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How do Marvels Told/Voices of Malice interact with Witch-King of Angmar?
CoE Digest #111 incorrectly ruled that a player can play Marvels Told/Voices of Malice (hereafter referred to as MT/VOM) in response to Witch-King of Angmar (hereafter referred to as the Witch-king) being tapped to become a long-event, effectively targeting the Witch-king and canceling its effect:
The problem with this digest is that despite being a long-event, TWK behaves like any other Nazgul, per CRF 4:QUERY 1
The question has arisen whether the previous understanding of the interaction of Marvels Told & Voices of Malice with Witch-king of Angmar is correct. In light of Digest #110 ruling on the interaction of Nazgûl events and certain event-cancelers, we are making the following ruling:
If the Witch-king of Angmar is tapped in response to the play of Marvels Told or Voices of Malice, then it will resolve before MT/VoM and thus be unaffected by them. If, by contrast, MT/VoM is played in response to the tapping of the Witch-king of Angmar, then MT/VoM will resolve first, and discard (and thereby cancel, since it has not resolved yet) the event.
Note that Ancient Secrets does not work in the same way because it can only target permanent-events.
And the CRF for the Witch-king of Angmar confirms that he behaves the same way (“just like other Nazgul”, although admittedly it is a bit less specific here):CRF, Nazgul: If a Nazgûl is tapped to become a short-event as printed on its card, it turns into a short-event upon declaration. At this point, the Nazgûl is a short-event just as if had been played as such from your hand.
In other words, a Nazgul is no longer in play once it is tapped to become an event; it actually “becomes” the event for all intents and purposes “as if had been played as such from your hand,” and therefore it is no longer in play at the time that MT/VoM would be playable; at that point, it is a declared-but-not-yet-resolved long-event, which means it cannot be targeted and discarded by cards that target and/or discard cards in play, specifically MT/VoM. And once the Witch-king long-event resolves, it is immediately discarded anyway with its effect active.Although he becomes a long-event when tapped, he is discarded when the effect resolves just like other Nazgûl. The long-event effect will remain until the appropriate time.
Since The Witch-King is discarded when the effect resolves, there’s no time for the resource player to play MT/VoM and discard it. It's not possible to play MT/VoM in response to its declaration because it is still not in play, either. But this is best explained with some examples, assuming that the Witch-king is already in play as a permanent-event in each case.
Scenario 1:
Declarations:
Player A plays MT, targeting the Witch-king.
Player B taps the Witch-king in response.
Resolution:
The Witch-king resolves, and according to the CRF entry, it is discarded immediately after resolution with its effect still remaining.
MT loses its target and thus is negated and discarded.
Scenario 2:
Declarations:
Player B taps the Witch-king to use his ability (and the Witch-king immediately turns into a long-event as if it was played from hand).
Player A wants to play MT targeting the Witch-king, but it’s not a permanent-event at this point; it’s a long-event being treated as if it was just played from hand, and thus it cannot be targeted by MT (which targets cards in play). In order to discard the Witch-king using MT, Player A should wait for the Witch-king long-event to resolve, but the CRF specifies that it’s discarded at that point. There isn’t any way for Player A to respond to Player B’s declaration with MT.
Resolution:
The Witch-king resolves, turning all Shadow-holds into Dark-holds, and then is immediately discarded.
The bottom line is that the Witch-king works just like the other tapped Nazgul when it comes to MT/VoM; the Nazgul always “wins” (assuming that its player hasn’t exceeded the hazard limit once it resolves, of course). But note that cards like In the Name of Mordor and Praise to Elbereth would work against the Witch-king because they both cancel and discard Nazgul events.
Note that this overturns CoE Digest #111 Q1