Sacrificing and Trample interation
Asked by ajclarke 11 years ago
Lets say I have Tenacious Dead on the field. And my opponent attacks with a 4/4 trample lets say Ghor-Clan Rampager .
I declare the Tenacious Dead to block the Rampager, then after declare blockers , use its ability to sacrifice it.
Now my thoughts are that trample states "If this creature would assign enough damage to its blockers to destroy them, you may have it assign the rest of its damage to defending player or planeswalker." that because at the damage phase there is no creature blocking, the trample damage doesn't propagate to the player/planeswalker.
Hmmm interesting. The text on the card is somewhat misleading then!
August 29, 2013 10:31 a.m.
Absinthman says... #3
Wait a moment... I actually didn't pay attention to what cards you were referring to. You are wrong here on two accounts in fact.
1. What I said about sacrificing blockers that block creatures with trample is correct. Creature will trample for full damage.
2. Tenacious Dead
doesn't have a sacrifice ability. Its ability is triggered when it dies. So if you block Ghor-Clan Rampager
with it, you can't sacrifice it unless you have something like Blood Bairn
on the field. The ability of Tenacious Dead
lets you pay 1B when it dies, to return it to the battlefield tapped. Nothing else.
August 29, 2013 10:37 a.m.
Absinthman says... Accepted answer #4
The reason why trample works this way is that if you sacrifice creatures blocking a creature with trample, the amount of damage required to destroy the blockers that "If this creature would assign enough damage to its blockers to destroy them, you may have it assign the rest of its damage to defending player or planeswalker." talks about becomes 0, because exactly 0 damage is now required to destroy those blockers which are no longer there. All the damage can now go through.
August 29, 2013 10:40 a.m.
Aah apologies, that was a poor card to pick for the defense. But thanks for answering as if it was a sacrifice. So the lack of presence of any blockers doesn't 'fizzle' the trample effect, it in essence means that there is 0 defense. So I would take the full 4 damage.
In short, block them and kill them ;)
Thanks for your help.
August 29, 2013 10:45 a.m.
Absinthman says... #6
Yes. Also note that the creature is still considered blocked, even if you sacrifice all its blockers. Creatures are considered blocked from the moment you declare blockers against them, until end of combat. So cards like Smite will still work, even after you sacrifice the blockers.
Absinthman says... #1
It in fact does. If there are no creatures to assign damage to during combat damage step, the creature with trample will assign all its damage to the defending player or planeswalker.
August 29, 2013 10:29 a.m.