The stack and priority, explained for Commander players

Sooner or later someone at the table says "in response," and the game suddenly feels like it has rules nobody told you about. It does, but there are only two ideas to learn: the stack, which holds things waiting to happen, and priority, which decides who is allowed to act. Once those click, counterspells, removal in response, and piles of triggers all make sense. This guide explains both, with rule numbers from the official Comprehensive Rules for anyone who wants to check.

What the stack is

The stack is a shared zone where spells and abilities wait before they take effect. When you cast a spell, the card goes onto the stack. It hasn't done anything yet. It only does what it says when it resolves.

New things always go on top (rule 405.2), and the top item is always the next one to resolve (405.5). That's last in, first out, like a stack of plates: the last plate you put down is the first one you pick up. So if you respond to a spell, your response happens first.

What uses the stack

• Spells. Every spell you cast, from instants to creatures. (Lands aren't cast, so they never use the stack; see below.)
• Activated abilities. Anything written as "cost: effect," like equip, or ", {T}, Sacrifice: draw a card."
• Triggered abilities. Anything that starts with "when," "whenever" or "at." They trigger automatically and go on the stack the next time a player would get priority (603.3).

What doesn't use the stack

These happen immediately, so nobody can respond to them (405.6):

• Mana abilities. Tapping a land or a mana rock for mana (605.3b). You can't respond to someone tapping a Forest.
• Special actions (rule 116), most importantly playing a land (116.2a) and turning a face-down creature face up (116.2b), such as a morph or a manifested card.
• Static abilities, like "creatures you control get +1/+1." They just apply.
• State-based actions, the game's automatic checks: a player at 0 life loses, a creature with lethal damage dies, and so on (704).
• Turn-based actions, like untapping and drawing your card for the turn.

What priority is

Priority is permission to act. Only the player who has priority can cast a spell or activate an ability. Here is how it moves, in plain terms:

1. At the start of most steps and phases, the active player (the player whose turn it is) gets priority first (117.3a).
2. A player with priority can cast a spell, activate an ability, or pass. If you do something, you get priority again afterward (117.3c), so you can keep acting.
3. When you pass, priority goes to the next player in turn order (117.3d), around the table.
4. When every player passes in succession, with nobody doing anything in between, the top item of the stack resolves. If the stack is already empty, the step or phase ends (117.4).
5. After something resolves, the active player gets priority again (117.3b), and the cycle starts over.

The key phrase is "in succession." If three players pass and the fourth casts a spell, everyone has to pass again before anything resolves. In a four-player game, that means all four people get a chance to answer every single spell.

Responding

When you cast a spell or activate an ability while something else is on the stack, you are acting in response to it (117.7). Yours resolves first. That's the whole trick behind "in response": you get to change the situation before the other thing happens.

Some common responses:

• Removing a creature in response to an Aura or Equipment being put on it.
• Sacrificing a creature in response to removal, so you get value from it first.
• Giving a creature indestructible or hexproof in response to removal.
• Countering a spell. A counterspell only works this way, because it has to target a spell that's still on the stack.

Timing: instants, sorceries and everything else

• Instants, and spells with flash, can be cast any time you have priority (117.1a), including on other players' turns and in response to things.
• Sorceries and other non-instant spells (creatures, artifacts, enchantments, planeswalkers) can only be cast during your own main phase, while the stack is empty (307.1, 117.1a). People call this "sorcery speed."
• Activated abilities can be used any time you have priority (117.1b), unless the card says otherwise. Equip, for example, is sorcery speed.
• Playing a land is allowed only in your main phase, with an empty stack, once per turn by default (116.2a).

When players get priority

Players get priority in almost every step: upkeep, draw, both main phases, every combat step, and the end step. There are two exceptions:

• Untap step: no player ever gets priority (117.3a). Nothing can be cast while you untap.
• Cleanup step: normally nobody gets priority (514.3). It only happens if something triggers or a state-based action occurs during cleanup.

This is why "at the beginning of your upkeep" is the earliest you can act in your own turn, and why the end step is the last normal chance to cast instants before the next player's turn.

Triggers in multiplayer: APNAP order

Often several abilities trigger at the same moment, and they can belong to different players. The rules sort them with APNAP order: Active Player, then NonActive Players in turn order (101.4).

When multiple abilities have triggered, the active player puts all of their triggers on the stack first, in any order they choose. Then the next player in turn order does the same, and so on around the table (603.3b).

Because the stack is last in, first out, this has a surprising result: the active player's triggers resolve last. The player sitting just before the active player (the last one in turn order) puts theirs on top, so theirs resolve first.

Split second

A spell with split second can't be responded to with spells or non-mana activated abilities while it's on the stack (702.61a). Krosan Grip is the classic example: you can't sacrifice or protect your artifact in response.

Split second doesn't stop everything, though (702.61b). Players can still activate mana abilities and take special actions, and triggered abilities still trigger and go on the stack.

Counterspells

A counterspell targets a spell on the stack and removes it. The countered spell doesn't resolve, none of its effects happen, and the card goes to its owner's graveyard (701.6a).

A few points that come up in Commander:

• Counterspell, Negate and similar cards counter spells, not abilities. To counter a triggered or activated ability you need a card that says so, like Stifle.
• If your commander is countered, it goes to the graveyard, and you may move it to the command zone (903.9a). It was still cast, so the next cast from the command zone costs more (903.8).
• You can counter a counterspell. That's how a "counterspell war" starts (see example 3).

Fizzling: when every target is gone

When a spell or ability tries to resolve, it first checks its targets. If all of its targets have become illegal, it doesn't resolve at all. A spell goes to the graveyard and nothing happens (608.2b). Players call this "fizzling."

A target can become illegal by leaving the battlefield, gaining hexproof or protection, or no longer matching what the spell can target. If a spell has several targets and only some are illegal, it still resolves and simply does nothing to the illegal ones.

Three worked examples

Example 1: removal in response to an Aura

Ana casts Rancor on her creature. Ben has Swords to Plowshares.

1. Ana casts Rancor targeting her creature. Rancor is on the stack. Ana gets priority and passes.
2. Ben gets priority and casts Swords to Plowshares targeting the same creature. The stack, top first: Swords, then Rancor.
3. Everyone passes in succession. Swords resolves: the creature is exiled, and Ana gains life equal to its power.
4. Ana, the active player, gets priority. Everyone passes again, and Rancor tries to resolve. Its only target is gone, so it doesn't resolve and goes to the graveyard.

The detail that matters: Rancor's "return it to its owner's hand" ability only works when it goes to the graveyard from the battlefield. Since it went to the graveyard from the stack, it's gone for good.

If Ana had a protection spell like Tamiyo's Safekeeping, she could have cast it in response to Swords in step 2. Then the stack would be Safekeeping, Swords, Rancor. Safekeeping resolves first and gives the creature hexproof, Swords fizzles, and Rancor resolves.

Example 2: two players' triggers at once

It's Ana's turn, with Ben, Cleo and Dev after her in turn order. Ana controls Midnight Reaper and one other nontoken creature. Cleo controls Blood Artist. Ana is at 4 life. She casts Wrath of God, and all three creatures die at the same time.

1. Midnight Reaper triggers twice, once for each nontoken creature Ana controlled, including itself. Blood Artist triggers three times, once for each creature that died, including itself.
2. APNAP order: Ana puts her two Reaper triggers on the stack first. Ben and Dev have none. Cleo puts her three Blood Artist triggers on top, targeting Ana.
3. Cleo's triggers resolve first. Ana loses 3 life, down to 1.
4. The first Reaper trigger resolves. Ana takes 1 damage and draws a card. She's at 0 life, and the game checks state-based actions before anyone gets priority, so Ana loses before the second trigger can resolve.

If the order were reversed, Ana would have drawn both cards before losing. Being the active player meant her triggers went on the stack first and resolved last.

Example 3: a counterspell war

Ana, Ben, Cleo and Dev sit in that order. It's Ana's turn.

1. Ana casts a big sorcery. She gets priority and passes.
2. Ben casts Counterspell targeting it. Ben gets priority and passes. Cleo and Dev pass.
3. Priority comes back around to Ana. Since not everyone passed in succession after Ben's spell, nothing has resolved yet. Ana casts Negate targeting Counterspell, which is a noncreature spell.
4. Ana passes, Ben passes, and Cleo casts Arcane Denial targeting Negate. The stack, top first: Arcane Denial, Negate, Counterspell, Ana's sorcery.
5. Everyone passes. Arcane Denial resolves and counters Negate. As Arcane Denial says, Ana may draw up to two cards at the beginning of the next turn's upkeep, and Cleo draws one.
6. Ana gets priority again. If nobody adds anything, Counterspell resolves and counters Ana's sorcery.

Anyone can join in at any point, as long as they have priority. And each new spell restarts the round of passing.

Common misconceptions

• "I respond to your land drop." You can't. Playing a land doesn't use the stack. You can respond to a landfall trigger it causes.
• "You can't respond to a trigger." You can. Triggered abilities use the stack, so players can act before they resolve.
• "I tap my lands in response." Tapping for mana is a mana ability and doesn't use the stack, so it isn't a response. Mana also empties between steps, so floating it early rarely helps.
• "I'll cast a creature in response so it can block." Only creatures with flash can be cast outside your main phase. A flash creature can block if it's on the battlefield before blockers are declared, for example cast during the declare attackers step. Summoning sickness doesn't stop blocking. Once blockers are declared, it's too late. See Combat in Commander.
• "The stack resolves all at once." It resolves one item at a time, and everyone gets priority again between items. You can respond to the second item after seeing the first one resolve.
• "The removal still kills it after the creature gets hexproof." No. If its only target became illegal, the removal fizzles.

How this works in the Podtable game

In a real game, passing priority out loud for every spell would take forever. The Podtable game handles it for you, with controls for when you want to act.

• Auto-pass. When you can't do anything, the game passes priority for you automatically.
• ✋ Hold priority. Turn this on to keep priority while your own spell or ability is on the stack, so you can respond to it yourself, for example by casting a second spell before the first one resolves.
• 🎛 Full control. Stops at every step for the rest of the turn, so you never miss a window.
• Wait. When the game is about to auto-pass, the Wait button stops it so you can respond.
• Phase stops. On the phase bar, choose which steps the game stops at for you, such as an opponent's end step if you like casting instants there.
• Seeing what others do. Opponents' spells are shown large for a moment when they're cast, and a spell that targets you gets a red Targets you tag.
• The stack. The stack is shown top-first: the item at the top is the next one to resolve.

Quick reference

Question	Answer
Which item resolves next?	The top one, the last added
Who gets priority first in a step?	The active player
Who gets priority after something resolves?	The active player
When does the top item resolve?	When all players pass in succession
Do mana abilities use the stack?	No
Does playing a land use the stack?	No
Do triggers use the stack?	Yes
Whose triggers resolve first?	The last player in APNAP order; the active player's resolve last
Priority in untap or cleanup?	Never in untap; normally not in cleanup

Next: Combat in Commander puts these timing rules to work, Threat assessment and politics helps you decide what's worth responding to, and How to play Commander covers the format's basics.