Effects while attacking
Asked by nmiller 6 years ago
We were doing a two headed giant at boy scout camping. I had a Thriving Rhino that had my partner's Ordeal of Nylea on it and 4 energy. I spent my energy on Rhino and i think the Ordeal triggered, which is another question in itself. Anyway, my friend on the enemy team then did a tap spell (I cant remember the name) on my rhino and said that worked because it was at instant speed. Does the tap work? Ignore typos...
If your asking if your opponent could tap down the Thriving Rhino to prevent it from attacking, the answer is that it depends on when they're trying to tap it.
Combat is broken up into several steps. It starts with the Beginning of Combat step, which is when any "at the beginning of combat" abilities will trigger. It's also a chance to play instants before attackers are declared, but after the active player's main phase. This is where your opponent would want to use a tap spell to tap any creatures before they can attack.
After this is the Declare Attackers step, which is when you actually declare attackers, and when Thriving Rhino and Ordeal of Nylea both trigger if you declare it as an attacker. You get to declare attackers before anyone gets priority to cast spells or activate abilities, so at this point it's too late to tap a creature to prevent it from attacking.
If your opponent wanted to prevent Thriving Rhino from attacking, he should have done it before attackers were declared, and before the two "when this creature attacks" triggers were triggered. If that was his intent, then those actions should have been rewound to the Beginning of Combat step so he could attack, meaning your energy was unspent and your Ordeal of Nylea still attached to the Rhino. If he allowed them to trigger and resolve, and had no issue with that, then the Rhino is already declared as an attacker, and tapping it won't prevent it from continuing with the attack.
October 14, 2018 4:34 p.m.
Gidgetimer says... #3
(Small correction to myself since I got my green ramp spells confused. Ordeal of Nylea has a Rampant Growth effect, not a Cultivate one.)
Gidgetimer says... Accepted answer #1
What happens is entirely dependent on when exactly the tap spell (I am going to use Blustersquall in my scenarios just to have a spell to name, but it works with all similar spells) was cast. The combat phase has five different steps and all players must pass priority in succession with the stack empty to advance to the next step. We are only concerned with the first two steps in this scenario, the Beginning of Combat and Declare Attackers steps.
If your opponent wanted to prevent the Thriving Rhino from attacking, they should have cast Blustersquall when they got priority in the Beginning of Combat Step. This would tap the rhino before he attacked. He therefore would not be able to attack and neither his ability nor the ability of Ordeal of Nylea would trigger. The ordeal wouldn't place a counter on him, and you would not get the opportunity to pay to put a counter on him.
If your opponent lets you progress to the declare attackers step, you will be able to declare him as an attacker and tap him before any player receives priority. If you do, both his trigger and that of Ordeal of Nylea will trigger. At any time after you have declared the Rhino as an attacker your opponent can still cast Blustersquall targeting him, but tapping him at this point will not remove him from combat.
Be aware that you can not just start declaring attackers after you are done on your main phase to make the second scenario true. The flow of the game requires that each player pass priority in succession with the stack empty to proceed to the next step or phase. If you want to just keep bulling ahead in your turns, be prepared to rewind the game if anyone wants to take an action during a priority pass you skipped. If you want to be a bit more cautious with revealing your plans you can simply announce your intent to change step/phase and wait a couple of seconds before taking any actions. "Move to attacks" and a pause allows people to respond and doesn't take up too much time. I am personally in the habit of announcing each of my steps and phases because it reminds me of triggers and also allows people to respond.
As for your side question about Ordeal of Nylea; the Ordeal triggers and puts a counter on the attacking creature each time it attacks. If you already had at least one counter on the creature, you could resolve the Thriving Rhino's ability first and the sacrifice clause would sac the enchantment and trigger the Cultivate effect. It is important to note that Thriving Rhino's trigger only gives you the chance to pay once each time it attacks putting a single counter on it.
October 14, 2018 4:31 p.m.