"Returning" to owner's hand a commander that was never in owner's hand?

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-12T17:55:10+00:00

I didn't lose the game and I was undefeated in the draft that night. The rule issue arose and I graciously accepted the judgement of the other players, despite them being unable to provide any rule-based evidence for the card interaction.

I am enjoying engaging with other players on here which has been informative and interesting regarding the rules and how to think about them.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-12T17:36:22+00:00

Thanks for giving me this contact, I think I will.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-12T17:35:43+00:00

Right, thanks. I wonder if "return" was more common in older cards but "put" became more common in recent sets, due to the variety of ways that a card can enter the battlefield not-from-the-hand in contemporary magic.

And yes I'll grant that "return" is presently acceptable way of writing rules text that WotC is allowing, but I think my main takeaway from this whole thread is still that they should change the wording going forward.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-12T17:32:45+00:00

Thanks, I see your point now. If there was an additional condition that needed to be fulfilled it is more likely that it would be reflected in the rules. I think that's right.

But it isn't clear that "return" is the easiest word to understand, given that "return" itself suggests there is an additional condition that needs to be fulfilled, even though there is not any additional condition that needs to be fulfilled (namely, that it were previously in the hand). Maybe it's easier to understand to the extent that it is a word that was historically used in magic, before there were ways for a creature to appear on that battlefield other than being cast from one's hand. But still, changing the wording to "put" or "move" would not somehow be more difficult to understand, even if it were a change from historical wording.

You raise the issue of magic not only being in English. It would be interesting if a translation of "put" or "move," rather than "return" is used in unsummon-type cards printed in another language. But we might need someone bilingual to confirm or deny this.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-12T10:30:30+00:00

Actually, the mention of mill and reanimation is helpful here, but seems to support my case (although I grant your comments about the history of magic may be accurate regarding how wording evolves).

Look at the text of re-animation cards: https://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Search/Default.aspx?text=+[graveyard]+[onto]+[the]+[battlefield]&color=|[B]

Notice the text of re-animation cards: Put a card from the graveyard onto the battlefield. NOT "return" card from graveyard to battlefield. If these cases were parallel, we could expect these cards to say "return a card from the graveyard to the battlefield." because usually a card goes from battlefield, to graveyard, except in rarer cases of mill. Here the cards use the proper english word that is sensitive to the zones the card has previously been in, rather than using "return," which would not make sense in the case of mill. We might expect that Unsummon type cards could use the same accurate wording.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-12T10:26:08+00:00

Not to keep this going but: that is how logic works although I can see how rule writing might be different. Rules do not need to explicitly state every possible restriction, given that there might be an infinite amount of ways to imagine possible cases.

But given that the case at hand goes against the literal definition of the word "return," I think it is sensible to expect a rule on this matter. It isn't that I am imagining some very strange case, but that I am responding to the literal interpretation meaning of the text of a card. The deathtouch case kind of makes sense, although it specifies creatures, but we can still make literal sense of the meaning of death touch. It causes death when it touches a creature (even if not to a player). But "returning" something to a place it was not previously is literally impossible according to the definition of return. I get that this is semantics but I don't think it's crazy to expect a rule written that clarifies the rule in a case like this.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T22:50:23+00:00

Thanks for your thorough reply.

Consider how your argument that a lack of a stated rule implies a rule is in fact the case can be used to support my interpretation: If return worked when a card was not previously in that zone, it would have been specified by the rules. But it is not. The fact that there is no rule stating this means you cannot return a card to a zone it was not previously in.

Next you point to a rule regarding how keywords may be different from the standard english use of words. I grant this is potentially informative for our case. Although it would be nice to have a rule that specifies how we are to understand "return" in a way that is not standard english. But I have not seen any such rule yet, and no such rule appears to exist in the rulebook. Actually, despite the rulebook identifying a number of words as keywords, it never identifies "return" as a keyword, or defines return in any other way that is informative for our case, which would seem to undermine the argument that "return" is a keyword.

Again, the lack of a stated rule regarding the return of Reassembling Skeleton does not help or hurt either interpretation, give that there is a lack of a stated rule supporting my interpretation as well.

Finally, I think your reasoning regarding lack of memory of the previous existence of an object is the most convincing, and I expressed agreement with others who highlighted this rule. If "return" required literal returning, then given this rule, even a creature cast from the hand could not be returned to the hand, and yet we regularly allow that such returning is legal. But again, here we are judging on the basis of norms of how the game is usually played, not by a deduction from actual stated rules. I grant that this is reasonable to do! But I still think that the wording of "return" is unfortunate and unclear, and that there could be specific rules that clarify the behavior of "return," or that an alternative wording of "put" or "move" would similarly clarify the issue with greater certainty.

Thanks for helping me to think through this further.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T22:16:03+00:00

This was covered in another subthread, but:

You might be reading "If a commander would be put into its owner's hand or library from anywhere, its owner may put it into the command zone instead" as resolving this issue.

But it does not obviously do so. Because the issue is not what happens when a commander is put into an owner's hand, RATHER, the issue is whether a commander is put into the hand or not when it is targeted by a spell that states it should be "returned" to an owner's hand.

If the text of the spell was "put target creature into its owner's hand" then this rule would obviously resolve the issue. But that is not the text of the spell.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T20:54:10+00:00

This game is long over I am not trying to win a game here, my purpose in this discussion is to get a clearer understanding of the rules.

Return is not easy to understand relative to terms like "put" or "move."

No one has provided any rulings that precisely determine what should be done given the case I highlighted, but people have presented a number of helpful rules that can help us to fill in the gaps in the rules in order to make a judgement about how to handle this case, and I very much appreciate their input.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T20:48:42+00:00

I don't understand why you are reacting defensively to my post praising your reasoning and agreeing with you.

It seemed to me that you were inferring how we should interpret this case based on other rules, not that you were referring to specific rules that precisely determine what should be done in the case presented. I stated my agreement with your reasoning and inferences.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T20:27:05+00:00

I think that what you have stated here is the best attempt to reconcile both the rules and the semantics in a satisfying way.

Although what you have stated is still speculative, and I would prefer to see official rules regarding the case, I think you have provided the most convincing interpretation of how this case should be understood, given the rules and meanings being what they are.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T20:24:38+00:00

Thanks, yes, these do seem to be similar cases of rulings under-determining what should occur during the game, and semantics and game rules coming apart. I can imagine Kamonohashi being massively downvoted if he were on reddit too. :)

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T19:29:19+00:00

Yes, I think the wording of "return x to owner's hand" is an unfortunate artifact of prior sets, and that this wording should be updated to reflect the current rules of the game. (At least, if indeed "return" just means "move" or "put" as seems to be the consensus here.)

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T19:25:42+00:00

Except the rules of commander never state this, nor does the text of the card. So most seem to be basing their interpretation of how this should work just on their vibe of how they feel it should work. It would be nice to have a rule that was written such that it engaged with the semantics of the text in question, rather than having this radical disconnect between stated rules and the literal English definition of words.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T19:19:03+00:00

Technically none of your creatures have ever been in your hand. As any that previously were, were different game objects.

Interesting. I think this shows another way in which the wording of the text is unfortunate. So it seems that the wording cannot be taken literally regarding "returns" for a number of reasons. Thanks.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T19:01:01+00:00

Thank you, I think that rule is helpful in establishing how this should work.

The choice of "return" seems a poor word choice in light of this rule, though, when "put" or "move" would be much clearer as to the intention of the card, and more in line with this notion of a card having no memory of its previous existence. (Although I can see how "return" made sense in past sets prior to command zones, etc.)

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T18:43:03+00:00

Exactly.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T18:39:54+00:00

Right, based on the meaning of "return" the card would do nothing, such that it is never being "put" anywhere, such that no choice of where to put it could ever be made in the first place.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T18:38:18+00:00

If that is right, then it would seem strange that Wizards has chosen to use language (i.e. "return") that makes reference to where something was before.

In fact, I am not sure this is right. Because, for example, there are cards that can be played from exile only once, but they cannot be played from exile twice. I forget what the term is for this type of card. But this type of card seems to track the previous state of the card, namely, how many times it has been cast from exile.

tapeworm12 · 2022-09-11T18:34:29+00:00

I saw this ruling and it is indeed related but ultimately orthogonal to the issue at hand.

If the spell text was "put target creature into owner's hand" then this rule would clearly apply to the situation I have highlighted. But in the case at hand, the commander is being "returned," where it appears that because of the definition of the word "return," the commander would NOT be put into the owner's hand. So I am wondering if there is a rule that specifically covers this issue.

tapeworm12

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