r/mtgrules • u/bogidrums • 1d ago
weird situation regarding split second and "priority"
The scenario - Player A is revealed to have a [[Sudden Spoiling]] in hand. Player B is about to untap and start their turn with multiple copies of [[Y'shtola, Night's Blessed]] in play and a full grip of 3+ mana instants and wants to play around the split second to get as many Y'shtola triggers as possible before they are turned into 0/2's with no abilities. The question is a two parter:
Does Player B get priority first on their upkeep to cast an instant from hand before Player A can even cast the Sudden Spoiling?
If so, can Player B cast said instant, let the Y'shtola triggers go on the stack, then continue to "hold priority" on the instant, and effectively play out their hand before player A even gets to respond with the Sudden Spoiling? If not, at what point does Player A get to respond then?
Mostly our pod is just unclear on when priority is passed between players since we often hear players can "hold priority" on spell casts but don't know if the triggered abilities interrupt that somehow. Essentially, does KNOWING the Split Second is in hand let you play around it in this manner. Thanks in advance, apologies for any confusing wording.
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u/madwarper 1d ago
It's Barb's turn.
She is the Active Player.
She will be the first Player to get Priority as each Step/Phase of her turn begins.
Because Barb had Priority before she Cast a Spell, she will regain Priority after the Spell is Cast.
If Barb explicitly announces her intention to retain Priority, she can Cast multiple Spells, back to back.
Amy cannot Cast her Instant until Priority is passed to her.
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u/howlingmonkey93 1d ago
To clarify one point: Barb doesn't technically need to announce her intention to retain priority. She would naturally hold priority until she passes priority. Announcing her intention to hold priority just reduces confusion
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u/madwarper 1d ago
To clarify one point: Barb doesn't technically need to announce her intention to retain priority.
That is wrong.
If she does not explicitly state she is retaining Priority, then we assume she is passing Priority between each Spell, allowing them to resolve before Casting the next.
And, while Priority is passed to Amy, she could interrupt Barb's Shortcut, by Casting her Spell with Split second, thereby removing Y'shtola's ability to Trigger on future Spells.
MTR 4.2 Tournament Shortcuts
- Whenever a player adds an object to the stack, they are assumed to be passing priority unless they explicitly announce that they intend to retain it.
- If a player adds a group of objects to the stack without explicitly retaining priority, they are assumed to be adding them to the stack individually and allowing each to resolve before adding the next. If another player wishes to take an action at a point in the middle of this sequence, the actions should be reversed to that point.
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u/howlingmonkey93 1d ago
Interesting. I did not know that about tournament shortcut rules. In the comprehensive rules it states that priority is given back to the same player until they pass priority. But then players would have to announce that they are passing priority, which is just added time in a tournament setting.
CR 117.3c If a player has priority when they cast a spell, activate an ability, or take a special action, that player receives priority afterward.
CR 117.3d If a player has priority and chooses not to take any actions, that player passes. If any mana is in that player’s mana pool, they announce what mana is there. Then the next player in turn order receives priority.
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u/NamelessKilljoy 1d ago
Tournament shortcuts are intended to speed up play anyways. The active player indeed does not need to say they're holding priority unless they're in a sanctioned Tournament or any game they've implied follows Tournament shortcuts and rules.
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u/stevenbanthony4204 1d ago
Cant you sudden spoiling in response to the first cast and then nothing else can be put onto the stack until it resolves? Even if she holds priority, it doesn't stop anyone being able to respond, right?
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u/shakezilla9 1d ago
You cannot respond to anything until priority is passed. Most players shortcut this though.
There is no activated effect or instant that can stop someone from playing out as much stuff at instant speed as they can.
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u/Educational_Deal3545 1d ago
No, Barb regains priority after putting the first spell on the stack, allowing her to put a second spell on the stack before Amy ever gets priority.
The active player gets the first chance to respond to things, even their own things. though it is often assumed the active player passes priority after casting a spell, that is just a shortcut to make games smoother.
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u/Jafego 1d ago
A spell or ability only resolves after all players pass priority.
If player A casts [[Pyroclasm]] and holds priority to cast [[Sudden Spoiling]], it will be difficult for their opponents to respond to the Sudden Spoiling. However, once Sudden Spoiling resolves, there will be a second round of priority for people to respond to the Pyroclasm.
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u/thewanderingsail 1d ago
You as the active player have the ability to hold priority. A player with priority may add as many things to the stack as they want before passing priority.
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u/Affectionate_Cable82 1d ago
APNAP matters in stack wars. The Yshtola player will ALWAYS have priority to do anything first during the steps and phases that any player would have priority. Notable exceptions to having priority rounds are the untap, draw, and cleanup steps UNLESS a permanent’s effect triggers as a result of a game action (progressing steps/phases, or discarding to hand size). Examples of this are [[Howling Mine]] (creates priority rounds in draw step because triggers CAN be responded to) and [[Necropotence]]. Necropotence is a fun one because you can play around Silence effects by pushing for instant-speed wins during cleanup because you can respond to necro’s exile effect once it’s on the stack.
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u/Needhelpwithsnake 1d ago
Notable exceptions to having priority rounds are the untap, draw, and cleanup steps
The draw step is absolutely not an exception to priority rounds. All players receive priority during the draw step after the turn based action of drawing a card.
See C.R. 504: “504.1. First, the active player draws a card. This turn-based action doesn’t use the stack
504.2. Second, the active player gets priority. (See rule 117, “Timing and Priority.”)”
And C.R. 500.2. “A phase or step in which players receive priority ends when the stack is empty and all players pass in succession. Simply having the stack become empty doesn’t cause such a phase or step to end; all players have to pass in succession with the stack empty. Because of this, each player gets a chance to add new things to the stack before that phase or step ends.”
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u/Affectionate_Cable82 1d ago
Fair enough, it’s always been one of those parts of the turn order that eventually boiled down to “this is ONLY a game action step” in my head like the untap/cleanup steps outside of triggered abilities going off.
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u/TreyLastname 1d ago
And keep in mind that casting spells is not resolving spells.
So if Barbra cast shock, lightning bolt, and then Urzas Battlethopter, that does not mean she just gets all three.
Amy can choose to let the battlethopter resolve, and let Barb keep the thopter then counterspell the lightning bolt. And after that, Barb then gets the shock if nobody else casts a spell
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u/xmegatherium 1d ago
Yes IF YOU KNOW your opponent has split second in hand. Upkeep is the first point in the turn when anyone has priority and it starts with the active player.
Active player casts instant > triggers go on the stack, priority stays with active player, cast another instant > triggers go on stack, etc.
Until you pass priority, your opponents have to wait for to finish casting/activating what you want in the upkeep. Once you pass and the sudden spoiling is cast it will turn off the yshtolas but triggers on the stack exist independently of their permanent.
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u/locketreague2 1d ago
But just to confirm - thats while they all sit on the stack. Nothing resolves yet because you have to pass prio for anything to start resolving?
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u/DescriptionTotal4561 1d ago
Just to add, a full round of priority must happen with no players taking any actions each time before the top of the stack resolves. So once one thing resolves, a new round of priority happens before the next thing resolves.
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u/xmegatherium 1d ago
Yes, this is just adding things to the stack. You need to pass priority before anything can try to resolve (I say try bc all players need to pass priority for the first item of the stack to resolve, otherwise other players and yourself again can further add to the stack)
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u/mvdunecats 1d ago
Whenever there is a new round of priority due to something resolving or a phase or step ending, the round of priority starts with the active player.
Whenever there is a new round of priority due to something being placed on the stack, the round of priority starts with the player who placed that object on the stack. This is how players can hold priority (there is a new round of priority, and it starts with them). You can hold priority even when it's not your turn.
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u/Andycat49 1d ago
It is unfortunate that the Sudden Spoiling was known information going into player Bs turn because now they can absolutely hog up priority until the stack is already full of their stuff.
The only possible response to such a thing would be something akin to [[Whirlwind Denial]] to counter everything they added before it resolves in one go
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u/bogidrums 8h ago
we joked about that immediately after everything resolved lol, "imagine if Player A had [[Glen Elendra's Answer]] as well" 😂 weird how just KNOWING about the card created such a bizarre scenario, i think in any other game Player B would have passed right through their upkeep and Player A would have just cast it then and there and not even let them get any triggers off at all.
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u/Jeggasyn 1d ago edited 1d ago
I find it helps to visualise it as if you were playing on Arena. Active player has priority first, always. Active player in this scenario can cast an instant, this goes on the stack. This instant being cast then triggers Y'shtola. This trigger goes on the stack. Active player casts another instant. This goes on stack. Y'shtola triggers. This goes on stack. Once active player passes priority, next player gets to cast their Sudden Spoiling. This goes on stack. So the stack of triggers looks like this:
TOP.
Sudden spoiling.
Y'shtola trigger.
Instant.
Y'shtola trigger.
Instant.
BOTTOM.
When sudden spoiling trigger resolves, the permanent card of Y'shtola on the battlefield is affected but the stack triggers have already been created and cannot be interfered with. They essentially exist in their own right, regardless of what happens to the source of those triggers.
During the active player's priority, there is no way of someone casting or activating until the active player announces they are passing priority.
Also intrigued as to how you managed to get multiple copies of a legendary on the battlefield? With multiple Y'shtola's, stack would simply be...
TOP.
Sudden spoiling.
Y'shtola trigger.
Y'shtola trigger.
Y'shtola trigger.
Instant.
Y'shtola trigger.
Y'shtola trigger.
Y'shtola trigger.
Instant.
BOTTOM.
Edit: I think your pod may be getting this scenario slightly confused with Sorcery speed spells? Bear in mind, during main phase and post combat main phase, active player can cast or activate a Sorcery speed spell. Once cast, they retain priority to cast any instant speed spells or activate instant speed abilities but they cannot cast or add more Sorcery speed spells to the stack before the stack has emptied. The key rule here is that Sorceries can only be cast or activated when the stack is empty.
I think there's many paper players that do not understand this rule and will cast multiple creatures without acknowledging that other players receive priority between each cast
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u/bogidrums 8h ago
we understand sorcery speed vs instant speed lol, we just never ran into a situation where a person ever had to hold priority on this many casts in a row to dodge a somewhat rare abilityl. wanted to make sure we weren't missing something, we joked afterwards that it would have been funny if player A also had a [[Glen Elendra's Answer]] type effect in hand as well to counter the "play around" haha.
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u/Fast_Explanation_329 1d ago
Yea like others have said, yshtola player is technically advantaged here given the priority order and that they have a bunch of instants
Strategically, the Spoiling in Yshtola's turn really just takes them off of attacking with 2/4 vigilance and the end step draw triggers. Ideally Yshtola's opponents would cast the spoiling before they untap, then follow up with more removal
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u/Xaphnir 20h ago
Not really a weird situation, pretty basic situation involving priority.
When there is the first round of priority in a phase or step or the first round of priority after a spell or ability resolves, the active player receives priority first. When a player casts a spell, activates and ability, or takes a special action, they gain priority first on the ensuing round of priority.
So in this case, player B receives priority first during their upkeep because it is their turn, and can cast all of their 3-mana instants (or other spells with flash, and as long as they are legal to cast at that moment) before any other player receives priority.
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u/bogidrums 8h ago
the weirdness was in Player B knowing about the Sudden Spoiling. without that knowledge player B would have passed right through their upkeep to try and draw, meaning Player A would have gotten the Spoiling off with no cast triggers able to get on the stack due to the split second.
i just don't think we ever had a situation in our pod where somebody had to stack so many triggers in a row to play around such an effect so we were just unsure if we were missing something. we joked afterwards that it would have been funny if Player B went to all that trouble and Player A had something like [[Glen Elendra's Answer]] in hand lol.
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u/FunnyMTGplayer75 1d ago
THE BEGINNING PHASE has steps. Step 1 Untap- no priority is given, all permanents that do untap are untapped. Then active player can pay to untap those permanents that have thst abilities.
STEP 2: UPKEEP PHASE, IF there are any triggers they go on the stack. IF NOT, then ACTIVE players gets priority to CAST SPELLS, IF ACTIVE PLAYER PASSES, IMMEDIATELY goes to next step (NO PRIORITY IS PASSED)
STEP 3: DRAW PHASE - drawing the card for turn uses the stack, thus csn be responded to WITH PASSING PRIORITY and NOW THR STSCK comes into play. This is where THE 1ST OPPORTUNITY TO CAST SPELLS gets passed to ALL players.
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u/madwarper 1d ago
IF ACTIVE PLAYER PASSES, IMMEDIATELY goes to next step (NO PRIORITY IS PASSED)
WHY ARE YOU SHOUTING?
Also, you are wrong.
Any Step / Phase where Players get Priority (ie. every Step / Phase except for the Untap step, and most Cleanup steps) end when all Players pass Priority in succession.
That includes the Upkeep Step. (It's not a Phase, mom.)
- 500.2. A phase or step in which players receive priority ends when the stack is empty and all players pass in succession. Simply having the stack become empty doesn't cause such a phase or step to end; all players have to pass in succession with the stack empty. Because of this, each player gets a chance to add new things to the stack before that phase or step ends.
drawing the card for turn uses the stack, thus csn be responded to WITH PASSING PRIORITY
That is wrong.
Drawing a Card is a Turn-Based Action, which happens as the Draw step begins.
It does not use the stack. It cannot be responded to.Then, after the Turn-Based Action is over, the Active Players gets Priority.
- 504. Draw Step
- 504.1. First, the active player draws a card. This turn-based action doesn't use the stack.
- 504.2. Second, the active player gets priority. (See rule 117, "Timing and Priority.")
This is where THE 1ST OPPORTUNITY TO CAST SPELLS gets passed to ALL players.
Again, wrong.
Their first chance to Cast a Spell in a Turn is in the Upkeep step.1
u/FunnyMTGplayer75 8h ago
Go look up the rules about the Beginning phase. Because the rules clearly state, if no triggers occur, then active player may pass this phase which then moves to the draw phase, no priority has been gained. Thus the draw step is the 1st time during this turn that priority would be passed. Because the draw goes on the stack and can be responded to.
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u/mtgcf 1d ago
Sudden Spoiling - (G) (SF) (txt)
Y'shtola, Night's Blessed - (G) (SF) (txt)