I played against one guy who had it. He got it out both games and it did almost nothing for him. It would pop out a couple of 2/2s while I played more powerful things and ran him over. That said, the player seemed kind of inexperienced and I don't think his deck was very good, so perhaps not a good sample.
Heliod seems a pretty good comp and it was a marginal card in Theros limited at best, though as someone pointed out, Theros was a faster format and Heliod would probably actually be all right in Khans (even though he would very rarely become a creature).
Well sure, but that's a pretty unusual case - usually on turns 5 and 6 (at least) you are going to be considering hard-casting some of those morphs. Maybe your mana is screwed up so you can't, but then your problem is bad mana base/luck, not the morphs.
Thanks for all the comments Merl. Having not played with Morph outside of a few odd cards in the MTGO cube it seems likely I am underrating it - specifically the "big dumb common morphs" like the Loxodon. If I think of it more like a monstrous creature from theros (with the additional upside of being a secret), I can see how just these big things are hard to play against.
I think some of my low ratings were because some cards seemed clan-specific (e.g. you want them in Abzan but not Mardu), but I'm starting to rethink that after having watched some of the community cup matches. E.g. the 1-mana 0/4 is actually perfectly reasonably in Mardu because it can pretty much always swing safely on turn 2 and triggers raid, which is a pretty big deal because getting value off of 2-drop raid triggers on turn 2 is going to be important for aggressive decks to be fast enough.
Yeah, I'm speculating that reach felt unnecessary when green is always paired with at least one other color that has access to good flyers. I could be wrong though.
I think he meant reach as in "a way to get in the last 5-8 points of damage once your opponent has stabilized (e.g. Lava Axe, big tramplers, lightning bolt to the face, etc.) There's not much there at common/uncommon.
Oh man, you're totally right on Mandrills. I just went into "big simian - must be an Ape" mode. Geez, now I'm even more upset (well, upset is probably a strong word).
it was in MaRo's most recent article that said Briber's Purse was submitted in the design file as printed, other than having no mana cost in its activated ability; he said that development found that too strong and added the 1. i was surprised to read that!
Well in a Jeskai deck (or perhaps Mardu) where you are trying to tempo someone out I can see it being pretty powerful, and pretty nice to be able to keep curving out while you play it (e.g. drop it on 3, next turn ignore their blocker, swing for 3, drop your Raid 4-drop without having to lose a creature in the process), etc.
It only wins combat against morphs if your opponent is absolutely desperate to block. Otherwise nobody is throwing a morph in front of a 2/1 that can come right back to the battlefield the same turn.
Isn't that what's usually meant by "this creature wins combat vs ____"? Like, Hill Giant wins combat against Gray Ogres in a general sense, regardless of whether someone in the world is chump-blocking one right this second.
Regardless, it comes to the same thing -- it's a 1-drop that can, at best, be chump-blocked by the most common creature in the format (2/2 Morph), and that's all kinds of cool in an aggressive deck.
EDIT: I feel like my wording here is still ambiguous. What I'm trying to say is that 3-drop Morph creatures are going to be commonplace, and said Morph creatures can't do better than merely chump-blocking Bloodsoaked Champion. They can always not block, obviously, but that's kind of the point, isn't it? You want to get damage in.
Well, you'd probably rather trade your recurrable 1-drop for, well, any morph. It kind of depends how the format is - with so many high defense creatures and fairly expensive removal it seems possible that a 2/1 is going to be pretty irrelevant by turn 4 or 5, so if you don't have this guy in your opening hand, he's probably not doing much. That said as pointed out he is triggering other raid abilities for free-ish, so he's not a completely dead draw late. We'll kind of just have to see if aggro decks are a thing. If they are his value goes way up.
Not sure why incremental growth is seeing so much debate. Cone of counters, while weaker than it's red or black breathren, is still an extreme strong card. Occasionally, you give your opponent a +1/+1 counter, but only when you are about to kill them. It's very good.
Because I gave it a D- at first is the short answer to that question.
Am I the only one who thinks Empty the Pits is nuts?! Even in a three color deck with proper fixing turn 8 or so could be active. But I mostly plan on drafting 2 color decks. In a slow format like this I can't wait to respond to the end of their turn 8 but flashing in 8-12 power.
*Could* is the operative word in that sentence. 8-12 mana equals 12-16 mana/cards from the graveyard, in addition to the 4 black requirement. It's not that you'll never hit that, but assuming that it is consistently achievable by turn 8 seems pretty best case scenario. You're going to want at least 12 black sources and a decent number of delve enablers to make that happen with any kind of consistency.
Nothing is stopping you from putting one counter on one of your opponents critters and putting two and three on two of your dudes. Still usually going to go far in winning you the game.
I had thought the example was when you had only one creature in play - someone said it was then like a more expensive Awaken the Bear. Yeah, 2 counters on my creatures and 1 on opponent's is probably livable, though admittedly no ideal.
Overrun seems like the best comparison for Incremental Growth. If you've only got one creature, it's a sorcery speed Awaken the Bear for two extra green, and Awaken isn't exactly a stellar card to begin with. So you wouldn't be far off by calling Overrun uncastable when you've got one creature on board, meaning you need at least two creatures to use it. And yet that's a fairly well rated card in limited, overall.
No, it's worse than that, since you need to put 3 total tokens on opponent's creatures as well.
Hypothetically worse, but since you'd never cast either spell in that circumstance, not *actually* worse.
If there are times when the card is dead in my hand, that makes it actually worse.
Overrun seems like the best comparison for Incremental Growth. If you've only got one creature, it's a sorcery speed Awaken the Bear for two extra green, and Awaken isn't exactly a stellar card to begin with. So you wouldn't be far off by calling Overrun uncastable when you've got one creature on board, meaning you need at least two creatures to use it. And yet that's a fairly well rated card in limited, overall.
No, it's worse than that, since you need to put 3 total tokens on opponent's creatures as well.
Heliod seems a pretty good comp and it was a marginal card in Theros limited at best, though as someone pointed out, Theros was a faster format and Heliod would probably actually be all right in Khans (even though he would very rarely become a creature).
I think some of my low ratings were because some cards seemed clan-specific (e.g. you want them in Abzan but not Mardu), but I'm starting to rethink that after having watched some of the community cup matches. E.g. the 1-mana 0/4 is actually perfectly reasonably in Mardu because it can pretty much always swing safely on turn 2 and triggers raid, which is a pretty big deal because getting value off of 2-drop raid triggers on turn 2 is going to be important for aggressive decks to be fast enough.
I think he meant reach as in "a way to get in the last 5-8 points of damage once your opponent has stabilized (e.g. Lava Axe, big tramplers, lightning bolt to the face, etc.) There's not much there at common/uncommon.
Well in a Jeskai deck (or perhaps Mardu) where you are trying to tempo someone out I can see it being pretty powerful, and pretty nice to be able to keep curving out while you play it (e.g. drop it on 3, next turn ignore their blocker, swing for 3, drop your Raid 4-drop without having to lose a creature in the process), etc.
Well, you'd probably rather trade your recurrable 1-drop for, well, any morph. It kind of depends how the format is - with so many high defense creatures and fairly expensive removal it seems possible that a 2/1 is going to be pretty irrelevant by turn 4 or 5, so if you don't have this guy in your opening hand, he's probably not doing much. That said as pointed out he is triggering other raid abilities for free-ish, so he's not a completely dead draw late. We'll kind of just have to see if aggro decks are a thing. If they are his value goes way up.
Because I gave it a D- at first is the short answer to that question.
*Could* is the operative word in that sentence. 8-12 mana equals 12-16 mana/cards from the graveyard, in addition to the 4 black requirement. It's not that you'll never hit that, but assuming that it is consistently achievable by turn 8 seems pretty best case scenario. You're going to want at least 12 black sources and a decent number of delve enablers to make that happen with any kind of consistency.
I had thought the example was when you had only one creature in play - someone said it was then like a more expensive Awaken the Bear. Yeah, 2 counters on my creatures and 1 on opponent's is probably livable, though admittedly no ideal.
If there are times when the card is dead in my hand, that makes it actually worse.
No, it's worse than that, since you need to put 3 total tokens on opponent's creatures as well.