Fair enough, those are very good points indeed. Thank you.
I happen to have a couple of Keys to the city in my binder and more than enough Fiery Tempers I will switch Pia and Harnessed Lightning and try them this Friday.
I will come back to report my results, just for the record.
Hello everyone, recently came back to magic after a 10 years hiatus and I'm also new to the forums.
I just build the deck list used by Reid Duke to win SCG Baltimore ( https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/506314#online) and I can say that it is a really fun deck to play, not to mention the novelty of playing Gideon and Chandra in a single deck.
But regardless, one thing that is not very clear for me, and which I believe should be settled, is the comparison between Pia Nalaar and Key to the city.
I'm eager to listen what everybody thinks about this two cards but to begin, I will present my personal take on them:
Pia Nalaar
Pros:
-Offers 3 points of damage and toughness spread over two bodies.
- Can pump the attack of artifact creatures
Cons:
- remove blockers rather than make attackers unblockable.
- requires to sacrifice artifacts to use her ability.
Key to the City
Pros:
- Make attackers unblockable.
- Pseudo card filtering.
- CMC of 2
- Provides a discard engine for madness cards
Cons:
- requires card discard to use its ability
- the ability can only be activated once per turn
Conclusion:
I think Pia Nalaar is a better early game option, it provides 2 attackers and can pump our Coppters or even her own Thopter for more damage.
It synergizes extremely well with Reckless Bushwhacker,3rd turn Pia into a 4th turn 2 drop + Bushwhacker tends to close the game right on the spot.
On the other hand Key to the city is a better late game option, helping us to filter our draw and breaking the stalemate when multiple blockers exists in both sides.
The madness engine synergizes very will with Fiery Temper which take us to our next comparison.
Fiery Temper
vs
Harnessed Lightning
Without extending this post too much (it is long enough as it is) I think Fiery Temper is the better card, it is flexible, it can synergize with Smuggler's Copter and Key to the City. The synergy not only represent card advantage but also a cheaper mana cost.
The flexibility of doing direct damage to the enemy player should not be overlooked, the entire deck depends on creatures to win, Fiery Temper is an useful alternative to this issue.
Yet... for every good reason I find to include Fiery Temper, the same thing keeps coming up to prefer the use of harnessed lightning: it can deal with Smuggler's copter.
And that alone makes it superior in the current meta, Smuggler's copter is included as 4 of in 3 of the 5 top standard decks right now, that may change with Aether Revolt (specially considering the recent spoilers) but for the time being I feel Harnessed Lightning is the superior alternative and therefore push cards like Pia Nalaar above Key to the City.
How do you think about it? do you agree/disagree? please let me know your thoughts.
I happen to have a couple of Keys to the city in my binder and more than enough Fiery Tempers I will switch Pia and Harnessed Lightning and try them this Friday.
I will come back to report my results, just for the record.
I just build the deck list used by Reid Duke to win SCG Baltimore ( https://www.mtggoldfish.com/deck/506314#online) and I can say that it is a really fun deck to play, not to mention the novelty of playing Gideon and Chandra in a single deck.
But regardless, one thing that is not very clear for me, and which I believe should be settled, is the comparison between Pia Nalaar and Key to the city.
I'm eager to listen what everybody thinks about this two cards but to begin, I will present my personal take on them:
Pia Nalaar
Pros:
-Offers 3 points of damage and toughness spread over two bodies.
- Can pump the attack of artifact creatures
Cons:
- remove blockers rather than make attackers unblockable.
- requires to sacrifice artifacts to use her ability.
Key to the City
Pros:
- Make attackers unblockable.
- Pseudo card filtering.
- CMC of 2
- Provides a discard engine for madness cards
Cons:
- requires card discard to use its ability
- the ability can only be activated once per turn
Conclusion:
I think Pia Nalaar is a better early game option, it provides 2 attackers and can pump our Coppters or even her own Thopter for more damage.
It synergizes extremely well with Reckless Bushwhacker,3rd turn Pia into a 4th turn 2 drop + Bushwhacker tends to close the game right on the spot.
On the other hand Key to the city is a better late game option, helping us to filter our draw and breaking the stalemate when multiple blockers exists in both sides.
The madness engine synergizes very will with Fiery Temper which take us to our next comparison.
Fiery Temper
vs
Harnessed Lightning
Without extending this post too much (it is long enough as it is) I think Fiery Temper is the better card, it is flexible, it can synergize with Smuggler's Copter and Key to the City. The synergy not only represent card advantage but also a cheaper mana cost.
The flexibility of doing direct damage to the enemy player should not be overlooked, the entire deck depends on creatures to win, Fiery Temper is an useful alternative to this issue.
Yet... for every good reason I find to include Fiery Temper, the same thing keeps coming up to prefer the use of harnessed lightning: it can deal with Smuggler's copter.
And that alone makes it superior in the current meta, Smuggler's copter is included as 4 of in 3 of the 5 top standard decks right now, that may change with Aether Revolt (specially considering the recent spoilers) but for the time being I feel Harnessed Lightning is the superior alternative and therefore push cards like Pia Nalaar above Key to the City.
How do you think about it? do you agree/disagree? please let me know your thoughts.