Did I have to scoop?
Asked by Bobby654 6 years ago
This happened a while ago and didn't get a proper answer from my play group. I had 1/1 elves thanks to Nest of Scarabs and my other enchantments were Blowfly Infestation and Crumbling Ashes. Since my opponents creatures were off limits at the time did I get myself into infinite loop?
chosenone124 says... #3
If an uncontrollable infinite loop occurs, each player has a chance to play a card or activate an ability to disrupt it. If no player wishes to do so, the game ends in a draw.
September 26, 2017 11:19 p.m. Edited.
Rhadamanthus says... Accepted answer #4
There's a way out of this, and according to the rules of the game you have to take it. A loop made up of only mandatory actions will draw the game, but if there are any choices you can make to end it then you have to pick a number of iterations and make the different choice that will cause the loop to end after that point.
You can have any number of creatures with enough -1/-1 counters on them to reduce their toughness to 1. At the beginning of your upkeep Crumbling Ashes destroys one of them and triggers Blowfly Infestation. You target another creature with the trigger.
- When the Infestation trigger resolves and places a -1/-1 counter on the targeted creature, it triggers Nest of Scarabs, but it's not time to put the trigger on the stack yet
- State-based-actions (SBAs) are checked right before each time a player would get priority. The game sees a creature with 0 toughness and puts it into the graveyard, triggering Infestation again. Similarly, this trigger isn't on the stack yet
- When an ability triggers, it's put onto the stack the next time a player gets priority. If multiple triggers controlled by the same player are trying to go onto the stack at the same time, that player chooses what order to put them onto the stack. In this case you need to put the Nest trigger on bottom and the Infestation trigger on top. This is also when you choose a target for the Infestation trigger (another one of your 1-toughness creatures)
- Let the Infestation trigger resolve, and it sets off the same series of events described above. Now you have 2 Nest triggers on the bottom of the stack and an Infestation trigger on top.
- Eventually you'll run out of 1-toughness creatures to target and kill with Blowfly Infestation, so it will stop adding triggers to the stack. All of the Nest of Scarabs triggers you've accumulated can finally start to resolve and will create the appropriate number of Insect tokens
Quantumsandwich says... #1
You are never required to concede from a game.
September 26, 2017 10:07 p.m.