T.11 - State-Based Effects


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T.11.1- State-based effects are a special set of rules that are applied whenever a player is going to receive priority, prior to placing triggered abilities on the stack. [CompRules 1999/04/23]

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T.11.2- All state-based effects are checked at once and applied at once in a single event, then the check is repeated until nothing happens. [CompRules 1999/04/23] Neither player receives priority until the state-based effects are done resolving. [D'Angelo 1999/05/01]

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T.11.3- A check for state-based effects is also made during the Cleanup Step (see Rule P.13), and if any effect is applied the active player receives priority to play spells and abilities afterwards. [CompRules 1999/04/23]

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T.11.4- State-based effects are not controlled by either player. [CompRules 1999/04/23]

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T.11.5- The state-based effects are: [CompRules 1999/11/01] a) A player with zero or less life loses the game. b) A creature with toughness of zero or less is put into its owner's graveyard and it cannot regenerate. c) A creature with lethal damage (see Rule K.10.4) (which does not also have zero or less toughness) is destroyed. Regeneration can replace this event. [bethmo 1999/07/27] d) A local enchantment that enchants an illegal or non-existent permanent is put into its owner's graveyard. e) Duplicate legends are put into their owner's graveyard. See Rule K.17. f) A token in a zone other than "in play" ceases to exist. g) A player who was unable to draw a card due to their library being empty loses the game. h) If more than one Enchant World is in play, all or all-but-one are put into their owner's graveyard. See Rule K.12.10. i) A player with 10 or more poison counters loses the game. See Rule E.10.2. j) A copy of a spell anyplace other than the stack ceases to exist.

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T.11.6- Unlike triggered abilities, state-based effects do not pay attention during the resolution of a spell or ability. They only check when a player is about to receive priority. This makes them very different. [CompRules 1999/04/23] For example, a creature is in play with the ability "this creature has power and toughness each equal to the number of cards in your hand". Its controller plays a spell which says "Discard your hand, then draw seven cards." The creature will temporarily have a toughness of zero in the middle of the resolution, but it will be back to toughness 7 when the spell finishes resolving. So the state-based effect will see it at 7 toughness, while a triggered ability would have seen it temporarily be at zero toughness.

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Note- Don't confuse state-based effects with triggered abilities (see Rule A.4.14 and Rule A.4.15) that trigger on some game state. [CompRules 1999/04/23]

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