Evergreen Abilities

Akroma has many evergreen abilities

As promised last time, today I look at evergreen abilities (not evergreen actions; perhaps I'll cover those next time). Such abilities are described by keywords. Let's start with some terms.

'Evergreen' is a term not mentioned in the official rules, but refers to something in the game (today, abilities) that is not specific to a set or block. It is now part of the game's basic principles and thus not defined on the card itself.

Ability can mean several things in the game, but today, I'm focused on static abilities. From the rules:

604.1. Static abilities do something all the time rather than being activated or triggered. They are written as statements, and they’re simply true.

Keywords: over the years, Magic has 'keyworded' more and more abilities, most of which are static abilities. Keywords helps the veteran and cleans up the cards but can confuse the newcomer. (I look briefly at this idea here.) Some of these keywords appear only in a specific set or block: they are thematic and tied to other aspects of the expansion(s) in question. But other keywords can (and do) appear across all types of Magic releases, be they core sets, expansions, special releases, and so on. Such keywords are evergreen.

Keywords specific to a set or block are generally defined in italics on the card itself, but evergreen keywords are usually not. Consider Bridled Bighorn:

This creature has one evergreen keyword (Vigilance), presented without explanation on the card. Players are expected to know it, because it has appeared for years in various Magic products. It has an activated ability (the next paragraph), and, finally, a set-specific keyword (Saddle). That one is explained with text in italics.

Some Magic cards define evergreen keywords (generally those core sets), but not most. And sometimes, one evergreen keyword on a card will be defined, but another won't. Griffin Sentinel, below, does not define Flying but does define Vigilance. When you see such things, it generally indicates the 'age' of the keyword: older ones (Flying, here, which has had a keyword since 1993) are less likely to be defined on the card, whereas newer ones (Vigilance, here, which got a keyword in 2004) might.

To date, there are 16 evergreen keywords that are abilities on creatures, most of which are covered in section 702 of the official rules. Below, quotes from said rules are in italics.

- Deathtouch (Any nonzero amount of combat damage assigned to a creature by a source with deathtouch is considered to be lethal damage)

- Defender (A creature with defender can’t attack.)

- Double strike (this creature assigns combat damage twice; see next entry )

- First strike (modifies the rules for the combat damage step; If at least one attacking or blocking creature has first strike or double strike as the combat damage step begins, the only creatures that assign combat damage in that step are those with first strike or double strike.)

- Flash (means “You may play this card any time you could cast an instant.”)

- Flying (A creature with flying can’t be blocked except by creatures with flying and/or reach.)

- Haste (If a creature has haste, it can attack even if it hasn’t been controlled by its controller continuously since their most recent turn began.)

- Hexproof (means “This permanent can’t be the target of spells or abilities your opponents control.”)

- Indestructible (A permanent with indestructible can’t be destroyed.)

- Lifelink (Damage dealt by a source with lifelink causes that source’s controller . . . to gain that much life)

- Menace (A creature with menace can’t be blocked except by two or more creatures.)

- Protection [from ____] (A permanent or player with protection [from ____] can’t be targeted by spells with the stated quality and can’t be targeted by abilities from a source with the stated quality.)

- Reach (A creature with reach can block creatures with flying.)

- Trample (The controller of an attacking creature with trample first assigns damage to the creature(s) blocking it. Once all those blocking creatures are assigned lethal damage, any excess damage is assigned . . . to the player, planeswalker, or battle the creature is attacking)

- Vigilance (Attacking doesn’t cause creatures with vigilance to tap.)

- Ward [cost] (“Whenever this permanent becomes the target of a spell or ability an opponent controls, counter that spell or ability unless that player pays [cost].”)

Those interested in learning Magic would do well to commit the definitions of these terms to memory.