About Bait Doll

[antilegend]

Bait Doll
(Labyrinth of Nightmare)
Force the activation of 1 face-down Trap Card. If the timing of the activation of the Trap Card is incorrect, negate the effect and destroy it. If it is not a Trap Card, it is returned to its original position. After this card is activated, it is placed into the Deck (not the Graveyard). Then shuffle the Deck.

1) If Bait Doll did not force the activation of a card (the card is chained, destroyed by MST, etc.), did it return to the deck?
2) You can activate Bait Doll on YOUR OWN trap card so you don't have to pay the cost, right? (e.g. Return from the Other Dimension)
3) If you activate Bait Doll on a face-up Trap card that is set previously in the same turn (e.g. Opponent's Trap set by Dust Turnado or you own Trap set previously), will it be considered "Incorrect Timing" and get destroyed?

Thx for the answers~

 

[chaosruler]

Any trap's timing is off if you just set it. You cannot legally (and henceforth, correctly) activate Traps during the turn they were set, without some outside effect, not Bait Doll. A card has to specifically state that you can activate Traps during the turn they were set, and Bait Doll solely checks to see if the timing for activation was correct. You can Bait Doll your own Trap, but the timing will be off since it couldn't be normally activated, regardless of other activation conditions.

-chaosruler

 

[OKShadow]

Would the only exceptions to those be Statue of the Wicked, Dark Coffin, Kozaky's Self-Destruct Button? THose effects do not activate until they are destroyed. Or are they considered face up at time of destruction?

 

[Inuzuka Kiba]

They're destroyed since they're effect activates in the graveyard. The timing is off technically since they're effect activates in the graveyard. So it's flipped face up, then it burns in Ha Des. (and effects activate, blah blah blah)

Edit: with Kozaky's self destruct buttion. Whoever activated Bait Doll on it would take 1000LP since they made it go to the graveyard. (You probably already knew that.)

 

[SPK]

So assuming that you have a Bait Doll in hand, and no cards left in your deck, can you activate Bait Doll on a f/d Spell card on your side of the field, the Spell card remains f/d on the field, and the Bait Doll will go back to the deck, preventing yourself from manually decking out, as you will only have to draw Bait Doll every turn from then on, and keep repeating this action?

 

[Inuzuka Kiba]

yea you can...until they activate Drop Off.....

it's more like this

Player A; Draws Bait Doll and activates it on an opponents m/t card. (Bait Doll is the only card in Player A's Deck)

Bait Doll would go back to Player A's Deck and he would draw it again when it is his/her turn.

Here's another yummy treat. What if there are no m/t cards on the field? Can you still activate Bait Doll? Or would it just fizzle and go to the graveyard?

I don't see anything as a cost of Bait Doll but, just to make sure......

 

[SPK]

I don't think you will, because according to the text of Bait Doll, it has to force the activation of one f/d Trap card. Thus I believe that if there are no f/d trap cards on the field, there would be no legal target for Bait Doll to activate in the first place.

Compare it to something like Snatch Steal (may not be the best example). Snatch Steal allows you to take control of a face-up monster on your opponent's side of the field. If there are no face-up monsters on their side of the field before you activate Snatch Steal, can you activate Snatch Steal in the first place?
Of course not!

 

[Maruno]

Of course you can't activate Bait Doll if there are no cards for it to target. You can't activate Fissure is there are no face-up monsters on your opponent's side of the field. You can't activate Axe of Despair if there are no face-up monsters on the field. You can't activate Brain Control if there are no face-up monsters on your opponent's side of the field. You can't activate Remove Trap if there are no face-up Trap Cards on the field. And so on.

 

[Raijinili]

I'm not talking about turning the card over I'm speaking of "using the effect". You can't activate the effect of Skull Lair and then choose not to remove any monsters. This would be analogous to paying 0 life points for WORL.
And Bark of Dark Ruler would have no effect if activated by Bait Doll and thus be destroyed. That is a simple timing issue and has nothing to do with paying the cost or not. I was speaking in game terms of not being able to "pay 0".

And neither card is relevant in Wall VS Bait Doll, which you yourself have just shown. Because neither can be FORCE-activated into a legal activation with a result that would matter.

You can't force Skull Lair to activate its effect, and you can't force Bark of Dark Ruler to activate in the Damage Step. So you just brought up two cards that have nothing to do with this discussion.

It wasn't clarified "as such". There is a ruling that it happens. You yourself said that only proved that you didn't pay and it didn't do anything so it had no bearing on whether other trap cards activated without cost would work (although the ruling on Skill Drain would suggest that it does.) A ruling to "clarify" would be to actually state the mechanics of Bait Doll and how it operated and that when it interacted with WORL it was "just weird". Thus actually explaining what would happen when Raigeki Break or Elemental Burst were activated by Bait Doll and why it works that way or if it does allow for the effect to work without the cost with normal traps.

WHAT ruling on Skill Drain?

Besides, how is it NOT clarified as a special case when they CAME OUT WITH A RULING ON IT?

Would the only exceptions to those be Statue of the Wicked, Dark Coffin, Kozaky's Self-Destruct Button? THose effects do not activate until they are destroyed. Or are they considered face up at time of destruction?

They are destroyed while face-up. Their effects do not activate.

 

[anthonyj]

I was referring to your comment that paying 0 was "fulfilling the cost". I simply was showing that the game does not count 0 as a payment amount. That was all. I'm not trying to force activate with Bait Doll, just showing that "PAYING 0" is NOT PAYING.

 

[Raijinili]

And I say that you have no proof that paying 0 does not fulfill the cost. I offer the alternate explanation that those effects can't activate paying 0 because you can't activate an effect to do nothing.

 

[Digital Jedi]

And I say that you have no proof that paying 0 does not fulfill the cost. I offer the alternate explanation that those effects can't activate paying 0 because you can't activate an effect to do nothing.

Um...both those statements are exactly the same thing said in two different ways. Where exactly are we going with this debate?

 

[anthonyj]

And I say that you have no proof that paying 0 does not fulfill the cost. I offer the alternate explanation that those effects can't activate paying 0 because you can't activate an effect to do nothing.

If your theory is correct then you should be able to activate WORL and pay 0 to have a Wall that will prevent 0 ATK monsters from attacking. That seems pretty implausible. I would love to get answers on Bait Doll from UDE but they don't seem able to answer. Beyond that we truly are just postulating theoretical answers for why the extremely limited amount of information they have given us could be correct while trying to make that agree with the OCG rulings. All I am saying is that we can't assume that the ruling on WORL is meant to be "ONLY" for WORL as far as not having to pay costs is concerned. Until we get an answer that other cards like Skill Drain are destroyed if the cost isn't paid and that only WORL is special because it is a unique case we have to go with the more likely answer that Bait Doll activates traps without having to pay the cost. Obviously if this disagrees with the OCG rulings then we will be getting some kind of retraction from Kevin (okay it is more likely that something obscure will be posted and UDE will act like they knew it the whole time and we were just not listening).

 

[daivahataka]

I don't think you will, because according to the text of Bait Doll, it has to force the activation of one f/d Trap card. Thus I believe that if there are no f/d trap cards on the field, there would be no legal target for Bait Doll to activate in the first place.

Compare it to something like Snatch Steal (may not be the best example). Snatch Steal allows you to take control of a face-up monster on your opponent's side of the field. If there are no face-up monsters on their side of the field before you activate Snatch Steal, can you activate Snatch Steal in the first place?
Of course not!

If the card is facedown the only info the game has on it is what zone it's in, as such it would be legal to activate it on the same spell card over and over since the game "forgets" that it's a spell and not a trap as soon as it is flipped back down.

 

[Raijinili]

Um...both those statements are exactly the same thing said in two different ways. Where exactly are we going with this debate?

Same result, different explanation.

If your theory is correct then you should be able to activate WORL and pay 0 to have a Wall that will prevent 0 ATK monsters from attacking.

Not at all. I also said that Wall can't usually pay 0 because if it did, it would have no effect. And you can't activate a card if it would have no effect (not counting negation).

All I am saying is that we can't assume that the ruling on WORL is meant to be "ONLY" for WORL as far as not having to pay costs is concerned.

No, we can't assume that for sure. But it is the most logical interpretation, because, as I stated before, I have rulings saying that it can't, and you have rulings not stating that it can't, but not stating that it can either. Unless you count WoRL. For which I already gave what I believe is a perfectly reasonable explanation.

 

[anthonyj]

No, we can't assume that for sure. But it is the most logical interpretation, because, as I stated before, I have rulings saying that it can't, and you have rulings not stating that it can't, but not stating that it can either. Unless you count WoRL. For which I already gave what I believe is a perfectly reasonable explanation.

But we do not have English rulings stating that it can't, and there are still a number of Japanese rulings that are contradictory to the rulings we have in English. For purposes of our game here we don't look at Japanese rulings. This is why it is so frustrating for UDE to let these types of questions just sit unanswered. The only rulings we have thus far point to Bait Doll allowing the trap card to be activated without cost, while this does not agree with the OCG rulings that isn't going to matter at all here as those are not "Official Rulings" to go by for our events.

This is one of those rare occassions when our rulings don't flat contradict an OCG ruling outright. That shouldn't mean we attempt to adhere to the Japanese rulings and just count this one ruling as a "special case". It is just a vague ruling without enough detail (wow never seen one of those before) that goes more to show that UDE and Konami think differently about this card. Unfortunately these types of differences in opinion seem to cause incredibly long delays in getting a final official ruling clarification.

 

[Raijinili]

But we do not have English rulings stating that it can't

Yes, I forgot about that one. Not only do you have rulings not stating that it can't, you don't have rulings stating that it can't.

Oh, except for that e-mail from Steve stating that it can't. But that doesn't count, because he didn't post it on the list. Right?

and there are still a number of Japanese rulings that are contradictory to the rulings we have in English

I recently found a log of a conversation between myself and Curtis Schultz in which I told him about the Fusilier Dragon VS Megamorph ruling in Japan, where his response was a laugh.

For purposes of our game here we don't look at Japanese rulings.

A perfectly reasonable and ignorant stance. Well, at least one of the two.

The only rulings we have thus far point to Bait Doll allowing the trap card to be activated without cost

They don't point to that. They barely imply that.

This is one of those rare occassions when our rulings don't flat contradict an OCG ruling outright.

Hold on. I never said anything about a Japanese ruling for Wall of Revealing Light VS Bait Doll.

That shouldn't mean we attempt to adhere to the Japanese rulings and just count this one ruling as a "special case".

I didn't say it was a special case for an individual card. I would say that if another permanent Trap card had a similar cost option, it would also stay on the field.

 

[DaGuyWitBluGlasses]

Not at all. I also said that Wall can't usually pay 0 because if it did, it would have no effect. And you can't activate a card if it would have no effect (not counting negation).

Not true:
Continuous Spells and Traps can be activated even if they have/will have no effect (unless they're targetting, etc..).

Take Toon World for example, Pay 1000 LP, and... umm nothing, no effect.

You can activate Type-Zero Magic crusher even if you have no spell cards in your hand, nor any possibilty of getting spell cards that turn.

Skull Lair can be activated when you have no monsters in your graveyard..

 

[Raijinili]

Skull Lair, Type 0 Magic Crusher, and the like have the effect of being on the field, ready for their effects to appear.

Toon World used to have an effect. Then they changed it.

Well, fine. To fit Toon World, it shall now be "would not have an effect unless it was meant not to have an effect anyway".

 

[anthonyj]

Yes, I forgot about that one. Not only do you have rulings not stating that it can't, you don't have rulings stating that it can't.

Oh, except for that e-mail from Steve stating that it can't. But that doesn't count, because he didn't post it on the list. Right?

Are you talking about this letter from Steve?

2 Follow-Up Questions:

1) So, if the controller did have the four required monsters, would Bait Doll force the activation?

2) Is the reason for it normally not having correct timing because of the text "...to activate this card..." (which is found on only the seven cards below), or is there some other reason?

Archfiend's Roar
Assault on GHQ
Battle-Scarred
Elemental Burst
Ninjitsu Art of Decoy
Rope of Life
Taunt

Answer:


1. If the activation requirement is met, then it should follow that "Bait Doll" would successfully force the activation of "Elemental Burst".

2. It's not so much that line of text, but rather the fact that Tributing the four monsters is a cost of activation. And if you cannot meet the activation cost of a card, it cannot be activated (but of course, you know that).

__________________
Steve Okegawa
Official UDE Netrép Rules Coordinator
Yu-Gi-Oh! TCG

The one that pretty plainly states that Bait Doll does activate traps without having to have the cost paid? Or are you referring to a different e-mail from Steve?

 

[anthonyj]

I recently found a log of a conversation between myself and Curtis Schultz in which I told him about the Fusilier Dragon VS Megamorph ruling in Japan, where his response was a laugh.

Well since they were incorrect about this all the way through the release of CRV it doesn't surprise me.