Can I exile a creature sacrificed to Sheoldred using Nihil Spellbomb?
Asked by Dopeysboy 7 years ago
Sheoldred, Whispering One is in play with a Nihil Spellbomb. Opponent has to sacrifice a creature, say Solemn Simulacrum. Can I exile his solemn?
TheRedMage says... Accepted answer #2
Basically, if your goal is for your opponent not to get the trigger, you need a way to make sure that the Solemn doesn't go to the graveyard at all. The ability doesn't check if Solemn Simulacrum is in the graveyard upon resolution: it just cares that it "died" (i.e. it went into the graveyard from the battlefield), which it did. The fact it got exiled later is irrelevant, even if it got exiled before the ability resolved.
This is true of most triggered abilities - if their trigger condition is true when they trigger, they won't check again on resolution. They'll just resolve to the best of their ability.
There is one class of triggers that check if a condition is true upon triggering and also upon resolution, and they are said to have an "intervening if clause". they are worded:
When/Whenever/At <TRIGGER>, if <CONDITION>, <ACTION>
Consider for example Heir of the Wilds: because the ability is worded like this, if the opponent attacks and you Doom Blade their only creature with power 4+ in response to the trigger, the ability will check again upon resolution, and not resolve. However, this is not even true of all "if" clauses: for example, Triumph of Ferocity is worded diffently (the "if" clause is at the end), so it will only check upon triggering, and if in response to the trigger you kill your opponent's creature that had the highest power on the board and make it so that now you have the creature with the highest power, they will still draw a card.
In order for the trigger to work the way you want (i.e. you deny the opponent the draw by exiling Solemn Simulacrum the ability would need to be worded "Whenever Solemn Simulacrum dies, if it's in the graveyard, draw a card". Similar templates have been used before (Animate Dead) but they are just kinda weird.
August 3, 2016 8:48 p.m.
If you want to keep Solemn's death trigger from happening you'll need something with a replacement effect that keeps it from going to the graveyard entirely, like Rest in Peace or Leyline of the Void. (Generally worded: "If __ would be , ___ instead.")
acbooster says... #1
You definitely can, provided it's in the graveyard for Nihil Spellbomb to be able to clear it out. If you mean doing it in response to Solemn Simulacrum's LTB ability going on the stack, you can do that as well but it won't affect the ability.
August 3, 2016 4:58 p.m. Edited.