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Emrakul the Aeons Torn

Emrakul the Aeons Torn Russian

Last Modified 29.03.2020

How to kill Emrakul? Protection from spell: what is it and how it’s work? Can you exile Emrakul with Oblivion Ring?

Emrakul the Aeons Torn

Oracle Text:

Legendary Creature — Eldrazi

Emrakul, the Aeons Torn can’t be countered.

When you cast Emrakul, take an extra turn after this one.

Flying, protection from colored spells, annihilator 6

When Emrakul is put into a graveyard from anywhere, its owner shuffles his or her graveyard into his or her library.

Colorless, nonartifact, legendary

Emrakul is colorless since it has no color mana symbols in its mana cost, but it is not an artifact, since it doesn’t have word “artifact” in its type line.

On the other hand, we see that Emrakul is Legendary, so it is affected by “Legend Rule”: two or more Legendary permanents with the same name don’t stay on the battlefield under the control of the same player. Well, they can stay, but not for a long time, precisely until the next time SBA are performed. Whenever a second Emrakul appears on the battlefield under the same player's control, that player must choose one of them and put the other into the graveyard. According to the rules (since 13.07.2013) each player may control Emrakul of his own.

When Emrakul is put into a graveyard from anywhere

Emrakul has an ability connected with it being put into the graveyard (from anywhere). This is a triggered ability, so it triggers regardless of the player’s desires. When Emrakul is put into a graveyard (from the battlefield or from a library or from the hand, literally from anywhere), the ability triggers. Then, when the player gets priority, it goes on the stack, and only then it can resolve. Let’s make some conclusions:

  1. Emrakul actually is put into the graveyard — if not, its ability doesn’t trigger;
  2. This ability can be countered (say “Hello” to Disallow);
  3. In order for Emrakul to be shuffled into its owner’s library on resolution of this ability, it must still be in the graveyard. If you manage to remove it from the graveyard before this ability resolves, nothing will happen to it on resolution (say “Hi” to Mimic Vat and Extirpate). The remaining graveyard will be shuffled into the library anyway, of course.

This ability is not a leaves-the-battlefield ability since it has the text “into a graveyard from anywhere”). It triggers from the graveyard, not from the battlefield. Feel the difference:

Leyline of the Void

If you opponent controls Leyline of the Void, your Emrakul never goes to the graveyard. So the replacement effect will exile it instead.

Humility

If Humility is on the battlefield and Emrakul dies, then the ability will trigger.

Yixlid Jailer

If Yixlid Jailer is on the battlefield and Emrakul dies, then the ability will not trigger.

If a player forgot to shuffle Emrakul, which went to the graveyard, into his or her library, this is considered a “missed trigger”.

Protection from colored spells

Emrakul has a static ability which functions only while Emrakul is on the battlefield. This is a very important fact number one. A very important fact number two: Emrakul has protection from spells, and not from anything else. And the important fact number three is: protection doesn't mean that any colored spell won’t affect Emrakul.

Wrath of God

— Can Wrath of God destroy Emrakul?

— Sure! Wrath of God doesn’t target and it doesn’t deal damage.

Hurricane

— Can I kill Emrakul with Hurricane on 15?

— Nope. Hurricane doesn’t target, but it deals damage, which will be prevented by protection.

Black Sun's Zenith

— What about counters from Black Sun’s Zenith?

— Like Wrath of God, Zenith doesn’t target and doesn’t deal damage, so counter will be placed on Emrakul. And 15+ of them will send Emrakul to its owner’s graveyard. It’s SBA.

Extirpate

— May I target the Emrakul with Extirpate?

— Obviously. Protection doesn’t work in a graveyard. By the way, Emrakul actually can be in the graveyard.

Oblivion Ring

— Can Oblivion Ring exile Emrakul?

— Yes. We should understand that Oblivion Ring spell doesn’t target at all. Here we deal with the triggered ability of Oblivion Ring, which is a permanent.

Royal Assassin

— Can Royal Assassin kill Emrakul?

— Yes. Because here we deal with a permanent’s ability again.

Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre

Source of the first Ulamog’s trigger is the spell. Usully that trigger can target since Ulamog is colorless

Painter's Servant

But if Ulamog was given a color by Painter’s Servant, Emrakul can’t target of Ulamog’s trigger since its source is the colored spell.

Gaze of Pain

Gaze of Pain create a delayed triiggered ability. its source is the black spell. So it can’t target Emrakul!

Can’t be countered

Emrakul, the Aeons Torn can’t be countered, but nobody can prevent you from targeting it with a countering spell or ability. A spell or ability will resolve normally, but the countering part of its effect will be ignored.

If you wish to remove Emrakul from the stack you can use another ways: Time Stop or Mindbreak Trap will do it perfectly fine.

Отчисление

You can’t counter Emrakul by Remand, but you can target it and you will draw a card on Remand's resolution.

Mindbreak Trap

Mindbreak Trap exiles Emrakul from the stack. Voilà!

When you cast Emrakul…

The main point in this triggered ability is its trigger event. Emrakul must be cast. It doesn’t matter from which zone and what happens next. This ability doesn’t care whether Emrakul comes to the battlefield or not. It cares only for the fact that it was cast.

Keep in mind that in order to trigger this ability it’s not enough just to put Emrakul on the battlefield without actually casting it:

Show and Tell

If you put Emrakul into the battlefield as result of Show and Tell’s resolution, you will not get an extra turn.

Jhoira of the Ghitu

If you cast Emrakul without paying its mana cost due to Suspend, then its ability triggers.

Karador, Ghost Chieftain

Casting Emrakul from graveyard leads to trigger her ability.

NB: this ability goes to the stack after the Emrakul spell and hence will be resolved before it.

Now it’s time to tell couple of words about extra turn.

  1. You will take an extra turn directly after the current turn (the turn when Emrakul trigger was resolved).
  2. If you get multiple extra turns (e.g., you have already cast Temporal Mastery during this turn), the extra turns are added one by one. The most recently created turn will be taken first. The same situation will happen if multiple players get extra turns during a single turn. See rule 500.7.
  3. In a Two-Headed Giant game you team takes the extra turn. See rule 805.8.
  4. In more exotic Grand Melee variant multiple players can take turns at the same time. See rule 807.
  5. If there is some effect causes a turn to be skipped, this effect and “extra turn” effect from Emrakul are mutually annihilating.
  6. If you take an extra turn during five additional turns after the match time limit is reached, there will be exactly five additional turns. But you will take more turns than your opponent. (on the assumption of the turn, when Emrakul trigger was resolved, wasn’t the last one).

Annihilator

Yet another triggered ability. You should know that it triggers and resolves before declaration of blockers. So a player can’t send a creature to block Emrakul and than sacrifice it for the annihilator. Also note that the annihilator ability doesn’t target anything.

/runed Halo

If you control Runed Halo with Emrakul named on it, your opponent can attack you with Emrakul, annihilator will still trigger and you will have to sacrifice 6 permanent.

If after resolution of annihilator Runed Halo is still on the battlefield, damage from Emrakul’s attack will be prevented by protection.

And the last two cents: Emrakul is banned in Commander :(


  1. Permanent — a card or token on the battlefield.
  2. Spell — a card on the stack. Also a copy (of either a card or another spell) on the stack.

Translated by Witas Spasovski