Golden Rule cards

[Illissius]

This is a kind of thought experiment / research expedition. Most cards draw support for their abilities from various parts of the CompRules: activated abilities, triggered abilities, replacement effects, combat, steps and phases, copy effects, color and text changing effects, flip cards, split cards, mana and costs, etc. etc. are all explicitly described and regulated. The vast majority of cards are built from this toolbox. But there are a minority which aren't, cards which rely only on the Golden Rule that any time a card contradicts the CompRules, the card wins. Cards which, basically, make up their own rules on the spot, or change and bend the existing ones in novel and fundamental ways. I'd like to gather as many examples of these cards as possible.

Here are some that spring to mind:

Upwelling
Omnath, Locus of Mana
Mirror Gallery
Skullbriar, the Walking Grave
Sigarda, Host of Herons
Celestial Dawn
Masako the Humorless

I only read the CompRules about halfway through so I might be wrong about some of them. What others can you think of?

[nedleeds]

Trinisphere. I wasted 45 minutes explaining how Trinisphere worked to players at the SCG this weekend over the course of the tourney.

[Esper3k]

Trinisphere. I wasted 45 minutes explaining how Trinisphere worked to players at the SCG this weekend over the course of the tourney.

Trinisphere + Lodestone Golem = 4 mana cost, right?

[sdematt]

What's there to explain? Your stuff costs three if under 3, and if over 3, other tax effects take place. Trinisphere applies last always, after tax effects. Boom. Done. Your opponents must have been real mouth-breathers.

-Matt

[Octopusman]

Trinisphere + Lodestone Golem = 4 mana cost, right?

I know the smiley gives it away but in case anyone is legitimately confused by your post. If the CC is < 3 then it's 3 with trini and lodestone.


Thank you SO much for making this thread. I absolutely love these cards as well.
Some of this stuff is hard to define, though. What exactly is breaking the rules?


Blood Moon
Magus of the Moon
Eon Hub
Possessed Portal
Fatespinner


Edit:

Pale Moon
An-Zerrin Ruins
Halls of Mist
Meekstone
Marble Titan
Time Stop
Meddling Mage
Nevermore
Silence
Orim's Chant
Abeyance
Festival
Word of Command
Cornered Market
Embargo
Winter Orb
Rising Waters
Anvil of Bogardan
Havoc Festival
Sulfuric Vortex
Stigma Lasher
False Cure
Tajuru Preserver
Spellbook
Library of Leng
Gnat Miser
Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur
Locust Miser
Thought Devourer
Thought Eater
Thought Nibbler


omg

Peacekeeper
Blazing Archon
Moat
Arboria
Duh...

Went back through and deleted stuff that was triggered or activated in compliance with OP.


I'm sure I'll come up with some more.

[Illissius]

Thanks for the replies! I'm not entirely sure about Trinisphere -- cost increases and decreases are covered by the Rules -- but that's definitely a solid candidate, and a unique and strange card at least.

I don't think most of the others from the long list qualify. That's not intended as discouragement, because I'm having a hard time defining even for myself what my criteria are, not to mention communicating it to other people. But I'll add a brief note for each card explaining why I think that is or isn't the kind of thing I'm looking for, in case that helps give a better idea.

Blood Moon
Magus of the Moon
This is not all that different from "all Elves are blue" or "all creatures are Slivers" or Mirrorweave or whatever. There's a big section of the rules regarding how ability granting and removing effects, characteristic defining abilities, copy effects, and so on and so forth apply in different layers, so you can figure out what happens if you have more than one of them in play. And yes, even Humility is covered by that. Whether something is hard for humans to think about and whether the CompRules addresses that thing are independent questions.

Here's an article explaining the layer system. Anything covered by that is not Golden Rule.

Eon Hub
Fatespinner
I think there's enough cards which add and remove phases (though usually they're combat and main phases) that this can't really be considered uniquely rule-bending. But Paradox Haze as well, in that case.

Possessed Portal
Replacement effect + triggered ability

Pale Moon
There's also quite a few cards that change what type and amount of mana various lands produce, so this is not exceedingly unique. (FWIW, "white mana can be spent as mana of any color" was the part of Celestial Dawn that I found interesting.)

An-Zerrin Ruins
Meekstone
Marble Titan
Cornered Market
Embargo
Winter Orb
Rising Waters
"Doesn't untap" effects are dime a dozen, but the no-more-than-one cards are at least an interesting twist.

Time Stop
A solid entry, albeit the CompRules did grow a section to define what it means to end a turn.

Meddling Mage
Nevermore
Silence
Orim's Chant
Abeyance
Cards defining when players can and (usually) can't do various things are also so common that I don't think they're exceptional. Although there might be instances I'm not thinking of right now where the thing they're regulating is strange and noteworthy.

Word of Command
Definitely a winner!

Havoc Festival
Stigma Lasher
"Can't gain life" is borderline. Obviously contradicts the rules, but that in itself is not so remarkable, and there's a few cards which do this kind of thing. But "until the end of the game" probably qualifies.

Sulfuric Vortex
False Cure
These are just replacement and triggered abilities.

Tajuru Preserver
Ah, a simplified version of Sigarda. I'm not sure why I regard some instances of "can't do X" as more noteworthy than others. "Can't sacrifice permanents" seems more novel than "can't gain life" or "can't block", but I can't articulate why -- maybe it's just that fewer cards do it.

Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur
Anvil of Bogardan
Spellbook
Library of Leng
Gnat Miser
Locust Miser
Thought Devourer
Thought Eater
Thought Nibbler
For the most part, if you can find 5-10 examples of cards with the same kind of effect, it's probably not what I'm looking for.

Halls of Mist
Festival
Peacekeeper
Blazing Archon
Moat
Arboria
Ditto. There's a big section in the CompRules on combat and I think this kind of thing is covered there, but even if it's not, "can't attack" and "can't block" effects are pervasive.



Let me mention a little bit about what my motivation is, in case that helps shed some light on what cards I'm looking for. I was doing a thought experiment to figure out what it would take to implement the Magic rules in software, basically what MTGO does. And the conclusion I arrived at is that it would be a big, laborious, and in parts tricky project, but that there wouldn't be any real, fundamental obstacles to doing it... except for the Golden Rule. You would have to come up with some immensely advanced magic to be able to implement the Golden Rule itself as a piece of code. The only way I can see of supporting the cards which rely on it would be to explicitly extend the core engine with the kind of effects the cards have, even if it's just for one card.

And that's basically the "precise" definition of what I'm looking for. Cards which, if you were trying to implement Magic in software, you would have to implement new capabilities for in the engine just to be able to support that card. Which doesn't help very much for people who don't know about software, but as a rule of thumb, if a card does something that very few other cards do (and it's not something covered by the layering or targetting or etc. rules), it's probably a strong candidate.

And yes, asking for cards which only draw support for their abilities from the Golden Rule, and not from other sections of the CompRules, and asking for cards with effects that are novel and unique, is asking two different questions, and I didn't make that very clear. I think I want cards which qualify for both. Added, I'm also not enough of a rules guru to be able to reliably decide the first question for every card. :)

Here's another card I thought of in the mean time:
Platinum Emperion

[John Cox]

Platinum angel
laboratory maniac
phage the untouchable
glacial chasm?

[Julian23]

Exploration, loving it.

[Octopusman]

Shahrazad

^_^

[Octopusman]

Thanks for the replies! I'm not entirely sure about Trinisphere -- cost increases and decreases are covered by the Rules -- but that's definitely a solid candidate, and a unique and strange card at least.

I don't think most of the others from the long list qualify. That's not intended as discouragement, because I'm having a hard time defining even for myself what my criteria are, not to mention communicating it to other people. But I'll add a brief note for each card explaining why I think that is or isn't the kind of thing I'm looking for, in case that helps give a better idea.

Blood Moon
Magus of the Moon
This is not all that different from "all Elves are blue" or "all creatures are Slivers" or Mirrorweave or whatever. There's a big section of the rules regarding how ability granting and removing effects, characteristic defining abilities, copy effects, and so on and so forth apply in different layers, so you can figure out what happens if you have more than one of them in play. And yes, even Humility is covered by that. Whether something is hard for humans to think about and whether the CompRules addresses that thing are independent questions.

Here's an article explaining the layer system. Anything covered by that is not Golden Rule.

Eon Hub
Fatespinner
I think there's enough cards which add and remove phases (though usually they're combat and main phases) that this can't really be considered uniquely rule-bending. But Paradox Haze as well, in that case.

Possessed Portal
Replacement effect + triggered ability

Pale Moon
There's also quite a few cards that change what type and amount of mana various lands produce, so this is not exceedingly unique. (FWIW, "white mana can be spent as mana of any color" was the part of Celestial Dawn that I found interesting.)

An-Zerrin Ruins
Meekstone
Marble Titan
Cornered Market
Embargo
Winter Orb
Rising Waters
"Doesn't untap" effects are dime a dozen, but the no-more-than-one cards are at least an interesting twist.

Time Stop
A solid entry, albeit the CompRules did grow a section to define what it means to end a turn.

Meddling Mage
Nevermore
Silence
Orim's Chant
Abeyance
Cards defining when players can and (usually) can't do various things are also so common that I don't think they're exceptional. Although there might be instances I'm not thinking of right now where the thing they're regulating is strange and noteworthy.

Word of Command
Definitely a winner!

Havoc Festival
Stigma Lasher
"Can't gain life" is borderline. Obviously contradicts the rules, but that in itself is not so remarkable, and there's a few cards which do this kind of thing. But "until the end of the game" probably qualifies.

Sulfuric Vortex
False Cure
These are just replacement and triggered abilities.

Tajuru Preserver
Ah, a simplified version of Sigarda. I'm not sure why I regard some instances of "can't do X" as more noteworthy than others. "Can't sacrifice permanents" seems more novel than "can't gain life" or "can't block", but I can't articulate why -- maybe it's just that fewer cards do it.

Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur
Anvil of Bogardan
Spellbook
Library of Leng
Gnat Miser
Locust Miser
Thought Devourer
Thought Eater
Thought Nibbler
For the most part, if you can find 5-10 examples of cards with the same kind of effect, it's probably not what I'm looking for.

Halls of Mist
Festival
Peacekeeper
Blazing Archon
Moat
Arboria
Ditto. There's a big section in the CompRules on combat and I think this kind of thing is covered there, but even if it's not, "can't attack" and "can't block" effects are pervasive.



Let me mention a little bit about what my motivation is, in case that helps shed some light on what cards I'm looking for. I was doing a thought experiment to figure out what it would take to implement the Magic rules in software, basically what MTGO does. And the conclusion I arrived at is that it would be a big, laborious, and in parts tricky project, but that there wouldn't be any real, fundamental obstacles to doing it... except for the Golden Rule. You would have to come up with some immensely advanced magic to be able to implement the Golden Rule itself as a piece of code. The only way I can see of supporting the cards which rely on it would be to explicitly extend the core engine with the kind of effects the cards have, even if it's just for one card.

And that's basically the "precise" definition of what I'm looking for. Cards which, if you were trying to implement Magic in software, you would have to implement new capabilities for in the engine just to be able to support that card. Which doesn't help very much for people who don't know about software, but as a rule of thumb, if a card does something that very few other cards do (and it's not something covered by the layering or targetting or etc. rules), it's probably a strong candidate.

And yes, asking for cards which only draw support for their abilities from the Golden Rule, and not from other sections of the CompRules, and asking for cards with effects that are novel and unique, is asking two different questions, and I didn't make that very clear. I think I want cards which qualify for both. Added, I'm also not enough of a rules guru to be able to reliably decide the first question for every card. :)

Here's another card I thought of in the mean time:
Platinum Emperion

No offense! Love this thread anyway.

[Hanni]

I know the smiley gives it away but in case anyone is legitimately confused by your post. If the CC is < 3 then it's 3 with trini and lodestone.

Minor nitpick, but you put the 'less than' sign backwards. < 3 would mean that spells that cost more than 3 cost three under a Trinisphere, which is obviously not what you meant. Just thought that I would point that out.

[HammerAndSickled]

Minor nitpick, but you put the 'less than' sign backwards. < 3 would mean that spells that cost more than 3 cost three under a Trinisphere, which is obviously not what you meant. Just thought that I would point that out.

No, pretty sure that's correct. The "mouth" of the symbol opens towards whatever is the larger side of the inequality. He's trying to say that if three is larger than the CMC of a spell, it costs 3 under Sphere.

[Julian23]

While we're already at nitpicking: Trinisphere doesn't give a shit about cc. All it looks at is "how much mana was actually spent while casting?" which is total cost.

[Kich867]

Minor nitpick, but you put the 'less than' sign backwards. < 3 would mean that spells that cost more than 3 cost three under a Trinisphere, which is obviously not what you meant. Just thought that I would point that out.

Actually he's correct in that writing. CC > 3 == "Casting Cost Greater Than 3".

He correctly wrote "CC < 3" == Casting Cost Less Than 3.

If a spell costs less than 3, it costs 3 under trinisphere.

[Snap_Keep]

Mindslaver?

[John Cox]

Do cards from unglued and unhinged count?

[Fry]

Do cards from unglued and unhinged count?

This is exactly what I was just thinking... I particulary enjoy Super Secret Tech, but then I collect foils... Also Cheatyface is just awesome

[Illissius]

Mindslaver?

Unique for sure (there's also Sorin Markov now, and anything else?), but, like Time Stop, this is a case where they came up with a new effect and then expanded the Rules to define what it means.

Exploration, loving it.

Playing lands is well regulated. It says you have to mention which effect allows you to play the land you're playing whenever you play a land and all that.

Shahrazad

^_^

I think there's rules about subgames and restarting games and all that too. :) But definitely unique! And that reminds me of:

Karn Liberated

which is in the same category.

Platinum angel
laboratory maniac
phage the untouchable
glacial chasm?

- Can't remember if there was a rule about this, good idea in either case.
- Replacement ability
- Triggered abilities
- Combat, damage prevention

Do cards from unglued and unhinged count?

The Rules don't apply to those at all, so no.



...it seems this is harder than I thought. To be honest I was expecting people to pick my own choices apart as not qualifying, but apparently there aren't many Level 3 Judges around. I suppose the silver lining is people learning a few useless factoids about the CompRules.

[Koby]

Every card uses the Golden Rule, more or less. Otherwise the game would be a bunch of vanilla creatures.

Example: "one land per turn"
Exploration
Explore
Fastbond

Example: "sorceries during main phase"
Teferi
Vedalken Orrery
Hypersonic Dragon

Example: "you lose at 0 life"
Platinum Angel
Phyrexian Unlife
Angel's Grace

[n00bas4urus_r3x]

What about the Epic cycle?


Enduring Ideal
Endless Swarm
Eternal Dominion
Neverending Torment
Undying Flames

Also Solitary Confinement?