Safe Passage: Does it prevent ALL the damage?
Asked by fabiode 12 years ago
If I attack my opponent with a Pillar of Flame and then attack with a lot of creatures and use tricks to power up my creatures, then my opponent use Safe Passage after all I've done. It will prevent all the damage, even the damage before the Safe Passage or it prevents just damage after Safe Passage ?
Epochalyptik says... Accepted answer #2
This means that if your opponent casts Safe Passage before combat damage, no combat damage will be dealt to him/her or to creatures he/she controls. If he/she waits until after combat damage to cast Safe Passage , any damage that was dealt to him earlier in the turn will still have happened. All future damage in that turn will be prevented, though.
August 20, 2012 12:25 a.m.
fabiode you may want your playgroup to read a more recent rulebook if you're asking a question like that, mtg isn't a perfect game and it's creators have altered the rules many times, it's easily possible that someone in your playgroup may be living in the past. My casual playgroup has a good number of people like this, there's even one guy I swear learned mtg completely wrong as every time I've played with/against him I end up in a long argument with him on a number of mtg related things like him thinking the big eldrazi's graveyard ability was like Darksteel Colossus where it didn't use the stack, or Koth's emblems stack in a way that allows mountains to ping for extra damage, or it's ok to run 12 land in a 79 card deck because he has 16 mana dorks... I think I went on a tangent somewhere in here, oh well submit.
August 20, 2012 5:30 a.m.
What do you mean, "Koth's emblems stack in a way that allows mountains to ping for extra damage."
It doesn't, his emblems do not stack. A mountain of yours would look like this:
Mountain
Basic Land - Moutain
T: Add R to your mana pool.
T: This land deals 1 damage to target creature or player.
T: This land deals 1 damage to target creature or player.
You can use either ability, but not both because tapping is a part of both costs. Maybe I misunderstood something... but you know never know :D
August 20, 2012 6:30 a.m.
deathbygiraffe says... #5
He said some guy in his playgroup 'thinks it works that way', Demarge knows better and was giving that as an example, I believe.
August 20, 2012 8:59 a.m.
Jarrod_0067 says... #6
To finish this argument:
When you cast Pillar of Flame and he chooses to not cast Safe Passage , he takes 2 damage. This damage can't now be undone.
When you declare an attack and he chooses to not cast Safe Passage , the combat moves to blocker's step.
When he chooses to/not to block, and he chooses to not cast Safe Passage , the combat moves to damage step.
Damage is dealt. Combat damage I believe no longer uses the stack the way it used to (M10 rules change). If he casts it now, or any point after now, it is too late.
That said, you must give him the opportunity to cast it during each step of combat. If you, say, "I attack, you take 50million damage" and he says "hang on, I want to play this spell" and you reply "too late, the damage is dealt, you lose" (has happened to me on multiple occasions)... that's not really how the rules go, and it's a pretty bad social move too
August 20, 2012 10:16 a.m.
Epochalyptik, thank you for the answer.
Demarge, I guess you're right, I should probably get an updated rule book to put in my group's reading. But there is some questions even reading the rules in mtg digital rulebook, it remains kind of ambiguous.
Jarrod_0067, so you're saying that if I declare an attack and he chooses to use Safe Passage when he would declare the blockers, it would prevent the damage, right? Then he could even defend with his creatures, kill some of my creatures and neither him or his creatures would not take any damage.
Epochalyptik says... #1
You don't "attack your opponent with a Pillar of Flame ." Only creatures attack. You targeted and dealt damage to your opponent with Pillar of Flame .
Safe Passage does not retroactively undo damage. It prevents further damage. A static effect like that can't undo something that happened before it began, it just "prevent[s] all damage that would be dealt" later on in the turn to you and creatures you control.
August 20, 2012 12:23 a.m.