daze + wasteland

Sorry for the stupid question but i am a bit rusty with rules nowadays. ;)

Opponent (playing UR) has a tapped volcanic island on the battlefield.
i play a wasteland and then a mox diamond. In response to the mox, opponent wants to daze it and bounce his volcanic to pay the spell.

Bouncing the land is an alternate cost so paid when spell is casted. So do i have a window to answer and use my wasteland on the volcanic before it bounces away ?

Probably no but i want to be sure (cost are costs and part of casting the spell).

Thank you :)

No you don’t have a window as the problem is stated.

You still had priority after playing the wasteland. If you want to waste the volc you should wasteland now, instead of casting the mox diamond. You still can’t respond to daze picking up the island, but the delver player can’t pay the cost without a legal target for the daze, and since you wasted first there is no spell on the stack to target. Once you the lands are in the bin, then play the mox diamond. This requires you deciding beforehand if you want to waste the volc or play a 2 drop into daze, you indeed don’t get to figure out if they have it or not first.

They could still save the volc by creating a spell for themselves to counter (usually brainstorm hold priority daze) but that usually is a good 2 for 1 for you.


Other similar things with costs that come up: you can’t surgical their pitch card in response to a FoW, you can’t remove a visionary that is being picked up with wirewood, you can’t plow a veteran explorer to fizzle a cabal therapy

Thank you for your complete answer. That is what i thought but i wanted to be sure.

The logic behind playing waste , then mox was to be able to play a thoughtseize being daze proof and if no daze then waste his land after (or not, depending what i see with thoughtseize). But you are right that open a window for him to play his daze on the mox while if i waste first the volcanic he just can't daze after when i will play mox and thoughtseize. Sometimes trying to be too much smart is just not smart at all ;)

If you didn’t want to wasteland unless absolutely necessary, then your move is best. Say you have only 1 more land and a key 3 drop like Hiditsugu Consumes All. Just pay for daze with wasteland and then thought-seize once your mox resolves; they have no islands to daze your thoughtseize now even if they have another daze in hand.

My suggested play is generally best if you think it is likely for you to want to wasteland. This is because it gives no options to your opponent.

If you are absolutely sure you don’t want to wasteland, you should have played another land instead unless you expect stifle. Assuming you are playing some sort of slow depths, you could go fetch, mox diamond, thoughtseize. If you see daze wait, if you don’t crop rotation or something.

Just pay for daze:cool: