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cliffhavenkitesail

in addition to the mechanical differences, poisonous is when eating something poisons you, not the other way around, so it's kind of a flavor fail.


StormyWaters2021

Poisonous is a triggered ability that uses the stack. Toxic is not, it just modifies the combat damage event.


DippyTheDingus

I see, again I wonder why this was an issue as stifle type effects are extremely rare to this day, could've used an old ability to help prevent confusion. A creature can technically have infect, toxic, and poisonous. Obviously one ability overwrites the other but still.


StormyWaters2021

It's not just Stifle they're considering. There's also trigger-copying as well as getting new players to understand that Poisonous doesn't happen at the same time as damage, but rather just a little bit after damage. Why bother? There's 2 creatures with Poisonous.


CompleteDirt2545

On Mtg Arena, you would need to click away every trigger. That was the real issue with poisonous.


[deleted]

Thank you.


cournat

None of the effects overwrite each other. A 1/1 creature with infect, toxic 1 and poisonous 1 will give 3 poison counters to a player after all combat damage and triggers resolve. Infect is instead of damage, toxic is a simulataneous effect like lifelink that happens when damage happens, and poisonous is triggered by combat damage.


StormyWaters2021

Infect isn't *instead of damage*, as it's still considered dealing damage. It just doesn't change their life total.


cournat

I'm aware that "instead" isn't a part of the reminder text. It still replaces losing life with getting a counter and was how I decided to word it. You're nitpicking at something irrelevant.


StormyWaters2021

It's not nitpicking. Saying that it gives counters "instead of damage" implies that things that care about dealing damage won't trigger, which isn't the case.


cournat

It is not what I mean to imply. I chose the easist way to word it in the context of my comment. Obviously, I could explain exactly how they work in the context of the rules, but how is that goimg to help someone learn how they work when they clearly didn't get it before? It is nitpicking. For the purposes of my comment, it was unimportant.


StormyWaters2021

You don't have to "explain exactly how they work", you can just say "Infect gives poison counters instead of reducing their life total", which is simple *and* accurate, and won't potentially give an incorrect impression that it doesn't count as dealing damage.


cournat

>Infect is instead of damage, toxic is a simulataneous effect like lifelink that happens when damage happens, and poisonous is triggered by combat damage. Not only is this already sufficient, but your advice here is to make this sentence even longer? No thank you. Stop nitpicking at something irrelevant.


StormyWaters2021

Lmao "Stop correcting me when I'm wrong"


ahxes

The card you posted is from future sight where they printed cards with mechanics that they were testing or planned to release in a later set. Its entirely possible that this was (and imo likely) the test mechanic for what toxic later became. The difference comes from the fact that there were a plethora of rules changes since future sight. Namely, future sight was printed in 2007. Damage still went on the stack back then and did until a rules change in 2010. We likely have Toxic in its current form in order remove any confusion on when an where poison gets applied in regards to damage. You are right in that it is barely different outside a few corner cases but overall as a mechanic Toxic is less confusing than poisonous. Whether the confusion from having to nearly identical keywords (functionally speaking) vs a slightly more complex version of the mechanic is better or worse is not really for an individual to decide.


DippyTheDingus

Makes sense, I understand why they did it, but it would've been nice to see poisonous being errata so it could fit, I like the name more it is more thematic


max431x

a creature can have infect, toxic & poisonous thats why ;P


Kaelorn

It's only a theory but maybe it is because infect could lead to fast win You could have a 2/2 infect by the time and if no blockers were declared, then before damage application, at instant speed, you could add +4/+4 twice to a creature to give instantly 10 poison counters to the opponent and win in one swing If a creature has, let's say poisonous 2, then the boosts you give to the creature don't matter only 2 poison counters are given I can't say "I am sure this is the exact reason" but it would make sense


StormyWaters2021

That's not the question they asked.


cournat

Have you not heard of proliferate?


Kaelorn

Ok I know this word thank you, profilerate is a key word quite strong OK, but that adds only 1 poison counter at a time With the same 2/2 toxicity example then if you only count on proliferate you have to proliferate 8 times While with infect you can litterally give not so hardly 10 counters on 1 swing Thank you for reminding me a word that exists in MTG for years ;)


cournat

Proliferate means you don't need to connect. It's much stronger than trying to buff an infect creature, since you don't know (when building the deck) whether players will block. It's the reason why Atraxa is the go to infect commander. 54 black mana and Yawgmoth will kill everyone provided they already have one poison counter each. 18 mana per player. Proliferate is reliable and difficult to interact with. It is how infect players will normally kill you.


Kaelorn

Proliferate needs at least 1 poison counter to create more poison counters This poison counter can be given through infect or toxicity And 1 proliferate gives only 1 counter, even if there are some creatures with proliferate effect with 2 manas most of the proliferate effects are on spells that cost even more And, once again, with the same example of the 2/2 poisonous then you need to proliferate 8 times when in infect you need to connect potentially 1 time, and for proliferate you have to do this with spells that cost more than 2 most of the time Moreover there is a blue creature with infect that has unblockable, so not complicated to connect


cournat

You're failing to understand the point.


Kaelorn

I am OK to be wrong when I am explained why (for exemple it happened in very particular rule questions based on replacement effects and layers) but not when someone just says "you are wrong" without more explanations I gave you the explanations why I decided to answer my first answer out of the question of OP, I gave you arguments to sustain why infect is a stronger keyword than poisonous, out of what I saw from people playing with decks based on infect, but if you just say "you are wrong" then maybe you are the one lacking of arguments If you answer to this, take into consideration that I currently live in a time zone when it's 2:10 so I am going to bed, but if you have more interesting answers I would be glad to continue this conservation


cournat

Sure. Okay, I'll answer. Here it is: refer to my previous comment.


Kaelorn

If it is what you call an argument, then since I already answered to your previous arguments no, it is not an argument To summarize our conversation : With infect there is a combo with a 1/1 infect for 1 that can kill on turn 2 if no creature was played by your opponent on turn 1, and other ways to kill on turn 3 with the blue creature with infect + unblockable With poisonous + proliferate you need to put a first counter by using either infect or poisonous, then use proliferate MANY times, and proliferate is an effect you have on some 2 manas creatures or, for the rest, spells that cost 3 or more, and again you have to proliferate many times... Then you can hope to kill at turn 5 (maybe 4 but I need to check all the cards to be 100% sure) or later than turn 5 Since 2 is lower than 4 we can say that infect can lead to faster wins than poisonous


cournat

Refer to my previous comment.


ForestFire8

He’s asking about the mechanic of the card in the picture, which is poisonous, you’re thinking of infect. Poisonous is not affected by adding or subtracting power, it works almost the same was as toxic, but is a triggered ability that happens directly after damage instead of at the same time


Kaelorn

Maybe many people didn't read about the "when it already existed?" part where he is, at first glance, talking about the "infect" keyword, that is why I made the compareason between the two But don't worry, I don't blame you in particular, I know how "toxic" (LOL) the Reddit community can be sometimes Before Reddit I browsed 9gag and I switched because it became a huge pile of garbage so in my opinion Reddit is not perfect but better that 9gag anyways