Pithing Needle on a stick? I'll take it. It looks good on paper. 2/1 body that can shut down a Planeswalker. What do you guys think? Will this replace Needle in Sideboards or no?
Compared to Needle, it can't name Mutavault or any other land, but it can stop mana abilities on nonland permanents, in case you want to shut off a mana dork early.
I don't think we're currently in a hatebear format. In Legacy, decks don't have tons of removal or blockers, and 2/1 creatures can often get in there and provide a clock while the ability is doing work. In Standard, 2/1's just don't do much (unless you're hyperaggressive red). Put another way, let's look at the matchups that define Standard right now:
B/x Devotion: Lots of creature removal, everything can block a 2/1 favorably. Needle makes more sense here.
UW/x Control: Possibly better than Needle here, small creatures are good in this matchup. They have plenty of answers to it though, so the ability will only be a temporary solution.
Monsters & Midrange: 2/1's don't match up well against any of the Courser of Kruphix decks.
Burn and RDW: Useless, though Needle isn't good either.
Also, Needle is typically played over Revoker in sideboards in older formats. Revoker is more likely to show up in the maindeck, usually in Death and Taxes. There could be an aggro/control deck that wants this in the maindeck, but I don't think it's especially well-positioned at this point. White Weenie and similar strategies haven't been a major factor this year.
If we look at its uses against Mono Black, the biggest deck in standard right now, it can't shut off Underworld Connections or Mutavault. It does shut off Pack Rat and Erebos (until they kill it with one of the 10+ removal spells they have). Dying to removal is alone enough to make this card bad compared to Pithing Needle, even if it does get in for damage on its own.
Needle is better simply because it forces a more narrow set of answers to deal with it. Revoker has a much broader array of answers for an opponent to claim back an activated ability.
Needle is better simply because it forces a more narrow set of answers to deal with it. Revoker has a much broader array of answers for an opponent to claim back an activated ability.
Well, that's the advantage of Needle, yes. The advantage of Revoker is that it's a 2/1 beater in its own right. But yeah, 2/1 beater isn't all that great in the format that's defined by removal, more removal, and green having 0/3 and 2/4 dudes that ramp into 5/5 dudes.
Pithing Needle on a stick? I'll take it. It looks good on paper. 2/1 body that can shut down a Planeswalker. What do you guys think? Will this replace Needle in Sideboards or no?
When asking for if something was stolen on Kamigawa:
Have some irony:
I don't think we're currently in a hatebear format. In Legacy, decks don't have tons of removal or blockers, and 2/1 creatures can often get in there and provide a clock while the ability is doing work. In Standard, 2/1's just don't do much (unless you're hyperaggressive red). Put another way, let's look at the matchups that define Standard right now:
B/x Devotion: Lots of creature removal, everything can block a 2/1 favorably. Needle makes more sense here.
UW/x Control: Possibly better than Needle here, small creatures are good in this matchup. They have plenty of answers to it though, so the ability will only be a temporary solution.
Monsters & Midrange: 2/1's don't match up well against any of the Courser of Kruphix decks.
Burn and RDW: Useless, though Needle isn't good either.
Also, Needle is typically played over Revoker in sideboards in older formats. Revoker is more likely to show up in the maindeck, usually in Death and Taxes. There could be an aggro/control deck that wants this in the maindeck, but I don't think it's especially well-positioned at this point. White Weenie and similar strategies haven't been a major factor this year.
Well, that's the advantage of Needle, yes. The advantage of Revoker is that it's a 2/1 beater in its own right. But yeah, 2/1 beater isn't all that great in the format that's defined by removal, more removal, and green having 0/3 and 2/4 dudes that ramp into 5/5 dudes.