Welcome to Personal Tutor, where we learn how to maximize our opportunities for education. Our goal is to transcend the basic answer to create an informative answer that the players will really remember and teaches them something about the rules, rather than just resolving this ruling. You may even find this process helps you come to a better understanding of the rules yourself.

Here's this month's scenario:

You're the head judge at a PPTQ, and Arnold calls you over to ask a question out of earshot of his opponent. “If I Act of Treason his Jace, Vryn's Prodigy then I flip it, can I use one of the planeswalker abilities before he gets it back?”

The short answer here is “No.” But we don't think that's the best answer for educating players, which is an important role of a judge! So tell us: how would you answer this question.

As usual, we're going to ask you to provide an actual quote from yourself in this situation, rather than a general description.

L1s and Judge Candidates, feel free to give your answers immediately. L2s, please wait a day to add your input. L3+, please wait two days.

What do you expect to happen, when you flip Jace? If you activate his ability and he would ‘flip’, it means that he will be exiled and returned under its owner's control. (exactly as it is written on the card)

“Remember that these planeswalkers dont just ‘flip’, they are exiled and then return to the battlefield flipped under its OWNER control. You are controlling the creature now, but its owner is the one that bringed it to the tournament.”

No, because you won't actually control the planeswalker version of Jace at any point. Note that Jace's ability says he gets exiled and then returns to the battlefield under his owner's control. Your opponent is the owner of the card.

Whenever a card comes back from exile, it always goes back to the owner, no matter who controlled the card before the exile.

So in this case Jace gets exiled before it is flipped. Which means that the flipped planeswalker Jace will be under the control of the owner, in this case your opponent.

I think this scenario is a bit tricky, as it's very easy to stray into giving strategic advice. My response would be:

“If you activate Jace, and after drawing and discarding you have 5 or more cards in your graveyard, then you will follow the rest of the instructions on the ability. Namely, you will exile Jace and then return him to the battlefield transformed under his owner's control. So, in the situation you described, you won't ever have control of Jace in his Planeswalker form.”

I may also pull up the Oracle text of Jace. Both to read it again, to double-check that my ruling is correct, and to show to the player as I am explaining the process.

Originally posted by Thomas Pupe:

Whenever a card comes back from exile, it always goes back to the owner, no matter who controlled the card before the exile.

I don't think this is a good thing to include in your explanation to the players, as it isn't true. In fact, the CR says:

Comprehensive Rules
110.2a If an effect instructs a player to put an object onto the battlefield, that object enters the battlefield under that player’s control unless the effect states otherwise.

So this situation of the Origins Planeswalkers returning under their owner's control is actually a special case, because the effect specifically says so, not because that is the default behavior when something returns from exile.

“Jace's ability says that it returns under it's owner's control. While you would be controlling it due to the Act of Treason, your opponent will always be Jace's owner, since it's his.”

Depending on my familiarity with the player, this may be as simple as pointing to the word “Owner” on the card, but in the dark that's what I'd say.

“If you look at the card's text, it specifies that it is exiled and then returned to the battlefield under its owners control. You control the card after you've played Act of Treason, but you don't own it. Therefore, if you transform it, you won't be able to use one of its abilities. Ok?”

Edited Lars Harald Nordli (Aug. 11, 2015 08:59:47 PM)

"Please read the card again carefully. Do you still have a question?"

I'm probably too cautious regarding strategic advice ;-)

To me, this sounds like he is confused not about whether or not the owner will eventually get control back, but rather when the control change will happen.

I think I would answer with something like, “No. Jace's ability exiles the card and puts it back transformed under its owners control. There is never a time when you control Jace as the planeswalker.”

Edited Nathen Millbank (Aug. 12, 2015 12:45:02 AM)

Note that Jace The Creature gets exiled and returns to the battlefield under it's owners control as a planeswalker after it's been exiled. On top of that, your act of treason won't influence Jace The Planeswalker as it's considered a different object after it's been in exile.

“Well, the ability on Jace and the way all Transform planeswalkers in Magic Origins work is that when their transform ability happens, they are exiled from the battlefield, and then brought back in to play under their OWNERs control. This means it will not exist as a planeswalker while under your control at any time based on the Act of Treason, instead it will return to your opponent's control after you activate his ability.”

“No, because Jace's ability says to exile it and return it transformed under its owner's control. You're not its owner. It's important to remember that all planeswalkers in Origins work the same way, they exile, then return transformed to their owner.”

My opinion on this scenario:
This is basically a simple case of “Did you read the card carefully?”. Reminding the player to read the card would be too condescending and rude coming from a judge, so you should do it gently in a more explanatory fashion.

In my mind, it is strategic advice to provide an answer that directly informs the player that, by activating Jace, he will be returning the cars transformed to his opponent. As a result, my response would be “You can only activate the loyalty abilities of planeswalkers if you control them and it's during your main phase.”

If you don't own… Jace leaves you alone :)