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Infernity Archfiend Draw Timing And Empty Hand Checks

26_infernity_archfiend_draw_empty_hand_trigger_timing.md

Infernity Archfiend Draw Timing And Empty Hand Checks

Infernity Archfiend has two separate effects with separate timing and hand-state checks.

Relevant card text

Infernity Archfiend

"When you draw this card, if you have no other cards in your hand: You can reveal this card; Special Summon this card from your hand. When this card is Special Summoned: You can add 1 'Infernity' card from your Deck to your hand. You must have no cards in your hand to activate and to resolve this effect."

Reckless Greed

"Draw 2 cards and skip your next 2 Draw Phases."

Allure of Darkness

"Draw 2 cards, then banish 1 DARK monster from your hand, or, if you do not have any in your hand, send your entire hand to the GY."

Simultaneous draws from an empty hand

If a player has no cards in hand and draws multiple cards at the same time, a "When you draw this card" Trigger Effect can see that the card was drawn while the player had no cards in hand. The drawn cards are not ordered one by one for this purpose.

Example: Kalin has no cards in hand and resolves Reckless Greed, drawing Infernity Archfiend and one other card. Infernity Archfiend can activate its hand Trigger Effect and Special Summon itself, because it was drawn as part of the simultaneous draw that began from an empty hand.

Do not treat the other drawn card as having left the hand unless the question says it left the hand.

The second effect checks the later hand state

Infernity Archfiend's second effect is a separate Trigger Effect that activates after Infernity Archfiend is Special Summoned. That effect requires the player to have no cards in hand to activate and to resolve it.

In the Reckless Greed example above, after Infernity Archfiend Special Summons itself, the other card drawn by Reckless Greed is still in hand unless the scenario explicitly says otherwise. Because the player has one card in hand, the player cannot activate Infernity Archfiend's second effect.

Correct ruling for that scenario: Infernity Archfiend can Special Summon itself, but the player cannot activate its second Trigger Effect.

If the scenario explicitly says the other drawn card leaves the hand before the on-Summon Trigger Effect would be activated, then evaluate the second effect using that explicit fact. Do not infer it.

Missing timing after later processing

Infernity Archfiend's draw effect is optional "When ... you can" text. It can miss timing if drawing Infernity Archfiend is not the last thing to happen in the resolving effect. Put another way, it misses timing when later required processing happens after the draw.

Allure of Darkness draws 2 cards, then performs later required processing: banish 1 DARK monster from the hand, or send the entire hand to the GY if there is no DARK monster. If Infernity Archfiend is drawn by Allure of Darkness, the draw is followed by that later processing. Because the draw was not the last thing to happen, Infernity Archfiend's optional "When you draw this card" effect cannot activate.

Judge calls to watch for

  • Do not invent hand-state changes. Track only cards that the question says entered or left the hand.
  • A simultaneous multi-card draw from an empty hand can satisfy a drawn card's empty-hand draw trigger.
  • A later "no cards in hand" effect is checked at that later activation and resolution point, not at the earlier draw.
  • Optional "When you draw this card" effects can miss timing if the resolving effect continues after the draw.

Sources

What's new

  • Added to corpus.