Mastering Equipment: Can an Artifact Equip Itself in Magic: The Gathering?
No, an Equipment card in Magic: The Gathering cannot equip itself. The rules explicitly state that an Equipment can’t equip itself. This restriction is fundamental to how Equipment functions within the game. Let’s delve into the intricacies of Equipment and related rules to understand this restriction better.
Understanding Equipment in Magic: The Gathering
What is Equipment?
In Magic: The Gathering, Equipment is a subtype of artifact that can be attached to a creature. This attachment grants the equipped creature additional abilities or stat boosts, enhancing its combat prowess or overall utility. The Equip ability is a keyword action that allows you to attach an Equipment to a creature you control by paying its equip cost.
Key Characteristics of Equipment
- Artifact Subtype: Equipment is an artifact, inheriting all the rules and interactions associated with artifacts.
- Equip Ability: This ability defines how the Equipment attaches to a creature.
- Attachment to Creatures: Equipment enhances the creature it’s attached to, providing bonuses or new abilities.
- Detachment: Equipment becomes unattached when the equipped creature leaves the battlefield or becomes an illegal target for the Equipment.
The Rule Against Self-Equipping
The rule stating that an Equipment can’t equip itself is a core design choice to prevent infinite loops or unintended interactions. If Equipment could equip themselves, it could lead to situations where the power and toughness of the equipment are added to itself repeatedly. This would create issues with balance and game design.
FAQ: Deep Dive into Equipment Mechanics
Here’s an extensive list of Frequently Asked Questions to further clarify the rules and nuances surrounding Equipment in Magic: The Gathering:
1. What happens if an Equipment tries to equip an illegal target?
If an Equipment attempts to equip an illegal or nonexistent permanent, it becomes unattached from that permanent but remains on the battlefield. The Equipment essentially “falls off” without being destroyed.
2. Can you equip an artifact?
Equip is a keyword ability found on artifacts with the subtype “Equipment.” By paying the equip cost, you can attach the artifact to a creature you control, which is referred to in the text as the “equipped creature.”
3. Can you equip artifacts to creatures you don’t control?
Normally, using the equip ability, you can’t attach equipment to opponents’ creatures. The Equip ability specifically targets a creature you control. However, other effects might move an Equipment onto an opponent’s creature.
4. Can you equip an artifact the turn you play it?
You can only equip creatures at sorcery speed – during your turn, on your main phase, with an empty stack. Some equipment, like Embercleave, have “enter the battlefield” effects that allow them to come into play attached to a creature.
5. Is equipping an artifact a spell?
Equipping is an ability, which is separate from a spell. You activate the equip ability, which goes on the stack and can be responded to, but it is not a spell itself.
6. Can you equip an artifact to a creature with shroud?
A creature with shroud cannot be the target of any spell or ability — including yours! No combat tricks, no enchantments, no equipping — nothing! If a permanent gains shroud, any other permanents that were previously attached to it or affecting it will still apply.
7. Do artifacts have summoning sickness?
Only Creatures, Artifact Creatures, Land Creatures, planeswalker creatures and Enchantment Creatures (or Land, Artifacts, planeswalkers or Enchantments that have become creatures) are affected by Summoning Sickness. Regular artifacts are not.
8. Can you equip artifacts to Progenitus?
“Protection from everything” means that Progenitus can’t be blocked, enchanted, or equipped, Progenitus can’t be the target of spells or abilities, and all damage that would be dealt to Progenitus is prevented.
9. Is equipping an artifact an instant?
The Equip ability is done at sorcery speed. Unless an equipment has another ability that states otherwise. Equip [cost] ([Cost]: Attach this permanent to target creature you control. Activate this ability only any time you could cast a sorcery.)
10. Can you enchant an artifact?
Yes, you can enchant an artifact with an aura that enchants artifacts or permanents.
11. Can you tap an artifact that is equipped to a creature?
Tapping an artifact won’t cause its abilities to stop applying unless those abilities say so. Equipment attached to a creature doesn’t become tapped when that creature becomes tapped, and tapping that Equipment doesn’t cause the creature to become tapped.
12. What happens to artifact equipment when a creature dies?
The equipment will simply unattach from the creature if the creature dies. Equipment stays on the battlefield until something specifically removes them, such as a “destroy artifact” spell.
13. Can artifacts tap immediately?
Yes, as long as it’s not a creature. Only creatures are affected by summoning sickness. If it’s a creature due to other effects then you wouldn’t be able to tap it if it came under your control that turn. Otherwise, it can tap immediately.
14. Does Hexproof stop equipment?
Hexproof only affects spells and abilities controlled by opponents, so you can still enchant, equip, or cast spells on your own creatures with hexproof.
15. Are artifacts colorless?
Most artifacts have no colored mana symbols in their mana costs, and are therefore colorless. However, there is no correlation between being colorless and being an artifact: artifacts may be colored, and colorless objects may be card types other than artifact.
Artifacts in D&D
While this article primarily focuses on Magic: The Gathering, it’s interesting to note that artifacts in Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) also follow specific rules. In D&D, an artifact cannot be destroyed by normal means. Each artifact can only be destroyed by its own unique method, often requiring a special quest to uncover its weakness.
Equipment and the Games Learning Society
Understanding the rules of Magic: The Gathering, including the nuances of Equipment and artifact interactions, is crucial for strategic gameplay and deeper engagement with the game. Organizations like the Games Learning Society help explore the educational potential of games and complex systems like Magic: The Gathering. To learn more about how games can be used for educational purposes, visit GamesLearningSociety.org.
In conclusion, while you can’t equip an artifact to itself, the strategic deployment of Equipment on your creatures remains a vital component of mastering Magic: The Gathering.