I don't think Merfolk wants to spend more slots in the "running out of gas" department. It has 8 cards that cantrip, 4 pseudo-Empty the Warrens that generates three 2/1s even if your board is empty save a Spreading Seas, and Mutavault.
Merfolk Branchwalker is a neat value creature. It's either a 3/2 with better-than-scry 1, or a 2/1 that draws you a land. Unfortunately, you don't know which one you'll get until you cast it. Neither side is very good by Modern standards either. Veteran Motorist is a 3/1 that scrys 2 on ETB and sees 0 play despite being in a very aggressive color combination. A 2/1 that draws a land is technically +CA, but marred by the fact that it's a land and not a spell. Elves plays Elvish Visionary and not Sylvan Ranger, to put that into perspective.
Tried Smal Naya Revolt Zoo with Old-Growth Dryads pre-board against Junk Midrange (No Bob), UWR Midrange-Control (the type with 4 Spell Quellers, a bunch of Logic Knots, and a lot of 4-ofs, but no Geist of Saint Traft unlike the latest trend), and Ad Nauseam (I was predicting a bad time for OGD there because Ad Nauseam wants to hit 5-6 mana ASAP).
OGD tended to make games slightly worse for Zoo against all 3 decks. No Bob Junk plays too many guys that dodge Bolt, and while the pre-board match-up is already atrocious for Zoo regardless of whether OGD shows up (as I found out about 10 games later), OGD ensured that Junk had enough mana and colour fixing to weather the storm. (A particularly bad game for Zoo started off with Junk keeping a 1-land hand with 3 1-cmc removal spells in it, then watching OGD ramp Junk.) The UWR match-up behaved similarly in that UWR could count on hitting the right colours and sufficient mana to stabilize.
Maybe OGD was at its swingiest against Ad Nauseam. Ad Nauseam got just enough mana to combo off safely a fair few times, but it didn't matter more than half the time, and OGD occasionally brought in enough power to win the game when Ad Nauseam couldn't find its combo pieces.
Note that I tended to play OGD if it was the highest-power creature remaining in hand, there were no ties for highest power (so, since I always count Wild Nacatl as a 3/3, Nacatl always gets played first), and there were no Goblin Guides in hand. Maybe the better tactic against these decks is to delay OGD until it's the last creature in hand.
Tonight, I'll be testing against BGx variants with Bob, but things are looking less optimistic for OGD.
the card itself really isn't worth the card board its printed on...does it serve a purpose? Sure its a blue 1 drop that might not be a 1/1. I would not put it in a list and expect to win a PTQ or GP though.
Again, Old-Growth Dryads looks the best in hyper aggro decks from that initial testing of mine. Your opponent often cannot take advantage of the mana/tempo boost fast enough, especially when you're pumping out 6 damage a turn or more. The games where I chained OGD into a game-ending Reckless Bushwhacker were an extreme example of this. (For the record, I tend to cut Goblin Guide, Grim Lavamancer, Experiment One, and even Kird Ape for OGD.)
I'm not sure that Humans wants Wanted Scoundrels--those aggro decks are leaning on the black splash more than the red one lately, but having a frame similar to Voltaic Brawler is distressing.
Again, Old-Growth Dryads looks the best in hyper aggro decks from that initial testing of mine.
Which deck you are testing against? No bolt or push or path?
Now I'm not going to defend Old Growth here, but I will say, beating removal by playing more dumb but buff creatures than midrange/control decks have removal for is stompy decks speicality. So "but removal kills it" isnt the the greatest defense for why a creature is bad in those types of decks. They play, around 30 creatures, sometimes up to 40, against even the most removal heavey deck's 20 removals.
So yeah, what really matters is having a critical mass of high power creatures at low curves. So old growth fits there. Grant it, unlike nacatl, which if it gets bolted you just accept a 1 for 1, this getting bolted is a 2 for 1. But sometimes you are just trying to exhaust them, so its fine.
As far as "zoo already has enough good one drops" ask tell any zoo player that and we will tell you that you are flat out wrong. 2 damage from a 1 cmc card is too low mathematically now. If I have 3 2/3s out I have a 4 turn clock. If I have 3 3/3s I have a 2-3. 3 damage is the magic number, go and ask burn players that, its a well known fact.
Zoo has 1.5 cards that are 3/3s. You have Nacatl and Experiment 1, who isnt super reliable as a 3/3 yet. Critical mass for them is getting another 3/3 at 1 mana. Old growth likely isnt it, but it's the closest theyve gotten in years.
I think there's a meta deck to be made that mainboards graveyard hate in rest in peace and the new ashes. Between dredge, delve, and flashback the only deck I can think of that doesn't use the graveyard is affinity, etron, and Lantern Control.
So you run this 4/3, treacherous Pit dweller, underworld cerberous and you have the start of a deck.
Control Magic was pivotal in the Draw/Go mono Blue decks of yore. It's absolutely a 2 for one against a deck playing creatures (or at least those at a reasonable CCM.) Obviously it's good against Death's Shadow and goyf, correct? So then where does it top out? You're certainly not stealing a Gurmag Angler or a Wurmcoil Engine. So then is the top end good enough? Stealing a Thought-knot Seer seems good and stealing a Matter Reshaper seems fine. Modern has a lot of lower CMC creatures across a variety of archetypes.
Control Magic is too good for modern and Standard. How expensive would it need to be before it's OK? It's not at 3UU. Not even at 5 stapled onto a 1/1 bc we got Beguiler of Wills instead. Entrancing Melody is pushed. Enough for Modern is a question that will need to be answered but it is certainly a bump for control.
Control Magic isn't too good for Modern, I don't know if it would even be played if it was legal.
We have Soul Ransom/Sower of Temptation which are pretty close and see no play and recently we've got Kefnet's Last Word which doesn't give back the creature and can steal artifacts/enchantments but has that massive drawback.
Love this card. The issue with the other ones mentioned is they all have severe drawbacks. Paying an instant free cost is just bad. A shock, bolt, path, push, terminate getting the guy back is just bad.
I believe control magic would be played in modern.
I suspect Entrancing Melody wins the overall meta call between it and Kefnet's Last Word, but it's a close one, and several metas may make me pack Kefnet's Last Word in my non-black, non-white decks instead.
Entrancing Melody costs the same as or cheaper than KLW against 0-2-cmc creatures. Some of the most significant of those that don't die to Bolt are Death's Shadow and Goyf.
Part of me suspects that KLW being at least 1 mana cheaper makes it better than Entrancing Melody against creatures with cmc 3 or more.
I'd like to think that UW Control and Esper Control would play it, too, but they tend to play less spot removal, so they have bigger Bob/dorks/etc. problems.
Stealing Thought-Knot Seer is terrible, value-wise. You lose a card when it comes down and then they draw a card when it dies? For six mana? Just Path it or something.
I think if you cast this against burn you lose the game on the spot since your land-heavy control deck just guaranteed they'll draw gas for the rest of the game. Also it can be countered. Not even instant speed matters because good players will see four lands up and at least assume cryptic and pass into combat before doing anything. They even got an extra card before you could cast it. The advantage of it being one sided also gets blanked because the deck running wrath is already ok with losing their wall of omens or Snapcaster. I just don't see the value of Mass to Exile in control. I do like it in an aggro deck that wants to swing out against another agro deck and not care about the crack back.
While I agree that Death's Shadow is the card of choice you'd want to yank with this, DS commonly only has to connect 2-3 times to turn the game. Often I sit at a quite high life total while they manipulate their life, discard my hand of anything relevant (probably this), and then set up the clock with denial backup. I don't think it's good, as I'd rather just get the shadow off the field instead with something like path. You can't even cast this until turn 3.
While I do like that it is scalable, there are a large swath of decks you're not getting any milage out of in time. Just off the top of my head:
Storm (its too slow),
Zoo (no impactful targets if they don't run goyf),
living end (creatures too much),
faeries (creatures too weak), elves (creatures too weak or 5+ to steal a wincon),
merfolk (counterspells and things like kopala (sp?) or kira),
amulet titan (titan's too much), tron (no cheap targets),
affinity (can't steal a manland or they can modular in response),
infect (has hexproof spells and counters),
any tribal (lack synergy to make a bad card good),
UW control (has no targets),
Grixis delve (delve guys are just too big),
Ad Naus (no targets),
pos (no targets),
turns (no targets),
Spirits (hexproof all day long),
GW Company (while you may can steal a combo piece once, tapping out t3 can also just lose you the game),
Grishoalbrand (too mana intensive),
etc.
Really the only few creatures that I can see taking with this that "may" be impactful would be a goyf, a grim flayer, or something similar in a midrange super efficient list. Because it hits so few things I'd probably just avoid it in the 75 all together. If you're creature light in game 1 for a control style tap out build (which is what I would think may want this?) then you turn ALL of their removal online. It may be a two for one, but basically its just a mini time walk at that point if they care enough to kill their own dude. The kill spell was probably dead in hand anyway.
There's just more powerful things you can be doing at that point in the curve. I have reservations in standard alongside cards like hostage taker, kefnet's last word, or confiscation coup, and this certainly has tougher competition in modern.
Legion's Landing Is the best one thus far. It has an ETB trigger so It's legendary clause can be worked around. It's also the easiest to flip. It's flip side is also "good enough".
Dowsing dagger is being tested in faeries, guaranteed. The 0/2 defender creatures are made super irrelevant and the 3 extra Mana makes countering around tar pits and mutavault easier
Private Mod Note
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Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Decks I have in my bag of tricks- Needless to say, someone who wants to play will probably have a deck UB/x Faeries UR Storm XURWB Affinity G Elves UW control
Will Opt finally give birth to a Miracles style deck? With Serum Visions, Telling Time, and now Opt you may have just enough ways to set up the top card of your library and cast Terminus. With Opt you can even cast it during the opponent's turn - something we have never seen before in Modern without Top/Brainstorm being legal
Growing Rites will see play as a 1-2 of in Modern Elves list as an additional tool for going off on turn 3.
Turn 1 - Dork
Turn 2 - Heritage Druid/Dwynen's Elite - Growing Rites for another Elf
End Step - Flip Growing Rites now you have a coco
Turn 3 - Win more>
Will Opt finally give birth to a Miracles style deck? With Serum Visions, Telling Time, and now Opt you may have just enough ways to set up the top card of your library and cast Terminus. With Opt you can even cast it during the opponent's turn - something we have never seen before in Modern without Top/Brainstorm being legal
I think miracles needs a way to put cards from hand back onto the deck more than it needs "Is this it? Ok, well next card in the dark is...."
Do we think Search for Azcanta will be more useful as a 3 or 4 of in control decks as an engine, or more of a 1 or 2 of that grants incidental ramp and card selection?
Merfolk Branchwalker is a neat value creature. It's either a 3/2 with better-than-scry 1, or a 2/1 that draws you a land. Unfortunately, you don't know which one you'll get until you cast it. Neither side is very good by Modern standards either. Veteran Motorist is a 3/1 that scrys 2 on ETB and sees 0 play despite being in a very aggressive color combination. A 2/1 that draws a land is technically +CA, but marred by the fact that it's a land and not a spell. Elves plays Elvish Visionary and not Sylvan Ranger, to put that into perspective.
Vraska is a Relic Seeker now lmao
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.
OGD tended to make games slightly worse for Zoo against all 3 decks. No Bob Junk plays too many guys that dodge Bolt, and while the pre-board match-up is already atrocious for Zoo regardless of whether OGD shows up (as I found out about 10 games later), OGD ensured that Junk had enough mana and colour fixing to weather the storm. (A particularly bad game for Zoo started off with Junk keeping a 1-land hand with 3 1-cmc removal spells in it, then watching OGD ramp Junk.) The UWR match-up behaved similarly in that UWR could count on hitting the right colours and sufficient mana to stabilize.
Maybe OGD was at its swingiest against Ad Nauseam. Ad Nauseam got just enough mana to combo off safely a fair few times, but it didn't matter more than half the time, and OGD occasionally brought in enough power to win the game when Ad Nauseam couldn't find its combo pieces.
Note that I tended to play OGD if it was the highest-power creature remaining in hand, there were no ties for highest power (so, since I always count Wild Nacatl as a 3/3, Nacatl always gets played first), and there were no Goblin Guides in hand. Maybe the better tactic against these decks is to delay OGD until it's the last creature in hand.
Tonight, I'll be testing against BGx variants with Bob, but things are looking less optimistic for OGD.
tl;dr the card will certainly see play but in no way replace Serum Visions. Jeskai Flash-style decks stand to gain the most from this card IMO.
Counter-Cat
Colorless Eldrazi Stompy
Now I'm not going to defend Old Growth here, but I will say, beating removal by playing more dumb but buff creatures than midrange/control decks have removal for is stompy decks speicality. So "but removal kills it" isnt the the greatest defense for why a creature is bad in those types of decks. They play, around 30 creatures, sometimes up to 40, against even the most removal heavey deck's 20 removals.
So yeah, what really matters is having a critical mass of high power creatures at low curves. So old growth fits there. Grant it, unlike nacatl, which if it gets bolted you just accept a 1 for 1, this getting bolted is a 2 for 1. But sometimes you are just trying to exhaust them, so its fine.
As far as "zoo already has enough good one drops" ask tell any zoo player that and we will tell you that you are flat out wrong. 2 damage from a 1 cmc card is too low mathematically now. If I have 3 2/3s out I have a 4 turn clock. If I have 3 3/3s I have a 2-3. 3 damage is the magic number, go and ask burn players that, its a well known fact.
Zoo has 1.5 cards that are 3/3s. You have Nacatl and Experiment 1, who isnt super reliable as a 3/3 yet. Critical mass for them is getting another 3/3 at 1 mana. Old growth likely isnt it, but it's the closest theyve gotten in years.
Hey, thanks!
Entrancing Melody
Control Magic was pivotal in the Draw/Go mono Blue decks of yore. It's absolutely a 2 for one against a deck playing creatures (or at least those at a reasonable CCM.) Obviously it's good against Death's Shadow and goyf, correct? So then where does it top out? You're certainly not stealing a Gurmag Angler or a Wurmcoil Engine. So then is the top end good enough? Stealing a Thought-knot Seer seems good and stealing a Matter Reshaper seems fine. Modern has a lot of lower CMC creatures across a variety of archetypes.
Control Magic is too good for modern and Standard. How expensive would it need to be before it's OK? It's not at 3UU. Not even at 5 stapled onto a 1/1 bc we got Beguiler of Wills instead. Entrancing Melody is pushed. Enough for Modern is a question that will need to be answered but it is certainly a bump for control.
We have Soul Ransom/Sower of Temptation which are pretty close and see no play and recently we've got Kefnet's Last Word which doesn't give back the creature and can steal artifacts/enchantments but has that massive drawback.
Entrancing Melody seems more like an upgraded Threads of Disloyalty to me.
I believe control magic would be played in modern.
My 720 Peasant Cube
Entrancing Melody costs the same as or cheaper than KLW against 0-2-cmc creatures. Some of the most significant of those that don't die to Bolt are Death's Shadow and Goyf.
Part of me suspects that KLW being at least 1 mana cheaper makes it better than Entrancing Melody against creatures with cmc 3 or more.
I'd like to think that UW Control and Esper Control would play it, too, but they tend to play less spot removal, so they have bigger Bob/dorks/etc. problems.
While I do like that it is scalable, there are a large swath of decks you're not getting any milage out of in time. Just off the top of my head:
Storm (its too slow),
Zoo (no impactful targets if they don't run goyf),
living end (creatures too much),
faeries (creatures too weak), elves (creatures too weak or 5+ to steal a wincon),
merfolk (counterspells and things like kopala (sp?) or kira),
amulet titan (titan's too much), tron (no cheap targets),
affinity (can't steal a manland or they can modular in response),
infect (has hexproof spells and counters),
any tribal (lack synergy to make a bad card good),
UW control (has no targets),
Grixis delve (delve guys are just too big),
Ad Naus (no targets),
pos (no targets),
turns (no targets),
Spirits (hexproof all day long),
GW Company (while you may can steal a combo piece once, tapping out t3 can also just lose you the game),
Grishoalbrand (too mana intensive),
etc.
Really the only few creatures that I can see taking with this that "may" be impactful would be a goyf, a grim flayer, or something similar in a midrange super efficient list. Because it hits so few things I'd probably just avoid it in the 75 all together. If you're creature light in game 1 for a control style tap out build (which is what I would think may want this?) then you turn ALL of their removal online. It may be a two for one, but basically its just a mini time walk at that point if they care enough to kill their own dude. The kill spell was probably dead in hand anyway.
There's just more powerful things you can be doing at that point in the curve. I have reservations in standard alongside cards like hostage taker, kefnet's last word, or confiscation coup, and this certainly has tougher competition in modern.
UB/x Faeries
UR Storm
XURWB Affinity
G Elves
UW control
However, IF you can flip it, it is bonkers.
Greetings,
Kathal
Modern/Legacy
either funpolice (Delver, Deathcloud, UW Control) or the fun decks (especially those ft. Griselbrand)
Turn 1 - Dork
Turn 2 - Heritage Druid/Dwynen's Elite - Growing Rites for another Elf
End Step - Flip Growing Rites now you have a coco
Turn 3 - Win more>
I think miracles needs a way to put cards from hand back onto the deck more than it needs "Is this it? Ok, well next card in the dark is...."
More like Lotus Vale.
UB Faeries
U Taking Turns
BGW Abzan Midrange
EDH Decks
MonoU Sakashima the Impostor and the Clone Army
UG Rashmi, Eternities Crafter
Dralnu, Lich LordUBR Kess, Dissident Mage1) build battalion tribal with Boros Elite and Kytheon, Hero of Akros
2) use the life gain to negate Bitterblossom's life loss
3) slam it in a deck with Thraben Inspector, Doomed Traveler and Crack the Earth for 1-mana Stone Rains
4) automatically trigger it with Thatcher Revolt or Burning-Tree Emissary + Reckless Bushwhacker
5) Polymorph the token with the only other creature in your deck being Emrakul
6) flicker it with Flickerwisp or Felidar Guardian (preferably before it transforms)
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.
I agree the synergies with this card are many. Could find a home in a token style deck