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[Donald X.]

The "problem", of course, is that they're fun...

That is how they came to exist. But today they'd all do the Necromancer trick and be just as fun too.

[chipperMDW]

Generally, card wordings refer to the "current state" of a card (itself or another), with minimal exceptions (I mentioned Ritual, Jeebus added Treasure Map).

From another thread:

Duplicate looks for a card costing up to $6 being gained, which didn't happen, so you can't use it.

I think that means this type of card (those that check the state of a card at the time their triggering event occurred) can also be added to this list of cards that look at the past.

[Jeebus]

Generally, card wordings refer to the "current state" of a card (itself or another), with minimal exceptions (I mentioned Ritual, Jeebus added Treasure Map).

From another thread:

Duplicate looks for a card costing up to $6 being gained, which didn't happen, so you can't use it.

I think that means this type of card (those that check the state of a card at the time their triggering event occurred) can also be added to this list of cards that look at the past.

I wouldn't go that far. Ritual, Treasure Map and Smugglers, as part of their play ability, look at a card that was trashed/gained and what its cost/name was then.

Duplicate, Groundskeeper, Academy, etc, are in another category. They only trigger when a specific kind of card is gained. They never look back at what a card was.

[chipperMDW]

Duplicate, Groundskeeper, Academy, etc, are in another category. They only trigger when a specific kind of card is gained. They never look back at what a card was.

But since an ability may not become available to trigger (indeed, may not even exist (e.g. with BoM)) until long after the triggering gain (as a result of other abilities triggered by that gain), checking the trigger condition at that point necessarily involves checking the gained card at the time of the gain, which is in the past. Right?

[Jeebus]

Duplicate, Groundskeeper, Academy, etc, are in another category. They only trigger when a specific kind of card is gained. They never look back at what a card was.

But since an ability may not become available to trigger (indeed, may not even exist (e.g. with BoM)) until long after the triggering gain (as a result of other abilities triggered by that gain), checking the trigger condition at that point necessarily involves checking the gained card at the time of the gain, which is in the past. Right?

Ok, I see what you mean. I don't actually think what you're describing is possible; I don't think it's possible to gain a card, and as a when-gain from that make a when-gain on another card be available. Remember that Innovation can only be used on the first card you gain. But nevertheless I get your point. The rule is that we keep checking triggers, so the trigger apparently has to look at what card was gained, not the card's current state.

Let's compare two simple scenarios:
1) We gain Band of Misfits and play it via Innovation as a Duplicate.
2) We gain Overlord and play it via Innovation as a Duplicate.
In (1), we may call Duplicate to gain a Duplicate. The trigger is gaining a card costing up to $6, which we did. Then we resolve it, and look at the current state of the card.
In (2), it doesn't trigger, since we didn't gain a card costing up to $6.

So yes, I agree that the triggers look at the past. It means that the triggering event never changes. If we gain an Overlord, that's the only triggering event we have for the whole when-gain window. It's still a bit different from Ritual, Treasure Map and Smugglers, because those cards specifically refer to cards in the past, while this is true for all triggers on all cards.