Good answers define the flow of a game and set the standard for what threat cards are good enough to actually see play. Let's jump right in and see what the new Commander decks have to offer.
RESPECT MY AUTHORITAH! This card is reasonable. It is an expensive and slow removal spell that has a targeting restriction that I am not a big fan of, but this card does have some good things going for it. First, it exiles the target. This is a big step up, particularly when you think about how many more Indestructable Enchantment Creatures just got added to the format.Second, it has the potential for card advantage. Removing multiple choice threats or pieces of equipment is a big game. Should they so choose to kill one of your things and send it back to you then you get an opportunity to re-use it. This can get somewhat more complicated in multiplayer, but I would just say: don't play this in multiplayer...and what I really mean by that is: don't play multiplayer.
Third, if you lose the Act then their stuff doesn't just pop back into play like it does with Oblivion Ring-style effects. This means an opposing board sweep is less likely to result in you being even further behind. Lastly, this is a permanent. It can stay in play until you need it. You can sacrifice it to Annihilator triggers. You can bounce it to your hand. The promise of repeatable value is truly seductive. I have played much worse cards in the name of getting value.
Finally! Now I can build my own Darksteel Myr! I have been waiting so long. This isn't a horrible removal spell, but it isn't impressing me either. I'd pretty much always rather have Swords or a Swords substitute. For me to play a Sorcery speed removal spell that costs two mana it has to be basically infallible. This can pretty easily go wrong and loses hard to board sweepers. It also makes your opponents Artifact/Enchantment removal into ex post facto counterspells, which I am not a fan of.
UNEXPECTEDLY ABSURD?! Yes. No doubt about it. This is the most powerful card in the set by a landslide and this will go straight into Legacy. You want to crack your fetch land? Yea...just go ahead and shuffle your
Even when this works in the most 100% fair manner, you still trade cards 1 for 1 and get a reprieve from the most dominant threat on the board. This is particularly strong against planeswalkers because their value is both: quantized and time-sensitive. If the opponent ever tries to tutor, use search based ramp, or crack a fetch land though, then you have the straight up two mana instant speed Vindicate. It tucks Commanders. It embarrasses opponents. It wins games. Not joking here guys, get as many of these as you can.
Bruce Lee finally has a Magic card. I am down with this. I think this is a very sick update both in terms of modern gameplay and a hike in rarity. I will also add that, by having this, Guard Gomezoa, and Fog Bank in the Commander 2013 lists, new players can see how this niche style of creature evolved and gain an appreciation for the game's history and development.On its own, this card actually kills the things that attacks into it...so it is much better than previous iterations and basically every card with Defender. This can attack. This can suit up and I can dig that. Creatures with Defender serve no real purpose. Designers would tell you that you need to make it obvious to new players that this creature was optimized for use on defense.
However, not EVERYONE is a moron and the fact that this card has no power makes it virtually useless on offense unless it carries equipment...but given the fact that this is the one instance where you do really want to battle with him it will be obvious that you should. This is good design. The master and Spellskite are welcome to hang out in all my decks. Wall of Derp? You aren't invited.
This is a little discount over typical Wrath effects, but you make up for that cost in life. Mana becomes more available as the game goes on, while life typically goes the opposite direction. This means that the true cost and effectiveness of this card will vary widely based on when you draw it. It will be excellent at killing mana dorks and utility creatures early on, but 7-8 life is a much larger cost when your opponent can threaten lethal in just a few swings.Point of fact: a toxin is a harmful chemical substance that is produced by biological organisms, including for example, the bacteria that constitute a plague. However, it is not literally, a toxic deluge, but more of a deluge contaminated with potentially harmful bacteria. That might be knitpicking, but based on this art it looks like it is raining SPEARS so I don't even know what I should be thinking.
Alright, next up from the 'Ambi-turner' cards. This one is pretty sweet. It is almost always going to be ganking something for nothing which is a sick deal at four mana, even on a Sorcery. In 1v1 this is almost as good as Control Magic. In multiplayer this card is...Well. It is interesting isn't it? The net effect of your opponents trading around a bunch of creatures is going to be marginal in aggregate, but the specifics of the board state will decide both how complex and how beneficial this card can be.Flavor complaint: What does this card have to do with the planeswalkers, who are playing the game inside the game, choosing a successor. Long live... bad flavor?
This card is very tempting indeed and is probably the most powerful of this cycle, although that doesn't necessarily mean it is the best one to actually cast in a game. If something is worth copying, then having a bunch of copies of it on your side of the table is going to be a big game.What I said in the previous segment about being selfish is very important here. The consequences of each opponent getting a copy of the best threat on the board is very severe, particularly if one of those people has multiple copies. Thus, players will almost always choose to get a copy, lest they will immediately be behind on board. This leads to an interesting consequence of how effects are placed on the stack. Since all the copies enter the board as part of the resolution of this single spell, none of the resulting ETB triggers will be put onto the stack until ALL of the copies are in play.
At this point, the active player, which is most likely you since this is a Sorcery, puts ALL of their triggers on the stack in the order of their choice and has to announce all relevant targets at that time. Then it proceeds along to the next player in the turn order. Because of this Active Player -> Non-active Player order, the person immediately to your right gets the benefit of knowing about all of his opponents' choices before he has to make a decision AND his triggers will resolve FIRST. This is of course most relevant when copying variants of Nekrataal and Acidic Slime. Things will get very crazy if somebody has tricky tech like Faith's Reward.
What the what the double bubble butts? This is so much worse than Armageddon that I think I am going to cry. It only kills nonbasics which is already enough of a handicap for me to to not really want to play it. Ruination is fine, but far from unfair. This let's them find replacement lands and thins 3+ lands out of their deck. It is the only land destruction spell that I can think of that doesn't actually limit your opponents mana! This is just silly. I can't believe that they cut down 300 trees just to print this. A crying shame.Bonus: I am going to call this Tfis-pacs because it is just Scapshift in reverse. (which is much worse)
Why is everyone in your entire clan climbing the same mountain at the same time? That doesn't make a whole lot of practical sense. More importantly, if your entire extended family on back through the generations were mountain climbers why do you suck at it? Shouldn't you have trained or learned the ancient Chinese secret to sick climbing skills? At the very least, you should be aware of the risks.
It's like the creative team is a bunch of nerds who never go out and have no sense of the real word...but there is just no way that could be true...It is also a little confusing that they have chosen to make a Skifsang Sea and the Skyfang Mountains. Even though one exists on Zendikar and one on Innistrad, they could be a little more creative with their names.
Holy convoluted text box Batman! This is a new take on an unpopular style of Green card that has come up in the last 4-5 years. If they are going to kill your dude, you point this at it and try to leverage some value out of the situation.Curiously, the templating of this card allows you to select the same creature that just died, which doesn't seem like a reincarnation so much as a regeneration, but I am not complaining. Unlike, Autumn's Veil or Avoid Fate, this card allows you to retrigger ETB effects or upgrade to a better creature, which is probably worth the increase in cost. Three is a lot of mana to be wasting every turn, but in general, if your threat is worth buying insurance on, it will probably win the game if they can't ever kill it so...congrats! Victory is yours.
This card is very weird. It is worse than a spot removal spell because it leaves you at a disadvantage on cards. It is worse than something like Executioner's Capsule because it is much more expensive. AND it is worse than Oblivion Stone because it doesn't have the potential to save your board while damaging the opponents. I just don't understand the point. This is another one of those don't ever play it/ I can't figure out why they designed it cards. Fairness is overrated.Well, that is all of them. Pretty short article today. I hope you will join us next time, when we take a look at the remainder of the new cards from the Commander 2013 decks. Be sure to let us know how you feel about these cards and more in the comments.
-GG
Before I read it today, I thought Eye of Doom was actually going to be bonkers with Glissa T's in multiplayer because I thought each player was responsible for choosing a nonland permanent under their own control and putting a doom counter on it. This would have been way better.
ReplyDeleteI was trying to come up with a design for "everybody loses one thing, but their oponenents choose what it is" but the wording is tricky. letting people choose their own doomed thing probably isnt very effective, unless its repeatable, ie Savra. Maybe someday they'll figure it out. side note: doom counters are sweet. I want to see more of them.
ReplyDeleteI had a similar thought when I initially heard about the card. I hadn't yet seen it, but I assumed that it had an activated ability that worked something like: "{2}, {T}: Each player chooses a nonland permanent. Destroy those permanents." Th actual iteration is much less useful. Repeatability would have been very nice, and probably pretty fair as well. Any player could simply choose the Eye of Doom as a permanent to be destroyed if it was getting out of hand. That being said, at least it is a way to destroy Hexproof permanents, which are becoming an increasingly large problem.
ReplyDelete