If I cast Necromancy at the end of someones turn, do I have to sacrifice the card at the same turn or on the end of the next one?

Asked by pedroedmarcos 2 years ago

Hey there

So, at fitst I thought I would have to sacrifice it at the beginning of the next end step, but then I realized that on gatherer it says "at the beginning of the next cleanup step.". When exactly that happens? Its at the end of each phase right? Does that means that even if I cast it on the end of turn I still have to sacrifice at the same turn? I'm a bit confused

God-Eternal-Magic-Player says... #1

Yes, the cleanup step is at the end of the end step. So, probably before you would discard down to hand size and heal creatures.

October 18, 2022 9:44 a.m.

Rhadamanthus says... Accepted answer #2

The End Phase has two steps: end step and cleanup step. The end step is when "at the beginning of the end step" things happen. The cleanup step is where the game takes care of several other things before the next turn begins: "this turn" and "until end of turn" effects end, damage is removed from creatures, players discard excess cards in hand, and a few other things. If any abilities trigger during a cleanup step, the game will start another one after it's over to make sure everything is taken care of before moving on to the next turn.

When Necromancy and some other similar cards were printed, the rules worked a little differently. The big update to the rules for 6th Edition caused the printed text to have some issues, the biggest one being that the auras giving +X/+Y (Soar, Armor of Thorns, a couple others) would fall off before damage was removed, meaning a creature might die when a player wouldn't expect it. All of these enchantments with the instant-casting option were changed to fall off at the beginning of the cleanup step instead so the auras would continue to work in the expected and intended way.

October 18, 2022 10:32 a.m.