Again, to quote Shadow Blade:
“Deal 3 damage to a patroller.
If it dies from Shadow Blade, its controller discards a card at random.”
Those are also two separate sentences printed on two separate lines. By your logic, that would indicate two separate abilities, so there would be time for Technician to insert itself between them.
And don’t say, “No, the ‘If’ makes them into one ability despite the separate lines and the period.”
'Cause then you’re just making rules up arbitrarily.
They are two separate abilities. Technician can’t insert itself between them, because effects go on a queue, not a stack (see post #2). Technician gets triggered during Shadow Blade’s first ability, but isn’t resolved until after SB’s second ability is resolved.
Okay… I think I see what you’re getting at.
You’re saying that:
Aside from the problem with calling patroller effects abilities, I can at least see how that hangs together as a logical argument.
My argument would be that the patroller slot effects are not abilities, but are instead a separate class of game effect. From the Rules .pdf:
“Each of your five patrol slots gives a different bonus on opponents’ turns”
It specifically does not use the word “ability.”
Also: “Lookout: Gets resist 1.” Note how it doesn’t just say, “Resist 1”; a non-ability game rule effect is granting an ability to the unit. (Though I know this is less relevant as it is not triggered.)
And in my mind, I don’t see how the triggered bonus effect is different from a triggered damage effect (tech building pops: base takes damage). If one should happen simultaneously, so should the other.
guys, plz, this is becoming the pettifogger thread. Let’s ask @sharpobject or @Sirlin for an official statement, and then simply accept that, whatever it will be. Is meaningless endlessly arguing the rules
The Earthquake situation already has a ruling. It says to damage their damaged buildings, so you do that. Then after that, it says to deal damage to undamaged buildings, so now you do that.
Along the same lines if something said:
"Discard a card.
Draw a card."
Then you could not draw a card first. You would start by discarding a card. Then, when you were done with that, you’d go on to the next thing about drawing a card.
And of course the effect would be different if it said “Deal X damage to undamaged buildings and deal Y damage to damaged buildings.” That is all one sentence and would be meant to be executed all at once. That’s very different from two separate abilities. The one-sentence version would be asking you to separate all buildings into either damaged or undamaged then deal the damage as appropriate. The actual real card is asking you to do a thing, then to do another thing after that.
That isn’t the point. The question is: when a Tech building is destroyed, when does the 2 damage to the Base happen? It seems like it should follow the same timing as Scavenger/Technician bonuses, but I can’t get to the rulebook to confirm.
So, just to clarify for myself and the rest of the thread who may be as confused as I am, the Earthquake sequence goes like this if you consider “tech buildings deal 2 damage to the base” to not be a triggered ability.
If “tech buildings deal 2 damage to the base” is a triggered ability.
So is there any other ability that acts the same way as situation one? Lacking some clarification I would assume that “when a tech building dies, deal 2 damage to your base” is triggered in the same way that “when a tactician dies, draw a card” is triggered, and would follow the same timing rules.
Not trying to be pedantic - just trying to understand.
The only line in the rulebook I can find about timing is this.
A triggered ability (such as “Whenever you attack, your units get +1/+1”) might kick in during another action, but you can’t use activated abilities or other actions you initiate yourself before resolving any effects or combats in progress.
It doesn’t really help. To me, it would put both tactician bonuses and Tech/Add-On buildings dying on the same timing rules (since they are both triggered by something happening), but doesn’t clarify when they should happen: do they both go to the end of the queue, or do they both interrupt whatever is happening and trigger immediately?
The more I think about it, the more I think the bugblatter example is just wrong, and that shadowblade, tactician, and bugblatter abilities all happen immediately and simultaneously as soon as it is killed, with active player choosing the order in which they are resolved. Since they are all triggered cus of “when X, do Y” wording. This is also the timing that Sirlin’s Earthquake example uses.
Here is the relevant clarification from the 2nd post in this thread (“What happens when multiple things are triggered simultaneously? In what order are they resolved?”)
The TL;DR is “triggered abilities interrupt whatever is happening and are resolved before anything else occurs” and “triggered abilities that are triggered by other triggered abilities have to wait until the previous batch of triggered abilities” is resolved.
So let’s take the Bugballter in Tactician killed by Shadowblade example:
Earthquake example therefore works like this:
A more complicated version of the Bugblatter example, to explain the “triggered effects because of other triggered effects are resolved after the 1st batch of triggered effects are resolved” would be if the shadowblade player had an upgrade that said “when your base takes damage, deal 1 damage to an opponent’s unit or hero.”
It feels weird because the first instance of a trigger happening interrupts the active thing, but subsequent things have to “wait their turn until other triggered effects are resolved” but whatever.
Can either @sharpobject or @Sirlin confirm that these examples are correct?
Yeah, your first example is how I believe the interaction would play out.
This is really the best way I can think of to reconcile the “queue” timing/examples in post #2 with the rulings on cards like Earthquake, or Patriot Gryphon:
As an example, if Patriot Gryphon attacks a tech II building, he’ll destroy that tech building because he deals 6 damage to it. As usual, that tech building being destroyed deals 2 damage to its controller’s base. Then, because of Patriot Gryphon’s ability, he’ll deal an additional 6 damage to that same base. — Sirlin
…which implies that the base damage occurs simultaneously with, or at least immediately after, a tech building being destroyed.
Question about Sentry.
Does that mean (1) Sentry prevents the first damage dealt by an ability each turn (i.e. it will prevent 1 damage per turn), or (2) Sentry prevents the first point of damage dealt by each ability (i.e. it prevents 1 damage per ability)? I assume it’s (1) but my brain just can’t parse this ability.
Question about Assimilate used on Bird’s Nest.
Does assimilating an opponent’s bird’s nest give you 2 birds? I think that “get 2 birds” is only something that happens when you cast it, but I’m not completely 100% positive. If assimilating bird’s nest does give you 2 birds, does it care how many birds are still alive on the opponent’s board?
Similar question about Assimilating someone’s Hive. I assume the Stingers don’t die, because the Hive didn’t die. But is the assimilated Hive prevented from generating Stingers by the Stingers that are in its opponent’s control?
This is consistent with “the first instance of a triggered ability will interrupt whatever is happening and must be resolved before you proceed with whatever you were doing” and “triggered abilities triggering off other triggered abilities must wait until all previous triggered abilities are resolved before being resolved.”
That can’t be right. It was confirmed by sharpo that the bugblatter example is correct, back on the old forums iirc.
The other example that matches the base damage issue is Smoker.
This contradicts all previous discussions regarding Shadow Blade.
Then I have no idea what’s happening and will wait for clarification.
I thought it was known that Smoker is the exception to the normal timing rules. If base damage from tech building destruction needs to be the second exception, that seems fine to me and also seems like the cleanest way to resolve the situation.
Never heard of it. Until I checked the card database I wasn’t aware that there was some accepted timing rule that he was an exception to. What does the “resolve everything that you’re doing first, then do triggered abilities” ruling prevent from happening that having exceptions to it is a benefit, would be my question.
It prevents Smoker existing in its current form (returning to your hand before it takes damage from a burn spell), and it might also prevent your base taking damage from a tech building destruction for a bit, apparently.
I’m confused and would like an answer too - sorry if I came off blunt there.
Sentry prevents 1 damage per turn, and only from spells or abilities (note that Sparkshot and Overpower count as Abilities for this purpose)
Stealing the opponent’s thing does not trigger Arrives: abilities. (you can’t assimilate a Hive, since it’s a Unit, but you could Mind Control or Kidnap it)
Limit: X does not count tokens controlled by other players. see here:http://codexcarddb.com/ruling/limit_x. Note that this means if you steal an opponent’s Hive, and they play a second one, the second Hive’s Arrives: make 5 stingers will only make enough stingers to bring their total up to 5, per the Limit: 5 stingers/hive requirement.