Ban Ki-moon wrote:
I got some
Strionic Resonator questions by PM, and I thought I'd post the answers here. He can't be the only one wondering:
Quote:
Hey, have a few questions about interactions:
Utvara Hellkite:
Whenever a Dragon you control attacks, put a 6/6 red Dragon creature token with flying onto the battlefield.
Will this copy the trigger of one dragon attack (that I choose) or all of them?
Iona, Shield of EmeriaAs Iona, Shield of Emeria enters the battlefield, choose a color.
Is this an enters the battlefield trigger, and if so, can I choose a second color? >_>
I'm guessing this works plainly with
Sylvan Primordial (an extra permanent is destroyed from each player)?
Thanks so much for your response...

Utvara Hellkite triggers whenever a dragon you control, meaning you'll get separate triggers for each one.
Strionic Resonator still works, but you'll get just one extra 6/6.
Iona's ability isn't a triggered ability, and can't be copied. All triggered abilities begin with the word "when", "whenever" or "at". Abilities that start with "as" happen during that event and don't use the stack. Note the similar templating on
Vesuvan Shapeshifter; if this were a triggered ability, it would enter the battlefield as a 0/0 and die while it was waiting for its trigger to resolve.
If, hypothetically, Iona did have a triggered ability, then yeah, you'd be able to name a second color. Here might be a good place for a tangent about imprint and similar abilities: A lot of triggered abilities attach info to a card (usually by exiling another one) that's used in a second, linked ability (examples:
Duplicant,
Oblivion Ring,
Isochron Scepter,
Elite Arcanist,
Exclusion Ritual). When the linked ability refers to "the exiled card" it's referring to
all the cards that its triggered ability exiled, including copies of that ability. So Exclusion Ritual would exclude two different spells, all the permanents exiled by Oblivion Ring would return to the battlefield when it goes away, and activating Isochron Scepter or Elite Arcanist once would let you cast a copy of
each spell they're holding onto. If the card looks for a value, such as Duplicant or Elite Arcanist, it gets more than one answer and uses the sum. So Elite Arcanist would cost a bunch to activate, but
Duplicant will be gigantic.As you'd expect, Sylvan Primordial's triggered ability is one big chunk, it's not a separate ability for each opponent. Copying it will blow up another permanent for each opponent, not just one.
I assume you're saying "
Duplicant will be gigantic" since he would seemingly use the total P/T of the 2 exiled creature cards. However, this doesn't and can't happen. A creature cannot have multiple sets powers and toughness at the same time. Per Matt Tabak's
M14 Rules Update Bulletin:
"
Duplicant (functional, sort of)
As you'll read in the Comprehensive Rules section (you will read that part too, right?), our favorite friend
Strionic Resonator can do some wacky things with cards that have imprint abilities. Cards that were meant to only have one exiled card can now have two or more. In most cases, that's fine, a rules tweak lets those cards take advantage of that, but
Duplicant is a bit different. It's the one card of the bunch that doesn't react well to exiling multiple creature cards. It simply can't have multiple powers and toughnesses. Back before linked abilities were codified, this was solved by having
Duplicant get the power, toughness, and creature types of the last creature card it exiled. We're using that solution again, updated with modern terminology.
Old wording:
Imprint—When Duplicant enters the battlefield, you may exile target nontoken creature.
As long as the exiled card is a creature card, Duplicant has that card's power, toughness, and creature types. It's still a Shapeshifter.
New wording:
Imprint—When Duplicant enters the battlefield, you may exile target nontoken creature.
As long as a card exiled with Duplicant is a creature card, Duplicant has the power, toughness, and creature types of the last creature card exiled with Duplicant. It's still a Shapeshifter."
So the copying of Duplicant's trigger will simply change P/T & creature types from one set to another as the triggers resolve, but will still end up exiling two creatures in the process; which is still good enough for me to abuse with the Resonator.
