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Thread: How does Dredge work? Ruling please

  1. #1

    How does Dredge work? Ruling please

    Hi all,
    So I've been playing Dredge lately, and I got ruled against by a judge - for doing something I thought was legal.
    Could you all help me out to understand the rule about what I can legally dredge etc., and what I'm not allowed to do?

    Here's the scene;
    My turn 3, I have about 10 cards or so in the graveyard, one dredger (Golgari Grave-Troll), a Dread Return & a Griselbrand.
    I also have an Ichorid & two zombie token's in play at the beginning of my first main phase.

    So here's what happened;
    I pull Dread Return out of the GY by sacrificing my three creatures, and pop Grisel into play.
    My opponent pulls instant removal (Swords to Plowshares) on Grisel, but I pay 7 life in response, and delcare I'm going to draw/dredge seven cards.
    Now, bear in mind I only have one dredger in the yard....
    I pull the Troll from the 'yard, and drop six cards off the library into the yard.
    Then I continue to pull dredger's from the yard I've recently found with the Troll to keep drawing/dredging the full 7 cards from Grisel.
    My opponent crys foul and calls the judge.
    -= JUDGE =- says;
    A> Grisel can't be activated until next turn due to summoning sickness
    B> I can only dredge from the initial 10 cards in the graveyard, not from any cards put in there from activating Grisel in the first place!!

    Huh?

    I thought Grisel was able to be activated instantly in response to removal provided I pay the 7 life immediately.
    And I thought each draw/dredge was essentially a separate action, ie. Draw 1 card, Draw 1 card, draw etc., and definitely NOT Draw/dredge 7 cards all at once.

    So was this judge right here? ...Or did I get screwed?
    Cheers everyone.

  2. #2

    Re: How does Dredge work? Ruling please

    Don't know who this judge was...

    Summoning sickness only applies when creatures are attacking or using abilities with the tap symbol in their ability. You are doing neither of these with Griselbrand, so you can activate it.

    For dredge, let's take a look at the rules for it:

    702.49. Dredge
    702.49a Dredge is a static ability that functions only while the card with dredge is in a player’s
    graveyard. “Dredge N” means “As long as you have at least N cards in your library, if you
    would draw a card, you may instead put N cards from the top of your library into your
    graveyard and return this card from your graveyard to your hand.”
    702.49b A player with fewer cards in his or her library than the number required by a dredge ability
    can’t put any of them into his or her graveyard this way.
    Also, the rule for drawing multiple cards:

    119.2. Cards may only be drawn one at a time. If a player is instructed to draw multiple cards, that
    player performs that many individual card draws.
    So, for the first of 7 draws, you choose to replace it with dredge. More cards are put in your graveyard, which happens to include more dredgers. Then you do to resolve the second card draw. There are more dredgers in your graveyard now, so you can go ahead and dredge again. This is a common tactic used for cards like Breakthrough with multiple draws in dredge.

  3. #3
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    Re: How does Dredge work? Ruling please

    Quote Originally Posted by slave View Post
    -= JUDGE =- says;
    A> Grisel can't be activated until next turn due to summoning sickness
    B> I can only dredge from the initial 10 cards in the graveyard, not from any cards put in there from activating Grisel in the first place!!
    Both of these calls are incorrect for the reasons stated above by Ryoku. If this was a sanctioned event, contact the DCI-Judge regional coordinator about having the judge in question re-certified.
    West side
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  4. #4

    Re: How does Dredge work? Ruling please

    Cheers guys,

    This wasn't a sanctioned event, just a card-store legacy night with about 12 players, so nothing serious.
    The top prize was only a small amount of store cred, so I'm not torn up - just curious to see if my interpretation of the rules was wrong.

    I didn't quiz the judge on their cred, I tried to keep it polite and respectful, as he was a volunteer on the night, judging for nothing - so I didn't get up his face or anything.

    I just simply asked for an email address so I could chat to the dude at a later date about rulings, he was pretty cool about that idea so I'll send him a link to this thread.

    Cheers again fella's.

  5. #5
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    Re: How does Dredge work? Ruling please

    702.49. Dredge
    702.49a Dredge is a static ability that functions only while the card with dredge is in a player’s
    graveyard. “Dredge N” means “As long as you have at least N cards in your library, if you
    would draw a card, you may instead put N cards from the top of your library into your
    graveyard and return this card from your graveyard to your hand.”
    702.49b A player with fewer cards in his or her library than the number required by a dredge ability
    can’t put any of them into his or her graveyard this way.

    As stated before, with these rules you can Dredge the first card, and then use any cards NOW in the graveyard to Dredge again. Starting with 1 Dredge card you may be able to chain 7 together if your lucky enough.

    Lets take a look at your exact situation tho. You have 10 cards in your library. Grave-Toll in the yard, and after returning Griselbrand your opponent wants to kill it and you activate Griselbrand.
    1> It does not appear your opponent any priority when he cast that spell, usually doesn't matter but it can (what if you wanted to cast something before activating him?). He enters the Battlefield and it's your priority, your opponent will have a chance to respond the next time you pass priority.
    2> IF you decide to replace a draw with dredge you must have at least the required cards in your library remaining. If you did that with the first draw, and now have 4 cards left, and can only dredge a card of Dredge 4 or less. Also... if you have 4 cards left in your library, and you still need to draw 6 more cards, you are going to deck yourself (not part of the ruling, because that's game advice, just remember you can't replace all 7 draw with 7 dredgers if you don't meet the library requirements)

  6. #6

    Re: How does Dredge work? Ruling please

    Quote Originally Posted by WildCard View Post
    702.49. Dredge
    702.49a Dredge is a static ability that functions only while the card with dredge is in a player’s
    graveyard. “Dredge N” means “As long as you have at least N cards in your library, if you
    would draw a card, you may instead put N cards from the top of your library into your
    graveyard and return this card from your graveyard to your hand.”
    702.49b A player with fewer cards in his or her library than the number required by a dredge ability
    can’t put any of them into his or her graveyard this way.

    As stated before, with these rules you can Dredge the first card, and then use any cards NOW in the graveyard to Dredge again. Starting with 1 Dredge card you may be able to chain 7 together if your lucky enough.

    Lets take a look at your exact situation tho. You have 10 cards in your library. Grave-Toll in the yard, and after returning Griselbrand your opponent wants to kill it and you activate Griselbrand.
    1> It does not appear your opponent any priority when he cast that spell, usually doesn't matter but it can (what if you wanted to cast something before activating him?). He enters the Battlefield and it's your priority, your opponent will have a chance to respond the next time you pass priority.
    2> IF you decide to replace a draw with dredge you must have at least the required cards in your library remaining. If you did that with the first draw, and now have 4 cards left, and can only dredge a card of Dredge 4 or less. Also... if you have 4 cards left in your library, and you still need to draw 6 more cards, you are going to deck yourself (not part of the ruling, because that's game advice, just remember you can't replace all 7 draw with 7 dredgers if you don't meet the library requirements)
    The player had 10 cards in his yard, not his library.

  7. #7

    Re: How does Dredge work? Ruling please

    I can see someone questioning being able to chain-dredge (it's come up from my opponents before) but Griselbrand being summoning sick? Oh man, that's a pretty bad call.

  8. #8
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    Re: How does Dredge work? Ruling please

    Quote Originally Posted by Kich867 View Post
    The player had 10 cards in his yard, not his library.
    now it makes sence, turn 3 with 10 cards left? with 1 dredger in the yard? my bad, it's been a long day, and I hear there will be 14 foot waves, joy...

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