There’s a lot here, so let’s get to it. First, soulbond is actually two triggered abilities; the first triggers as the creature with it enters the battlefield, and states that you may pair it with another unpaired creature you control – more on that in a minute. The second states that whenever another creature enters the battlefield under your control, if the creature with soulbond is unpaired, you may pair it with the new creature. The main function of soulbond is this “pairing,” While it doesn’t technically do anything on its own, each soulbond creature comes with an ability that grants something to the paired creatures.
With me so far? Hope so, because here’s more:
- A creature can only ever be paired with one other creature.
- Pairing can be broken if one of the paired creatures leaves the battlefield for any reason, you lose control of one of the paired creatures, or one of the paired creatures stops being a creature for any reason.
- The two paired creatures still function individually, attacking and blocking on their own, each counting as their own target, and so on.
- Soulbond does not target, so even creatures with shroud can end up paired.
- If you have multiple possible pairings for a creature entering the battlefield, you don’t choose which it gets paired with until the trigger resolves.
- Abilities and bonuses granted by a pairing cease to apply the instant a pairing ends for any reason. Abilities that have been activated and are already on the stack remain unaffected.
- If two soulbond creatures get paired, they both get the abilities and bonuses granted by the other in addition to their own.
- Even if a paired soulbond creature loses soulbond, the pairing remains in place until it would be broken normally.
Okay, we did it. This one definitely confused people. Once you played with a bit, it made enough sense, but there’s a lot to remember here. So much so that its unlikely to return outside of supplemental sets. That said, there’s some powerful creatures that have soulbond, and the possibilities they present can still make some interesting things happen.
If you want to add Soulbond cards to your collection, head on over to cardkingdom.com!