Tapping Question??
D. A. Lear
I have a question regarding tapping creatures to attack. Here is what
happened. In a multi player game an opponent had a Flood in play (
Tap 2 blue: Tap target creature w/o flying.) I announced my attack and
waited a second for any fast effects. I then declared what creatures
were going to attack and tapped them, again pausing for any fast
effects. Now, once I declared that I was going to attack the player
with Flood, he announced that he was going to tap it to tap my
attacking creature. Thus he would not take any damage. I argued that
he couldn't tap a creature already tapped. Who was right? How should
it have been resolved? Thanks in advance for any replies!!
David
David Wintheiser
Neither one of you is completely right, but you are more right than your
opponent.
Once you are done declaring your attackers and tapping them, their
combat status is not affected by any ability which simply taps or untaps
them. Only an effect which says that it removes creatures from combat
will prevent combat damage in this way (and there are still plenty of
other ways to prevent combat damage--Fog, Gossamer Chains, etc.).
It sounds like your opponent wanted you to commit those creatures to an
attack for some reason. What he should have done is responded to your
attack announcement by tapping your creatures with his Flood. However,
by doing this, he cancels your declaration of attack, and thus gives you
the opportunity of deciding that you don't want to attack after all. He
wanted to have it both ways, but that doesn't work in this situation.
You are not entirely correct in your interpretation of Flood, though.
Flood says to tap target creature without flying, not tap target
_untapped_ creature without flying. A creature who is already tapped is
a perfectly valid target for Flood.
David Wintheiser
American
David Wintheiser wrote:
>
> Neither one of you is completely right, but you are more right than your
> opponent.
>
> Once you are done declaring your attackers and tapping them, their
> combat status is not affected by any ability which simply taps or untaps
> them. Only an effect which says that it removes creatures from combat
> will prevent combat damage in this way (and there are still plenty of
> other ways to prevent combat damage--Fog, Gossamer Chains, etc.).
>
> It sounds like your opponent wanted you to commit those creatures to an
> attack for some reason. What he should have done is responded to your
> attack announcement by tapping your creatures with his Flood. However,
> by doing this, he cancels your declaration of attack, and thus gives you
> the opportunity of deciding that you don't want to attack after all. He
> wanted to have it both ways, but that doesn't work in this situation.
>
> You are not entirely correct in your interpretation of Flood, though.
> Flood says to tap target creature without flying, not tap target
> _untapped_ creature without flying. A creature who is already tapped is
> a perfectly valid target for Flood.
>
> David Wintheiser
But how to you tap a tapped creature?????
--
_____
/_ _\
(|0 _ 0|)
---------------oOOo--(_)--oOOo----------------
Ingo Kemper
On Sun, 20 Apr 1997 03:13:08 -0500, American <ame...@hotmail.com>
wrote:
>But how to you tap a tapped creature?????
The effect will fail to do anything, of course, but you may play the
spell or ability nonetheless.
__ _ __ __ __ __
__/ /_/ \/ /_/____/_ |___Sky...@uni-muenster.de___---===> \
/_/ /_/\_/ |__/ |__/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ---===>__/
Phaedrus
In article <3359D0...@hotmail.com>, American <ame...@hotmail.com> wrote:
>David Wintheiser wrote:
>> You are not entirely correct in your interpretation of Flood, though.
>> Flood says to tap target creature without flying, not tap target
>> _untapped_ creature without flying. A creature who is already tapped is
>> a perfectly valid target for Flood.
>But how to you tap a tapped creature?????
You can't; nothing happens. But it's perfectly legal to use an effect
that taps its target on something that's already tapped, unless the effect
says otherwise (by saying "Tap target untapped something...").
Note that if something requires you to tap something as a _cost_, you
can't do that by trying to tap an already-tapped card; there's a specific
rule against that.
--
\o\ If you're interested in books/stories with transformation themes, \o\
/o/ try <URL:http://www.halcyon.com/phaedrus/translist/translist.html>. /o/
\o\ New list entries always appreciated. FC1.21:FC(W/C)p6arw A- C->++ D>++ \o\
/o/ H+ M>+ P R T++++ W** Z+ Sm RLCT a cmn++++$ d e++ f+++ h- i++wf p-- sm# /o/
Brian Wilson
Before I could do anything to stop it, American wrote:
> > You are not entirely correct in your interpretation of Flood, though.
> > Flood says to tap target creature without flying, not tap target
> > _untapped_ creature without flying. A creature who is already tapped is
> > a perfectly valid target for Flood.
>
> But how to you tap a tapped creature?????
The effect attempts to tap the creature, discovers it already tapped, and
then fizzles.
--
What could be more dainty than a brimming mouthful of crunchy crab shells?
Phaedrus
In article <5jeetk$i...@navajo.gate.net>, Brian Wilson <bwi...@gate.net> wrote:
>Before I could do anything to stop it, American wrote:
>> > You are not entirely correct in your interpretation of Flood, though.
>> > Flood says to tap target creature without flying, not tap target
>> > _untapped_ creature without flying. A creature who is already tapped is
>> > a perfectly valid target for Flood.
>> But how to you tap a tapped creature?????
>The effect attempts to tap the creature, discovers it already tapped, and
>then fizzles.
Terminology nitpick: It doesn't fizzle; fizzling means that the effect
had an invalid target, and there's nothing invalid about targeting a tapped
creature with a "Tap target creature" effect.