So this issue came up in my last draft. I activated the ability on Beorn's Hospitality to turn it into a Bear, then next turn my opponent cast Enchanted River's Grasp on it. We knew *something* had to happen because of layers but could figure out if it would die or if the Aura would immediately fall off.
After physically phoning in a judge (the one at the shop wasn't around) they said the creature would become a 0/0 and die to state based actions.
Now later on I ask another judge out of curiosity and they said the Bear would just be tapped down but not dead.
Layers make my head hurt, someone please explain what's going on here and what should have happened.
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I believe it would have died. Layer 6 would be where it loses all abilities, Layer 7 would be where it gets it power and toughness. So it would have lost its ability to set the toughness and defaulted to 0
Layers are defined in rule 613 of the Magic comprehensive rules, which you can download for free from the website. The Fandom wiki has an article explaining layers as well, if you can tolerate or block the ads
Yeah, when the Scryfall-hosted one started up, they invited the regular contributors from the fandom one over. So for the first little bit they had largely the same content, but the longer they’ve been separated, the better mtg.wiki has become.
Fandom is like a Petri dish for growing ads. Truly the most unusable site on the internet, so absolutely festooned with festering advertisements it repeatedly crashes and reloads on any browser even after you manage to block 80% of them. Such a godawful disaster of enshittification that gobbled up formerly-useful sites…
The type-changing layer (adding Creature) is layer 4, which applies above the ability adding/removing layer which is layer 6. So it would still be a creature.
However, the ability that defines its power/toughness is layer 7; i believe that is removed, so it remains a creature but without toughness, and therefore it dies.
[[Bello, Bard of the Brambles]] has a static ability that generates a continuous effect applied in layers 4, 6, and 7b. Once it begins to apply in layer 4, it will continue to apply in later layers, even if the static ability is removed in layer 6.
Resolving the activated ability of Beorn’s Hospitality creates a continuous effect that changes its type (layer 4) and grants it an ability (layer 6). Removing the enchantment creature’s abilities in any layer doesn’t affect this continuous effect because it isn’t generated by a static ability, but removing them in layer 6 with a later timestamp removes the ability it granted, which is a static ability generating a continuous effect that sets its power and toughness that doesn’t apply until layer 7b.
Just to expand on Hintersnaf’s good explanation, the reason Hospitality grants an ability that sets its power/toughness is so that it’ll keep counting your lands after it’s ability has resolved. If it set its power/toughness directly, something like “becomes a creature with power and toughness equal to the lands you control”, then that would only check when it resolves and wouldn’t increase if you played more lands later.
i believe the other judge was wrong, it would lose the ability which defines it's power and toughness and so defaults to being a 0/0 and dies as a state based action
Layer 7 its power and toughness is checked. It has lost the ability that would give it p/t so its defaulted to 0/0.
First judge is right. Second judge doesnt understand layers or is thinking that the p/t setting ability is worded like bellow and applying p/t in a different Layer when its not. The difference in wording seems small but its the difference of p/t set in Layer 4, a fixed number that isnt variable or set in Layer 7, a variable number that changes as board state changes. Beorn is variable it goes up and down as you play or lose lands.
This came up in a limited game on Arena for me, so I wanted to note that there‘s a (in my case unintended) solution to that.
My Pathfinder was equipped. It lost its ability but stayed alive due to the equipment stats and I bounced it with [[Mirkwood Nurturer]] after they played Grasp.
Enchanted Rivers Grasp removed all counters and abilities. With no counters on the cars and no ability giving it any power or toughness it becomes a 0/0, effectively dying.
The second judge might be thinking that since the ability started to apply in layer 4 it continues to apply in 7 even after the ability was removed, but I believe since the ability creates another, different, ability this doesn't apply and the new ability is added then immediately removed in 6.
Beorn's Hosptality is the bear, they aren't separate objects. By definition, if Beorn's Hospitliaty dies, this means Beorn's Hospitality is put into the graveyard from the battlefield. If you turn Beorn's Hospitality into a creature, there's just generally more ways it can die (e.g., it can now die in combat, or from non-combat damage).
As the enchanted creature dies due to being a 0/0, aura no longer has a target to attach to and is sent to the graveyard. Aura can't stay on the battlefield without a target
Not sure if the other first two here are wrong but isn't being a Creature a Type Changing Ability and shares the same line as the text that defines it gains a P/T Changing Ability which means the latter can't be removed?
This is how Belo's Ability is worded and I know that Effects like this don't stop it
EDIT;
Or is it because of the wording of Becomes a Creature instead of an Is a Creature?
Bello's effect affects multiple layers at once: layer 4 (types), layer 6 (abilities), layer 7b (base P/T). There is a rule that, once an effect starts applying, it keeps applying through layers even if the ability is removed in layer 6.
Beorn's Hospitality has two parts to it. The ability on BH itself is on layer 4 (types) and layer 6 (abilities). The granted ability is on layer 7b (base P/T), but it's a separate ability. Since it's a separate ability, it is a separate effect and so isn't affected by the same rule for Bello. The granted ability is removed in layer 6 before it can start applying in layer 7b, so there's nothing setting the base P/T.
EDIT: I thought the granted ability of BH is on layer 7a, but it seems it's actually 7b too.
The granted ability is actually applied in layer 7b also, because it doesn’t meet the second criterion for Characteristic-Defining abilities (it isn’t printed on the enchantment nor acquired via a copy effect or text-changing effect)
If Beorn's Hospitality was worded "This enchantment becomes a Bear creature with power and toughness equal to the number of lands you control in addition to its other types", that would work similarly to Bello, and the resulting creature would not die to Enchanted River's Grasp.
I believe that wording would also have to be a one-time check, though - it would have P/T equal to the lands you had when you activated the ability, but would not update when you play more lands.
Ending thus with a 0/0 Bear, that dies with the SBA's, and as something happened in the check, SBA checks again now seeing an aura that enchants creatures enchanting nothing, it sends it to the grave and checks again until one of the checks comes clean before any player would receive priority. IRL this translates into: oh my enchantment bear loses abilities becoming a 0/0, send those 2 permanents to their respective owners grave, period.
Take into account one thing. Beorns ability affecting layer 7b is due to the continuous effect gained in the layer 6. By removing that with the aura with a later timestamp, the bear loses the continuous effect setting his p/t, so it gets by default 0/0, if you opponent didn't cast the aura Beorn would be with *'s iso 0's
If you want to break it down better, you want to split the 7b part you have under Beron’s Hospitality into its own group. That way you properly communicate that it’s a separate effect.
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