Phyrexian Furnace questions

[Tobi]

Phyrexian Furnace
1, Artifact
: Remove the bottom card of target player's graveyard from the game.
,Sacrifice Phyrexian Furnace: Remove target card in a graveyard from the game and draw a card.
 


1st question:
Is it possible to activate Phyrexian Furnace (especially the second ability) when there are no cards in any graveyard? Do I get to draw a card?

2nd question:
Do I get to draw a card, if I activate the second ability and the targetted card is removed in response?

[Harlequin]

The answer is no in both cases.

In order to play a spell or ability you follow the following 3 basic steps in order:

1st - Anouce the Spell or Ability (and in the case of spells reveal the card).
2nd - Declare targets.
3rd - Pay the costs.

So your attempt to play the ability would fail when you could not target anything.


For the 2nd question, when a spell with one or more targets has NO legal targets when it resolves then it "countered upon resolution."   So the entire ability would be countered.

[parallax]

You can activate the first ability, but it won't do much.