Well, I’m back in the states after being away for a month so that partially explains the gap between this and the last article. I recently was at GP KC (judging) and I witnessed pieces of a very interesting set of games. Paul Rietzl plays Magic unlike anyone I’ve ever seen. He plays like he’s on MTGO. “Pass Priority on my Main Phase.” Etc. This article was already being kicked around but after seeing that it really took off. That is the way to play Magic (not like a robot). Let’s talk about Priority because after watching other professional games I noticed quite a pattern of this (if not always vocal) and this seems to be a path to victory.

You may think you know something about Priority because of playing MTGO (and given that you’re reading this article you likely play MTGO). However, in my interactions with Magic players who play MTGO and think they know about Priority, they generally don’t know quite a few things about Priority (though they are generally better than people who don’t play MTGO).
For the remainder of the article I may be referring to the Active player (the player whose turn it is) as Player A and the other player, the Non-Active as Player N.

So, let’s get started by answering a question: Why is Priority important? You may only cast spells, activate abilities, morph facedown creatures, take special actions (more on these later) or basically do anything important when you have Priority.
So, when do I get Priority? The Player A gets Priority at the beginning of most steps (I’ll explain more about the exceptions later) after triggers have been put onto the stack (and after actions like drawing a card for the turn). Players also get priority after they cast a spell, activate an ability or take a special action (regardless of who is the active player) and the active player gets Priority after any State-Based Actions.

Ok, let’s quickly look at the exceptions to when you don’t get Priority before we look at how you can use misconceptions about Priority to win games.
You never get Priority during your Untap Step (though you occasionally get to make choices like untapping [card]Rust Tick[/card]) and you rarely get Priority during the Cleanup Step (you’ll get Priority if something happens that triggers something; i.e. When an “until End of Turn effects” ends (maybe a [card]Giant Growth[/card]) and a creature has less than 0 toughness (it might have -1/-1 counters on it) and you happen to have a [card]Deathgreeter[/card] in play. The creature goes to the graveyard and [card]Deathgreeter[/card] triggers. Priority goes around and then there is a second Cleanup Step and (assuming nothing happens) the turn ends.
No one gets Priority before Declare Blockers or Declare Attackers once you’re in the that step. This is important because you have to activate creature lands and other abilities (in the Declare Attackers Step) before any blockers are declared if you want them to block (this is obvious on MTGO but not on Paper) and you have to activate during the Beginning of Combat Step if you want to attack with them.

When can I use Priority to my advantage? Ok, here’s a simple situation: let’s say Player A has a [card]Birthing Pod[/card] and Player N has a [card]Doom Blade[/card], Player A casts [card]Vengevine[/card] and passes Priority, Player N passes Priority, [card]Vengvine[/card] resolves, Player A gets Priority and activates [card]Birthing Pod[/card] (sacrificing [card]Vengevine[/card] as part of the cost). Player N never had a chance to kill the creature before [card]Birthing Pod[/card] could work its magic because he/she never has priority when [card]Vengevine[/card] is in play.
The above example should tell you to look at “What is the cost of a spell or ability?” This can be really important in many cases (especially in Legacy, EDH or Cube, e.x. Your opponent [card]Capsize[/card]s one of your lands, you [card]Deprive[/card] the [card]Capsize[/card] returning the land that was targeted; Pretty much no matter what that [card]Capsize[/card] will be going down even if your opponent has counterspell backup).

Another interesting situation is if Player N controls [card]Tumble Magnet[/card] (with some counters) and Player A has some creatures and a [card]Raging Ravine[/card]. Player A asks, “Combat?” (this is accepted as saying “I’ll pass Priority until the Declare Attackers Step unless you have effects”), Player N says, “During your Beginning of Combat Step (The last chance for effects before attackers are declared, Player N is being careful not to let Player A play any more Sorcery-speed effects before combat) I’ll Tap your Creature with my Magnet. This is the time when Player A should activate his [card]Raging Ravine[/card]. The strategy behind this play is if you are the beatdown (you have the clock and they are trying to stop the bleeding). This forces Player N to not use [card]Tumble Magnet[/card] for fear of the [card]Raging Ravine[/card] (you should almost never be activating cards like [card]Raging Ravine[/card] until Beginning of Combat Step unless you have a legitimate reason such as equipping it with something).

There are sadly some misconceptions about Priority that I should address. First, there is no such thing as the end of a step. There are “End Steps of Phases” (please see the End of Combat Step) but there is never an actual end to a step unless you leave that step. So, if I say, “At the end of your Main Phase, I’ll Bolt your [card]Fauna Shaman[/card],” and you let it happen, then you can continue to cast creatures or make use of Sorcery-speed effects. The second problem that I’ve seen is that people think they can maintain priority and have a spell resolve. Saying “I’ll maintain Priority.” Is a fancy way of saying, “I won’t pass priority until I’ve used all of these instants and instant-speed effects.”
Please note that you don’t get Priority until after State-based effects are checked. So, if you have a [card]Gaea’s Cradle[/card] and then your opponent plays one, neither of you gets to tap [card]Gaea’s Cradle[/card] for mana.

And that is about all in a nut shell, if you have specific questions, don’t hesitate to ask in the comments, I’ll respond within 24 hours unless my world falls apart.
Well, until next time. I hope that everyone stays safe, sane and follows the rules. Please let me know what I should write about in the future. The idea for this article was suggested via Twitter right before I left on vacation by someone who was interested in Priority.
Alaric Stein
L1 Judge
@PlatypusJedi on Twitter

Here’s a question for the readers now that you know about Priority.
Player N controls [card]Leonin Arbiter[/card]; Player A cracks a fetch, looks at Player N, who says “Ok.” and moves to pick up his Library then he remembers the Arbiter. Can he choose to pay? What does the Arbiter’s ability constitute (activated ability, triggered, static, etc.)?
I’ll post the answer for you guys 72 hours after this is published.