Can you use an ability to drop your life count below zero that will activate an ability to gain life to put your life back in the positive?

Asked by Zashman32 5 years ago

I have 1 life left and I have a Doom Whisperer in play. Can I pay 2 life to surveil and cast a Creeping Chill which would then bring me to 2 life, and deal 3 to my opponent winning me the game.

Rhadamanthus says... Accepted answer #1

Unfortunately that won't work, for two reasons:

1. You can't pay life you don't have. Though it's possible to go down to a negative life total, you can only pay costs from your positive life total. If you're only at 1 life then you can't pay a cost that requires 2 or more life.
2. Even if you were at 2 you would lose the game for being at 0 life before Doom Whisperer 's ability starts resolving. Losing for 0 or less life is one of the game's "state-based actions", which are checked right before every time a player would get priority.

January 28, 2019 1:11 a.m.

Caerwyn says... #2

One additional point of clarification--the way I read this is you wanted to surveil, put Creeping Chill into the graveyard as part of this surveil, and thus implicate its second ability.

Rhadamanthus has already explained why this would not work, but just to be clear, this would not be "casting" Creeping Chill . Creeping Chill 's merely triggers, exiles the card, and results in the same effect as if it had been cast. At no point is the card itself put on the stack, only its ability.

January 28, 2019 11:41 a.m. Edited.

Rhadamanthus says... #4

Zashman32: A correct answer to this question has been up for a while. I marked it as the "Accepted Answer" so that the thread can move out of the Unanswered queue. Please remember to take care of this yourself in the future.

I usually avoid choosing my own response when I have to do this, but in this case it was the only option for a complete answer.

February 4, 2019 12:11 p.m. Edited.