#for more mtg rants ask me why i hate blood moon

[dravidious]

There's this really janky card from way back in MTG's history called Ertai's Meddling

Nowadays, this wording just does not work within the rules, so its official text ("oracle text") has been updated to say this:

"X can't be 0.

Target spell's controller exiles it with X delay counters on it.

At the beginning of each of that player's upkeeps, if that card is exiled, remove a delay counter from it. If the card has no delay counters on it, the player puts it onto the stack as a copy of the original spell."

Much more modern and rules-friendly. However, on the card's official gatherer discussion page, there's one particular comment that is absolutely... Amazing? Infuriating? Dumb, let's go with dumb. You don't have to read all of it, mainly just the first three lines, but here it is:

There's a million ways to dissect this awful comment, discussions to be had about the history of the game's rules, and how tournament play works, and erratta, and that one time they forgot to print "until end of turn" on a spell, and the fact that nowhere on the original text does it actually specify that the spell doesn't resolve normally, but the funniest thing about the idea of "it stays on the stack" is that, even if you assume the card works exactly as written and does what it's supposed to...

Here's the rules regarding when you're allowed to cast a noninstant spell, straight from the comprehensive rules (important part in red):

117.1a A player may cast an instant spell any time they have priority. A player may cast a noninstant spell during their main phase any time they have priority and the stack is empty.

No matter how you look at Ertai's Meddling's text, it certainly doesn't create an exception to this rule, which means that, as written, no player can play noninstant spells while a spell is delayed with Ertai's Meddling. There's a similar rule for playing lands, so the game just kind of grinds to a halt. If you want to be SUPER literal about it, the game's turn structure can't even progress unless the stack is empty:

500.2. A phase or step in which players receive priority ends when the stack is empty and all players pass in succession.

So yeah. Go ahead and play with the printed text. Come up with all your clever combos and interactions that technically work. But just remember that when you play with technicalities, you play with ALL the technicalities.