A dilemma with priority.

Asked by Ganandorf 5 years ago

So me and my brother were facing off in a commander game and an interesting problem arose when he started to pull of an infinite combo. On his field he had Slimefoot, the Stowaway, Savage Thallid, and two cards that allowed him to sacrifice a creature and give him mana whenever a creature dies (Every creature gives him 4 mana). On my field I had Patron of the Vein, Retribution of the Ancients, and a few vampires with a number of +1/+1 counters on them. I still had 12 swamp lands able to be tapped. On his turn he sacrificed a saproling dealing 1 damage and getting enough mana to make another saproling. This could be infinitely done so I spent mana to remove 1/1 counters on some vampires (which got 1/1 counters from Patron of the Vein) and kill slimefoot or savage. He responded to saying since he had priority he would have used slimefoots ability and sacrificed them enough times to kill me before I could use Patron's ability. Is this true?

Neotrup says... #1

Well, it sounds like you could activate Retribution of the Ancients a number of times in response to him trying to make more saprolings, before he'd get the chance to sacrifice them. There's also the question of how he's getting the mana, as mana abilities couldn't be responded to, but there are a number of non mana abilities that add mana. Ultimately this will probably come down to a battle of who has how much mana, with you also being limited by the number of counters you had.

July 8, 2018 9:14 p.m.

FancyTuesday says... Accepted answer #2

Your opponent may "hold" priority until they need something to resolve to continue the combo, such as a "when a creature dies add ". For that ability to resolve they must pass priority.

Once they have passed priority with all triggers waiting to resolve on the stack you may activate Retribution of the Ancients, targeting Slimefoot. If, at that point, your opponent can start the combo anew on top of your activation of Retribution of the Ancients they can do so, and if again they need part of it to resolve before continuing you can activate RotA again, on and on until one of you runs out of resources.

If, for example, your opponent has 12 mana available and earns for every creature that dies from a triggered ability and you have 6 +1/+1 counters to remove it plays out like so:

  • Opponent pays 4 to create a saproling, 8 mana available
  • Ability resolves, saproling is created
  • Opponent sacrifices the saproling, creating at least two triggers: one that deals 1 damage to you and another that adds

At this point (or before the saproling is created, as that is also an ability that must resolve) they may either wait for the ability to resolve, or pay from their 8 available mana. If they're paying attention they'll wait, because they need you to spend all your resources before they can go infinite, because:

  • If you don't respond they're functionally going infinite, so you must remove X +1/+1 counters to kill some piece of the combo. If Slimefoot is the smallest piece you need 3
  • Your opponent repeats the first 3 steps, 4 mana available and waiting for the "when a creature dies..." triggers to resolve
  • You activate RotA again, leaving you with no +1/+1 counters
  • Your opponent repeats the first 3 steps, and this time they can wait for abilities to resolve and have a complete loop

If they "hold" priority completely they can't create tokens with Slimefoot and can't gain mana from "dies" triggers.

116.3b The active player receives priority after a spell or ability (other than a mana ability) resolves.
116.3c If a player has priority when they cast a spell, activate an ability, or take a special action, that player receives priority afterward.
116.4. If all players pass in succession (that is, if all players pass without taking any actions in between passing), the spell or ability on top of the stack resolves or, if the stack is empty, the phase or step ends.

July 8, 2018 10:21 p.m. Edited.

Ganandorf says... #3

I have forgotten to mention that when a creature gets a +1/+1 counter I got one black mana and 1 life (the cards at which did this I can not remember as I was not using one of my own decks), effectively making both our resources unlimited. My problem with breaking his combo is Savage Thallid because he will regenerate anything I destroy making an infinite loop of back and forth.

July 9, 2018 11:17 a.m.

Neotrup says... #4

Okay, so you aren't destroying anything, so there's nothing for him to regenerate. Also, it sounds like each time through his loop (on his turn) you gain 3 +1/+1 counters, then gain 3 life (1 at a time) and add ( at a time, simultaneous with the life gain), then lose 1 life and he gains 1 life. This combo seems really bad for him. By the end of his turn you will have gained twice as much life as him (net) and Slimefoot, the Stowaway will be dead. There's no real question, you win this game, assuming the board state is as you've described with a number of effects I've not heard of being printed.

July 9, 2018 2:22 p.m.

FancyTuesday says... #5

If indeed it is the case that you got mana and life for every +1/+1 counter placed on your creatures, and 3 of your creatures got +1/+1 counters for every one of theirs that died their infinite combo benefits you more than them. However, like Neotrup, I can't think of or find any effects that do either of those things without a specially engineered board state.

Crystalline Crawler could provide the mana, but it's not a vampire. The only thing I see that converts +1/+1 counters to life is Spike Feeder, that's 2 life and is also not a vampire. It's possible to make them vampires with something like Conspiracy or Olivia Voldaren but beyond that I'm not sure the effects you controlled worked as you're describing.

And yeah, as mentioned above, regeneration shields will not protect from having a toughness less than 1. Retribution of the Ancients doesn't destroy its target, it reduces (or at least can reduce) its toughness to 0 or less, which causes it to be moved to the graveyard by a state-based action.

July 9, 2018 5:17 p.m. Edited.

Madcookie says... #6

I noticed this question was still marked as unanswered a few days in a row and decided to check it out. First there is no combination of cards that add 4 mana from a creature dying. The only thing I've found that comes remotely close is Carnival of Souls which triggers on entering and will net a total of 3 mana if the created token was sacked with Ashnod's Altar, combined with Pitiless Plunderer, which also adds a treasure token to be sacked. In any way this seems overly complicated way to go infinite. Are you sure you and your brother understand the rules for sacking and the situation is not as follows "I'll sacrfice my token to Ashnod's Altar, then while this is on the stack I'll sacrifice the same token again and net myself 4 colorless mana".

On another note as already said if he holds priority he can't do anything else and will block the game. Also since you gain 1 life for whenever a creature dies (possibly from Deathgreeter) your brother can't kill you since he also does 1 damage for each token dying and the game will end in a draw. But this is the case ONLY if he manages to prevent you from killing Slimefoot. You say you have 12 black mana, but the question is can your brother create tokens more times than you can pay and remove counters to kill his commander. Regenerating Slimefoot does nothing since the ability with the counters give Slimefoot -X/-X and if it resolves he will die as a state-based action.

Hope that clears the situation

July 10, 2018 9:32 p.m.

Rhadamanthus says... #7

In order to answer this question properly it's important for us to know exactly which cards were involved on both sides. Between your original question and the additional details in your comment, it sounds like it's possible that something wasn't being played correctly.

July 11, 2018 12:12 p.m. Edited.

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