Dream Halls and Flashback

[Maveric78f]

Is it possible to flaskback a card by paying Dream Halls's alternate cost (discard a card sharing a colour) ?
Same question for madness.
Same question for Future Sight.
etc...

[parallax]

No to Flashback and madness, because you are not paying those spells mana costs. Instead, you are paying their flashback and madness costs. Yes to Future Sight and Yawgmoth's Will, because you are paying their mana cost. Any additional costs (such as kicker) must be payed normally (but can be payed).

[rufus]

No to Flashback and madness, because you are not paying those spells mana costs. Instead, you are paying their flashback and madness costs. Yes to Future Sight and Yawgmoth's Will, because you are paying their mana cost. Any additional costs (such as kicker) must be payed normally (but can be payed).

Similarly, yes to Retrace, Haakon, Three Wishes and Colfenor's plans. You can also Dream Hall Ancestral Visions and other cards without mana cost.

[heroicraptor]

yes to Retrace

Note that you still have to discard the land.

[Shanghi Knights]

curious with what follows as dream halls oracle text, it doesn't address x in casting costs being zero. even if it is 0, could dream halls cause a strange interaction with bonds of agony?

oracle for dream halls

Oracle text: Rather than pay the mana cost for a spell, its controller may discard a card that shares a color with that spell.

(yes the printing says zero but you have to follow the oracle so...)

Bony of agony oracle
one black and x

Oracle text: As an additional cost to cast Bond of Agony, pay X life.
Each other player loses X life.

i am wondering with dream halls oracle can you circumvent the x in bond of agonys casting cost and jump strait to the "0additional life cost" to play it and chose the amount of life for the "additional life cost's" x.

I'm wondering if the reaction would he similar to the previous cascade interaction of chosing x. I am fairly sure what i'm describing doesn't work but just to be certain i am asking.

[heroicraptor]

It's the exact same resulting interaction that Cascade has with it. Because you're paying an alternate cost that doesn't include X, you must choose X = 0. Then when you go to pay additional costs, because X = 0, you must pay 0 life.

[Malchar]

The answer to the previous post was addressed in an update to the comprehensive rules. To paraphrase, if you're playing something with X in the mana cost, the value is set by the amount paid for X in the mana cost. If you don't pay mana then X is zero even if there's an additional cost that also requires you to pay X of something else.

[Shanghi Knights]

i didn't realize they altered the rules of x it self to address "additional casting costs."

kinda of a bummer though

thanks

[cdr]

Read as writtent the current rules are still ambiguous about bonds or skeletal scrying. Of course that's academic since there are better things to do with Dream Halls and there aren't any judges that will rule it the silly way.

No. The rules are not currently ambiguous at all.


107.3b. If a player is casting a spell that has an {X} in its mana cost, the value of X isn't defined by the text of that spell, and an effect lets that player cast that spell while paying neither its mana cost nor an alternative cost that includes X, then the only legal choice for X is 0. This doesn't apply to effects that only reduce a cost, even if they reduce it to zero. See rule 601, "Casting Spells."

[parallax]

Could you explain what "the value of X isn't defined by the text of that spell" means? I always thought the rule was just "If there's an X in the cost, then X=0."

[cdr]

As far as I know, there is only one card where X is defined by the text of the spell:


Spoils of War XB
Sorcery
X is the number of artifact and/or creature cards in an opponent's graveyard as you cast Spoils of War.
Distribute X +1/+1 counters among any number of target creatures.

Former rule, for reference:


If you're playing a spell that has {X} in its mana cost, the value of X isn't defined by the text of that spell, and an effect lets you play that spell without paying any cost that includes X, then the only legal choice for X is 0.

The "any cost that includes X" part was what was ambiguous with cards like Bond of Agony.

[Malchar]

Could you explain what "the value of X isn't defined by the text of that spell" means? I always thought the rule was just "If there's an X in the cost, then X=0."



As an additional cost to cast Bond of Agony, pay X life.
Each other player loses X life.

If you play something like Fireball without paying its mana cost, then X is zero. However, people thought that if you played something like Bond of Agony without paying the mana cost, you could still give X a nonzero value because X was also being paid out in another way. It was something like paying 19 life to define X=19, then you get to ignore the mana cost because of Dream Halls or whatever. However, it is now clear that if you play something like Bond of Agony, X is automatically set at zero as soon as you don't pay the mana cost.

[Shanghi Knights]

what exactly is dream halls doing? i asked some one if it could be stifled they said no, so i assume its not a trigger ability based on that response but I just want to have a post some where, so i can reference if need be on the matter. (my wild guess is its a replacement effect to casting costs?)(thats probably not the right wording for what its ability is.)

[Anusien]

Dream Halls has a static ability that lets you play an alternate cost for your spells.