The Game in Slow Motion
This page is current as of Comprehensive Rules April 2011. Please direct your feedback to: The Staff
Magic has a very tight timing system: at any given time, it's always perfectly clear which one player can take actions or announce choices, and everybody else must stay silent. We say that the player who's allowed to act has priority. Priority bounces back and forth as players sling spells or decline to do so, even though most of these passages are implied. However, for a full understanding of the game flow, it's useful for a fledging judge to slow down the pace of the game[1] and track priority as it's yielded around.
But there's more happening among the lines here. Triggered abilities and state-based actions fire off as players receive priority, roughly at the same time but with completely different behaviours. Countless occurrences of these events happen during each game, so it's crucial to master this part of the rules, even though - or perhaps "just because" - they're quick and transparent during game play, except when they aren't.
Footnotes
↑ In his mind, unless he likes to be abused by every other player involved in the game.
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