Oh, they're going with this version of Belbe. Don't forget to run as much Pestilence variants as possible, and watch as your opponents turn on each other, Edric-style. And the Courts are a cycle? This one's pretty strong. The reprint here is Hunter's Insight, which still has Garruk flavor text, but still has no Garruk in the new art.
The problem with defining this format by what is "fun" is that everyone seems to define fun as what they don't lose to. If you keep losing to easily answered cards, that means you should improve your deck. If you don't want to improve your deck, then you should come to peace with the idea that you are going to lose because you chose to not interact with better strategies.
Belbe is not what I expected, but she is cute. I kind of wish they would have given her another ability as well; you can see where this loses interest in the mid to late game when your opponents have mana and you can't use it to play politics as well, but it is very good with mana sinks.
How i feel about competitive players and casual players in EDH: The competitive are german tourists, the casual are italian tourists, both in a italian beach. The italians asking themselves "why are the germans here?" make a legitimate question, the answer is because the beach is beautiful, no matter the country you came from. The italians wanting to ban the germans are dumb, because if the germans pay for their stay and follow the rules like everyone else, they have the right to be in the beach. Hovewer, if the germans started to ask themselves "why are the italians here?"... they would be dumb as hell.
I like that Belbe's ability works like Edric's, only triggering off your opponents losing life (not you).
I like that we have another Golgari artifact/colorless legend. I guess Belbe slots into Glissa? Or does anyone think she's strong enough on her own?
Her art is kinda bland - like she doesn't have the detailed rendering of a Legendary creature. They should have tried to go for something like the art on her mtg.gamepedia wiki page.
Her art is kinda bland - like she doesn't have the detailed rendering of a Legendary creature. They should have tried to go for something like the art on her mtg.gamepedia wiki page.
That's an art from the cover of Nemesis novel. Also depicted on Belbe's Portal (lying in Eladamri's arms).
As for the "rendering of a legendary creature" - whatever is meant by that - the image is blurry, and flowstone (that the wall is made of) is not exactly known for its color variety and lots of features...
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A character that played 3 different sides, and was going to run off with ertai, doesnt even get partner
Her ability is... its intereeting given the color pair, but to give your opponents potentially 6 mana every turn? Kinda dangerously dumb in supernovapalooza. Id probably build her with the idea of sacing her after i get the mana for myself since shes so cheap
I like Belbe because she is... interesting and not just in your face strong like a lot of these commanders are. I want to work hard to try to break something.
Her art is kinda bland - like she doesn't have the detailed rendering of a Legendary creature. They should have tried to go for something like the art on her mtg.gamepedia wiki page.
That's an art from the cover of Nemesis novel. Also depicted on Belbe's Portal (lying in Eladamri's arms).
As for the "rendering of a legendary creature" - whatever is meant by that - the image is blurry, and flowstone (that the wall is made of) is not exactly known for its color variety and lots of features...
This looks like a newly-reanimated Belbe, with the robot voice and the activated Eye of Yawgmoth. The Belbe of the Nemesis cover shows up later on, when she becomes less Phyrexian.
A character that played 3 different sides, and was going to run off with ertai, doesnt even get partner
Her ability is... its intereeting given the color pair, but to give your opponents potentially 6 mana every turn? Kinda dangerously dumb in supernovapalooza. Id probably build her with the idea of sacing her after i get the mana for myself since shes so cheap
Her original role was to be a kingmaker, and I can see this card doing just that.
This is a very interesting design, and not disappointing to me at all. I want to play her in a deck with lots of Sanctum of Stone Fangs style effects, then big artifacts and colorless mana sinks to play with the 6 mana you get every turn.
In a four player game, your opponents will get at most 4 mana from her each turn, and their decks won't be built to optimize her. The political play is a nice bonus.
Court of Ambition seems super strong, but also makes you into a super arch enemy. More so than the other courts that have been spoiled so far. I'm a little afraid to slot this into my new Queen Marchesa deck, which is trying to be a bit more political and less "make everyone hate me."
The more I think about the Belbe card, the more I actually like it flavor-wise.
Belbe's original function was to be an impartial observer of the rivalry between the various successors to Volrath's throne, and then to choose one for the position. She was successful at her impartiality at first and tried to encourage each candidate (Initially thought to be Crovax, Ertai, and Greven, but eventually Greven bowed out in favor of a returning Volrath) to seize power, but eventually she sided with one (Ertai) and tried to help manipulate his victory.
Similarly, this card initially chooses no sides and encourages your opponents to take each other out before worrying about you, while giving you a subtle way to play kingmaker and take the reigns yourself.
I really like courts so far. I think I would add the black and white one to may Liesa deck if I build one. Monarch is super fun in commander and a nice distraction and Liesa can benefit from that.
The flavor is almost perfect. She's just here watching Greven, Crovax and Volrath beating each other (and subtle helping)
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How i feel about competitive players and casual players in EDH: The competitive are german tourists, the casual are italian tourists, both in a italian beach. The italians asking themselves "why are the germans here?" make a legitimate question, the answer is because the beach is beautiful, no matter the country you came from. The italians wanting to ban the germans are dumb, because if the germans pay for their stay and follow the rules like everyone else, they have the right to be in the beach. Hovewer, if the germans started to ask themselves "why are the italians here?"... they would be dumb as hell.
Disappointed with this Court. I guess it could be a finisher in 8Rack or something but it costs to much for that list and that list has almost no way to take back monarch if it loses it, so it's probably a trap to play it there.
Disappointed with this Court. I guess it could be a finisher in 8Rack or something but it costs to much for that list and that list has almost no way to take back monarch if it loses it, so it's probably a trap to play it there.
Monarchy actually has an interesting interaction with decks like Tinybones, Trinket Thief. Normally, once you empty out the opponents hand, they're incentivized to make sure they don't hold onto anything so you can't trigger the draw by making them discard. If they end up with the monarchy, though, they draw on their end step, meaning they'll frequently be stuck with whatever land or creature they drew in hand, giving you another bite at those sweet sweet discard effects.
Disappointed with this Court. I guess it could be a finisher in 8Rack or something but it costs to much for that list and that list has almost no way to take back monarch if it loses it, so it's probably a trap to play it there.
I just wish these cards weren't even legal in vintage and legacy, so we could forget about even thinking to make evaluations like this. And it would help avoid ridiculous spikes for the 1 or 2 cards that are accidentally busted in those formats.
Omg a BG legendary that doesn't care about death triggers and graveyard manipulation.
As others said she has really decent flavor and opens up a new kind of BG decks.
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Oh, they're going with this version of Belbe. Don't forget to run as much Pestilence variants as possible, and watch as your opponents turn on each other, Edric-style. And the Courts are a cycle? This one's pretty strong. The reprint here is Hunter's Insight, which still has Garruk flavor text, but still has no Garruk in the new art.
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I like that we have another Golgari artifact/colorless legend. I guess Belbe slots into Glissa? Or does anyone think she's strong enough on her own?
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That's an art from the cover of Nemesis novel. Also depicted on Belbe's Portal (lying in Eladamri's arms).
As for the "rendering of a legendary creature" - whatever is meant by that - the image is blurry, and flowstone (that the wall is made of) is not exactly known for its color variety and lots of features...
Let this great clan rest in peace (2001-2011)
A character that played 3 different sides, and was going to run off with ertai, doesnt even get partner
Her ability is... its intereeting given the color pair, but to give your opponents potentially 6 mana every turn? Kinda dangerously dumb in supernovapalooza. Id probably build her with the idea of sacing her after i get the mana for myself since shes so cheap
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Her original role was to be a kingmaker, and I can see this card doing just that.
In a four player game, your opponents will get at most 4 mana from her each turn, and their decks won't be built to optimize her. The political play is a nice bonus.
Court of Ambition seems super strong, but also makes you into a super arch enemy. More so than the other courts that have been spoiled so far. I'm a little afraid to slot this into my new Queen Marchesa deck, which is trying to be a bit more political and less "make everyone hate me."
Belbe's original function was to be an impartial observer of the rivalry between the various successors to Volrath's throne, and then to choose one for the position. She was successful at her impartiality at first and tried to encourage each candidate (Initially thought to be Crovax, Ertai, and Greven, but eventually Greven bowed out in favor of a returning Volrath) to seize power, but eventually she sided with one (Ertai) and tried to help manipulate his victory.
Similarly, this card initially chooses no sides and encourages your opponents to take each other out before worrying about you, while giving you a subtle way to play kingmaker and take the reigns yourself.
And with Zulaport Cutthroat Cake walk of netting Six C
and the black monarch enchantment that’s gonna be nasty with tiny bones
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I just wish these cards weren't even legal in vintage and legacy, so we could forget about even thinking to make evaluations like this. And it would help avoid ridiculous spikes for the 1 or 2 cards that are accidentally busted in those formats.
As others said she has really decent flavor and opens up a new kind of BG decks.
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Ooooh, great detail! Nice connection.
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