Damage and blinking creatures
Asked by Ozzirohc 1 year ago
So i had a game recently, where i had an Agent of Treachery in play, and my opponent had a Goblin Sharpshooter in play. In my Main phase i cast Sakashima the Impostor , so in response to that he uses his Goblin Sharpshooter and sacking a few Goblins, to ping the Agent of Treachery , in response to that I play Momentary Blink on the Agent of Treachery , but he sacks a few more goblins and pings my Agent of Treachery for 3, so it dies, and i get no blink ETB effects nor the Sakashima the Impostor copy. So is that how it works with the damage on the stack?
Also does Sakashima the Impostor have no target anymore since the creature died? is the target decided on cast or on ETB? Thanks in advance :)
Caerwyn says... Accepted answer #1
To start with the damage question, the outcome was correct, though you shortcut your description some.
Every time a spell or ability is put on the stack or resolves, players have the opportunity to respond.
You put Sakashima the Impostor on the stack and passed priority - passed to the other player that they can choose if they want to respond. They responded by placing Goblin Sharpshooter on the stack, holding priority, then sacrificing a goblin to put the Sharpshooter’s untap ability on the stack.
Priority passed around, so the top item on the stack resolved, untapping sharpshooter. Since an ability resolved, everyone has the chance to activate abilities again in turn order - you passed, they activated sharpshooter, placing a second sharpshooter ability on the stack, and then sacrificing to place an untap trigger on the stack. That repeated so they now have three sharpshooter abilities on the stack, all targeting Agent of Treachery.
At this time, the stack looks like:
First (and thus last to resolve) the Sakashima creature spell, then three damage triggers on top of that.
You responded to that situation by casting Momentary Blink, which goes on the stack on top. They responded again with the cycle of Goblin Sharpshooter and allowing the untapped triggered ability to resolve so they can activate Sharpshooter again, placing three damage abilities on the stack.
The stack now looks like first the Sakashima creature spell, then three damage abilities on top of that, then momentary blink, then three more damage abilities.
Each of the second round of damage abilities will resolve first, since the stack resolves in last one in, first one out order. Those will kill your Agent. The Momentary Blink and the other three damage triggers will all fizzle and have no effect, since their target is no longer in play.
Sakashima will resolve last and enter the battlefield.
That seems to be what you all did, even if you did not use all the technical procedural elements, the outcome was correct.
Now let’s look at what happens when Sakashima enters the battlefield.
Sakashima‘s ability is a replacement effect modifying how it enters the battlefield. It occurs at the time of entry and does not use the stack. It also does not target (with a few exceptions like auras on the stack and mutate, which say “target” in their specific rules, all things that target will use the word “target” in their text box). This means you can “choose” creatures with hexproof or shroud or protection.
So, when Sakashima enters the battlefield, that is when the effect occurs and you choose something in the field to copy. You do not choose when it is cast - only when it ETBs. Here, the Agent will be dead so you cannot choose it as it is no longer in play, but you can choose something else that might be on the battlefield.
October 27, 2022 4:27 p.m.