How does Super Mega Death Rocket! work when?

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Accepted Answer

When you play Super Mega Death Rocket!, it deals 5 to a unit as the spell resolves. The card also has a triggered ability that reads “When you conquer, you may discard 1 to return this from your trash to your hand.” That line is a triggered ability tied to the Conquer event (see Conquer definition and Cleanup timing). When you actually Conquer a battlefield (which happens during the Cleanup after Establishing Control), that triggered ability can be placed on the chain; during finalization you may pay its discard cost to return the card from your Trash to your hand. [157] [464.1] [461.5] [323] [333] [FAQ:unleashed#2]

Play/resolve: When Super Mega Death Rocket! resolves as a spell, execute its text top-to-bottom, which in its first line is “Deal 5 to a unit.” That effect happens as part of the spell resolving [157]. Conquer trigger: The second line is a triggered ability that watches for you Conquering a Battlefield. Conquer is the scoring method that occurs when a player Establishes Control and gains Control of a Battlefield they have not yet scored this turn [464.1] [461.5]. Establishing Control and the resulting Conquer are handled during Cleanup tasks [323]. When that Conquer event occurs, the “When you conquer” ability may be added to the chain as a Pending Item per the normal triggered-ability process [333]. During the Finalize step for that triggered ability you may pay its cost (discard 1) to return Super Mega Death Rocket! from your Trash to your hand; if you don’t finalize it or cannot pay the cost, you do not get the return. Note: this explanation assumes the card is in your Trash at the time the triggered ability resolves and that spells can be returned from Trash by effects; see assumptions below. [157] [464.1] [461.5] [323] [333] [FAQ:unleashed#2]

You play Super Mega Death Rocket! and it starts a Chain as a normal spell would; finalize choices/costs and then resolve the spell. Its first line "Deal 5 to a unit" is executed when the spell Resolves [157] [340]. After the spell has finished resolving, normal game flow continues into whatever follows. (The provided core text does not explicitly state the post-resolution destination for spells; we assume it will be in its owner's Trash for the self-return ability to be relevant.) Sometime later, if you Establish Control of a Battlefield and thereby Conquer it (Conquer occurs when a player Establishes Control of a Battlefield they haven't scored this turn), that Conquer event happens as part of the Cleanup process [461.5] [464.1] [323]. When that Conquer event occurs, the "When you conquer" printed on Super Mega Death Rocket! is a triggered ability that may be added to the Chain as a Pending Item under the usual triggered-ability rules [333] [FAQ:unleashed#2]. During Finalize for that triggered ability you may pay the cost printed in the ability (discard 1). If you finalize and pay the cost, the effect portion of the triggered ability — "return this from your trash to your hand" — becomes a finalized chain item and will resolve in the normal order (newest-on-top) [FAQ:unleashed#2] [340]. If the card is in Trash at the time the effect resolves and you paid the cost, it is returned from your Trash to your hand as instructed. If it is not in Trash at that time or you cannot/won't pay the cost during finalization, the effect will not return the card.

If the Conquer occurs while a spell or ability is Resolving, Cleanups cannot occur during resolution; per rule text an event during resolution that qualifies for Cleanup becomes an Outstanding Task and is handled after resolution [321] [157]. That means the Conquer-created trigger will be handled in the subsequent Cleanup/triggering steps rather than mid-resolution [321]. If the triggered ability is added to the chain but its Finalize step is reached while the chain is otherwise not allowing Cleanups, the ability still follows the normal FEPR (Finalize/Execute/Pass/Resolve) process — see FAQ about splitting triggers and finalization choices [FAQ:unleashed#2]. If for some reason Super Mega Death Rocket! is not in your Trash when the Conquer trigger resolves (for example, it was removed from Trash earlier), the instruction to "return this from your trash" will fail to find the object in Trash and thus cannot return it. The provided core text does not give a replacement for a missing object in Trash. If you choose the 'may' option not to place the triggered ability on the chain (or you fail to finalize it by not paying discard), nothing happens and the card is not returned. The 'may' is the choice to place/pay as part of finalization per the FAQ on triggers [FAQ:unleashed#2].

Two distinct parts to Super Mega Death Rocket!:

1) The spell effect when you play it: The card's first instruction is a spell effect — "Deal 5 to a unit." When you successfully play the spell, you execute its rules text from top-to-bottom as the spell Resolves. That means the "Deal 5 to a unit" happens during the Resolve step for that chain item and fully finishes before other chain items resolve [157] [340].

2) The "When you conquer" line: The card also contains a triggered ability reading "When you conquer, you may discard 1 to return this from your trash to your hand." "Conquer" is the scoring outcome that occurs when a player Establishes Control of a Battlefield they haven't scored this turn, and Establishing Control/Conquer is handled in the Cleanup tasks (the Establish Control task and the note that Establishing Control results in a Conquer) [461.5] [464.1] [323].

When that Conquer event occurs, the printed "When you conquer" ability is a triggered ability that may be placed on the chain as a Pending Item per normal trigger/chain rules [333]. The official clarification on triggered ability sequencing explains that triggered abilities are split into the condition and the effect; once the condition is met and you choose to put the trigger on the chain it becomes a Pending Item and is queued for Finalize, where you'll make choices and pay costs (in this case the "may discard 1") before the effect becomes a finalized chain item that can resolve [FAQ:unleashed#2]. If you pay the discard cost during Finalize, then the effect to return "this from your trash to your hand" is what will resolve (subject to the normal newest-on-top chain resolution rules) [340].

Important practical notes and the assumptions made here: The Core Rules excerpt you provided does not explicitly state that spells go to Trash after resolving nor does it include a rule explicitly stating whether printed triggered abilities on non-permanents in Trash can be used while the card is in Trash. For the ability to return "this from your trash" in the normal way, the card must be in your Trash at the time the effect resolves. This ruling therefore assumes that a resolved spell will be in Trash and that the printed triggered ability can be observed/placed on the chain when its trigger occurs while the card is in Trash. If your game session has an explicit rule that spells do not go to Trash after resolving or that triggered abilities on cards in Trash cannot trigger, that would change the result; that rule is not present in the provided context.

In short: Play the spell to deal 5. Later, when you Conquer, the second line can trigger; during Finalize you may discard 1 to return the card from your Trash to your hand — assuming the card is actually in your Trash at that time and the game allows the trigger from Trash. [157] [333] [461] [464.1] [323] [FAQ:unleashed#2]