Chains of Mephistopheles

[KDenz81]

This is an old confusing card that I ran into at a local tournament.  I read the card and I think I've got the jyst of what it does, but then I saw the official Oracle text and got even more confused.

Here is the card text and Oracle text.  Chains of Mephistopheles

This is how I understand this card to work.

For each card a player would draw beyond the first card of their turn, that player instead discards a card from there hand.  If that player can't discard a card from their hand, that player puts the top card of their library into their graveyard.

Do I have this right, this is probably one of the most confusing cards I've ever run into.
Denz

[Jacob Orlove]

Here's what chains does, assuming no other draw-replacement effects are around.

Every time you would draw a card, check: is this a draw phase? If yes, check: is this the first card I am drawing in this draw phase? If yes, just draw the card. Note that it does NOT need to be *your* draw phase.

If you answered "no" to one of those questions, check: do you have at least one card in your hand? If yes, discard a card, then draw your card. If no, mill for one. In other words, if you have at least one card in-hand, Chains turns regular draws into Compulsions.

Drawing multiple cards is just drawing one card several times in a row.

Multiple chains gets more complicated. Search the archives of this forum for some excellent summaries.

[KDenz81]

Huh, well you explained it in a way that's perfectly clear.  So, if I have out something along the lines of Underworld Dreams, Megrim, Chains, and Anvil of Bogardan, this is what would happen.

1: My opponent draws a card for the turn, takes a point from Dreams.
2: My opponent discards a card from being forced to draw an additional card from Anvil.  They take 2 from Megrim
3: My opponent then draws their card for Anvil and takes a point from Dreams.
4: My opponent discards a card from Anvil and takes 2 from Megirm

I'm considering building a deck around this if I have it figured out correctly.  Thanks a lot Orlove.

[Jacob Orlove]

Looks like you've got it down.