A weird conundrum with a Legendary rule issue.

[TheWarfox]

So, I've got a Preston, The Vanisher deck with Abdel Adrian, Gorion's Ward in it. Now, obviously a token copy of Abdel created by Preston would fall under the Legend rule and all but one of them would have to be sacrificed. That's not in question. The problem is, how long do they exist simultaneously.

For instance, the Legend rule states that they both exist long enough for their ETB abilities to happen, but do you resolve those ETBs before the Legends are sacrificed down to 1?

The reason I ask, is because if state-based actions cause you to sacrifice the copy before the ETB on the stack resolves, Abdel would exile his target permanents, but he would die/leave play before the ability resolves, resulting in exiling those permanents without being able to get them back.

If the sacrifice happens after the ETB resolves, then it would be a near-instant blink of the permanents that he exiled, and indeed he would be able to exile the original Abdel as well, causing a potential infinite loop.

Thoughts? I've got a judge friend trying to figure it out, but additional input would be helpful.

[Landale]

First of all, you do not sacrifice them, so nothing that cares about sacrifices will interact, they go straight to the graveyard.
The triggers will be queued, but not put onto the stack, then the state based action of getting rid of it will occur along with any other SBAs, and finally the trigger will enter the stack. Copy Abdel would permanently exile anything you chose with its ability and never bring them back.

704.3. Whenever a player would get priority (see rule 117, “Timing and Priority”), the game checks for any of the listed conditions for state-based actions, then performs all applicable state-based actions simultaneously as a single event. If any state-based actions are performed as a result of a check, the check is repeated; otherwise all triggered abilities that are waiting to be put on the stack are put on the stack, then the check is repeated. Once no more state-based actions have been performed as the result of a check and no triggered abilities are waiting to be put on the stack, the appropriate player gets priority. This process also occurs during the cleanup step (see rule 514), except that if no state-based actions are performed as the result of the step’s first check and no triggered abilities are waiting to be put on the stack, then no player gets priority and the step ends.
704.5. The state-based actions are as follows:
704.5j If two or more legendary permanents with the same name are controlled by the same player, that player chooses one of them, and the rest are put into their owners’ graveyards. This is called the “legend rule.”

[DDaniDMrt]

SBAs are very tricky forse me, thanks guys I learned something today. The queue thing is very interesting.
But I disagree on the trigger of the death abdel.
For me is like a conclave tribunal, not an oblivion ring. 
In the gatherer you read:
If Conclave Tribunal leaves the battlefield before its triggered ability resolves, the target permanent won't be exiled
Let me hear tour thoughts

[TheWarfox]

Forgive my inaccurate language(sacrifice), but thank you for finding the rule for me! <3

[TheWarfox]

SBAs are very tricky forse me, thanks guys I learned something today. The queue thing is very interesting.
But I disagree on the trigger of the death abdel.
For me is like a conclave tribunal, not an oblivion ring. 
In the gatherer you read:
If Conclave Tribunal leaves the battlefield before its triggered ability resolves, the target permanent won't be exiled
Let me hear tour thoughts

It does appear to me to read more like Conclave Tribunal than Oblivion Ring...

[Landale]

SBAs are very tricky forse me, thanks guys I learned something today. The queue thing is very interesting.
But I disagree on the trigger of the death abdel.
For me is like a conclave tribunal, not an oblivion ring. 
In the gatherer you read:
If Conclave Tribunal leaves the battlefield before its triggered ability resolves, the target permanent won't be exiled
Let me hear tour thoughts

Fair enough, I hadn't looked into exact rulings on the parts he was sure on just the ordering for SBA and ETB. You're very likely right that the ETB wouldn't actually accomplish anything.