Battlefield Thaumaturge's interaction with Strife and X costs

Asked by TheAmazingSalsa 10 years ago

I'd like to know how's Battlefield Thaumaturge 's interaction with strife cards (like Launch the Fleet ) and X costos (like Glimpse the Sun God ).

For example, can you simply target whomever you want just for W in both those cases?

filledelanuit says... #1

You are correct. With Battlefield Thaumaturge the cost is reduced for both X cards and strive cards.

August 7, 2014 10:25 p.m.

FancyTuesday says... Accepted answer #2

Just like it says, it reduces the cost by 1 for every target. What is happening is when you go to cast the spell you move it to the stack, declare targets, then the cost is calculated.

601.2b ...If the spell has alternative or additional costs that will be paid as its being cast such as buyback or kicker costs (see rules 117.8 and 117.9), the player announces his or her intentions to pay any or all of those costs (see rule 601.2e). A player cant apply two alternative methods of casting or two alternative costs to a single spell. If the spell has a variable cost that will be paid as its being cast (such as an X in its mana cost; see rule 107.3), the player announces the value of that variable...

...

601.2e The player determines the total cost of the spell. Usually this is just the mana cost. Some spells have additional or alternative costs. Some effects may increase or reduce the cost to pay, or may provide other alternative costs. Costs may include paying mana, tapping permanents, sacrificing permanents, discarding cards, and so on. The total cost is the mana cost or alternative cost (as determined in rule 601.2b), plus all additional costs and cost increases, and minus all cost reductions. If the mana component of the total cost is reduced to nothing by cost reduction effects, it is considered to be 0. It cant be reduced to less than 0. Once the total cost is determined, any effects that directly affect the total cost are applied. Then the resulting total cost becomes locked in. If effects would change the total cost after this time, they have no effect.

So with Glimpse the Sun God you declare your targets, it then calculates the cost to be W + 1/target - 1/target and ends up with W. With Launch the Fleet you end up with the same deal as strive is an additional cost to playing the spell.

August 7, 2014 10:29 p.m.