Sacrifice Question

General forum

Posted on Feb. 27, 2013, 7:20 p.m. by StealthyGunnar

Say I have a creature with "R: Sacrifice this creature, and your opponent loses 2 life."

And I play another card like Fling or something. Can I play Fling and one red mana to do 2 damage to my opponent and Fling my creature at him/her?

vila_a23 says... #2

no

February 27, 2013 7:25 p.m.

cartwheelnurd says... #3

No and here's why:

When you sacrifice a creature, it is as a cost of the spell or ability. Sacrificing does not use the stack, so you cannot respond to it, and your creature will die when it is sacrificed, immediately before you can use that ability.

February 27, 2013 7:36 p.m.

GreatSword says... #4

Are you sure you wrote that ability right? The colon (:) is very important, everything before it is the cost, and everything after it is the effect that goes on the stack.

So with that exact ability, yes you could use Fling. Pay the R, put the effect on the stack. Before it resolves, cast Fling, sacrificing the creature. Fling resolves, then the effect tries to resolve the best it can, making the opponent lose 2 life.

Generally though, sacrifice abilities are part of the cost to put the ability on the stack, and so don't really work well with other spells.

February 27, 2013 7:49 p.m.

StealthyGunnar says... #5

I'm not sure if it's a real ability; it's just an example. I've been trying to figure out if I can make use of spells that involve sacrificing.

So if I decided to sacrifice Vampire Hexmage with Bone Splinters, would I be able to destroy a creature AND remove all counters from a permanent?

February 27, 2013 9:37 p.m.

Rayenous says... #6

There are a few abilities where the 'sacrifice' is a part of the ability and not the cost. A few I can think of....

Garruk Relentless  ^Flip.... flip side... -1.

Knowledge Vault (Oracle text = 0: Sacrifice Knowledge Vault. If you do, discard your hand, then put all cards exiled with Knowledge Vault into their owner's hand.)

Shifty Doppelganger... but it's on the delayed trigger, of the activated ability.

What you will notice is that they all have the clause "If you do...". Thus, you can use something like Fling after activating the ability, but the "If" clause will not occur. This will usually negate the effects of the ability.

February 27, 2013 10:49 p.m.