MTG Salvation

Today, I had Temur Sabertooth in play and a sideboarded Ingot Chewer in hand. My opponent was less than thrilled at that how that interaction matched up against his Tezzeret deck.

Quote from wtwlf123 »

If you only had 1 card in your graveyard on T5, that' probably not a good representative sample of his average performance...

Sure. Average is probably 3 mana and remove 3 cards from the graveyard. Or maybe 2 mana and remove 4 cards. But he also has an ability that lets you pay mana to cast him instead of removing cards from the graveyard.

When evaluating him people focus on the average way he will be cast and define paying more mana as a worse case. I think this is a mistake; it is better to view it as an alternative casting cost similar to convoke or Spectral Procession. In that sense it is just another ability.

In my game he came out for 5 mana. It is easy to view this is an instance of below-average performance. Too many of these and someone might conclude that he is not worthy of inclusion.

I am arguing that, conversely, it should be seen as a great performance of his alternative casting cost ability of paying mana instead of removing cards.

Well, given that his activated ability gets so much better when you try and maximize the delve, he's usually a bad example of when it's right to delve for less than you can.

But if the moral of the story is sometimes that a 5 mana 4/5 is good enough, I agree with that. Sometimes all you need is a body.

We just finished up a cube draft. A few thoughts on the new additions:

Mardu Strike Leader- showed up in a very solid Jund build, and was great.
Alesha- See above.
Ugin, the Spirit Dragon- was drafted in a UG ramp deck along with Karn. Only saw play once, was fine, but not amazing.
Warden of the First Tree- Saw excellent play in the Jund deck, great card.
Soulfire Grand Master- Very solid in URW control. Recurred Burst Lightning, Path To Exile, and Forbid. Other games she came out and did some early damage, then traded, which was fine.
Tasigur, the Golden Fang- Brutal in UB control...and just as brutal when my URW deck stole him with Treachery. Very solid EOT ability.

A few delayed thoughts on some of these cards that others may not have tested (for reference, my list is 540 unpowered):

Frost Walker- Honestly, this has been the surprise winner of the set for me. Combined with Man o' War and Control Magic effects, this gives blue a shockingly fast clock and something that can actually trade up with problematic midrange roadblocks. It does get pretty roundly outmatched by tokens and planeswalkers, but that's a problem for blue cards in general.

Temur Sabertooth- Has had moments of glory, and will be sticking around for now. Your opponent often will have a window to kill this thing, and exile/control effects are a weakness, but left unchecked opponents have a miserably uphill battle, and the combos are bountiful (Shriekmaw is a personal favorite). It plays a bit like Flickerwisp in that you don't always feel you're getting full value, but when you do, you get so much of it that it outweighs the other times.

Citadel Siege- Strong card that's impressed me so far, but will likely end up a victim of the slot. The power level has been close to the CMC 4 Ajanis, so I may slide this in and out depending on the archetypes I'm supporting.

Valorous Stance- Really not suited to the cube environment. The versatility is nice, but there's so much that this doesn't defend against; 4 toughness creatures are indeed more rare than I expected.

Shaman of the Great Hunt- Jury is still out here. There are times when this is just a midrange monster that wins the game in ways that no other card can, and there are others where it rots stupidly in your hand against a Master of the Wild Hunt. It's honestly been hard to determine an ACS, since the variance has been so dramatic. Anybody else have feedback on this guy?

We made two drafts yesterday. Here are some thoughts/results on some FRF cards:

Soulfire Grand Master
Didn't see any play in either of the two drafts.

Renowned Weaponsmith
Accelerates into turn 3 Precursor Golem? Check.
Helps to cast Bosh, Iron Golem early? Check.
Helps to use Bosh's ability twice in a single turn? Check.
Defends against early aggro beaters? Check.
This guy is certainly a bit niche, but in its niche, it did exactly what I wanted him to do.

Mardu Strike Leader
I mostly dashed him out in my BR aggro deck. Both his casting cost and his dash cost are perfectly reasonable.

Brutal Hordechief
Yes, he has no haste himself, but his ability kinda has. I dropped him precombat multiple times and he immediately gave my attack an additional 2 or 3 points of lifedrain. Which means an immediate lifeswing of 4 or 6 points. That's pretty good in a tight race. I never got to use his activated ability and he was still good enough.

Crux of Fate
Third best black mass removal. Sure, it would be a lot better at 4 mana, but considering the lack of alternatives, it is perfectly reasonable.

Alesha, Who Smiles at Death
Never got to use her ability. Was still decent as a 3/2 first striker.

Warden of the First Tree
Never went beyond being a vanilla 3/3. But I mostly wanted him as a 3/3 attacker on turn 2 anyway.

Quote from TheTennesseeFireman »

Valorous Stance- Really not suited to the cube environment. The versatility is nice, but there's so much that this doesn't defend against; 4 toughness creatures are indeed more rare than I expected.

I run over 50 creatures that can be killed by this, so I thought that I might give it a try. It's interesting that this removal is good in aggro, but bad against aggro. The indestructible option is also nice against sweepers and as a "counter" to many removal spells. The only sad part is that it only destroys its target, since several of its potential targets have strong death triggers or are indestructible. Wish it would exile instead.

Crux below Toxic deluge and Damnation but above Sudden spoiling and Black sun's Zenith?

I still like Zenith more, I think.

Quote from Incendiaryspade »

Crux below Toxic deluge and Damnation but above Sudden spoiling and Black sun's Zenith?

Yes. Deluge and Damnation are clearly the best black mass removal spells. After that, the power drops significantly. Crux and Zenith are roughly on the same level, but I think the ability to destroy (almost) any creature for a reasonable cost - instead of having to pay a whooping 7 or 8 mana to permanently deal with opposing fatties/finishers - puts Crux ahead.

Quote from Star Slayer »

instead of having to pay a whooping 7 or 8 mana to permanently deal with opposing fatties/finishers - puts Crux ahead.

Alternatively, having to wait until you have 3BB available before you can kill tokens, Lions and bears puts Crux behind. My control decks are far more afraid of an early aggressive start than they are dealing with a resolved late-game threat.

I always liked the fact that sudden spoiling and BSZ get through regeneration and indestructibility, which has mattered in the past.

I like Crux more than Zenith as well. More often than not Zenith is best at 4 mana. 1 More and you get full board wipe. I think that trade off is worth it.

Being able to adjust the size of bsz made it good, sometimes you want your side of the board to survive.

Agreed. You can sweep all their bears off the board and still leave a 3/3 tombstalker or whatever behind to close things out.

Played with some of the new black cards in a B/G/u aggro-midrange shell:

Tasigur, the Golden Fang is a genuine card so far. Not surprised at his power showing through in other formats. Pretty good as just a huge beater (think he was 1B on average, which seems better-than-expected), but his draw ability is just an amazing way to spend extra mana on what was always gas. This is going to be a high pick for a few decks: U/B control, Rock/Junk, G/B midrange... and definitely the generic 2C/3C goodstuff decks.

Mardu Strike Leader was in there but I never drew it. Despite drawing Tasigur every game.

Brutal Hordechief was in a deck where I couldn't play his ability. He was respectable but not amazing. The life swings really add up fast with just another creature or two but playing him on an empty board sucked. OTOH his ability would have been exceptionally useful in every appearance. In fairness, a deck that wants him is going to be running R or W about 9/10 times, this was the 1/10, but I should think about his classification. The effect is certainly something nice for black and the ability is the ultimate stallbreaker.

Some results from yesterdays 8 man draft.
361 card cube btw
Frost Walker

This card really looks good in a tempo build, but in practice its played like a dud. In my tempo deck at least, I wanted to play a 2/1 on turn 1, followed by a turn 2 or 3 threat, and protect that threat. You can't protect frost walker, which is really bad. Really wanted to manaleak removal :(.

Warden of the first tree

This guy is a great midrange junk card. Not much else to play, but I am wondering about siege rhino because I recently acquired a foil, and it is probably stronger in the midrange build. Casting cost is the main reason I like warden better.

In the BSZ debate, The shuffle clause actually matters. With tutors, it essentially gives you two+ wraths in your deck with one card. I think its the 3rd best black wrath.

I'm testing all the Khans (except the awful Abzan one) from FRF, plus Mardu Woe-Reaper, Lightform, Frost Walker, Renowned Weaponsmith, Mardu Strike Leader, and Goblin Heelcutter. Of course, I plan to run Monastery Mentor ASAP.

Haven't tested yet, but in online drafting, Alesha is capable of making some really sick decks.

I'm impressed with Tasigur, the Golden Fang. I would suggest testing him at 360. He's great in UB counterspells and BG graveyard, I suspect he's decent in monoblack but I wouldn't suggest it. His ability becomes better with more powerful cards, you'll hear many opponents say "aww no, I don't want to do that!"

Quote from blacksmithy »

I'm testing all the Khans (except the awful Abzan one) from FRF, plus Mardu Woe-Reaper, Lightform, Frost Walker, Renowned Weaponsmith, Mardu Strike Leader, and Goblin Heelcutter. Of course, I plan to run Monastery Mentor ASAP.

Haven't tested yet, but in online drafting, Alesha is capable of making some really sick decks.

We've been extremely impressed with Alesha too, she's very often the glue that pulls a deck together. Was great w/ Hornet Queen in one deck and a solid part of Br midrange along side Siege-Gang and Braids. I think she'll be a staple for a while, and I don't say that lightly.

We're going to get a lot of sweet cube cards in the next few years due to the power creep and elimination of core sets. Also Magic Origins is nearly all new cards.

Anyone else enjoying how you can be drafting a two-colour combination, and mid-draft, one of the new khans turns up and winks at you knowingly, essentially saying "You know you want to push into that third colour, big boy..." (e.g. drafting Orzhov and Alesha turns up, drafting Boros and Shu Yun shows up)

I feel you, Cadaverous. The Khans are also a nice, non-committal way to narrow down your color options from 5 to 3 early in the draft, I've found.