old school Mana Short
Asked by btmankin 13 years ago
no rulings on old mana-short-vs.-old/new-mana-short. I play in a group so old MS say all opponents drain mana while new card says "target opponent".... which wins?
Epochalyptik says... #2
Well, actually it targets a player in general. But the old version only referenced opponents, and I assume you would not target yourself.
For reference, the Gatherer page is here:
http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Default.aspx
August 4, 2011 2:22 a.m.
xxxxxxCronoxxxxxx says... #3
mana short use to say "all opponents lands are tapped and opponents mana pool is emptied" and did so untill 4th edition and asuming the orical text of the spell in that dayandage were the same as the card it was affecting all opponents and not targeting anyone
but since 4th edition every copy including ones from older sets(congrads if you have one) can target any player including your self but only affects one player
when bringing a deck to a tornoment make shur you lookup all your cards on the gatherer for the orical ruleing for all the cards in your deck or you might get surprized by changes that are not on the card
August 4, 2011 4:51 a.m.
emblasochist says... #4
In "sanctioned" play, you play a card with its Oracle text. In a playgroup, it's the group's consensus. In this case, Mana Short is not against all opponents. Shame, because in a multiplayer game, Mana Short is stupidly good.
August 4, 2011 5:27 a.m.
Epochalyptik says... #5
As I pointed out, Mana Short used to be printed with the text "All opponent's lands are tapped, and opponent's mana pool is emptied." Each instance of the word opponent was in the singular possessive, which, logically, indicates to me that it affected only a single opponent. I believe that if it was meant to affect all opponents, they would have used the plural possessive, "opponents'", or said something to the effect of "tap all lands you don't control."
Then again, I'm not big on old cards, but from reading it that's definitely the impression I get.
August 4, 2011 5:40 a.m.
Rhadamanthus says... #6
Epochalyptik is correct. Mana Short has never worked on more than one player at a time, because "Opponent's" is singular possessive. That's the only valid way to interpret the meaning of the word (apostrophes aren't used to mark plurals).
Epochalyptik says... Accepted answer #1
Whenever you have a question like this, Gatherer is usually a good place to start.
The current Gatherer/Oracle text for Mana Short is as follows:
"Tap all lands target player controls and empty his or her mana pool."
Mana Short does indeed target an opponent. Note that on the old versions of Mana Short, "Opponent's" is the singular possessive, meaning one opponent. If it instead used "opponents'", the plural possessive, it would drain all opponents' mana pools.
As a general rule, the most recent printing of a card will be the most accurate in terms of rules.
August 4, 2011 2:20 a.m.