Targets and Damage Allocation

A spell or activated or triggered ability can target without saying “choose.” “Kill a unit” targets a unit. “Kill a unit at a battlefield” still targets the unit; the battlefield is its location restriction. “Kill all units at a battlefield” instead chooses and targets the battlefield, not the automatically included units. If it says all units at battlefields, it selects that set automatically without targeting those units or a particular battlefield.

The actual rules also exclude objects mentioned only in costs, trigger conditions or replacement effects; choices in non-public game areas, such as a hand; choices assigned in whole or part to other players; and choices an instruction says a player must make. An ability can target its own source, the card or game object that created it, because they are separate objects, but a spell or ability cannot target itself. These distinctions decide whether targeting protection, Deflect or a targeting trigger applies.

A single legal option can still be a target. "Kill a unit at a battlefield" remains targeted even if only one unit is there. Automatic selection instead concerns instructions that never offer a choice.

"Ready your legend" has its own exception: it does not target, even if you now control several legends. Select one during resolution. "Ready a friendly legend" targets one when the item is finalized. "Kill a unit; its controller draws 2" targets the unit but determines its controller from that unit rather than making a separate target choice. Explicit "pick" choices also do not target. Only finalized spells and abilities can be targeted on the Chain.

For split damage, choose each target while completing the spell or ability’s play steps, called finalization. You may not choose more targets than the initial available damage: each must eventually receive at least 1. The amount assigned to each is chosen only at resolution. Each chosen unit is independently targeted for relevant costs and triggers.

With Alpha Strike and a friendly unit currently at 5 Might, choose that friendly unit and, for example, three legal enemy units at battlefields. You are not yet committed to splitting 5 as 3 + 1 + 1. Responses can change that friendly unit’s Might or the target units’ states. At resolution, check legality and the available amount, then make the legal split among the surviving chosen targets. You cannot add a new enemy target just because more damage became available.

Now use the fuller Alpha Strike case: your friendly damage-dealing unit began at 5 Might and you chose five enemy units. A response reduces that unit to 3 Might. You now have 3 damage and five targets. Choose which two cease to be targets so that the three remaining targets each receive 1. You cannot drop four targets to concentrate all 3 damage on the last one.

This special reduction allows only the necessary target removal when the amount cannot cover the original group. It does not reopen ordinary target choice. Costs already paid and targeting effects already triggered remain paid or triggered for the original choices. If some targets instead become illegal, apply the legality rules before allocating to those the effect can still affect.

A group requirement, such as total Might no greater than 4 at one battlefield, applies to the group as a whole. Choose a legal group during finalization. If responses make it fail that requirement, choose an eligible subset of the original targets at resolution; do not recruit new targets.

For the Core Rules’ Fox-Fire example, four chosen Recruits begin at 1 Might each. Two become 2 Might, making the total 6. A legal subset can be the two 2-Might units, or one 2-Might unit plus the two 1-Might units. Any location requirement still applies collectively. Units that moved to another battlefield can remain in an eligible original-target subset if the complete chosen subset meets the card’s requirements there. Targeting is not a license to ignore either the shared total or the required shared location.