Andrew controls a Goblin Rabblemaster. He says, “Combat?” and pauses. Natasha thinks for a couple seconds and says, “Sure.” Andrew plops down a Goblin token and attacks with it.

Is this a Missed Trigger on Andrew's part? “Combat?” is a Tournament Shortcut designed to skip right to the Declare Attackers step, after the Rabblemaster ability should have triggered and resolved. Would we treat this differently at other RELs?

Originally posted by MTR:

A statement such as “I'm ready for combat” or “Declare attackers?” offers to keep passing priority until an opponent has priority in the beginning of combat step. Opponents are assumed to be acting then unless they specify otherwise.

This is actually what the shortcut says. An opponent can have priority in the Beginning of Combat step with the Rabblemaster trigger on the stack. If they pass priority, the trigger will resolve and a token will be put into play.

This situation is perfectly fine for me as described.

Edited Jack Doyle (Nov. 25, 2014 02:14:33 PM)

When we read the MTR and what it has to say about phrases such as
“Combat?”, it does not state that the player is moving to the Declare
Attackers step. What the MTR says it means is that the active player is
offering to pass priority and do nothing until Natasha has priority during
the Beginning of Combat step. Natasha now has the option of using that
priority and if she does nothing with it, it is now time for the
Rabblemaster to resolve. This is now the time that Andrew must demonstrate
awareness of the trigger and in your scenario he has done so. The one
caveat to your scenario will be that after he has put the token into play
and declared attackers, Natasha still has the opportunity to back Andrew up
into the Beginning of Combat step and cast spells or activate abilities
then since both players must pass priority consecutively without taking an
action.

Okay .. So “an opponent has priority in the beginning of combat step” means the very first time the opponent has priority? There's not an implied empty stack?

Edited Jack Hesse (Nov. 25, 2014 03:51:05 PM)

Nope. These tournament shortcuts are relatively explicit, and if that was the wording that was intended, that would more than likely be the wording used :)

Gotcha. Thanks!

I would like to add that it's not always explicit. The previous one for example, when saying “go”, does imply an empty stack:

http://blogs.magicjudges.org/unclescott/2013/05/14/april-l4-summary/

(which also explains why it doesn't have to be explicit)
So also keep context/intent in mind. For example I believe in these cases, “attack” says "if you are not responding I am going to do something“ where that something can be attacking, resolving a trigger or playing something second main, doesn't really matter. Whereas ”go“ says ”if you are not responding you are going to do something“ in which case the something is taking your turn and untapping, which isn't as easily interchangable with ”or I do something else after all".

Edited Toby Hazes (Nov. 26, 2014 03:49:57 AM)

I'd make the note that Natasha has the opportunity to respond to the goblin token entering the battlefield as the change in board state requires an additional pass of priority.

Marc, You are correct that after the trigger resolves that there will be
one additional priority pass before moving steps. However it is important
to note that it is not responding to the token entering the battlefield.
This terminology has a tendency to confuse players into believing that they
can prevent a creature from coming into play (relevant for things like
Purphoros) by doing something “in response”. It isn't a terribly hard idea
to wash out of a player's mind.

In the same way that you cannot respond to a planeswalker entering the battlefield. Once it resolves, the active player has priory and the opponent cannot stop the AP from activating his new planeswalkers ability. Or an old one for that matter.

The shortcut attack means: “I want to pass priority until you have it in
the Beginning of Combat step.” The response “OK” usually means: “I agree to
your shortcut, we are now in the BoC step and I also pass priority.”

Now, at the beginning of the Beginning of Combat step, Rabblemaster
triggers and its trigger is put on the stack. This happens automatically by
CR and there is no need for any player to point it out at this moment.
Therefore, when both players pass priority in BoC step, stack is not empty,
and therefore instead of moving to the next step we only resolve the
trigger and AP receives priority again.

Missed trigger rules does not modify the Comprehensive rules for placing
triggers on the stack. They only add specific situations when the triggers
are removed from the stack (they don't exactly say so, but it is the best
representation of what happens). Once the point of no return is passed
(i.e. active player tried to take an action after the point when the
trigger should have resolved), the trigger is removed from the stack with
no effect and AP proceeds with taking his next action (which would have
been illegal with the trigger still on the stack).

TL;DR: Yes, “The game” automatically places triggers on the stack even if
the controller showed no awareness.

2015-02-24 13:26 GMT+01:00 Jorge Monteiro <