Seeking Dispel

[Rumsey]

Situation:

Player A has a Seeking Dispel in hand
Player B has an enchantment in hand

First, if during the Quickcast Phase Player B casts an enchantment and pays to immediately reveal the enchantment, can Player A use Seeking Dispel to cancel the enchantment before it is flipped?

Second, Can Seeking Dispel be used during the Counter Spell phase?

I say no to both, but some kid says that a designer told him that he could.

[Arcanus]

You were right - the answer is no.  

The reason why is that Seeking Dispel, like all other spells in Mage Wars, is not cast as a reaction.  It can only be cast as part of the action phase or using the quickcast action.

Thus, player B could not react to the enchantment being revealed by interrupting that player to immediately cast Seeking Dispel.  Not could it be used during the counter spell step.

The correct question would be - when player B casts Seeking Dispel, can player A reveal an enchantment?  The answer is - NO, he cannot reveal the enchantment which is the target of the spell.  However, he could reveal a different enchantment, during the counter spell step.

[Rumsey]

Just what I thought. He was using the Mage Wand with a spellbound Seeking Dispel. He was under the impression that he could kill any enchantment that way and they would never get the chance to reveal. The combo is still great because you force your opponent to go ahead and spend the extra to reveal right away. Hard to keep secrets against it.

[Jon.Ambriz]

Again, Rumsey, you appear to only have heard partially what this "kid" was saying when I was explaining that you cannot play Sacred Ground flat out and pay the 6 total mana. You first pay the 2 mana to play it face down, then you turn it over and pay the reveal cost as a "free action".

What you are describing are two totally different things. Having Seeking Dispel in my "hand" and casting it as a "reaction" of course is not permitted. Being in range for Seeking Dispel to be cast as a quick action, since remember what your friend was talking about was the when he and I were in the Quick Cast Phase, is permitted.

Again, since I was three zones away the semantics of arguing that I could not cast Seeking Dispel are moot. Had I been in range to cast Seeking Dispel when Sacred Ground was played face down, I would have destroyed it before it could have been flipped since the Quick Cast would have been mine.

[Rumsey]

Jon, re-read what Bryan is saying. You do not get an action before an immediate reveal. You are under the assumption that when your opponent plays an enchantment and decides to "immediately" reveal it, that you have the option to act between the two. You don't. Bryan spells it out. Read everything again.

P. S. You owe me $50. Lol.

[Jon.Ambriz]

Jon, re-read what Bryan is saying. You do not get an action before an immediate reveal. You are under the assumption that when your opponent plays an enchantment and decides to "immediately" reveal it, that you have the option to act between the two. You don't. Bryan spells it out. Read everything again.

P. S. You owe me $50. Lol.

Again, you still are not hearing what I'm saying. I am not saying I am going to stop a player from "immediately" turning over a face down enchantment. What I have been trying to get across to you, and what your friend was trying to say, is that when you are trying to avoid Seeking Dispel and you play the card face up immediately, playing that enchantment face up from the start is something you cannot do. You first play it face down. See page 23 "Designer's Note: The Enchantment Matrix", and the first couple of lines on page 22. So, the $50 I "supposedly" owe you, I don't.

The Seeking Dispel combination that I set up is not for most enchantments. It's for blocks, reflects, nullifies, and traps. Because those enchantments can't be "immediately" turned up, Seeking Dispel would destroy those and leave a huge opening for me to attack. The other enchantments that are "immediately" turned up I have a Mage Wand with Dispel attached waiting for those. This whole thing has been brought up because you only heard, "I am going to destroy all of your enchantments when you play them face down with Seeking Dispel, if I am in range, as a reaction to you playing them face down."

[Rumsey]

So are you saying that you had two Mage Wands out?  One with Dispel and one with Seeking Dispel?  You are still claiming that a person cannot avoid "Seeking Dispel" by immediately revealing their Enchantment directly after playing it. Yes, you can. You cannot avoid subsequently if you do not do so. There is no "event" between the two that you can act upon. You are making this game more complicated than it actually is.

The Pope spoke. Listen to the Pope. Arcanus designed the game.

[Jon.Ambriz]

So are you saying that you had two Mage Wands out?  One with Dispel and one with Seeking Dispel?  You are still claiming that a person cannot avoid "Seeking Dispel" by immediately revealing their Enchantment directly after playing it. Yes, you can. You cannot avoid subsequently if you do not do so. There is no "event" between the two that you can act upon. You are making this game more complicated than it actually is.

The Pope spoke. Listen to the Pope. Arcanus designed the game.

I did not have a second Mage Wand out. I had an Elemental Wand with Lightning Bolt, and a Mage Wand with Seeking Dispel. Now before you jump down on that equipment set up, read the following scenarios very carefully:

Scenario 1
Player A plays an enchantment face down on a creature two zones away from him, and two zones away from Player B, and Player A chooses to not reveal it, knowing Player B has Seeking Dispel bound to a Mage Wand, and another Mage Wand with Dispel bound. Player A chooses not to reveal because it's a hidden Decoy. Player B uses Seeking Dispel as the action to destroy the hidden enchantment, and seeing it's a Decoy, wastes the action on Seeking Dispel.

Scenario 2
Player A plays an enchantment face down one zone away, and three zones away from Player B and chooses to reveal it, knowing Player B is both too far away to use Seeking Dispel bound to a Mage Wand, and Player B's Dispel bound to another Mage Wand. It's Sacred Ground. Can Player B stop the action of revealing Sacred Ground? No. But, Player B knows that playing Seeking Dispel does not work on the reveal enchantment, instead Player B uses his action marker to move one zone closer to Sacred Ground, and uses his second Mage Wand's Dispel to dispel the Sacred Ground. That is allowed.

What I was talking about with "events" applies to Scenario 1. If the creature that has Decoy on it starts its move action, Player B can't use Seeking Dispel until the creature action is completed. This applies particularly for curses like Chains of Agony, where creatures take damage for every move action. Because Sacred Ground does not work that way, and because Player A in Scenario 2 chose to reveal it before Player B moved into range to use Seeking Dispel, that is not allowed.

[Tacullu64]

Not to stick my nose into what appears be a personal discussion, but that is not possible either because you cannot have two mage wands equipped to your mage at the same time.

[Jon.Ambriz]

Not to stick my nose into what appears be a personal discussion, but that is not possible either because you cannot have two mage wands equipped to your mage at the same time.

You can since Mage Wand equips to either your main hand or off hand (the shield). But, thank you for changing the subject

[Tacullu64]

I have to disagree since you can only have one spell of any given name attached to an a creature at a time. You could have an elemental wand and a mage wand but not two mage wands or two elemental wands. This is addressed in another topic, sadly I can't remember which.

[Rumsey]

Jon, you went way off topic. The only issue is whether or not you get an action between the playing of a hidden enchantment and the IMMEDIATE reveal of the enchantment. Arcanus pointed out that you do not get one under any circumstance.

I agree with Tacullu64 about Mage Wands also. No two of the same name per pg.22.

"You may not have more than one equipment spell with the same name attached to your Mage at any time."

[Jon.Ambriz]

Jon, you went way off topic. The only issue is whether or not you get an action between the playing of a hidden enchantment and the IMMEDIATE reveal of the enchantment. Arcanus pointed out that you do not get one under any circumstance.

I agree with Tacullu64 about Mage Wands also. No two of the same name per pg.22.

"You may not have more than one equipment spell with the same name attached to your Mage at any time."

No, the issue has been the playing an enchantment FACE UP from the get go! How many times do I have to reiterate this? I know you can't have two Mage Wands equipped. The scenarios I had up for you went on your post about having two Mage Wands.

This has gotten waay out of hand. Period.

[Rumsey]

Technically you actually can play an enchantment face-up as long as you pay the hidden plus the reveal cost and there is no existing enchantment on the target that can be used during the "counter spell" step.  There isn't anything that can happen between the hidden and reveal as long as it was done immediately.

I invite other players to comment.  This isn't personal although Jon will need my blessing if he wishes to organize gaming at the store.  So, to other players: Am I missing something about Jon's argument?  Am I completely misreading something?  I do enjoy a good debate.  Please hop on in.

P.S. Jon, you're the one that told Tacullu64 that you could have two Mage Wands because they were in different hands.  It was very nice of you to thank him though.

[theduke850]

Technically, you always play enchantments face down. but you can immediately pay the reveal cost and flip it over with no intervening steps for the opponent mage the chance to respond; no matter where they are on the board or what spells they have in hand or bound to their Mage Wand.  

so, what I believe Rumsey is advocating is a kind of short-hand to just pay the whole cost and play the enchantment face up.

I think what is clouding the issue for Jon's argument is the whole two copies of Mage Wand thing. Disregard that in his 2 scenarios above:

for Scenario 1 assume that player B only has a Mage Wand with Seeking Dispel.
-and-
for Scenario 2 assume that player B only has a Mage Wand with Seeking Dispel and stipulate that he has a Dispel in hand.

In Scenario 1 the steps Jon describes are correct.

In Scenario 2 the steps Jon describes are correct with the exception that it doesn't matter that Sacred Ground was cast face down out of range from Player B, It could have been in the zone right next to him and Player B would still not be able to do anything if Player A decides to immediately reveal Sacred Ground.

in Jon's write-up at the end of the two scenarios:

"What I was talking about with "events" applies to Scenario 1. If the creature that has Decoy on it starts its move action, Player B can't use Seeking Dispel until the creature action is completed. This applies particularly for curses like Chains of Agony, where creatures take damage for every move action. Because Sacred Ground does not work that way, and because Player A in Scenario 2 chose to reveal it before Player B moved into range to use Seeking Dispel, that is not allowed."

Jon is correct that "if the creature that has Decoy on it starts its move action, Player B can't use Seeking Dispel until the creature action is completed."  Player B does however have an opportunity to use his quickcast action immediately BEFORE or after he activates a friendly creature, so he could Dispel something like Chains of Agony before the creature moves.

In the case of Sacred Ground (sounds like a Sherlock Holmes novel), again, it does not matter that Player B was out of range before Player A revealed it, provided that Player A reveals Sacred Ground immediately after casting it. there is no intervening step for Player B to respond. If, on the other hand, Player A chose not to immediately reveal Sacred Ground, then Player B could use a quick action to cast Seeking Dispel.

I hope I am being fair to both sides of the discussion and that I accurately represented what you are each trying to say and that the corrections that I offered don't come across as antagonistic in some way.

hope this helps.

p.s., you can only have One copy of Mage Wand equipped at a time.