Mistbind Clique question

[Lord Seth]

I remember that a trick people would do with Fiend Hunter is to cast it, put its ETB ability on the stack, then hit it with Restoration Angel (or somehow remove it), triggering its leaves play trigger. The result is that the leaves play trigger happens first, does nothing, and then the creature is permanently exiled.

My question is, can you do that to an opponent's Mistbind Clique? That is, they cast it, champion a faerie, and then while that's on the stack, you kill the Mistbind Clique, making its "leaves play" trigger occur first. Would the same thing happen, meaning that the exiled Faerie is now gone forever?

[Holly]

No.
Champion a xxx doesn't target. Which card gets exiled is chosen on resolution of the trigger.

That means if you kill the other faerie with the "champion-trigger" on the stack, your opponent can chose a third faerie to champion. If he doesn't have a third one Mistbind Clique dies.

[JPoJohnson]

The only trick of sorts that I can think of with Mistbind Clique is to kill off their critter that they would have championed and then it no longer gets its ETB effect.

[Lord Seth]

No.
Champion a xxx doesn't target. Which card gets exiled is chosen on resolution of the trigger.

That means if you kill the other faerie with the "champion-trigger" on the stack, your opponent can chose a third faerie to champion. If he doesn't have a third one Mistbind Clique dies.
I think you're missing what I asked. I wasn't asking about killing the other faerie. I was talking about killing the Mistbind Clique. Specifically, this was the situation I suggested:
1) Opponent casts Mistbind Clique. Comes-into-play ability goes on the stack.
2) I kill Mistbind Clique while it's on the stack. Its leaves play ability goes on the stack.
3) Leaves play ability resolves and does nothing because the Faerie hasn't been exiled yet.
4) Enters the battlefield resolves, other Faerie gets exiled and never returns due to the leaves-play trigger never triggering (as it's already gone from play when this is resolved).

My question was whether that worked. Now, you did bring up something relevant in that it doesn't target, so even if it does work, by the time they choose which Faerie to champion, they can choose to just not champion anything anyway because it wouldn't benefit them, shutting the whole thing off. But I am still curious, if my opponent for whatever reason tried to do that anyway (after all, it does let them tap my lands), if the other Faerie is permanently exiled.

[Technics]

They have the option to champion another creature (which would stay exiled) or they can choose to sacrifice the Clique (which is no longer there), and have nothing happen.


502.72a Champion represents two triggered abilities. "Champion an [object]" means "When this permanent comes into play, sacrifice it unless you remove another [object] you control from the game" and "When this permanent leaves play, return the removed card to play under its owner's control."

[TsumiBand]

I remember that a trick people would do with Fiend Hunter is to cast it, put its ETB ability on the stack, then hit it with Restoration Angel (or somehow remove it), triggering its leaves play trigger. The result is that the leaves play trigger happens first, does nothing, and then the creature is permanently exiled.

My question is, can you do that to an opponent's Mistbind Clique? That is, they cast it, champion a faerie, and then while that's on the stack, you kill the Mistbind Clique, making its "leaves play" trigger occur first. Would the same thing happen, meaning that the exiled Faerie is now gone forever?

Champion a [thing] is optional - they either exile a [thing] or sacrifice the creature with 'champion a [thing]'. If they choose to exile their Chameleon Colossus after you've cast Hero's Demise on their Mistbind Clique with the ability on the stack, they would not get it back, but that would be A Bad Play.