Orochi Hatchery and X

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.rules (More info?)

orochi casting cost is xx. does that mean:
A)you can't spend less than 2 mana to cast this spell. or
B)you devide the amount of mana you paid for it by two. i.e if you paid 4
it would recieve 2 counters on it. or
C)Something completely different

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.rules (More info?)

"Zhambah" <zhambah@hotmail.com> writes:
> orochi casting cost is xx. does that mean:
> A)you can't spend less than 2 mana to cast this spell. or
> B)you devide the amount of mana you paid for it by two. i.e if you paid 4
> it would recieve 2 counters on it. or
> C)Something completely different

Option B is close, but you have the causality in the wrong order.

When playing a spell with X in the cost, you first choose the value
for X. Unless explicitly stated, 0 is a valid choice. You then have to
pay the cost for the spell. In this case, the cost is X twice. So, if
you chose X=2, you would need to pay X+X, which is 4.

--
Peter C.
"The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."
-- Douglas Adams

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.rules (More info?)

Zhambah <zhambah@hotmail.com> wrote:
>orochi casting cost is xx. does that mean:

>A)you can't spend less than 2 mana to cast this spell. or

No.

>B)you devide the amount of mana you paid for it by two. i.e if you paid 4
>it would recieve 2 counters on it. or

Almost.

>C)Something completely different

It means that, as for any spell with an X in the mana cost, you first decide
what the size of X will be, then figure out the mana cost, then pay that much.
Here the mana cost is XX - so if you say "X will be 2", you'll pay 2 + 2 = 4.

It's not a case of "pay for it, then figure out what X is based on what you
paid" - you can't pay an odd number of mana, for the most basic example. You
decide the size of X, which can be any number including 0, then pay twice that
much, and it later comes into play with X counters on it. See section 409.1*
for full details on announcing a spell or ability.

(Notice that the activated ability does NOT say "Put X 1/1 green Snake..."
- because once it's IN play, the X in the mana cost is seen as zero, regardless
of what you paid for it, so any other Xs on the card would also be 0 there. But
while it's on the stack it sees the full value of X.)

Dave
--
\/David DeLaney posting from dbd@vic.com "It's not the pot that grows the flower
It's not the clock that slows the hour The definition's plain for anyone to see
Love is all it takes to make a family" - R&P. VISUALIZE HAPPYNET VRbeable<BLINK>
http://www.vic.com/~dbd/ - net.legends FAQ & Magic / I WUV you in all CAPS! --K.

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.rules (More info?)

Zhambah wrote:

> orochi casting cost is xx. does that mean:
> A)you can't spend less than 2 mana to cast this spell.

No, because you can set X to be 0, in which it case it costs 0
to cast. Granted, it won't do much that way. Maybe you could
feed it to an Atog...

> or
> B)you devide the amount of mana you paid for it by two. i.e if you paid 4
> it would recieve 2 counters on it. or

Yep, that pretty much it. You declare what X is, and then you must pay
twice what X is.

> C)Something completely different

--
Christopher Mattern

"Which one you figure tracked us?"
"The ugly one, sir."
"...Could you be more specific?"

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.rules (More info?)

David DeLaney wrote:

> Zhambah <zhambah@hotmail.com> wrote:
>>orochi casting cost is xx. does that mean:
>
>>A)you can't spend less than 2 mana to cast this spell. or
>
> No.
>
>>B)you devide the amount of mana you paid for it by two. i.e if you paid 4
>>it would recieve 2 counters on it. or
>
> Almost.
>
>>C)Something completely different
>
> It means that, as for any spell with an X in the mana cost, you first
> decide what the size of X will be, then figure out the mana cost, then pay
> that much. Here the mana cost is XX - so if you say "X will be 2", you'll
> pay 2 + 2 = 4.
>
> It's not a case of "pay for it, then figure out what X is based on what
> you paid" - you can't pay an odd number of mana, for the most basic
> example. You decide the size of X, which can be any number including 0,
> then pay twice that much, and it later comes into play with X counters on
> it. See section 409.1* for full details on announcing a spell or ability.
>
> (Notice that the activated ability does NOT say "Put X 1/1 green Snake..."
> - because once it's IN play, the X in the mana cost is seen as zero,
> regardless of what you paid for it, so any other Xs on the card would also
> be 0 there. But while it's on the stack it sees the full value of X.)
>
This means that casting with X equal to zero could prove to be useful,
since there are any number of ways to get charge counters onto an
artifact, of course...

--
Christopher Mattern

"Which one you figure tracked us?"
"The ugly one, sir."
"...Could you be more specific?"

 

[Guest]

Archived from groups: rec.games.trading-cards.magic.rules (More info?)

Zhambah <zhambah@hotmail.com> wrote:

> orochi casting cost is xx. does that mean:
> A)you can't spend less than 2 mana to cast this spell. or
> B)you devide the amount of mana you paid for it by two. i.e if you paid 4
> it would recieve 2 counters on it. or
> C)Something completely different

Orochi Hatchery
XX
Artifact
Orochi Hatchery comes into play with X charge counters on it.
5, T: Put a 1/1 green Snake creature token into play for each charge
counter on Orochi Hatchery.

a) You can indeed spend less than two mana to cast it. This is
accomplished by choosing X equal to zero, or by having a cost-reducing
effect somewhere. (In the former case, the Hatchery will fail to do
anything useful, but still.)
b) You choose a value for the "X". The two X's each become that amount,
and since they're both part of the cost you have to pay for each. In the
end, it means that you choose a value for X and pay twice that many to
play the spell (you may choose X = 1 and pay 2, X = 2 and pay 4, X = one
million and pay two millions and so on).

- ∞