. A lot of people read the question threads here besides the one asking the questions, and it's important to make sure every answer is as strictly correct as possible. Epochalyptik and Rhadamanthus have done it to me many times. It's all part of making the Q&A as helpful and informative as possible, not trying to one-up other people trying to help, so I apologise if it seemed like I was doing that.
GlistenerAgent says... Accepted answer #1
You can go to negative life. If your opponent makes 100 Deceiver Exarchs and attacks you (assuming you are at 20 life), blocking with Vampire Nighthawk will leave you at -78 life.
November 22, 2014 10:17 p.m.