What is Trample in Magic?
Trample is a keyword ability in Magic: The Gathering that allows a creature to deal excess combat damage to the player it’s attacking, even if the creature is blocked. In essence, trample enables a creature to assign its combat damage to the blocking creature(s) first and then deal any remaining damage to the defending player, making it a powerful ability in the game.
Frequently Asked Questions About Trample
1. What is the Rule for Trample in Magic?
The rule for trample in Magic states that an attacker with trample deals excess damage to the defending player, planeswalker, or battle, even if it is blocked. This ability is primarily found in green on the color wheel, but red‘s share has been growing over time.
2. What is Trample Damage?
Trample damage is a sub-type of Area of Effect (AoE) damage that differs from the latter in that it commonly does full damage on a primary target and only deals a small amount of it to adjacent opponents. Unlike classic Area of Effect attacks, which deal homogeneous damage in a certain area, trample damage is more focused.
3. What is the Difference Between Trample and Protection in Magic?
A creature with trample can still assign damage to the player if the creature with protection that is blocking has insufficient toughness to be assigned all of the damage. For example, if you’re attacking with a 7/7 trampler into a 2/2 with protection, it will still assign 5 damage to the defending player.
4. What is the Difference Between Trample and Planeswalkers?
If a creature with trample is attacking a planeswalker, none of its combat damage can be assigned to the defending player, even if that planeswalker has been removed from combat or the damage the attacking creature could assign is greater than the planeswalker’s loyalty.
5. Does Trample Carry Over Indestructible?
Although you can’t actually destroy an indestructible creature, the trampling creature would deal enough damage to it that would ‘normally’ kill it, then trample over the rest, and it still counts as lethal damage, even though it doesn’t actually destroy it.
6. Why are Planeswalkers so Powerful?
Planeswalkers had incredible magical capabilities, surpassing all but the most powerful mortal wizards, with lives that could last indefinitely, and their physical forms were matters of will as they were energy projections of a center of consciousness.
7. Does Deathtouch Cancel Deathtouch?
Any two instances of the Deathtouch ability against one another cancel out the Deathtouch ability, making them ineffective against each other.
8. Does Deathtouch Stop Trample?
Unless the creature with deathtouch has first strike, deathtouch does nothing to stop a creature from trampling over to the defending player, as the creature with trample will assign lethal damage to the creature with deathtouch and any more damage can be assigned to the defending player.
9. How do Deathtouch and Trample Work Together?
If an attacking creature with deathtouch and trample becomes blocked, the attacking creature first assigns damage to the creature(s) blocking it, then any excess damage can be assigned to the defending player due to trample.
10. How Does Trample Work?
Normally, when a creature attacks a player and another creature blocks it, the blocking creature absorbs all the damage and the defending player takes none, but when an attacking creature has trample, any creatures that block it can only absorb damage equal to their toughness.
11. What is Trample Used For?
Trample is used to step heavily on someone or something so that you crush or harm them/it with your feet, and in Magic, it’s used to deal excess combat damage to the defending player.
12. Does Trample Go Through Planeswalker?
There is no way for a creature to trample from a Planeswalker to the defending player, or vice versa, as Planeswalkers can’t block, and if there are no blockers, the damage is either all done to the Planeswalker or the player that was attacked.
13. How Does Trample Assign Damage in Magic The Gathering?
The creature with trample needs to assign enough damage to a creature to kill it in order to assign the rest to the defending player, and if a creature is removed after blockers are declared, then the trample creature doesn’t need to assign damage to the creature and all the damage goes through.
14. Does Double Strike Affect Trample?
If a creature has both double strike and trample, the combat damage it assigned during the first combat damage step will be considered when determining how much damage can trample through in the second combat damage step.
15. Is Trample a Counter?
The keywords that a keyword counter can be are flying, first strike, double strike, deathtouch, haste, hexproof, indestructible, lifelink, menace, reach, shadow, trample, and vigilance, as well as any variants of those keywords, making trample a potential counter in certain situations.