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I attack with a large purple hero and my opponent blocks and plays Great Image followed by Isaac Decieved. I have initiative to negate Isaac Decieved so I play Reach then Authority of Christ.

Question #1: Do I lose all of my heroes?

What If my opponent played GI, Dream, and then Isaac Deceived and I decline to negate it.

Question #2: Do I lose my heroes?

I am inclined to say that that in the First scenario I do not lose my heroes because GI's ongoing condition (Like Assyrian Archer being interrupted by tkh) was interrupted by Reach and could never reactivate because there is no evil character in battle.

I am not sure about the second scenario. It seems like GI is indeed interrupted by the same logic, however, I am not sure if there is a enough "time" between the "after battle"/"end of battle" period and the characters returning to territory for Great Image to reactive. The difference here is that there is a character left to potentially reactivate on whereas, in the first scenario the evil character is discarded.

So the real discussion questions are does ITB followed by "battle winner" always stop Great image  from taking affect? If that is not absolutely incorrect/correct then my question is: Why does it matter who plays the battle winner?

I thought Great Image was an instant trigger that sets a delayed effect, not an ongoing ability? If it was the last enhancement played I'd agree that Reach interrupts it, but otherwise I had thought it activates, sets an appointment for later, and then is done.

Quote from: browarod on January 28, 2014, 11:45:03 AM

I thought Great Image was an instant trigger that sets a delayed effect, not an ongoing ability? If it was the last enhancement played I'd agree that Reach interrupts it, but otherwise I had thought it activates, sets an appointment for later, and then is done.

Delayed triggered abilities like GI aren't exactly the same as ongoing abilities like Protect, Immune, etc.  But it has always been ruled (as far as I can remember) that the trigger waiting to activate is "ongoing" and can be targeted exactly the same as any other ongoing ability.

Agreed, it is ongoing in the same way that Assyrian Archer is ongoing with the self-discard.  If it has not completed, then it is still ongoing.

However, how does the Momentum Change/Twice Afflicted ruling fit into this?  TA was worded so that it wouldn't work with MC.  But if you play MC first, it sets the trigger, and then is an ongoing ability as the trigger waits to activate.  TA is played next; can it really stop the trigger from activating via its Prevent ability? 

You can play Momentum Change first, and it would not be prevented by Twice Afflicted.  TA was not on the table to prevent it, so it being played afterwards does nothing to the ability (or the ongoing component), since it already activated.  You just can't use TA to pull MC out of discard and return cards to your hand, but doing MC first works just fine.

I agree with Redoubter that it is possible to play Momentum Change first and then TA, and then TA wouldn't prevent the return. But I also agree with the Hobbit that it is not that useful, since you have to play the enhancement you search for, so searching for MC forces you to play it when it is prevented. To answer the Hobbit's hypothetical, MCs ability activates after TAs ability is complete and the prevent is active.

So, just to clarify and confirm, all triggers always and forever, regardless of what they're paired with, are always ongoing?

An ability is ongoing if it is not something that completes when the card is played, but has an ongoing component.

Instant Abilities
Instant abilities are special abilities that complete when the card is played, and do not have ongoing
effects.

Ongoing Abilities
Ongoing abilities are abilities that have an ongoing effect on the game or specific cards and are
not completed until the phase in which they are used has ended. They are distinguished from
Instant Abilities, which have an instant effect on the game or specific cards, and then complete
when that effect takes place.

"We" could have just changed that right when the whole Assyrian Archer tkh thing exploded and clumped delayed effects into instant abilities. But no its okay for people to abuse cards, but not that great so lets change the wording on all of the horses from here on out to "balance" that out... lame.