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I'm currently watching Avatar: the Last Air Bender and the general says to prince Zuko.

Si te queda una pizca de lealtad, deberias decirme todo lo que sabes.

This sentence construction is to my understanding a

si + present tense + conditional tense

which according to Lawlessspanish cannot be done.

  1. The verb combinations are very strict. In a conditional sentence, the present tense cannot be paired with the conditional, or the future with the imperfect. So it’s vital to memorize these verb pairings.

Is lawless spanish incorrect?
Is this tense pair colloquial?

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3
  • That is just bad translation.
    – Lambie
    Commented May 26 at 22:27
  • The sentence in Spanish makes sense. The issue is that it is an advice more than a conditional sentence.
    – R18
    Commented May 27 at 8:46
  • That advice from Lawlessspanish doesn't work for me, or at least, how my brain works. I almost never memorize anything. I usually learn by example how things should be and a complete abstract thing born there. In the case of languages, I just start to feel if a sentence I'm building is correct or not, but I'm not trying to apply memorized rules to them. So, for me, thats bad advice. Maybe other brains work different.
    – jachguate ♦
    Commented May 31 at 21:00

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2

This sentence:

(1) Si te queda una pizca de lealtad, deberías decirme todo lo que sabes.

is perfect in Spanish.

It differs from:

(2) Si te quedara una pizca de lealtad, deberías decirme todo lo que sabes.

in that in (1) it is a fact that the person is supposed to have some sense of loyalty left, while in (2) it is improbable.

The same difference applies in English:

  • If you have some loyalty left, you should tell me...

  • If you had some loyalty left, you should tell me...

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