MTG Salvation

I am also swapping oldmane for him. I love that the lifegain and pump/vigilance ability are both together and on a plus ability. And I love that I can splash him into decks that could have never run Goldmane.

If you don't want to lose Goldmane, is it conceivable to run both? What about over a different Anthem effect like Spear of Heliod?

That would be my choice. I don't think Goldmane's necessarily better or worse though. Goldmane does a specific job of pumping an army much better but Steadfast can go high as well as wide, and if things are going badly for me I am likely to have one creature rather than a ton of them. And in that case lifelink is about the best thing. It's so much better when I don't already have a good board presence. Plus, it's splashable. Nothing wrong with running both, but I think I prefer the new Ajani.

I will probably try him, but not over Goldmane.

Ya, if I do decide to test him, it wouldn't be at the cost of Goldmane.

I like this card and I want to test it but the "correct" cut in not necessarily obvious. The closest card in power level would be something like Angelic Destiny (in my opinion) but I don't think many cubes are playing that card... maybe something like Parallax Wave (although they are different cards)?

I would cut another four drop or buffer like Hokori (!), Emeria Angel, Sublime Archangel or Griffin Guide (!).

Quote from Goodking »

I would cut another four drop or buffer like Hokori (!), Emeria Angel, Sublime Archangel or Griffin Guide (!).

All plausible cuts, yes.

The problem I see with trying to cut a 4-drop to test this guy is the lack of cuttable 4-drops in white (even at medium sizes).

Quote from calibretto »

The problem I see with trying to cut a 4-drop to test this guy is the lack of cuttable 4-drops in white (even at medium sizes).

Definitely. The 4-slot in white is totally stacked. I like this card and want to test it, but ultimately, I'm not sure I can find room. I'm not convinced it's better than Goldmane but it may be. Tough call.

Cheers,
rant

I'd not try him because white has too many 4 drops and white walkers I like better. If I wanted a 4th I'd likely go for Goldmane or go for Caller because he's lower CMC.

I think the key to his value is the 3W cost. He doesn't play all that well in the dedicated white decks that we play, which are typically swarm aggro, token/anthem midrange or creature-light control decks. His {+1} ability isn't stellar in those decks, so I think they key to his success will be finding a good aggressive midrange deck in one of the other color combinations and splashing for him. It's a powerful {+1} ability, but I think it needs to find the right home to be really valuable, and that will definitely be outside of our typical WW/x decks. Makes it harder to find room when it doesn't directly contribute to one of the commonly played decks in its color. He's certainly powerful, but it's hard to find a good cut...

Quote from wtwlf123 »

I think the key to his value is the 3W cost. He doesn't play all that well in the dedicated white decks that we play, which are typically swarm aggro, token/anthem midrange or creature-light control decks. His {+1} ability isn't stellar in those decks, so I think they key to his success will be finding a good aggressive midrange deck in one of the other color combinations and splashing for him. It's a powerful {+1} ability, but I think it needs to find the right home to be really valuable, and that will definitely be outside of our typical WW/x decks. Makes it harder to find room when it doesn't directly contribute to one of the commonly played decks in its color. He's certainly powerful, but it's hard to find a good cut...

In your Cube, my 3 choices of cuts would be Eternal Dragon, Entreat the Angels, or Faith's Fetters.

I'm not gonna cut Eternal Dragon, because I love that card and it contributes to quite a few decks I like to play.

Entreat is powerful in my list, especially since adding in the additional top-of-library manipulation. I like playing WG token ramp too, and it's a house there.

Faith's Fetters is an average card, but it works well with Rector, and It's cool with blink effects and stuff (and it's good removal for Winston/Sealed).

But thanks for the suggestions.

This is getting a little off topic, but what decks does Eternal Dragon contribute to? That card always seemed out of place in your list.

Creature-light control decks take good advantage of both options, it's a solid target that bins itself for reanimation, and it's great in Wildfire decks as a way to secure additional lands and survive Wildfire as it resolves.

Pretty solid so far, really good if you have one other PW out (especially a token generator, like with any Elspeth/BW Sorin/Garruk) but the +1 is surprisingly very good as well, since I found that it makes racing pretty awkward if you have anything 3+ power. The - is worse than Goldmane's, but Burst Lightning is worse Lightning Bolt in the base mode (not that I'm saying that Steadfast > Goldmane, but that isn't the complete picture to say that the minus is worse.) White 4s are tight but I like it.

I'm going to run it alongside of Goldmane- but in my case that's going to be mostly because I'm running at 720 and have 37 planeswalkers. With each guild color having a solid planeswalker, and each color having an easy 4-5 to pick from it's actually not that difficult to find yourself with that many!

It's actually the same large number of potential targets that has me wanting to add Garruk, Apex Predator.

I'm thinking about +Steadfast -Kor Sanctifiers and just running all the Ajanis. Thoughts on that swap?

Quote from calibretto »

I'm thinking about +Steadfast -Kor Sanctifiers and just running all the Ajanis. Thoughts on that swap?

I've actually been thinking the same thing. Sanctifiers has been in and out a lot.

I'm going to cut Galepowder Mage to try this out, so I'll be running this and Ajani Goldmane.