Locations
Two weeks ago, I began my quest to find the most accurate set reviewers for Rise of the Eldrazi. As multiple people pointed out in the comments (and what I mentioned myself in the article), my methods weren't perfect. I've taken the criticisms to heart, and I am making a number of changes.
The first and easiest change to implement is the way I score the two financial experts, Ben Bleiweiss and Jonathan Medina. It was clear from the beginning that cards like Eldrazi Conscription, while lower in price now than they were at the prerelease, had a large time frame in which they were hot commodities. If the author said to pick them up while they were cheap, he obviously intended for you to sell them when they peaked, and not hold on to them until after rotation. I knew all this last time, but didn't know where to find the data required to accurately assess the price change, so I went with what I had. Now, thanks to numerous commenters, I know about BlackLotusProject.com, and will use their prices to come up with some fairer scores. Here are the cards I went over last week (minus commons and bulk uncommons), and the updated scores for Mr. Medina and Mr. Bleiweiss. The plus or minus before their names indicates a hit or a miss, respectively.
Starting Price (April 25, 2010, three days after release): 12.05
Peak Price: 12.24
+Jonathan Medina: "Pick these up."
-Ben Bleiweiss: "Down."
Starting Price: 3.95
Peak Price: 5.12
-JM: "Trade em."
+BB: "Up."
Starting Price: 1.47
Peak Price: 3.31
JM: N/A – Unlike last time, I'm not going to score either way when a guy doesn't comment.
+BB: "Up."
Starting Price: 0.52
Peak Price: 1.73
JM: N/A
+BB: "Stable."
Starting Price: 1.20
Peak Price: 2.46
+JM: Pick up (implied).
-BB: "Down."
Starting Price: 5.81
Peak Price: Starting price (dropped like a rock before rising back to 3.50 in mid-November)
-JM: "Pick these up."
-BB: "Up."
Starting Price: 9.52
Peak Price: Starting price (crashed down to $5 in the summer months, stabilized in the high sevens in November)
-JM: "Pick these up."
-BB: "Stable."
Starting Price: 31.68
Peak Price: 42.07
+JM: Pick up (implied)
-BB: "Down."
Starting Price: 0.62
Peak Price: 1.47
JM: N/A
+BB: Pick up
Starting Price: 7.67
Peak Price: 13.41
+JM: "Pick these up."
-BB: "Stable."
Starting Price: 8.80
Peak Price: Starting price (dropped below $4 in August, then spiked to $6.74 at the end of October)
JM: "Keep an eye on this one." Can't mark him up or down for that.
+BB: "Down."
Starting Price: 0.68
Peak Price: 1.15
JM: N/A
-BB: "Stable."
Starting Price: 6.05
Peak Price: Starting price (this one just fell and fell all through summer, eventually climbing back up to – and stabilizing at – 3.67 in November)
-JM: "Pick these up."
-BB: "Stable."
Starting Price: 7.11
Peak Price: 8.14 (the card actually fluctuated wildly, going through the same dip that all of these cards went through in the summer, and then peaking when Eldrazi Green became popular)
-JM: "Trade em."
-BB: "Stable."
Starting Price: 20.34
Peak Price: 33.99
+JM: "Pick these up."
-BB: "I'm not sure that the ceiling for Vengevine is much higher than the $25 range."
Starting Price: 1.26
Peak Price: 1.53
+JM: "Get foils."
+BB: Pick up
New tallies for Part One:
Jonathan Medina: 6 hits, 5 misses. Batting average: .545
Ben Bleiweiss: 6 hits, 10 misses. Batting average: .375
Since I'm not marking down for failure to mention a card, Mr. Medina has an advantage – he could talk about only the more obvious cards, while Mr. Bleiweiss had to comment on each and every one, meaning he was more likely to miss. Imagine that Jon could pick which pitchers he wanted to bat against, while Ben had to face every pitcher in the league. Still, I feel pretty good about these results, as Ben missed some big ones that Jon hit (Vengevine, Gideon, Dragonlord).
As a wrap up to the financial part of this article, I'll run down the rest of the cards Jon talked about with the same approach as above.
Starting Price: 12.72
Peak Price: Starting price (fell quickly, only came back up to $8)
-JM: "Pick these up."
+BB: "Down."
Starting Price: 2.22
Peak Price: Starting price (ended up at $1.52)
+JM: "Trade em."
+BB: "Down."
Starting Price: 1.03
Peak Price: Starting price (fell, crawled up to $0.79, fell again)
+JM: "Trade em."
-BB: "Stable." While it did briefly come within a quarter of the starting price, the fluctuating price and eventual bulk-rare status means I can't reasonably say the price was stable.
Starting Price: 2.73
Peak Price: Starting Price (after the initial crash, it only recovered to about $1.50)
+JM: "Trade em."
-BB: "Stable."
Starting Price: 3.65
Peak Price: Starting price (actually hit $0.60 before stabilizing at a buck fifty, where it is now)
-JM: "Pick these up."
-BB: "Stable."
Starting Price: 4.04
Peak Price: 4.10 (held around $4 for the first couple months, then the summer dip, then back to $3.50)
+JM: "Pick these up." Hard to mark as correct, but there was a tiny profit to be made if you traded them away in the first few weeks, and if you didn't, it still maintained most of its value.
-BB: "Down."
Starting Price: 0.32
Peak Price: 0.64
+JM: "Pick these up."
+BB: "Stable."
Starting Price: 1.16
Peak Price: Starting price (Immediately fell to $0.50, where it remains today)
-JM: "Pick these up, if it turns out bad, then blame Kelly [Reid]." KELLY!!!
+BB: "Down."
Starting Price: 0.42
Peak Price: 0.52
+JM: "Pick these up."
+BB: "Stable."
Starting Price: 0.76
Peak Price: 0.83
-JM: "Trade em." If I'm going to mark him right for making you six cents, losing you seven cents has to be marked wrong. It's like the penny stock market.
+BB: "Up."
Starting Price: 4.72
Peak Price: Starting price (gradually dropped to a buck)
+JM: "Trade em."
-BB: "Stable, or up a little."
Starting Price: 3.52
Peak Price: Starting price (fell off a cliff, danced around the $1.25 mark, now a hair over $1)
+JM: "Trade em."
+BB: "Down."
Starting Price: 5.19
Peak Price: Starting price (I'm so sorry if you invested in these - $0.50 now)
-JM: "This will see play in all formats… Pick these up."
-BB: "Stablish."
Starting Price: 11.79
Peak Price: 15.17 (the month of June was good to Sarkhan, but July saw his swift decline to $6, where he basically is today)
+JM: "Pick these up."
-BB: "Stable."
Totals:
Jonathan Medina: 15 Hits, 10 Misses. Batting Average: .600
Ben Bleiweiss: 13 Hits, 17 Misses. Batting Average: .433
Jon maintains his lead, which I'm happy about, given that he was right about Momentous Fall – the second biggest flop in the set next to Realms Uncharted.
Ahh, all those numbers and pluses and minuses were fun weren't they? So simple, so clean, so objective. Now, we have the little matter of the overall set reviewers, where every statement is qualified, every attempted measurement completely subjective.
And that's the thing – my opinion on whether or not a reviewer's prediction was correct or incorrect is subjective. I'm not a Constructed expert, nor a Pro Tour Historian who remembers every decklist. I'm just a guy who reads Magic articles for hours every day. I follow tournament coverage regularly, but my memory isn't perfect (though I will do research if I'm not sure about a card). I play in MTGO queues nearly every day, but only Standard and limited, so my knowledge of older formats is entirely derived from second-hand information (I.E. results, articles).
Still, I'll own up to the fact that I made numerous mistakes in my last article. The first was leading you, the reader, astray regarding the purpose of the series. I wanted a strong, captivating opening, so I spoke brazenly about calling people out and the necessity of a watch dog that monitors the internet for errors in judgment (to paraphrase). Those were my words, but not my intentions. Really, I just wanted to look back at our first impressions in the same way one flips through their high school year book: "I can't believe Maria wrote that!" "Look at how stupid Doug's hair was!" "Did I really think Tuktuk was the love of my life?"
In other words, this should be a fun way to see how much things have changed, and appreciate the people who tend to deviate from the general murmur of the hype machine. At the same time, we get to discover hidden gems that never really found a place in constructed, and poke fun at people who were enamored with crappy cards.
To that end, I'm doing away with the color-coding, the "No Mentions" (good riddance!), and the scoring. I'm not going to go card-by-card and list who said what, but rather touch on the greatest hits from each writer. In this way, they are still held accountable for the erroneous statements they may have made, but I make fewer judgment calls which might make me look like an idiot. I'll still cover the history of the card in constructed and make comments about the reviews, but you can decide for yourself whether the authors were ultimately correct or incorrect.
This also allows us to include authors who may not have written official set reviews, but instead just gave their thoughts on a few cards in the context of a different article. My last article makes the importance of this clear - it was unfair to classify Mr. Chapin's early thoughts as a "set review", and then hold him to the same standard as the others.
With all that out of the way, here are the writers' thoughts on the cards I didn't get to last time.
Adrian Sullivan
Sphinx-Bone Wand: "[O]ne of those cards that might see play in a heavy card-draw deck. Unwieldy, it could provide Mono-Red a potential answer to Kor Firewalker, but it's more likely use is in a deck that is heavy on the Blue. Most likely it won't be strong enough to make the cut in a format with Maelstrom Pulse, but it is right on that cusp."
No Pulse in the format, and yet no pulse in the old Bone Wand - unbelievable, no? There are simply far better cards to be playing when you have seven mana.
Sarkhan the Mad: "Sarkhan the Mad seems like an incredibly potent addition to Jund, both increasing its reach with its Ultimate ability, or simply grinding a game out or upgrading sprouts or other outclassed creatures into ridiculously potent ones."
Bingo. This is exactly the role Sarkhan played in Standard, at least up until some black/red Vampires lists started playing him as a one- or two-of.
Arrogant Bloodlord: "Maybe I'm wrong, but I'm pretty sure a 4/4 for 3 with virtually no drawback is worth it. For Black, this is a pretty significant body, and the little beasts that might try to stop it are certainly something a Black deck will have the tools to mop up."
Efficient almost-vanilla creatures aren't what they used to be. Bloodlord missed his chance at glory when Vampire Nocturnus rotated out, causing Vampires to morph into the pseudo-combo sac-fest it is today.
Consume the Meek: "Simply awesome. Even if Smotherstorm doesn't kill everything, it kills such a huge swathe of things, it might nearly single-handedly wreck certain strategies in Extended. Knight of the Reliquary is still great, but it just got a whole heck of a lot worse."
The control decks in Extended can play Volcanic Fallout thanks to the excellent mana fixing in the format, and even if they couldn't, a turn-five Wrath probably wouldn't cut it against the most aggressive decks.
Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief: "Drana has the potentially [sic] to be a great control card."
In general, the finisher of a control deck needs to do one of two things: immediately stabilize the board (Baneslayer Angel, Frost Titan), or ensure eventual victory while being very resilient (Millstone, Sphinx of Jwar Isle). If the win condition is easily destroyed before it gets a chance to stabilize the board, you should look elsewhere. I think that last part is where Drana lives.
Narcolepsy: "For a Blue-based deck, Narcolepsy is basically a Pacifism. And that can be all you need."
Props to Adrian for nailing this Block Constructed sideboard all-star.
Guard Duty: "For a control deck, this card is basically creature removal. A great option for some decks."
..and slops for saying nearly the same thing about this card, which is in a color with much better removal, and as such saw no play. Someday my beloved Kor Spiritdancer deck will rise to dominance, but not yet. Not yet, my love.
Sphinx of Magosi: "Definitely a great creature. While it isn't untargettable like the Jwar Isle variety, it still outclasses it in the head-to-head. There are plenty of times when untargettable isn't the thing you need to win the game."
Clearly Mr. Sullivan is no Ms. Cleo, or he would have foreseen the coming of the Titans, which made every other six-drop creature irrelevant (except Wurmcoil).
Lightmine Field: "This one will be absolutely seen in some White-based control decks, and threatens to detooth many aggressive strategies."
I really liked this card when it was spoiled, and I still play it in some Commander decks. It may be too narrow and expensive for serious play, however. Remember this if a token deck becomes popular.
Ancient Stirrings: "I think that this card could be a real card for an Eldrazi Green (real Eldrazi, not just a deck with Monuments) or other similar deck."
Ancient Stirrings never lived up to its potential. You'd think, being in the middle of an Artifact block, it would see some play. If a combo deck revolving around Artifacts starts to coalesce, this could be the best card selection spell to find your pieces.
Boar Umbra: "While this card isn't Moldervine Cloak or Elephant Guide, there are times when it is simply better than either. Both of those cards absolutely saw a goodly amount of play, and Boar Umbra will as well."
You hear that Kor Spiritdancer? Somebody else believes in you too!
Realms Uncharted: "Yes, it is no Gifts Ungiven. But I love instant card draw for Green, even if it is just getting me land."
I wonder if this would have been playable in Standard had Cultivate not been printed. Probably not - Cultivate trades in instant speed and non-basics for an extra land drop, which is entirely reasonable as long as Life from the Loam doesn't get reprinted.
Luis Scott-Vargas
Deathless Angel: 2.5 "Some Blue-White tapout decks play Sphinx of Jwar Isle in addition to Baneslayer, and as a one or two-of I can see Deathless Angel taking that slot."
Perhaps another victim of the absurdity of the Titans, but I don't think Deathless Angel really had a shot anyways. Jace bounces her to be countered later, Journey takes her down quick and easy, and she's slow as molasses against the aggressive decks.
Hyena Umbra: 2.5 "I foresee being annoyed by Umbra'ed up Kor Firewalkers or the like…I am excited myself about casting it on Knight of the Reliquary."
Nary a mention about you, Spiritwalker, but that's okay. You're my little secret. Seriously though, a number of things kept Hyena Umbra out of competitive play, many of which I'll cover later in the article. For starters, I really want to play my creature-saving spells with Doomblade already on the stack, not the other way around.
Kor Spiritwalker: 1.0 "Relying only on Auras is a good way to fill your deck with situational and underpowered cards, and Kor Spiritdancer doesn't do enough to mitigate that."
Yet! But seriously, successful Enchantress decks relied on cheap, mana-generating enchantments to tear through their decks in a hurry. Until Wild Growth gets reprinted alongside Exploration, Spiritwalker and its ilk will remain disappointments to deckbuilders who share my fondness for janky card-drawing engines.
Transcendant Master: 2.0 "Yes, if you blindly spend all your mana you could get wrecked by a timely Bolt, so just be smart about it and I think the Master will be decent."
Mid-range guys like this have to be really special to find a home in Standard these days (see also: Leatherback Baloth, Mul Daya Channelers). Where fat three-and-four drops really come in handy is in stopping the all-out aggro decks, but this one just eats a Bolt while they continue the assault.
Domestication: 2.0 "I don't think this will replace Mind Control in most decks that are looking for the effect, but I don't want to completely write off any Control Magic variant, since they have been almost universally played."
Luis was pretty spot-on here. Domestication saw some fringe sideboard play, but was largely outclassed by the less narrow – and more expensive – Control Magic's.
Sphinx of Magosi: 2.5 "The power level on this card is really high, but so is the competition. It beats Baneslayer in a fight, which is a definite advantage."
I didn't remember that there was this much love for the flying lion. Hey, it also beats Primeval Titan in a fight if you pump it! Then you die to Valakut triggers.
Unified Will: 2.0 "Block Constructed might give this a home, since there is no Negate, but I don't think it will show up in Standard."
I loved Ben Hayes' green-blue Vengevine deck that dominated in San Juan (10-0!) , so I just had to point out that LSV saw it coming. I don't think we're finished with Unified Will yet. Traditionally, in control-heavy metagames, a good aggro-control deck ala Fish can become quite strong. In that scenario, Unified Will really shines.
Consume the Meek: 2.5 "I don't think this is that great, since a lot of its uses seem borderline at best."
Consume the Meek is definitely more narrow than most people thought upon first seeing the card. Think about the Standard into which it was released: Bloodbraid, Thrinax, Baneslayers, Vengevines – not an environment in which it could thrive. Note that this card has the same rating as Sphinx of Magosi and Hyena Umbra.
Drana, Kalastria Bloodchief: 2.5 "Eating a creature every turn is nothing to scoff at, and I wouldn't be surprised if she shows up as a 1 or 2-of in some Vampires decks."
After getting destroyed by this card in team drafts roughly eight kabillion times, I can honestly say I thought she had a chance in Standard too. Same with the next guy:
Gruul Draz Assassin: 2.5 "The Assassin might be more of a sideboard card against decks that can't kill him very easily, but even so he seems like a potent one."
Ah, the mythical aggro deck that can't deal with permanents. Many, many cards are falsely speculated about because they dominate the board if they stick around a few turns. Unfortunately, only Elf decks and White Weenie decks that skimp on the Journeys fill that metagame niche, and those hardly show up in huge numbers.
Inquisition of Kozilek: 2.0 "I don't want to call this unplayable, because it clearly has merit, but I am not overly impressed."
On the one hand, I'm glad Inquisition is seeing play these days. I've always liked Duress-style cards, after all, and I tend to root for the underdog – which this card has been since the day it was spoiled. On the other hand, I also thought this card was quite bad, and said as much to anyone who had the gall to disagree with me. According to Standard and Extended, I was wrong (but so was LSV!).
Pawn of Ulamog: 2.0 "There are a bunch of tier 2 tools ready to assemble the mythical Bloodghast sacrifice deck, and I suppose this would be one of them."
LSV had that Bloodghast deck in his sites from the second he saw Bloodthrone Vampire. Nice work.
Emrakul's Hatcher: 2.0 "If feels like there are a lot of speculative cards in this set, with the Spawn cards reminding me of the Bloodghast / sacrifice cards. I think the Spawn cards are more likely to see play, with Hatcher being one of them."
Apparently, he also had the sick green/red spawn deck in his sites from day one. Not so nice work.
Vendetta: 2.5 "One mana removal is always nice… It won't see a lot of play, but it will see some play."
As far as I know, it hasn't seen any play, though it is a pretty sick way to deal with a turn one Joraga Treespeaker if you don't happen to play Lightning Bolt.
Magmaw: 1.0 "I always think of this card being said in Dr. Evil's voice, and that is about the most interesting thing about it."
Good luck ever reading a Magmaw the same way again.
Splinter Twin: 2.0 "Now you can EOT Pestermite them, then untap and play this for the kill, which is vastly better than having to pay five for Kiki."
For reference, see the sideboards of the Pyromancer's Ascension decks from the Extended portion of Worlds. I find the 2.0 rating appropriate, considering the combo is tucked into the corner of a Tier 2 (for now) Extended deck. Now, if Myr Galvanizer combo takes off, maybe with the help of…
Ancient Stirring: 2.5 "This is another card that really only fits well into the Eldrazi Ramp deck, but in that deck it seems awesome. Being able to grab a land, a huge monster, or All is Dust makes Ancient Stirrings almost on par with Impulse, which is a good place to be."
This card seems to have made quite a stir.
Definitely reading too much LSV.
Momentous Fall: 2.0 "Greater Good saw a good amount of play, and this isn't that much worse…So many cards in this set just fold to Jund, and I greatly look forward to the day when I can re-evaluate everything that Blightning made unplayable."
I guess it's time for re-evaluation then. I think the fact that you sacrifice as a cost makes this card too much of a liability against counters, and if you have a guy fat enough to be worth sacrificing against aggro decks, you're probably better off just blocking with it and not running a situational card like Momentous Fall. It's kind of like Consume the Meek: in your head, you see all these great scenarios where you blow out your opponent; but when you actually play with it, those situations almost never come up.
Mul Daya Channelers: 1.0 "So, let me get this straight. I need to be playing a deck that is almost all creatures and lands, not spells, and I don't really get to choose if I get a beater or a mana ramp? I think I'll pass."
Kudos for calling this card unplayable when many others were hyping it up. I always saw the Channelers as a much worse Leatherback Baloth.
Tajuru Preserver: 1.0
He apparently missed the fact that All is Dust would be critical against creature decks in Block, and the Preserver was key in beating that card.
Sarkhan the Mad: 2.0 "One Sarkhan could be spicy, but I'm not sold that he will be good enough."
He didn't light the world on fire, but he was critical in the Jund mirror for a month or two. Is that a hit or a miss? Times like these, I'm glad I'm not keeping score.
Cedric Phillips
Cedric did a pretty good job reviewing his own work here. Let's see how things look with five more months of hindsight.
Deathless Angel: Underrated. "Deathless Angel really looks quite underwhelming but when you take into account that it is gigantic, hard to kill, and can survive any mass removal your White deck would be casting, it's hard for me to believe this card won't be good."
Some people chose to disregard Path to Exile, Journey to Nowhere, and Oblivion Ring in their assessment of Deathless Angel. She may be deathless, but she's not against taking a vacation now and then.
Hyena Umbra: Underrated. "I am of the opinion that Totem armor is a very good ability, so I think Hyena Umbra is a very good card. If you are familiar with my 18 land White Weenie deck, then you know how good a fit Hyena Umbra is in the deck."
It's a chicken-and-egg scenario. Was it the fact that white weenie was bad that made the Umbra unplayable, or was the Umbra bad to begin with? I just know that the number of slots a creature deck has for non-creature spells is very limited, and between Brave the Elements, Elspeth, Knight-Errant, Path to Exile, and equipment, white weenie was full to bursting when the Hyenas got to the party.
Survival Cache: Unsure. "When I look at Survival Cache, I have fond memories of cycling Renewed Faith. Maybe this isn't the same card at all, but perhaps it is close to it."
The Cache saw a little play in Conley Woods' Soul Sisters deck, and I could certainly see it coming up again sometime – drawing cards and staying alive are two worthwhile pursuits. There are two critical differences between Renewed Faith and Survival Cache that will likely keep the latter out of prime time: Renewed Faith is an Instant, allowing you to leave counter mana up; and Renewed Faith is modal, allowing you to gain six when you're on the back foot, or draw a card when life is irrelevant.
Sphinx of Magosi: "Card I Am Keeping My Eye On… Unchecked, Sphinx of Magosi will win the game all on its own, and very quickly. I would not be surprised to see Sphinx of Magosi become the win condition of control decks at all."
The Sphinx had more misguided fans than the Dallas Cowboys (yeah, I went there. Suck it Romo!).
Shared Discovery: Overrated. "To me, Shared Discovery seems like a card where you have to play a bunch of bad cards to get active, and once you do get it active, you will draw into more crappy cards."
All of this is true, but that discovery was shared by nearly everyone the second the card was spoiled. To the guy that beat me with his Eldrazi spawn-Shared Discovery deck in the two-mans: Bravo, sir.
Inquisition of Kozilek: Overrated. "My issue with Inquisition of Kozilek is that for how many relevant cards it nails, it misses just as many relevant ones."
It's interesting to see the role Inquisition has taken on in Standard. Rather than all-around disruption, it's played more like a pre-emptive Guttural Response in control mirrors. You take their Mana Leak and still have counter mana up, and then next turn you play your Jace without fear. Everything else you can do with an Inquisition is just gravy.
Ancient Stirrings: Underrated. "Ancient Stirrings is a role player in every sense of the term, but I love the role that it plays. Hopefully I can find a great deck for this card."
Replace the last sentence with, "Too bad I can't find a great deck for this card," and you have my feelings about Ancient Stirrings.
Mul Daya Channelers: Underrated. "I probably like Vampire Nocturnus more than most, but Mul Daya Channelers feels like an undercosted Vampire Nocturnus with no downside to me."
He goes on to say that, with fetchlands, you can usually get whatever half of the card you want, much like how Nocturnus could be turned on and off practically at will – so the statement isn't as crazy as it sounds. Still, a 5/5 for three is a far cry from a 5/4 double-Crusade-plus-Wonder for four.
Patrick Chapin
Consume the Meek: "While I am not sure how much of a maindeck card it is, it has some pretty sweet applications. For instance, it is an ideal sideboard card against Kor Firewalker, Devout Lightcaster, Wall of Omens, White Knight, Wall of Denial and more[.]"
Mr. Chapin had the right idea about Consume the Meek: more role-player than control deck staple. You don't run black in your Jace deck because Consume is the best sweeping option, the way players would always default to white for Wrath. Instead, its number in your ‘board increases or decreases with the number of crappy weenie decks in the format.
Surrakar Spellblade: "Probably not what I am looking for, but will catch some people, and might be somebody's filthy technology someday. They would have to be a particularly dirty mind, I suspect."
I have a dirtier mind than just about anybody (I listen to Howard Stern every single day!), and I can't figure out how to break this card. I get past Spell Pierce, Mana Leak, and Unified Will, move on to red for burn, and then… nope, can't make it work. Getting a Spellblade going is too much work for too little pay-off, especially when you can pay one more mana and get a Jace. Maybe as a part of a creature package alongside Kiln Fiend in a Pyromancer's Ascension sideboard?
Demonic Appetite: "If Suicide Black is a real deck, this is why."
That was a huge "if", but Vampires is as close to Suicide Black as we have been in Standard in ages. Even with the sacrifice theme, Bloodghast players haven't touched this card. I'm a little intrigued about the Appetite on a Plague Stinger, but you'd still need a sacrificial lamb, and you'd still get wrecked by a well-timed Bolt. One for the kitchen table, maybe.
Lone Missionary: "[T]his guy is gonna see play with the biggest limiting factor being the relatively ineffective size of his body in this powercreep world. A role player, as they say, but no superstar."
In a world without Kor Firewalker, this guy might have had a chance. He soaks up at least six damage (assuming he eats a Burst Lightning) for two mana, which is worse than Rest for the Weary, sure, but he can also trade with Goblin Guide or get in for two. We don't live in that world. Firewalker can shut down an entire board of red dudes, and neuter burn spells. Unless I need 5+ copies of Firewalker in my sideboard, I'm not looking to the Missionary. Wrong place, wrong time.
Sphinx of Magosi: "I like this card a lot more than Sphinx of Jwar-Isle, and it definitely hits a lot harder than Sphinx of Lost Truth (if less reliably securing an advantage). Overall, I predict at least a little play with outside chances of being truly great, particularly in Block."
Plus one for the Magosi bandwagon. When you compare him to the Invasion dragons, he sure does look impressive. Non-legendary, one color, doesn't need to connect to activate (which means you can leave him back on defense), it's all upside. When you compare him to Frost Titan, in a world with the high quality of removal we currently enjoy, you understand why this guy is in the dollar bin.
Mul-Daya Channelers: "Mul-Daya Channelers actually feels sort of like a Blazing Salvo among Green cards, but it does have the potential to fill out some stupid Green deck."
I like the analogy to Blazing Salvo, one of a series of cards that let your opponent make a "bad or worse" decision. People loved that card, and Book Burning, but they soon found that having a card do the opposite of what you need it to do every single time makes for a bad card. Channeler (could this be any closer to a Friends reference?) is different in that you can usually get what you want out of it; but the times you don't hurt you more than a 5/5 for three helps you.
Guul Draz Assassin: "This card might in many ways be the Vampire's version of Figure of Destiny."
Out of context, this sentence reads a lot more ridiculous than it really is. Basically, Chapin is saying that the Assassin is a fine one drop that is great in the late game, following in the tradition of the Eventide all-star. The problem is, the Assassin can't end a game quickly like a huge Figure. I wonder if he could be sick tech for the Vampire mirror, though. Now that everyone is splashing Lightning Bolt… probably not.
Lighthouse Chronologist: "This guy has the potential to be pretty awesome, in my opinion… The key is that the opportunity cost is low."
The Chronologist hasn't gotten any love in constructed, even though he seems like a good deal on the surface. Hey, he blocks Goblin Guides and represents a must-kill threat to control decks. A big problem for this guy is that, as a blue deck, you really don't have spare mana lying around. You need that mana to represent counterspells (even if you don't have them). Plus, all that nearly-dead creature removal now has a prime target.
Lord of Shatterskull Pass: "At the end of the day, all he really lets you do is make an Abyssal Persecutor, and that is just not what Standard calls for these days."
It's a shame, just as Big Red decks accumulate enough tools to make something like the Lord playable, they print Inferno Titan and Wurmcoil Engine.
Hyena Umbra: "While the power level is not through the roof on this one, I do think that there may be enough value on synergy for White Mages to consider this as a way to make their aggravating creatures even more so."
Decent auras like Hyena Umbra like otherwise could have had a chance are made completely unplayable by Jace, the Mind Sculptor. A repeatable Unsummon is one thing; when you make it so good that every blue player has to run at least three, I have to wonder why R&D bothers designing auras for constructed at all.
I also thought this was interesting: "If I were a betting man (and I'm not saying I'm not), I would be willing to bet that there is a rare Totem Armor that is totally bonkers in constructed, a la Rancor or Elephant Guide." Why isn't this true? Why would R&D make a whole new mechanic, in a big set no less, without a headliner that makes people take notice? The world may never know.
***
Wrapping up, Medina bested Bleiweiss largely because of big-ticket items like Gideon Jura, Vengevine, Kargan Dragonlord, and All is Dust; everyone got a little too excited about six-drops like Sphinx of Magosi and Deathless Angel (although part of that is because they had no idea the Titan-ocalypse was around the corner); modal spells that take the decision out of your hands are usually worse than they appear; and Jace ruins Auras for everybody. Also, Magmaw.
I hope you all had a fantastic twenty-fifth of December, and got lots of Magic cards (I didn't get any – my dad bought me a toilet). Sometime soon I'll do a Review Review of M11, so make sure you tell me what you liked and what you hated. I'm excited about the growing number of articles about Magic finance. I hope to have a few more writers to pit against Jonathan and Ben when I go over Scars of Mirrodin in a few months.
Until next time, keep on exaggerating!
Brad Wojceshonek
BradWoj at gmail dot com
BJWOJ on Twitter
