I'm curious how people feel about this card. Obviously lifegain alone is bad, but cantripping is obviously a significant add. I usually tend to think of cantrips in terms of "what if this was a repeatable ability that I could use as many times as I wanted?" So zap, still not very good. But 4 life for 3 mana is a pretty good deal. On the other hand, later in the game, drawing a card isn't as good as having a different nonland card, since you'll hit a useless land a fair percent of the time. On the other hand, it enables spell mastery.
Some people think this is utterly unplayable. I don't think it's exciting at all, but it seems playable to me, especially if you really want to turn on spell mastery. It's not super high impact, but it's also very low cost.
Fine filler in control. Turning on Spell Mastery isn't a huge deal, but it does keep the cards flowing and buys you time to start playing multiple spells in a turn.
Sadly this is a bit worse than zap. Cantrips can be finnicky about the timing. You don't get to see the card "hiding underneath" the cantrip until after you cast it, so while they aren't card disadvantage, they continue hiding the "card underneath" the cantrip until you cast them, which could be the reach blocker or removal or threat that is the great answer to whatever's happening in the board state. And with lifegain you want to play it as late as possible, because only the last point of life matters, so no matter how late you cast it, the effect of the lifegain is exactly the same, while an early bear gets in for more total damage than a late one.
This issue isn't specific to lifegain, it would apply to cantrip Lava Spikes too, though I can't think of many of though. (Pirahna Marsh is sort of one. Certainly would be better if you were somehow allowed to delay consuming one mana for the effect). Contradict has a similar factor working against it.
With Zap, you can play it earlier and have a board effect with it, and as soon as you've found that appropriate place to use it, you can see the card underneath it. You only have to fall 1-2 mana behind board state tempo to get to see the card beneath. With this you -always- fall 3 mana behind on board state tempo (with the narrow exception of when you bait someone into casting lethal Lightning Javelin on your face instead of deploying a creature threat but that's why it's in your sideboard waiting until you see red, right?)
Sadly this is a bit worse than zap. Cantrips can be finnicky about the timing. You don't get to see the card "hiding underneath" the cantrip until after you cast it, so while they aren't card disadvantage, they continue hiding the "card underneath" the cantrip until you cast them, which could be the reach blocker or removal or threat that is the great answer to whatever's happening in the board state. And with lifegain you want to play it as late as possible, because only the last point of life matters, so no matter how late you cast it, the effect of the lifegain is exactly the same, while an early bear gets in for more total damage than a late one.
This issue isn't specific to lifegain, it would apply to cantrip Lava Spikes too, though I can't think of many of though. (Pirahna Marsh is sort of one. Certainly would be better if you were somehow allowed to delay consuming one mana for the effect). Contradict has a similar factor working against it.
With Zap, you can play it earlier and have a board effect with it, and as soon as you've found that appropriate place to use it, you can see the card underneath it. You only have to fall 1-2 mana behind board state tempo to get to see the card beneath. With this you -always- fall 3 mana behind on board state tempo (with the narrow exception of when you bait someone into casting lethal Lightning Javelin on your face instead of deploying a creature threat but that's why it's in your sideboard waiting until you see red, right?)
you can't bait anyone into going for burn spell, as it's a sorcery. Unless they're really thick.
Zap has potential to be pretty good, but also potential to be quite bad. This card is always pretty decent I think. It's sort of a do-nothing card, so I wouldn't draft it very highly, but if I need a 23rd card I think this card is totally innocuous and I wouldn't feel bad about having it in the deck.
This seems like a fine 22-23 MD in more controlling limited decks, and pretty good sideboard for racing/trying to stabilize against aggressive decks. I think it will be better than it looks.
I think Zap is better, even in control, though of course this depends on the format and the number of playable X/1s.
For an expensive Cantrip, Instant vs Sorcery is a big deal. Healing Hands means you are either delaying the cantrip effect (i.e. less time to use the extra card, therefore less value from it) or doing nothing on turn 3 when a controlling deck would prefer playing a blocker or killing a 2-drop. If a control deck wanted to dig on turn 3, it would prefer Divination by far. Using turn 3 just to cycle seems like a suboptimal way to stabilize. Zap being an instant makes a difference, since you can at least just use it EOT on a turn where using the mana doesn't stall your board interaction. Also, burn interacts with the board (unlike lifegain), killing pesky aggro 2/1s and X/1 evasive guys that would otherwise deal you a lot of damage.
I don't like this card but I wouldn't mind playing it in a somewhat controlling deck if I had a few bombs which cantripping and gaining life would help me wait for. Also, just as filler it isn't terrible.
I agree that instant vs sorcery is a big deal here, as I would far prefer to leave up my mana for an instant effect and then cantrip if I don't use that other instant effect.
It seems OK. I think at it's best it's sideboard material against red, if it can buy you a turn to stabilize and replace itself. That would imply you have some outs though.
I'm all for the switch from Whitesun's Passage effects to Survival Cache effects in limited formats, if only to mitigate how many stone unplayables you're likely to see. Obviously nobody ever seriously cast Resupply, and it would surprise me if Healing Hands was much better, but if you're light on 3-drops and more defensive I could see running a copy to try and bridge the gap, which is way higher praise than most lifegain effects.
This would be much better at instant (although the precedent for 2W instant cantrip is 3 life, not 4).
Leaving up 3 mana until opponent EOT is a much lower cost than tapping 3 mana in your main phase. Even if you have nothing else you could play, the 3 mana represents a combat trick your opponent might respect.
This format is probably going to be aggressive enough that control decks can't afford to spend turn 3 durdling with this card. If that's the case, then this is going to be one of those cards that you play turn 7+ when you don't have anything better to do with your mana, or early on when you're desperate early on. I put this as maybe a 23rd card if you have nothing better, and would not be happy maindecking it. The odds of 4 free life being worth 3 mana probably isn't worth the cost of it being dead in your hand in a lot of situations as you're trying to stabilize.
Lone Missionary should be the bar for playable Limited lifegain. 4 life clearly can be added cheaply to a card, so the 4 life doesn't from this card doesn't represent much value. It's worth maybe slightly less than one mana. You are really just paying 2W at sorcery speed to cantrip.
This card is fine.
The question will be about how fast the format is.
If the speed is similar to the last few we've had than this card might be a nice option.
Ugh, this is a sorcery, I didn't realize that when I posted earlier about this.
This is awful! I would never want to play this unless ... unless ... I don't even know when, maybe if my PC crashed for several minutes and I was stuck on playables.
LSV compared this to a divination where the 2nd card you get is 0-mana gain 4 life. It's obviously not a perfect example, but the point is that it's not a negligible effect. People are saying you should want to do better things with your mana on turn 3... but maybe you don't want to do anything else. Sometimes you play a turn 1 or 2 blocker and you want your opponent to over-commit while you draw cards and slow down the game.
Now that's trying to sell the card in the best-case scenario. Sometimes you're going to cast this instead of a blocker and get blown out by an overrun or something - no one's calling it an auto-include or a snap-pick, but I don't think you need to feel bad playing this if your plan is to make the game go long.
One thing to note is that white is very aggressive in this format, which lowers this card's (already low) stock a bit. I don't think it's completely unplayable, but it's right on the edge of unplayable, and I'll be surprised if I ever end up running it.
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I'm curious how people feel about this card. Obviously lifegain alone is bad, but cantripping is obviously a significant add. I usually tend to think of cantrips in terms of "what if this was a repeatable ability that I could use as many times as I wanted?" So zap, still not very good. But 4 life for 3 mana is a pretty good deal. On the other hand, later in the game, drawing a card isn't as good as having a different nonland card, since you'll hit a useless land a fair percent of the time. On the other hand, it enables spell mastery.
Some people think this is utterly unplayable. I don't think it's exciting at all, but it seems playable to me, especially if you really want to turn on spell mastery. It's not super high impact, but it's also very low cost.
EDH Primers
Phelddagrif - Zirilan
EDH
Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif 4 - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif 3 - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
Cubetutor Link
This issue isn't specific to lifegain, it would apply to cantrip Lava Spikes too, though I can't think of many of though. (Pirahna Marsh is sort of one. Certainly would be better if you were somehow allowed to delay consuming one mana for the effect).
Contradict has a similar factor working against it.
With Zap, you can play it earlier and have a board effect with it, and as soon as you've found that appropriate place to use it, you can see the card underneath it. You only have to fall 1-2 mana behind board state tempo to get to see the card beneath. With this you -always- fall 3 mana behind on board state tempo (with the narrow exception of when you bait someone into casting lethal Lightning Javelin on your face instead of deploying a creature threat but that's why it's in your sideboard waiting until you see red, right?)
you can't bait anyone into going for burn spell, as it's a sorcery. Unless they're really thick.
Zap has potential to be pretty good, but also potential to be quite bad. This card is always pretty decent I think. It's sort of a do-nothing card, so I wouldn't draft it very highly, but if I need a 23rd card I think this card is totally innocuous and I wouldn't feel bad about having it in the deck.
EDH Primers
Phelddagrif - Zirilan
EDH
Thrasios+Bruse - Pang - Sasaya - Wydwen - Feather - Rona - Toshiro - Sylvia+Khorvath - Geth - QMarchesa - Firesong - Athreos - Arixmethes - Isperia - Etali - Silas+Sidar - Saskia - Virtus+Gorm - Kynaios - Naban - Aryel - Mizzix - Kazuul - Tymna+Kraum - Sidar+Tymna - Ayli - Gwendlyn - Phelddagrif 4 - Liliana - Kaervek - Phelddagrif 3 - Mairsil - Scarab - Child - Phenax - Shirei - Thada - Depala - Circu - Kytheon - GrenzoHR - Phelddagrif - Reyhan+Kraum - Toshiro - Varolz - Nin - Ojutai - Tasigur - Zedruu - Uril - Edric - Wort - Zurgo - Nahiri - Grenzo - Kozilek - Yisan - Ink-Treader - Yisan - Brago - Sidisi - Toshiro - Alexi - Sygg - Brimaz - Sek'Kuar - Marchesa - Vish Kal - Iroas - Phelddagrif - Ephara - Derevi - Glissa - Wanderer - Saffi - Melek - Xiahou Dun - Lazav - Lin Sivvi - Zirilan - Glissa
PDH - Drake - Graverobber - Izzet GM - Tallowisp - Symbiote Brawl - Feather - Ugin - Jace - Scarab - Angrath - Vraska - Kumena Oathbreaker - Wrenn&6
375 unpowered cube - https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/601ac624832cdf1039947588
For an expensive Cantrip, Instant vs Sorcery is a big deal. Healing Hands means you are either delaying the cantrip effect (i.e. less time to use the extra card, therefore less value from it) or doing nothing on turn 3 when a controlling deck would prefer playing a blocker or killing a 2-drop. If a control deck wanted to dig on turn 3, it would prefer Divination by far. Using turn 3 just to cycle seems like a suboptimal way to stabilize. Zap being an instant makes a difference, since you can at least just use it EOT on a turn where using the mana doesn't stall your board interaction. Also, burn interacts with the board (unlike lifegain), killing pesky aggro 2/1s and X/1 evasive guys that would otherwise deal you a lot of damage.
I agree that instant vs sorcery is a big deal here, as I would far prefer to leave up my mana for an instant effect and then cantrip if I don't use that other instant effect.
I just kinda assumed it was instant due to power level needs :/
Leaving up 3 mana until opponent EOT is a much lower cost than tapping 3 mana in your main phase. Even if you have nothing else you could play, the 3 mana represents a combat trick your opponent might respect.
The question will be about how fast the format is.
If the speed is similar to the last few we've had than this card might be a nice option.
This is awful! I would never want to play this unless ... unless ... I don't even know when, maybe if my PC crashed for several minutes and I was stuck on playables.
Now that's trying to sell the card in the best-case scenario. Sometimes you're going to cast this instead of a blocker and get blown out by an overrun or something - no one's calling it an auto-include or a snap-pick, but I don't think you need to feel bad playing this if your plan is to make the game go long.