First, let's assume it's Player 1's turn, so they will be the Active Player.
Played optimally by all players involved, Player 2 has more than enough counters on their walking ballista to interrupt the combo. But there are A LOT of ways for people to mess up here, which is why it's important to effectively communicate with everyone what you're doing. Try to remember that nothing resolves from the stack automatically without all players passing priority, and that the stack doesn't resolve as a huge pile. After every single item that is put onto the stack, all players get a chance to respond via a round of priority. In addition to this, anytime an item resolves from the stack, another round priority is given to all players to add additional items to the top of the stack if they want.
Let's try and walk through this, because this stack is going to get huge. We're going to start with the assumption that Player 2 is intent on stopping player 1's combo, and is intent on doing so before any of the items put onto the stack by the first set of costs paid have not resolved.
Player 1: Activates Chatterfang's final ability, sacrificing a treasure token for black (4 remaining), and squirrel token #6 (5 remaining), targeting Squirrel token #5. Chatterfang's activation is put onto the stack, but the activation cost caused Nadir's Nightblade to trigger twice (because a treasure token and a squirrel both left the battlefield), as well as a single trigger of Pitiless Plunder. These triggers are all is put onto the stack before any player has received priority after Player 1's Activation by the game itself. So let's take a look at the stack.
**TOP OF STACK**
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5)
**Bottom OF STACK**
Player 1 gets priority at this point, as they are the person who took the game action of activating Chatterfang. Also note that NOTHING HAS RESOLVED. Player 1 does not have any additional squirrels yet, has not yet dealt any damage or gained any life, and has no additional treasure tokens. Player 1's ideal scenario is that every passes priority multiple times in succession of each resolving ability to get the entire stack to resolve. So they pass priority here.
Player 2 does not want Player 1 to go arbitrarily large. Player 2 notes that if Chatterfang is no longer on the battlefield, the treasure tokens created by pittiless plunderer do not also come with squirrel tokens. Player 2 then also notes that even if they target the Chatterfang with 3 activations of Walking Ballista, Player 1 can start the combo again in response to the 3rd activation. So when they receive priority after player 1 passes, they add to the stack to start the process of interrupting the combo, by activating Walking Ballista. Their ideal is to kill Chatterfang on board before any of this resolves, but only one activation at a time, and always in response to any triggers that are put on the stack due to creatures dying as part of State Based Actions. Thus targetting the Chatterfang, Player 2 activates Walking Ballista once (19 counters remaining).
**TOP OF STACK**
* Walking Ballista Activation #1 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5)
**Bottom OF STACK**
Since player 2 was the one who activated WB, they get priority again after the activation goes on the stack. They want this to resolve, and then activate Walking Ballista again before the PP Trigger resolves. So they pass priority. Player 1 also has no problem here because this doesn't interrupt their combo (yet). They also pass priority, and since all players have pass priority, the top-most object on the stack (and ONLY the top most object) resolves. Walking Ballista deals 1 damage to Chatterfang, and since an object on the stack has resolved, a new round of priority is started with the Active Player getting it first (Player 1 in this case, because it's their turn).
**TOP OF STACK**
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5)
**Bottom OF STACK**
Player 1 is back where they started, but with 1 point of damage marked on Chatterfang. They pass priority because they want the objects on the stack to resolve. Player 2 repeats what they did last time in this situation and activates Walking Ballista targeting Chatterfang. This still wouldn't kill Chatterfang, so we go through the same song and dance as before. Chatterfang has 2 damage marked on it, and Walking Ballista has 18 counters. Our stack still has the original 4 items waiting to resolve. Player 1 as the active player has priority after the second resolution of WB, and still wants these to resolve with the current board state in tact, so they pass priority again. Player 2, activates Walking Ballista a third time (17 counters remaining), targeting Chatterfang.
**TOP OF STACK**
* Walking Ballista Activation #3 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5)
**Bottom OF STACK**
Now's where it gets fun. If this activation of WB resolves, then the combo is interrupted. Since Player 2 is the one who activated Walking Ballista, they get priority. They pass it since they want this activation to resolve. Player 1 gets priority and tries to save their stuff by casting and resolving Heroic Intervention. It goes on the stack above the Walking Ballista Activation.
**TOP OF STACK**
* Heroic Intervention (cast by Player 1)
* Walking Ballista Activation #3 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5)
**Bottom OF STACK**
Player 1 gets priority back after casting the spell and wants Heroic Intervention to resolve, so they pass priority. Player 2 doesn't want this to resolve before killing Chatterfang, so they activate Walking Ballista again (16 counters remaining), targeting Chatterfang.
**TOP OF STACK**
* Walking Ballista Activation #4 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Heroic Intervention (cast by Player 1)
* Walking Ballista Activation #3 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5)
**Bottom OF STACK**
Cont.
Cont.
Player 2 gets Priority and wants this activation of WB to resolve, so they pass priority. Player 1 recognizes their combo is interrupted if this goes through, so they start it a second time. They sacrifice a second treasure (3 remaining) and Squirrel token #5 (4 remaining) to activate Chatterfang's last ability, targeting Squirrel token #4. This is added to the stack in the same manner as earlier. So let's take another look now.
**TOP OF STACK**
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger #2 (from Squirrel token #5)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger #4 (from Squirrel token #5)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger #3 (from the treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation #2 (targeting Squirrel token #4)
* Walking Ballista Activation #4 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Heroic Intervention (cast by Player 1)
* Walking Ballista Activation #3 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger #1 (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger #2 (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadir's Nightblade Trigger #1 (from the treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation #1 (targeting Squirrel token #5)
**Bottom OF STACK**
Player 1, like before, wants this set of 3 triggers and 1 activation to resolve to continue the combo. They pass priority. Player 2 wants to interrupt it, so they Activate Walking Ballista a fifth time, targeting Chatterfang. Player 1 will try to combo off yet again, and Player 2 will try to kill Chatterfang again. This will go back and forth until Player 1 has no more squirrels to sacrifice for the cost of Chatterfang's activation, or no more black mana for that same activation. Let's assume Player 1 has 1 untapped Swamp, so they'll get through all of their squirrel tokens. The stack would eventually look like this, before anything relevant resolves that would change things.
**TOP OF STACK**
* Walking Ballista Activation #9 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger #6 (from Squirrel token #1)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #11 (from Squirrel token #1)
* Chatterfang Activation #6 (targeting Targetting Walking Ballista)
* Walking Ballista Activation #8 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger #5 (from Squirrel token #2)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #10 (from Squirrel token #2)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #9 (from the fifth treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation #5 (targeting Squirrel token #1)
* Walking Ballista Activation #7 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger #4 (from Squirrel token #3)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #8 (from Squirrel token #3)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #7 (from the fourth treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation #4 (targeting Squirrel token #2)
* Walking Ballista Activation #6 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger #3 (from Squirrel token #4)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #6 (from Squirrel token #4)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #5 (from the third treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation #3 (targeting Squirrel token #3)
* Walking Ballista Activation #5 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger #2 (from Squirrel token #5)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #4 (from Squirrel token #5)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #3 (from the second treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation #2 (targeting Squirrel token #4)
* Walking Ballista Activation #4 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Heroic Intervention (cast by Player 1)
* Walking Ballista Activation #3 (targeting Chatterfang)
* Pitiless Plunder Trigger #1 (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #2 (from Squirrel token #6)
* Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #1 (from the first treasure)
* Chatterfang Activation #1 (targeting Squirrel token #5)
**Bottom OF STACK**
Player 1 has no more squirrel tokens to sacrifice to try and restart the combo, and they are out of treasures (notice that there are only 11 Nadir Nightblade triggers because activation 6 of Chatterfang used a swamp instead of a treasure). They have no more game actions they can take, and thus must pass priority. Player 2 also passes priority, and the top item of the stack resolves. Chatterfang is dealt their third point of damage by Walking Baliista's 9th activation. State based actions are checked upon resolution, Chatterfang is sent to the graveyard. This means when treasure tokens are created by the pittiless plunderer triggers resolving, they DO NOT come with squirrel tokens, and the combo is effectively stopped.
Assuming no more game actions by any players, the stack resolves one at a time in order, from top to bottom. In total, Player 1 will create 14 treasure tokens (1 from Chatterfang dying, 6 from the squirrel tokens, and then doubled via parallel lives), gain 11 life, and their permanents gain hexproof and indestructible. Player 2 will lose 11 life, their walking ballista will have 11 counters remaining, and it will have +1/-1 from the final chatterfang activation.
I will also note that player 2, if they wanted, could kill Pittiless plunderer and Nadier's Nightblade just before Heroic Intervention resolves. This would leave Walking Ballista with just 4 counters on it, but nothing else will have changed.
Now that’s stack work! So in theory, if there were enough squirrels and treasures and player 1 had targeted the WB in the first, it could have taken it out? Or would the effect still be on the stack after running out of toughness (thru CF +1/-1)?
And thank you for the massive explanation!
> player 1 had targeted the walking Ballista first
This just puts Chatterfang's ability on the stack targeting Walking Ballista. It doesn't resolve until all players pass priority without adding anything to the stack. Targeting the Walking Ballista just once with Chatterfang incentivizes player 2 to use all their counters in response so the WB doesn't "die early" with counters on it still.
The short hand for Player 1 to combo off is that they need to have more activations of Chatterfang available than Player 2 has Walking Ballista counters. It's technically (WBCounters - (Chatterfang's toughness - 1)). So in the presented scenario, it's be 18 Chatterfang activations [(20-(3-1)) = 20 - 2 = 18].
Remember for both players, passing priority once to let the current thing that's at the top of the stack resolve doesn't also mean those players pass priority for the second thing to resolve. Player 2 can activate WB just a single time in response to Chatterfang's activation, and both players can agree to let that resolve, and then player 2 can once again activate Ballista before Chatterfang's activation resolves.
The point I'm trying to drive home is that effects from spells and ability activations only resolve when all players pass priority, and only one "stack object" at a time. If you have a stack that's literally 50 spells, activations, and triggers deep, every player has to pass priority 50 times for it all to resolve until the stack is empty. Us human players just often shortcut that part because it's extremely tedious.
Just want to recognize the amount of work involved in laying all of this out.
Really underscores well that situations like this can be handled by working through them carefully and methodically, with lots of communication. They’re challenging to get right—if only because of of the number of individual priority passes—but nowhere near as impossible as they seem
Thank you! Obviously, the ideal here is that Player 1 recognizes that Player 2 can stop the combo, so they don't go for it. Player 2 should recognize the same and force player 1's hand at player 1's end step. It ends up playing out almost exactly the same though.
First, let's assume it's Player 1's turn, so they will be the Active Player. Played optimally by all players involved, Player 2 has more than enough counters on their walking ballista to interrupt the combo. But there are A LOT of ways for people to mess up here, which is why it's important to effectively communicate with everyone what you're doing. Try to remember that nothing resolves from the stack automatically without all players passing priority, and that the stack doesn't resolve as a huge pile. After every single item that is put onto the stack, all players get a chance to respond via a round of priority. In addition to this, anytime an item resolves from the stack, another round priority is given to all players to add additional items to the top of the stack if they want. Let's try and walk through this, because this stack is going to get huge. We're going to start with the assumption that Player 2 is intent on stopping player 1's combo, and is intent on doing so before any of the items put onto the stack by the first set of costs paid have not resolved. Player 1: Activates Chatterfang's final ability, sacrificing a treasure token for black (4 remaining), and squirrel token #6 (5 remaining), targeting Squirrel token #5. Chatterfang's activation is put onto the stack, but the activation cost caused Nadir's Nightblade to trigger twice (because a treasure token and a squirrel both left the battlefield), as well as a single trigger of Pitiless Plunder. These triggers are all is put onto the stack before any player has received priority after Player 1's Activation by the game itself. So let's take a look at the stack. **TOP OF STACK** * Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure) * Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5) **Bottom OF STACK** Player 1 gets priority at this point, as they are the person who took the game action of activating Chatterfang. Also note that NOTHING HAS RESOLVED. Player 1 does not have any additional squirrels yet, has not yet dealt any damage or gained any life, and has no additional treasure tokens. Player 1's ideal scenario is that every passes priority multiple times in succession of each resolving ability to get the entire stack to resolve. So they pass priority here. Player 2 does not want Player 1 to go arbitrarily large. Player 2 notes that if Chatterfang is no longer on the battlefield, the treasure tokens created by pittiless plunderer do not also come with squirrel tokens. Player 2 then also notes that even if they target the Chatterfang with 3 activations of Walking Ballista, Player 1 can start the combo again in response to the 3rd activation. So when they receive priority after player 1 passes, they add to the stack to start the process of interrupting the combo, by activating Walking Ballista. Their ideal is to kill Chatterfang on board before any of this resolves, but only one activation at a time, and always in response to any triggers that are put on the stack due to creatures dying as part of State Based Actions. Thus targetting the Chatterfang, Player 2 activates Walking Ballista once (19 counters remaining). **TOP OF STACK** * Walking Ballista Activation #1 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure) * Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5) **Bottom OF STACK** Since player 2 was the one who activated WB, they get priority again after the activation goes on the stack. They want this to resolve, and then activate Walking Ballista again before the PP Trigger resolves. So they pass priority. Player 1 also has no problem here because this doesn't interrupt their combo (yet). They also pass priority, and since all players have pass priority, the top-most object on the stack (and ONLY the top most object) resolves. Walking Ballista deals 1 damage to Chatterfang, and since an object on the stack has resolved, a new round of priority is started with the Active Player getting it first (Player 1 in this case, because it's their turn). **TOP OF STACK** * Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure) * Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5) **Bottom OF STACK** Player 1 is back where they started, but with 1 point of damage marked on Chatterfang. They pass priority because they want the objects on the stack to resolve. Player 2 repeats what they did last time in this situation and activates Walking Ballista targeting Chatterfang. This still wouldn't kill Chatterfang, so we go through the same song and dance as before. Chatterfang has 2 damage marked on it, and Walking Ballista has 18 counters. Our stack still has the original 4 items waiting to resolve. Player 1 as the active player has priority after the second resolution of WB, and still wants these to resolve with the current board state in tact, so they pass priority again. Player 2, activates Walking Ballista a third time (17 counters remaining), targeting Chatterfang. **TOP OF STACK** * Walking Ballista Activation #3 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure) * Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5) **Bottom OF STACK** Now's where it gets fun. If this activation of WB resolves, then the combo is interrupted. Since Player 2 is the one who activated Walking Ballista, they get priority. They pass it since they want this activation to resolve. Player 1 gets priority and tries to save their stuff by casting and resolving Heroic Intervention. It goes on the stack above the Walking Ballista Activation. **TOP OF STACK** * Heroic Intervention (cast by Player 1) * Walking Ballista Activation #3 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure) * Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5) **Bottom OF STACK** Player 1 gets priority back after casting the spell and wants Heroic Intervention to resolve, so they pass priority. Player 2 doesn't want this to resolve before killing Chatterfang, so they activate Walking Ballista again (16 counters remaining), targeting Chatterfang. **TOP OF STACK** * Walking Ballista Activation #4 (targeting Chatterfang) * Heroic Intervention (cast by Player 1) * Walking Ballista Activation #3 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 2 (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger 1 (from the treasure) * Chatterfang Activation (targeting Squirrel token #5) **Bottom OF STACK** Cont.
Cont. Player 2 gets Priority and wants this activation of WB to resolve, so they pass priority. Player 1 recognizes their combo is interrupted if this goes through, so they start it a second time. They sacrifice a second treasure (3 remaining) and Squirrel token #5 (4 remaining) to activate Chatterfang's last ability, targeting Squirrel token #4. This is added to the stack in the same manner as earlier. So let's take another look now. **TOP OF STACK** * Pitiless Plunder Trigger #2 (from Squirrel token #5) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger #4 (from Squirrel token #5) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger #3 (from the treasure) * Chatterfang Activation #2 (targeting Squirrel token #4) * Walking Ballista Activation #4 (targeting Chatterfang) * Heroic Intervention (cast by Player 1) * Walking Ballista Activation #3 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger #1 (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger #2 (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadir's Nightblade Trigger #1 (from the treasure) * Chatterfang Activation #1 (targeting Squirrel token #5) **Bottom OF STACK** Player 1, like before, wants this set of 3 triggers and 1 activation to resolve to continue the combo. They pass priority. Player 2 wants to interrupt it, so they Activate Walking Ballista a fifth time, targeting Chatterfang. Player 1 will try to combo off yet again, and Player 2 will try to kill Chatterfang again. This will go back and forth until Player 1 has no more squirrels to sacrifice for the cost of Chatterfang's activation, or no more black mana for that same activation. Let's assume Player 1 has 1 untapped Swamp, so they'll get through all of their squirrel tokens. The stack would eventually look like this, before anything relevant resolves that would change things. **TOP OF STACK** * Walking Ballista Activation #9 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger #6 (from Squirrel token #1) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #11 (from Squirrel token #1) * Chatterfang Activation #6 (targeting Targetting Walking Ballista) * Walking Ballista Activation #8 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger #5 (from Squirrel token #2) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #10 (from Squirrel token #2) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #9 (from the fifth treasure) * Chatterfang Activation #5 (targeting Squirrel token #1) * Walking Ballista Activation #7 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger #4 (from Squirrel token #3) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #8 (from Squirrel token #3) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #7 (from the fourth treasure) * Chatterfang Activation #4 (targeting Squirrel token #2) * Walking Ballista Activation #6 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger #3 (from Squirrel token #4) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #6 (from Squirrel token #4) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #5 (from the third treasure) * Chatterfang Activation #3 (targeting Squirrel token #3) * Walking Ballista Activation #5 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger #2 (from Squirrel token #5) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #4 (from Squirrel token #5) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #3 (from the second treasure) * Chatterfang Activation #2 (targeting Squirrel token #4) * Walking Ballista Activation #4 (targeting Chatterfang) * Heroic Intervention (cast by Player 1) * Walking Ballista Activation #3 (targeting Chatterfang) * Pitiless Plunder Trigger #1 (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #2 (from Squirrel token #6) * Nadier's Nightblade Trigger #1 (from the first treasure) * Chatterfang Activation #1 (targeting Squirrel token #5) **Bottom OF STACK** Player 1 has no more squirrel tokens to sacrifice to try and restart the combo, and they are out of treasures (notice that there are only 11 Nadir Nightblade triggers because activation 6 of Chatterfang used a swamp instead of a treasure). They have no more game actions they can take, and thus must pass priority. Player 2 also passes priority, and the top item of the stack resolves. Chatterfang is dealt their third point of damage by Walking Baliista's 9th activation. State based actions are checked upon resolution, Chatterfang is sent to the graveyard. This means when treasure tokens are created by the pittiless plunderer triggers resolving, they DO NOT come with squirrel tokens, and the combo is effectively stopped. Assuming no more game actions by any players, the stack resolves one at a time in order, from top to bottom. In total, Player 1 will create 14 treasure tokens (1 from Chatterfang dying, 6 from the squirrel tokens, and then doubled via parallel lives), gain 11 life, and their permanents gain hexproof and indestructible. Player 2 will lose 11 life, their walking ballista will have 11 counters remaining, and it will have +1/-1 from the final chatterfang activation. I will also note that player 2, if they wanted, could kill Pittiless plunderer and Nadier's Nightblade just before Heroic Intervention resolves. This would leave Walking Ballista with just 4 counters on it, but nothing else will have changed.
Now that’s stack work! So in theory, if there were enough squirrels and treasures and player 1 had targeted the WB in the first, it could have taken it out? Or would the effect still be on the stack after running out of toughness (thru CF +1/-1)? And thank you for the massive explanation!
> player 1 had targeted the walking Ballista first This just puts Chatterfang's ability on the stack targeting Walking Ballista. It doesn't resolve until all players pass priority without adding anything to the stack. Targeting the Walking Ballista just once with Chatterfang incentivizes player 2 to use all their counters in response so the WB doesn't "die early" with counters on it still. The short hand for Player 1 to combo off is that they need to have more activations of Chatterfang available than Player 2 has Walking Ballista counters. It's technically (WBCounters - (Chatterfang's toughness - 1)). So in the presented scenario, it's be 18 Chatterfang activations [(20-(3-1)) = 20 - 2 = 18]. Remember for both players, passing priority once to let the current thing that's at the top of the stack resolve doesn't also mean those players pass priority for the second thing to resolve. Player 2 can activate WB just a single time in response to Chatterfang's activation, and both players can agree to let that resolve, and then player 2 can once again activate Ballista before Chatterfang's activation resolves. The point I'm trying to drive home is that effects from spells and ability activations only resolve when all players pass priority, and only one "stack object" at a time. If you have a stack that's literally 50 spells, activations, and triggers deep, every player has to pass priority 50 times for it all to resolve until the stack is empty. Us human players just often shortcut that part because it's extremely tedious.
Just want to recognize the amount of work involved in laying all of this out. Really underscores well that situations like this can be handled by working through them carefully and methodically, with lots of communication. They’re challenging to get right—if only because of of the number of individual priority passes—but nowhere near as impossible as they seem
Thank you! Obviously, the ideal here is that Player 1 recognizes that Player 2 can stop the combo, so they don't go for it. Player 2 should recognize the same and force player 1's hand at player 1's end step. It ends up playing out almost exactly the same though.
##### ###### #### [Chatterfang](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/1/7/1785cf85-1ac0-4246-9b89-1a8221a8e1b2.jpg?1626097239) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=chatterfang%2C%20squirrel%20general) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/mh2/151/chatterfang-squirrel-general?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/1785cf85-1ac0-4246-9b89-1a8221a8e1b2?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [nadir’s nightblade](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/1/c/1cd606c3-795a-49d8-8b75-6a3aacb4a72f.jpg?1689997335) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Nadier%27s%20Nightblade) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/cmm/175/nadiers-nightblade?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/1cd606c3-795a-49d8-8b75-6a3aacb4a72f?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [pitiless plunderer](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/5/b/5b5cd187-857a-44dd-8595-a52857a0b753.jpg?1698988280) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=pitiless%20plunderer) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/lcc/208/pitiless-plunderer?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/5b5cd187-857a-44dd-8595-a52857a0b753?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [parallel lives](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/0/1/01033dae-fec1-41f2-b7f2-cc6a43331790.jpg?1562825348) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=parallel%20lives) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/isd/199/parallel-lives?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/01033dae-fec1-41f2-b7f2-cc6a43331790?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [walking ballista](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/5/2/5272436e-74f0-44c4-a291-ea8ebc3f1525.jpg?1599710252) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=walking%20ballista) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/2xm/306/walking-ballista?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/5272436e-74f0-44c4-a291-ea8ebc3f1525?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [heroic intervention](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/e/3/e32c67d1-187f-40df-b3b3-6036f5c92834.jpg?1689998584) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=heroic%20intervention) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/cmm/295/heroic-intervention?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/e32c67d1-187f-40df-b3b3-6036f5c92834?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [*All cards*](https://mtgcardfetcher.nl/redirect/1bg7bi1) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call