What's the difference between death and destruction?
Asked by aepokh 12 years ago
Is there a concise way to define a creature's "death"? Does a creature have to enter the graveyard from the battlefield, no other conditions? Blood Artist , for example, reads "when [any] creature dies..." so when a creature is sacrificed, or when its toughness is zero or less and it goes to the graveyard, Blood Artist's ability will trigger, correct? Even though the creature wasn't "destroyed".
Does a creature being exiled count as dying? If not, can anything really "die" if Rest in Peace is on the field?
Is there any way for noncreature permanents to "die" without being sacrificed or destroyed?
Epochalyptik says... Accepted answer #2
"Dies" means "put into the graveyard from the battlefield." That's the literal longhand for the keyword. Only creatures are associated with the dies keyword (logically, only living or animated things can die, even though all types of permanents can be put into the graveyard from the battlefield).
If something is exiled, it obviously doesn't go to the graveyard. Therefore, on-death effects won't trigger if a creature is exiled.
Kirtanian says... #1
A creature "dies" when it it put into a graveyard from play. This includes sacrificing and destroying. It does not include exiling because an exiled creature never goes to the graveyard.
If Rest in Peace is in play then Blood Artist also will not trigger. This is because of the replacement effect signified by the phrase "If..." do something else "...instead" meaning that the cards never go to the graveyard either.
Destroy - is a command or action saying to put a creature or other permanent from play into the graveyard. A creature that is destroyed does "die" but a creature that has died was not necessarily "destroyed."
As to your final question, only creature permanents "die," other permanents are still "put into the graveyard from play."
I hope that helps.
January 4, 2013 3:32 a.m.