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CardNexus · recorded on Aug 22, 2026
low €0.70 · trend €1.59 · Aug 22, 2026
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Take control of an enemy unit at a battlefield. Ready it. (Start a combat if other enemies are there. Otherwise, conquer.)
Lose control of that unit and recall it at end of turn. (Send it to base. This isn't a move.)
What happens when I play Hostile Takeover gaining control of my opponent’s ready unit, move it to base, and then play Temporal Breach choosing it? Where will the unit go?
The unit will remain in Banishment.
Units cannot be played to a base of a player other than their own controller under any circumstances. Because the owner of the unit is the one being instructed to play the unit, and the location they are being instructed to play it to is a base other than their own, it isn’t possible to play the unit. During the check legality step of finalization, the unit will be returned to banishment from the chain and all actions taken will be undone.
Q: If I use Hostile Takeover to take control of my opponent’s only unit at a battlefield, will there be a showdown? Will it be a combat?
You’ll start a noncombat showdown. (Hostile Takeover’s reminder text is a little misleading in this regard—you have to have some kind of showdown before you can conquer.) This ruling applies any time you have a unit at a battlefield when your opponent still controls that battlefield, but doesn’t have any units there. (Yes, that can happen. Hostile Takeover and Stormbringer are the easiest ways to do it.)
There’s a gap in the current rules that leaves this situation without an obvious outcome. We plan to address that gap in the next regular rules update. The issue is surprisingly complex, and we’re not 100% sure what the answer will be when we’re done.
In the meantime, though, we believe starting a noncombat showdown is the least disruptive way to handle this scenario. If you need really precise timing: assume that your opponent loses control of the battlefield in the same cleanup that begins the showdown, even though ordinarily control is “frozen” once the battlefield becomes contested.