It’s Nationals season all around the world, and with a metagame much healthier than ever, there are many valid strategies you may choose. The actual Standard format is formed by the Alara block (Shards of Alara, Conflux, Alara Reborn), Zendikar block (Zendikar, Worldwake, Rise of the Eldrazi), and the Core Sets M10 and M11. This atypical situation of two core sets coexisting in Standard will last until October later this year.
Whatever deck you choose to compete in Standard, it is highly advisable you playtest it. Get a friend and play some games. Get used to the deck. Explore its possibilities, and find the different interactions that may come up later at a tournament. It is also advisable you know how your cards work. It is difficult to know how every single card works in Magic, but it will be to your advantage if you learn what your own cards do. To help you with that, let’s take a look to some common card interactions and rulings in Standard.
Drawing Cards
When you have an Oracle of Mul Daya on the battlefield, you need to keep the top card of your library revealed, and it is also necessary to do this between draws. Cards like Mind Spring or Jace, the Mind Sculptor (with its Brainstorm-like ability) instruct you to draw several cards; these draws happen sequentially, one by one (CR 120.2), not all at the same time. Thus you need to reveal each card you draw. On the other hand, cards like Halimar Depths don’t make you draw cards. You are looking at cards on the top of your library, so the cards remain in your deck. In this scenario you have to reveal the top card of your deck just before and after resolving the ability.
Also, when playing a land, please remember to specify what land drop you are using (CR 305.2): your regular land drop, or the extra one granted by the Oracle. You can play lands from the top of your library with either land drop, and the extra land drops are cumulative if you happen to control several Oracles on the battlefield.
Targets
Searing Blaze is a spell with two targets, so it won’t get countered if only one of both targets is illegal on resolution (CR 608.2b). Of course, you can’t cast it at all if there are no creatures on the battlefield that can be targeted on announcement.
With Forked Bolt, it is not possible to deal one damage to your opponent and one damage to a planeswalker he controls, since to divide the damage you’d need to choose two different targets (CR 114.3 and CR 601.2d).
If you control a Blazing Torch equipped to a Red creature, you won’t be able to kill a Kor Firewalker with it, as the Blazing Torch grants an ability that does target to the equipped creature. The damage is dealt by the Blazing Torch, but the equipped creature is the one that does the targeting.
The second ability of Sarkhan the Mad says “Target creature’s controller sacrifices it.” If you get rid of the targeted creature in response to this ability, the whole thing will get countered. No target, no cookie… errr no dragon. Remember you have to remove the loyalty counters as a cost (CR 606.4).
Emrakul, the Aeons Thorn cannot be the target of colored spells. As all of you already know, abilities can deal with Emrakul. Examples are Oblivion Ring; the Unsummon ability of Jace, the Mind Sculptor; or the triggered ability you get when casting Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre (the latter not because Ulamog is colorless, but because the one targeting Emrakul is a triggered ability and not a spell). Abilities have no color or any characteristics (CR 405.4) other than its text.
Graveyard
The unearth ability of cards like Hellspark Elemental or Hell’s Thunder is activated, and it is possible to respond to it. A timely Jund Charm will cause unearth to have no effect. The same happens for the triggered ability of a Vengevine; it won’t return to the battlefield if it is not in the graveyard when the ability resolves.
Destructive Force is a highly ineffective way to kill a Knight of the Reliquary. State Based Actions are not verified until a player gains priority (CR 704.3), which would mean you have finished resolving the Red spell, a time at which the lands are already in the graveyard and the Knight’s toughness has grown accordingly.
Prevention
With a Leyline of Punishment on the battlefield, a Kor Firewalker would die when blocking a Hellspark Elemental or a Goblin Guide. Since the Leyline states that damage can’t be prevented, the Firewalker’s protection would fail (CR 702.14e), leaving it defenseless against the Red horde. Note that Leyline of Punishment doesn’t remove the Firewalker’s “Protection from Red” ability; it just stops the damage prevention from working.
When Gideon Jura is a creature, the damage it receives is prevented. This means this damage is not marked, and Gideon does not lose loyalty counters. Spells like Combust, whose damage cannot be prevented, means 5 damages being marked on Gideon, and in addition 5 loyalty counters being removed. When animated, Gideon is subject to rules affecting both creatures and planeswalkers. You would get the same outcome out of a kicked Unstable Footing aimed at the Gideon controller’s head, but only if you choose to redirect the damage to Gideon on resolution.
Another interesting Gideon Jura ruling is what happens when you use its first activated ability. This ability will force all creatures target opponent controls to attack Gideon next turn, even those that aren’t on the battlefield when the ability resolves. This happens because the ability doesn’t modify any characteristics of any objects (CR 611.2c); it changes the rules of the game. If you manage to get rid of Gideon before declaring attackers, the requirement created by Gideon’s ability can’t be obeyed at all, so your creatures will be able to attack freely, or even not attack at all.
Triggers and Abilities
If your opponent casts Quenchable Fire on you, and it resolves, you may pay U so its delayed triggered ability does not trigger and deal you three more damage. You can take this special action (CR 115.2d), that doesn’t use the stack, at any time you have priority but before your opponent’s upkeep begins! This means a statement like “Go, in your upkeep I pay U” won’t work the way you expect. True story!
Two attacking Goblin Guides will resolve their abilities separately; this allows you to respond between both triggers, so you can crack your fetchland in between the resolution of the first and second ability so you maximize your chances to get some extra lands. Please be careful and remember that you only get to put the card revealed with Goblin Guide in your hand if it is a land card. If you do so and the revealed card is not a land, it is Game Play Error — Drawing Extra Cards (MIPG 3.4), and in Competitive REL you’d get a Game Loss for that.
If you control a Sovereigns of Lost Alara, and you attacked with a single creature getting an Eldrazi Conscription, the Annihilator ability won’t trigger, since the enchanted creature is already attacking and Annihilator triggers when the creature is declared as an attacker.
Even though playing a land does not use the stack, the ability of Lotus Cobra does, since it is not a mana ability. Okay, it produces mana, but it is a triggered ability that does not have a target and does not trigger off another mana ability being activated (CR 605.1b); since it is not a mana ability, it uses the stack.
You all know that Valakut, the Molten Pinnacle verifies its trigger condition; there must be five “other” Mountains on the battlefield, both when triggering and when resolving, which means Valakut won’t do damage until the sixth Mountain is on the battlefield and only if (CR 603.4) there are still five other Mountains on the battlefield when the ability resolves. Thus, if we have four Mountains and a Valakut and, thanks to the ability of a Primeval Titan or to a Harrow, we fetch two more Mountains, both Mountains will trigger Valakut and both will cause Valakut to deal damage.
If you activate Raging Ravine’s ability twice before attacking, everyone’s RG favourite manland will have two instances of the “put a +1/+1 counter” triggered ability, so you’ll get 2 counters on it when it attacks. That will use a lot of mana, but you can do it. Also, if you play a Raging Ravine and activate it, and then activate an Oran Rief, the Vastwood, your manland will get a counter. The Vastwood does not care if the Raging Ravine was played as a creature, it only cares if it’s entering the battlefield this turn and it being Green when the ability resolves.
To end this article, two quick reminders: when chaining one cascade spell with another, you need to shuffle the cascaded cards individually for each cascade effect. Failing to follow the cascade instructions correctly is a Game Play Error — Game Rule Violation (MIPG 3.6), and not shuffling each set of cascaded cards is a Tournament Error — Insufficient Shuffling (MIPG 4.4); and when you play a modal spell, such an Esper Charm, for clarity’s sake please choose your mode first (CR 700.2c). You all know the score.
Special thanks to Miguel Calvo, L1 from Madrid, for his valuable help in compiling these rulings. Good luck at Nationals, to both players and judges!