Does Paying Life Count as "Loss" of Life?

[netherspirit]

I'd like to know whether paying life counts as loss of life. I've never been given a clear answer on this, and I would like to know as I've just noticed the interaction between Yawgmoth's Bargain and Transcendence.

For those who don't know, here are the cards:

Transcendence
3WWW
Enchantment
You don't lose the game for having 0 or less life.
When you have 20 or more life, you lose the game.
Whenever you lose life, you gain 2 life for each 1 life you lost. (Damage dealt to you causes you to lose life.)

and

Yawgmoth's Bargain
4BB
Enchantment
Skip your draw step.
Pay 1 life: Draw a card.

Does this allow you to drop inifinitely below zero and keep drawing? Or do you die to Transcendence? I'm in a real pickle here!

Thanks guys!

  netherspirit

[Toad]

Transcendance will trigger each time you activate Yawgmoth's Bargain. Nevertheless, you cannot get down to infinite negative life, or even -1 life, since Magic does not allow you to pay with something you do not have. You cannot Bargain below 0.

[Clariax]

Losing life means any time your life total goes from some number to some lower number, how this happens being damage, paying life, or even some effect like biorythm doesn't matter, it's still losing life.

As mentioned, you cannot pay something you don't have.  If you're at -10 life (it is possible to get that low into the negatives, just not by paying life), you have no life with which to pay.  This is no different than being unable to pay something that costs mana when you have no mana in your pool.

In the case of yawgmoth's bargain and transcendence transcendence will always limit the number of cards you can draw (assuming you don't remove it from play at a timely point) because the "you gain 2 life for each 1 life you lost" trigger will always go on the stack on top of the "draw a card" ability.  Any time some trigger triggers off the playing of a spell or activated ability, the trigger will always go on the stack on top of the spell/activated ability that triggers it.

The best you can do is either continue putting the ability on the stack and simply win the game at some point while you're at 18 or 19 with some number of "gain 2 life" triggers (and "draw a card" activations) still on the stack, or remove the transcendence somehow in that same situation so that it's no longer in play when your life goes above 20.  Unless your library is very small though, the only way to draw all of it involves still having multiple "draw a card" activations on the stack after you no longer have cards left, meaning, again, you need to still win with all thsoe abilities on the stack.

[netherspirit]

Thanks for clearing that up for me guys!