Tapping in Response
Asked by belugawhaleonthefloor 6 years ago
I don't get when you're allowed to tap a creature or land in response to something that says 'tap X and it doesn't untap during their controllers next untap step' and how it works? And are you also able to target a permanent that is already tapped to prevent it from untapping during the untap step? For example, let's say you use Frost Breath and target a Zhur-Taa Druid and an Experiment Kraj. Would you be allowed to tap them both in response to make Frost Breath Fizzle and allow the creatures to both untap during their untap step? Or would they still not untap? And would both effects of each creature go through? (The +1/+1 counter from Kraj and the damage from druid) or would they be different since the druids ability is a mana ability?? Also how does this work with lands? Would tapping your land in response to something like Chandra's Revolution make it be able to untap like normally? With each of these examples can you target something that's already tapped?
belugawhaleonthefloor says... #2
Ahhh I see. So is the same for land? I'm guessing it's the same as the mana ability
June 17, 2017 2:01 p.m.
Yes. The fact a mana ability doesn't use the stack doesn't change much about this, Let's say you cast Chandra's Revolution targeting a creature and a land, The stack looks like this:
You pass priority, and your opponent taps the land in response to not lose the mana, but doesn't have a spell they want to cast yet. The stack now looks like this:
Pretty similiar. They pass priority back to you. Had they not tapped the land, the spell would now resolve. Even though they didn't add anything to the stack, they still took an action, so you have a chance to respond to the stack once more. Because it looks the same as last time, you probably won't respond, but you can. If you pass priority without doing anything, Chandra's Revolution will resolve. Because they have floating mana that will go away when you move to the next step/phase, it's important you announce when you're doing that, so they have a chance to cast an instant. Realistically you should always make it clear when you're moving to the next phase, but particularly when mana is floating (something they have to announce every time they pass priority with floating mana).
Neotrup says... Accepted answer #1
How it works is you cast Frost Breath with two targets. Your opponent has a chance to respond, which they can do by activating one of their creatures abilities, then either letting the new ability resolve (assuming you have no responces) or activating the second ability right away before you have a chance to respond (you'll still get to respond, they just both get put on the stack before you do). They could also respond by casting an instant, which might be important because one of their abilities is a mana ability. A note on that, you cannot respond to the mana ability, but you can respond the the triggered ability that results from it (The mana is put into their mana pool without using the stack, but the damage ability gets put on the stack). Assuming nobody has responses (which could be activated/casted between each resolution) their two abilities will resolve, tehn your Frost Breath will go to resolve. It will tap down both creatures, which doesn't do much as their already tapped, and prevent them from untapping, which still works. You're allowed to tap tapped creatures and untap untapped creatures, but doing so doesn't trigger "when this becomes (un)tapped" abilities. and abilities require the creature to be untapped/tapped, and costs will say "tap an untapped creature" so that they have a real cost (the remind text for crew doesn't specify untapped, but the rules do). If Frost Breath read "Tap two target untapped creatures" the spell would be countered due to the targets being illegal, but it works as is.
June 17, 2017 1:38 p.m.