It's funny, metamind, while I agree with you, your argument against this card actually made me want to try it lol. Specifically the part about stifle not being played. That's true. Stifle on its own is not worth the slot in cube. But it is a relevant effect and will occasionally be backbreaking. But the occasionally part is why Stifle isn't played. This is a card that will be a counterspell 80% of the time, but having the Stifle option could be huge the few times that you need it and there isn't another place in most cubes where you can get that option.
The Stifle is definitly better than Scry 1 to me. Main reason why is because it allows its caster to have more target options and to counter some crazy stuff that are normally uncounterable. Add to this the fact that Scry often whiff because when you look at the top card card of your library, it seems just fine as a draw. In those cases, the Scry part is dead wood. For those reasons, I don't think the 50% chance (or so) you have with Dissolve to try to upgrade your draw quality match the power level of the Stifle part.
Honestly, a split card - cancel/counter target planeswalker ultimate, is still a significant upgrade to cancel.
for a control deck, a planeswalker that slips through the cracks off your counter magic can be the end of the game... and that's not a rare scenario.
Imagine you are on the draw with a slower than average hand and your opponent casts turn 1 dark ritual -> liliana the last hope.
Unless you have one of the few answers to planeswalkers in your hand, there's a reasonable chance you will lose to her ultimate.
Disallow answers that 1 for 1.
Even though this rarely happens, the value when it does, is astronomical.
We ran actual Stifle for quite a while and it was never bad, but always outclassed. I'm super excited for this card. This is the Cancel variant I've been waiting on.
I guess we'll have to try it at Negate spot, that we had in order to the extend the 2-mana counterspells suite, and see how it goes. Would really want it to be 2U though. Maybe it's too much asking... We are kinda tired of those 2UU counter variants
Imagine you are on the draw with a slower than average hand and your opponent casts turn 1 dark ritual -> liliana the last hope.
Unless you have one of the few answers to planeswalkers in your hand, there's a reasonable chance you will lose to her ultimate.
Disallow answers that 1 for 1.
Imagine attacking in with creatures and Disallowing the use of Maze of Ith. Smack-smack-smack
It's definitely a nice benefit to have on the card. When you make Counterspell look situational, you may be useful.
I highlighted planeswalker ultimates because it is probably the most consistent high upside use of stifle.
Any effect that has an activation cost , ie pay life/planeswalker loyalty , or sacrifice xxx are the best targets.
IE you can stifle something like a mimic vat, feldon or an isochron sceptor to buy you a turn... but that's really only something you want to do out of desperation.
Stifling a planeswalker ultimate either kills the planeswalker or cripples it
Planeswalker ultimates rarely happen here, and chances are even if you counter the ultimate you are still going to lose that game due to the cumulative effect of repeated plus abilities (yes, there are exceptions like the new Liliana where the plus ability can do nothing against certain decks). And will you really keep Disallow for several turns in your hand, not countering anything, just so you can stifle that ultimate? Seems to rarely be worth it. It will happen a handful of times, make great stories, and be irrelevant the majority of the rest of times to gradually be included less and less in decks as novelty wears off. Again, playing Dissolve and digging for a real answer seems better to me.
Disallowing a fetchland activation seems way more common than counter planeswalkers ults. And while it may not be sexy, the idea of a card that's 1UU and reads 'counter target spell or destroy target fetchland' seems pretty good to me. Not to mention all the other million uses it has.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
I can't say I'm pleased to see you and must warn you I may have to do something about it.
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: URDelver
Modern: UGRDelver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
Ya, I don't like the planeswalker ultimate argument, because it's just so very rare and narrow. But there are tons of other 'walker activations where stifling the effect is still worth a card. And fetchlands and Strip Mine effects. Activated/triggered abilities that were about to cost you a card, cards with sacrifice costs like Explosives and Jar and Deed ...there are 100 ways that a activated/triggered ability would be worth a card to Stifle it.
But 1UU to destroy a fetch land will rarely be worth it.
Exceptions apply to small-ball tempo decks , but cancel mana inefficiencies are exaggerated in those decks.
Control decks should very rarely use this spell on a fetch land.
Especially because Your opponent can often play around expensive stifle effects with their fetchlands.
My point was highlighting UPSIDE, name another stifle trigger as powerful as a liliana emblem , or a Karn or ugin ultimate. Countering that is worth MULTIPLE cards.
The rarity of the event is debatable, although it is rare.
Well sure, but highlighting a play that will occur once out of every 1000 games doesn't sell it the way that showcasing ACS value does. There are tons of activated and triggered abilities in the cube where stifling the effect with Disallow will be a 1-for-1 trade. Even if it doesn't actually kill the card that's causing the ability to hit the stack. I doubt if I'll ever see Disallow counter a planeswalker ultimate ...but I bet I find a ton of spots where the Stifle effect is still great.
Planeswalker ultimates rarely happen here, and chances are even if you counter the ultimate you are still going to lose that game due to the cumulative effect of repeated plus abilities (yes, there are exceptions like the new Liliana where the plus ability can do nothing against certain decks). And will you really keep Disallow for several turns in your hand, not countering anything, just so you can stifle that ultimate? Seems to rarely be worth it. It will happen a handful of times, make great stories, and be irrelevant the majority of the rest of times to gradually be included less and less in decks as novelty wears off. Again, playing Dissolve and digging for a real answer seems better to me.
Planeswalker ultimates rarely happen here, and chances are even if you counter the ultimate you are still going to lose that game due to the cumulative effect of repeated plus abilities (yes, there are exceptions like the new Liliana where the plus ability can do nothing against certain decks). And will you really keep Disallow for several turns in your hand, not countering anything, just so you can stifle that ultimate? Seems to rarely be worth it. It will happen a handful of times, make great stories, and be irrelevant the majority of the rest of times to gradually be included less and less in decks as novelty wears off. Again, playing Dissolve and digging for a real answer seems better to me.
The thing isn't that a player is going to plan to do that, it's that this card gives them the option to. Cards that allow the player to make multiple relevant decisions are inherently strong, and having a counter spell that allows you to ask 'is this spell worth countering vs saving this for an ability later?' seems pretty powerful, much more powerful in most spots than scry 1 since it allows you to attack the game from many more angles. Sure, you probably use the counter spell most of the time, but you have the option to use it there vs saving it for one of the 100s of other applications in cube.
Inversely, every activated/triggered ability now comes across that question too. So in every game where you have disallow mana, you open up that many more lines of play to explore--do I counter this triggered ability, or do I save it for another ability/spell? In addition, you're giving your opponent that many more reasons to play around another card. When I've been in matches where I know my opponent has stifle and that U is open, I have to consider my plays that much more. Now any time I know my opponent has disallow in my deck (or the possibility of it being in the draft during a 4 person burn draft, for example) there are that many more cards to play around.
But 1UU to destroy a fetch land will rarely be worth it.
...
I don't think that's true. Destroying a fetchland, when they are about to fix their mana, can be backbreaking. And 3CMC is the normal cost for land destruction (traditionally). Pure 3CMC land destruction doesn't make most cubes, but strapped on a counterspell, I expect this to be great, even when limited to fetches/Strip Mine/Wasteland. It takes some luck to have Disallow and the mana open at the right time, but that's the same for countering walker ultimates (or anything, really).
In the end, we can only highlight some good applications of the Stifle effect, because a comprehensive list would be too long and full of fringe cases. Which is a pretty good thing to say about a card.
But 1UU to destroy a fetch land will rarely be worth it.
...
I don't think that's true. Destroying a fetchland, when they are about to fix their mana, can be backbreaking. And 3CMC is the normal cost for land destruction (traditionally). Pure 3CMC land destruction doesn't make most cubes, but strapped on a counterspell, I expect this to be great, even when limited to fetches/Strip Mine/Wasteland. It takes some luck to have Disallow and the mana open at the right time, but that's the same for countering walker ultimates (or anything, really).
In the end, we can only highlight some good applications of the Stifle effect, because a comprehensive list would be too long and full of fringe cases. Which is a pretty good thing to say about a card.
I agree with what you're saying, but a lot of blue decks won't require luck to be open for these abilities--blue control decks often play draw-go and at the EOT, which means you're not really relying on luck at all for these scenarios but having disallow mana open t3 going forward will be what your deck wants to do anyways. There have been a lot of scenarios where I'm not fetching or stripping on turns 1-2, and Disallow will punish those otherwise-correct lines of play.
But 1UU to destroy a fetch land will rarely be worth it.
...
I don't think that's true. Destroying a fetchland, when they are about to fix their mana, can be backbreaking. And 3CMC is the normal cost for land destruction (traditionally). Pure 3CMC land destruction doesn't make most cubes, but strapped on a counterspell, I expect this to be great, even when limited to fetches/Strip Mine/Wasteland. It takes some luck to have Disallow and the mana open at the right time, but that's the same for countering walker ultimates (or anything, really).
In the end, we can only highlight some good applications of the Stifle effect, because a comprehensive list would be too long and full of fringe cases. Which is a pretty good thing to say about a card.
Destroying a fetch CAN be backbreaking, but if you are playing a control deck (the context you omitted from my quote), it's an extremely risky proposition to tap out just to gamble that they are land light...
Plus the value has to be greater than saving the hard counterspell for the future.
There will be times when
A)you know they are land screwed,
B)they rip a fetch land
C) you have pressure on board
but those situations are rare...
The 3 mana LD price is for colours that are primarily aggressive AND can target any land.
Lots of value in targeting a man land, taking a player off a splash colour, maze of ith, tolarian academy etc.
Destroying a fetch land is much more narrow and slightly less powerful than a generic LD spell.
I think the ultimate point here is that this card allows you to explore those lines of play. When those scenarios do line up, disallow allows you to take advantage of it, along with a large list of other scenarios that could line up.
I think the focus shouldn't be whether or not a play is good, but that disallow gives you the option to make that play in so many scenarios when those scenarios arise. Like, when destroying that fetch is advantageous and I'm in position to because of disallow, it's going to feel really really really good, and when I don't decide to do it and use the disallow in one of the hundreds of other spots where I could use it, that wide swath of options presented by disallow is also going to feel really really really good.
The thing isn't that a player is going to plan to do that, it's that this card gives them the option to. Cards that allow the player to make multiple relevant decisions are inherently strong, and having a counter spell that allows you to ask 'is this spell worth countering vs saving this for an ability later?' seems pretty powerful, much more powerful in most spots than scry 1 since it allows you to attack the game from many more angles. Sure, you probably use the counter spell most of the time, but you have the option to use it there vs saving it for one of the 100s of other applications in cube.
Inversely, every activated/triggered ability now comes across that question too. So in every game where you have disallow mana, you open up that many more lines of play to explore--do I counter this triggered ability, or do I save it for another ability/spell? In addition, you're giving your opponent that many more reasons to play around another card. When I've been in matches where I know my opponent has stifle and that U is open, I have to consider my plays that much more. Now any time I know my opponent has disallow in my deck (or the possibility of it being in the draft during a 4 person burn draft, for example) there are that many more cards to play around.
I am saying most of these are irrelevant choices, as they must show up when you have that 1UU open, be worth a card and you being able to afford losing a counter spell. Which if you have a deck that packs a 1UU counterspell is probably not often the case. Forcing a player to play around it seems negligible - I am already playing around hard counters against you, and I'd be thrilled if you have wasted a counterspell to stifle most abilities. Plus on all examples given so far dodging the stifle is near effortless. Play the fetch early or just whenever they do not have a 1UU or you do not care anymore, at your leisure. Activate the planeswalker one more time before the ultimate.
Scry 1 on Dissolve allows for more lines of play and offers reaction to the game state just as much and arguably more so. Plus it will help you immensely in the much more common cases of mana screw and mana flood.
Zetsu's Cube on CubeTutor.com
Zetsu's Ebay MTG Online Store
Zetsu's Poker Draft Method
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
for a control deck, a planeswalker that slips through the cracks off your counter magic can be the end of the game... and that's not a rare scenario.
Imagine you are on the draw with a slower than average hand and your opponent casts turn 1 dark ritual -> liliana the last hope.
Unless you have one of the few answers to planeswalkers in your hand, there's a reasonable chance you will lose to her ultimate.
Disallow answers that 1 for 1.
Even though this rarely happens, the value when it does, is astronomical.
Last Updated 02/07/24
Streaming Standard/Cube on Twitch https://www.twitch.tv/heisenb3rg96
Strategy Twitter https://www.twitter.com/heisenb3rg
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
MTGS Average Peasant Cube 2023 Edition
Follow me. I tweet.
Zetsu's Cube on CubeTutor.com
Zetsu's Ebay MTG Online Store
Zetsu's Poker Draft Method
Imagine attacking in with creatures and Disallowing the use of Maze of Ith. Smack-smack-smack
It's definitely a nice benefit to have on the card. When you make Counterspell look situational, you may be useful.
Any effect that has an activation cost , ie pay life/planeswalker loyalty , or sacrifice xxx are the best targets.
IE you can stifle something like a mimic vat, feldon or an isochron sceptor to buy you a turn... but that's really only something you want to do out of desperation.
Stifling a planeswalker ultimate either kills the planeswalker or cripples it
Last Updated 02/07/24
Streaming Standard/Cube on Twitch https://www.twitch.tv/heisenb3rg96
Strategy Twitter https://www.twitter.com/heisenb3rg
The list on cube cobra
Read my blog on cube - Latest post June 2nd 2022
EDH: UGEdric
Pauper: UR Delver
Modern: UGR Delver
Draft my cube: Eric's 390 Unpowered
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
But 1UU to destroy a fetch land will rarely be worth it.
Exceptions apply to small-ball tempo decks , but cancel mana inefficiencies are exaggerated in those decks.
Control decks should very rarely use this spell on a fetch land.
Especially because Your opponent can often play around expensive stifle effects with their fetchlands.
My point was highlighting UPSIDE, name another stifle trigger as powerful as a liliana emblem , or a Karn or ugin ultimate. Countering that is worth MULTIPLE cards.
The rarity of the event is debatable, although it is rare.
Last Updated 02/07/24
Streaming Standard/Cube on Twitch https://www.twitch.tv/heisenb3rg96
Strategy Twitter https://www.twitter.com/heisenb3rg
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
I bet you will
Last Updated 02/07/24
Streaming Standard/Cube on Twitch https://www.twitch.tv/heisenb3rg96
Strategy Twitter https://www.twitter.com/heisenb3rg
Yes, Sneak Attack creates a delayed triggered ability that you can "stifle."
My High Octane Unpowered Cube on CubeCobra
That would be sweet. And I hope I do. But, I know I'll see it do lots of other cool stuff, so ya.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
The thing isn't that a player is going to plan to do that, it's that this card gives them the option to. Cards that allow the player to make multiple relevant decisions are inherently strong, and having a counter spell that allows you to ask 'is this spell worth countering vs saving this for an ability later?' seems pretty powerful, much more powerful in most spots than scry 1 since it allows you to attack the game from many more angles. Sure, you probably use the counter spell most of the time, but you have the option to use it there vs saving it for one of the 100s of other applications in cube.
Inversely, every activated/triggered ability now comes across that question too. So in every game where you have disallow mana, you open up that many more lines of play to explore--do I counter this triggered ability, or do I save it for another ability/spell? In addition, you're giving your opponent that many more reasons to play around another card. When I've been in matches where I know my opponent has stifle and that U is open, I have to consider my plays that much more. Now any time I know my opponent has disallow in my deck (or the possibility of it being in the draft during a 4 person burn draft, for example) there are that many more cards to play around.
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
I don't think that's true. Destroying a fetchland, when they are about to fix their mana, can be backbreaking. And 3CMC is the normal cost for land destruction (traditionally). Pure 3CMC land destruction doesn't make most cubes, but strapped on a counterspell, I expect this to be great, even when limited to fetches/Strip Mine/Wasteland. It takes some luck to have Disallow and the mana open at the right time, but that's the same for countering walker ultimates (or anything, really).
In the end, we can only highlight some good applications of the Stifle effect, because a comprehensive list would be too long and full of fringe cases. Which is a pretty good thing to say about a card.
I agree with what you're saying, but a lot of blue decks won't require luck to be open for these abilities--blue control decks often play draw-go and at the EOT, which means you're not really relying on luck at all for these scenarios but having disallow mana open t3 going forward will be what your deck wants to do anyways. There have been a lot of scenarios where I'm not fetching or stripping on turns 1-2, and Disallow will punish those otherwise-correct lines of play.
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
Destroying a fetch CAN be backbreaking, but if you are playing a control deck (the context you omitted from my quote), it's an extremely risky proposition to tap out just to gamble that they are land light...
Plus the value has to be greater than saving the hard counterspell for the future.
There will be times when
A)you know they are land screwed,
B)they rip a fetch land
C) you have pressure on board
but those situations are rare...
The 3 mana LD price is for colours that are primarily aggressive AND can target any land.
Lots of value in targeting a man land, taking a player off a splash colour, maze of ith, tolarian academy etc.
Destroying a fetch land is much more narrow and slightly less powerful than a generic LD spell.
Last Updated 02/07/24
Streaming Standard/Cube on Twitch https://www.twitch.tv/heisenb3rg96
Strategy Twitter https://www.twitter.com/heisenb3rg
I think the focus shouldn't be whether or not a play is good, but that disallow gives you the option to make that play in so many scenarios when those scenarios arise. Like, when destroying that fetch is advantageous and I'm in position to because of disallow, it's going to feel really really really good, and when I don't decide to do it and use the disallow in one of the hundreds of other spots where I could use it, that wide swath of options presented by disallow is also going to feel really really really good.
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic
I am saying most of these are irrelevant choices, as they must show up when you have that 1UU open, be worth a card and you being able to afford losing a counter spell. Which if you have a deck that packs a 1UU counterspell is probably not often the case. Forcing a player to play around it seems negligible - I am already playing around hard counters against you, and I'd be thrilled if you have wasted a counterspell to stifle most abilities. Plus on all examples given so far dodging the stifle is near effortless. Play the fetch early or just whenever they do not have a 1UU or you do not care anymore, at your leisure. Activate the planeswalker one more time before the ultimate.
Scry 1 on Dissolve allows for more lines of play and offers reaction to the game state just as much and arguably more so. Plus it will help you immensely in the much more common cases of mana screw and mana flood.
The list on cube cobra
Read my blog on cube - Latest post June 2nd 2022
Also, follow us on twitter! @TurnOneMagic