After watching all the pre-release shows from The Magic Show, I've realized that people always say the same thing.
"There are not a lot of cards will see play."
Yes. Yes, there are. Once somebody wins a tournament, then everyone will take notice.
Thank you! Exactly! Even in the much adored Ravnica block, people were stuck making pretty obvious Kamigawa heavy standard with a splash of obvious White Weenie "now improved with red cards." Then all of a sudden the Japanese came to town and it was the "BEST BLOCK EVAR!!!!!!" It amuses me to no end that people are automatically blinded by three color symbols in a mana cost, and refuse to see that they've been playing 5-color Toast for months.
At first I LoL'd cause I live in houston and the hurricane hit a while ago.
But seriously, we've just been spoiled with Lor/Sha block, where we got an infy amount of 2/2s that cost one, char 2.0, demigod, oversoul, colossus, bitterblossom, doran,a better version of pyroclasm, a ridiculous life gain creature (finks), The majority of the commands were also ridiculous, teeg who was a super lockdown creature, and the whole faerie deck with it's steadfast rank among the decks. That kind of power level was over the top, I feel that wizards was not being responsible when they were doing that, you're also comparing four sets to one, wait for conflux and the other set to come out, I'm sure by the end of this block there won't even be any tribal decks left. However right now the power level of uncommons and commons are high, 3 mana 3/4 lifelink, 4 mana 4/4 flier, stop looking at the gold cost in the creature, do you know what kind of environment standard's going to be? Don't you remember how much fixing is in there? Theres a cycle of filter lands, tribal lands, and reflecting pool which goes into any deck, we're also getting the ability to use pain lands again fixing will not be a problem in standard, thats why we have infy gold cards in the same set as fixing that you would only use in limited.
Also what about these cards did you think were weak?
Order of the White Orchid
Knight of Eos
Salvage Titan
Hell's Thunder
Wild Nacatal
Charm Cycle
Emyprial Archangel, This thing is nuts with mannequin
Qasali Ambusher
Sarkhan Vol
Stoic Angel
The whole exalted thing put together, in particularly Rafiq
What cards make you think that? I think the whole set is undepowered and janky. There are so few cards that excite me to play them in limited, and they're almost all in Bant.
Etherium Sculptor? Glaze Fiend? You have people talking about putting/testing these in extened Affinity builds. That's a pretty tuned and tough deck to begin with.
Wild Nacatl? That's generating some buzz as well.
Soul's Fire? That's going to be a casual favorite FOREVER, and it'd probably crack a competitive list as some point.
Magma Spray? While it'd need to find a deck, it seems like a wrecking ball in some environments. Oh Hi.. I hose Finks and Redcaps.
These are all commons.
Some already have places, some could very easily have them if a format shapes up a certain way.
Yes, I'm cherry picking, but those are five COMMONS that I could see getting play time in Standard and Extended.
I don't see how one can claim that this set is horribly desgined.
It just puts flavour a bit higher on the design goals than usual. Cards are given colours fitting to their shard, if you have 2/2 flying card that is iconic for Bant, that card should be GWU
I love this approach to desing, and think Alara might be the most interesting set since Ravnica (which incidently brought me back to Magic).
I hope they keep this up with the next sets.
Those who say this set is weak....give some numbers and facts please. This set has several things going for it. FIrst off, the artwork is stunning, secondly, shadowmoor allowed us very greedy manabases. So it'll be easier to play tri color decks.
As always, people analyze out of context. The loads of fatties in this block implies wizards is pushing for mid-range. To make mid-range viable, wizards only has to make cards that allow players to stablize. I don't know why people think 5-6 mana is a lot. Games don't happen in a vacuum. With the power of creatures now, combat IS the way to go. Blocking IS relevant.
There are tons of cards in this set that have constructed potential. If anything, I see a powercreep. How is it badly designed? Unncessary colors? What does that mean? Just because a card has U in its cost, it doesn't mean it must have characteristics of that color. Every color has vanilla creatures. That's like saying "There is nothing blue about Merfolk of the Pale Trident" or "There is nothing red about Hill Giant".
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"Wizards could put $100 bills in packs and people would complain about how they were folded." - from Dr Jeebus's Sig
You know what, I've decided I'm A-OKAY with people griping about this topic AGAIN. All you Spikes scramble for your Vol's and meanwhile the rest of us will be getting bargain deals on the rares that will end up jumping in price 3 months from now when some pro breaks them wide open.
Here are some good cards:
battlegrace angel
elspeth, knight errant
ethersworn canonist
knight of the white orchid
metallurgeon
oblivion ring
ranger of eos
scourglass
sigiled paladin
courier capsule
etherium sculptor
master of etherium
mindlock orb
tezzeret the seeker
ad nauseum
cunning lethemancer
death baron
executioner's capsule
infest
salvage titan
caldera hellion
dragon fodder
goblin assault
hells thunder
druid of anima
wild nacalt
agony wasp
ajani vergeant
bant charm
blightning
broodmate dragon
cruel ultimatum
deft duelist
empyrial archangel
esper charm
grixis charm
hellkite overlord
jund charm
punish ignorance
qasali ambusher
rafiq of the many
rhox war monk
sarkhan vol
sedraxis specter
sharuum the hegemon
spouting thrinax
stoic angel
tower gargoyle
obelisks
quietus spike
relic of progenitus
three color lands
They are many and the spoiler isnt finished yet, we wait 80+cards. So i dont know why you say this set is crappy. It has so may good cards, nice design and powerful decks.
Exactly....I was going to make a long list like that too. If anything, this set has MORE constructed potential than previous sets.
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"Wizards could put $100 bills in packs and people would complain about how they were folded." - from Dr Jeebus's Sig
You know what, I've decided I'm A-OKAY with people griping about this topic AGAIN. All you Spikes scramble for your Vol's and meanwhile the rest of us will be getting bargain deals on the rares that will end up jumping in price 3 months from now when some pro breaks them wide open.
Buy this man a pint!
Quote from Neugun »
What most people also fail to see is that of course most of the cards played in the new Type 2 will be from LOR/SHM block. Because 4 sets are a lot more cards than one set (with just 249 cards). You make Shards a bad set by saying "80% of the cards in the new environment will be from the last block." That's just dumb.
Dammit, everyone keeps saying what I want before I do.
If only 80% of the cards in the format are comprised of non-SoA cards, it would actually be a good sign for SoA's power level.
The new standard card pool will consist of 10E, LOR, MOR, SHA, EVE, and SOA which comes to a total of 1564 cards. SOA accounts for 249 of those cards, which is a scant 15.92% of the cards available, so for a small set to exceed that percentage of cards actually played in standard will be a pretty big feat.
Caveat: I am not a constructed player so I am not speaking about the overall "power" level of the cards, or whether or not they will result in some new super tier 1 deck type.
I am speaking about the overall design and the flavor and it looks good. And fun. And fun is the name of the game when I play.
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Ambush Krotiq makes me laugh so much. I keep rereading the card and it keeps not having Flash. In what sense is this an ambush again? I just have visions of this huge Krotiq poorly concealed in some bushes, feeling slightly sad that his carefully planned ambushes never seem to work.
I still think Spell Snip isn't so bad... At least it replaces itself late game where Mana Leak could possibly sit there collecting dust. Normally I am one of the ones trying really hard to justify why a set isn't all that bad to uber-players, at least from a casual or limited standpoint. But to say this set is bad is just bonkers. I have very little interest in the tri-color theme and will likely buy very little of this set... but I can still think outside of the box and recognize something that is well designed and ballanced. If I was still a tournament player, I would be doing everything I could to get my paws on at least half of the rares we see here. Heck, this is the first set in ages I've considered buying a box simply because it could pay itself back so easily.
I expected this thread to pop up... it always does with every set.
There will be a lot of cards that will see play and we still have ~70 cards left to spoil. Hopefully we've seen the last of all these Timmy-tastic cards.
I'm not calling this set a "bad set" power-wise, because I know very well many of these cards will see play at some point, but to back up the bad design thing I said earlier here are some things I just don't understand.
Why would they waste slots in a smaller "large" set reprinting cards that are still in standard, when they could stick them in 11th Edition and have the exact same effect?
And to add on to that what is the point of printing Spell Snip in the same set as Cancel?
Why exactly is Mindlock Orb an artifact and not an enchantment? They've really blurred the line between the card-types.
Why are the "Ultimatums" not mythic rares when they seem alot more special then Hellkite Overlord and his ilk?
Couldn't the flavor department think of a better name for the charms. Bant Charm, for example, is one of the laziest card names I've heard in some time.
Why does Broodmate Dragon create a red dragon, when (being his Mate) it should be BRG like him.
Why does Rhox Warmonk have U and G in his mana cost? I cannot find one aspect of him that belongs to either colors? Same question for Sedraxis Specter, Tower Gargoyle, Undead Leotau, and Wooly Thocter. I understand they need a prohibitive cost because of their power (Leotau aside ;)) but these should have been designed to fit their colors better.
Does the line "Artifact Creature - Illusion" bug anybody else but me?
On the flipside however Exalted is a very well designed mechanic.
I just realized. Mycoloth perfectly demonstrates the devour mechanic.
Mycoloth: NOMNOMNOM on Dragon Fodder.
One turn later, 1/1 turds come out.
Quote from kalkris »
btw i did it because i could. i was bored and decided to let my little med-free spree go ahead. I am bipolar, explaining all the drama that ensued after. I have problems.
Quote from ShadowWaveInc. »
Jon Finkel can simply walk into Mordor.
"When an artist dies the world loses two lives, that of the artist and that of his unfinished work."
Why does Rhox Warmonk have U and G in his mana cost? I cannot find one aspect of him that belongs to either colors? Same question for Sedraxis Specter, Tower Gargoyle, Undead Leotau, and Wooly Thocter. I understand they need a prohibitive cost because of their power (Leotau aside ;)) but these should have been designed to fit their colors better.
Because this set is being designed with Shards in mind, and not the usual rules about gold cards in mind. The card is a Bant card, not a UWG card.
At any rate, why is noone mentioning Wooly Thoctar? Think about a world where we can have two dorans on the board at once...a doran that enjoys having warhammer on his face, etc...
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News and spoiler contributor for GatheringMagic.com
The Charms are going to make a big impact, and Cruel Ultimatum as well (it basically says : if you don't beat me before I get 8 mana, I win). The Jund tokens are going to influence the current B/R token (STD) and/or B/W token (Block) decks into possibly splitting into multiple differently colored builds.
Did you read my post at all? I already said that about the RGB cards impacting the token deck. The charms are going to be played, you've got me there, but if I ever see Cruel Ultimatum at top tables, I'd probably eat my own food. A statement like that shows a gross misunderstanding of the way competitive constructed is played. If you really think that a 7 mana Sorcery that is near impossible to cast on turn 7, has absolutlely no relevent board presence when you cast is, and doesn't immediately win you the game when cast (see Tooth and Nail or Dragonstorm, which could be played on 4 easily), then you are sadly mistaken. I don't care what Chapin or your mother or anybody said about this card. 7 mana Sorceries that do not read "Win the game" in big bold letters do not see play. And no, Cruel Ultimatum does not say win the game. It says Edict you, make you discard three cards you don't have, and draw three. Was Twisted Justice played?
The only deck in there that made a splash right away was Elves (and it was only one of the many G/B archetypes). Fae was terrible until Morningtide gave it Bitterblossom. Kithkin was played en masse at our the first tourney after the release and got murdered by U/B Teachings deck that were still the superior deck choice. They didn't become good until Shadowmoor brought Mirrorweave to the table. Goblins didn't make a splash until Worlds (with Sam Black winning a car with it) and stayed Tier 2 at best even after that. The strategy got refined into the B/R Tokens deck after Shadowmorr, which was superior for not being tribe-oriented. Merfolk only really arose after Morningtide as an anti-deck when Faeries became the deck to beat.
I would say the only real deck that made a splash right away from Lorwyn (besides Elves and other G/B strategies) was Mannequin decks, and they were sporting a lot of Time Spiral, 10th and Coldsnap.
Mannequin was a deck that only existed because of the interblock synergy of Mannequin and Evoke. Faeries was not played as it is now, but U/G Fae was still a popular deck. Doran is a card, contrary to popular believe. The deck that won worlds if I remember correct. Lorwyn did have an impact on Standard, a much bigger one than Shards will have. I guess it's my turn to drive the "This set is the worst set" bandwagon around, ironic, isn't it?
At any rate, why is noone mentioning Wooly Thoctar? Think about a world where we can have two dorans on the board at once...a doran that enjoys having warhammer on his face, etc...
He doesn't really have much backing him up. One drops outside of mana dudes don't exist, Wild Nacatl is a 1/1 in standard. I'd just rather play Doran over him, seeing as Black seems to be the more powerful color to play with others (Red these days just doesn't like playing with others, RDW can't even play Mutavault because of how red mana intensive the cards are) Green is a poor splash color in a post goyf world, but still a good main color. I just don't see where he fits.
Because this set is being designed with Shards in mind, and not the usual rules about gold cards in mind. The card is a Bant card, not a UWG card.
This statement, while true, is the reason behind the problems in Shards. Cards do not need to be Multicolor just for the sake of being multi color. I could go on this too, but this is starting to look like a wall of text.
I made a post with around 60 playable shard cards and you comment THE WORST CARD OF THE SET. You prove nothing by saying that the worst card is pretty bad. Instead comment the good cards, those that represent the set.
Way to set up the Straw man Argument there both of you guys. I don't see anywhere in that post where he stated that Lorwyn sucks, he merely contributed a card from Shards that fits the topic. He wasn't out to prove anything. You using hyperbole to try and make him sound like a fanatic is a bad way of arguing your point. Better luck next time.
Here are some good cards:
(List of cards cut for space)
They are many and the spoiler isnt finished yet, we wait 80+cards. So i dont know why you say this set is crappy. It has so may good cards, nice design and powerful decks so stop conplaining and comparing this to shadowmoor a real junk set.
So if I can name about fifty borderline playable cards from Champions of Kamigawa, does that become a good set? You also mistyped Eventide when you said a real junk set. It's a common mistake to make, though Shadowmoor is an example of a good set, while Eventide is an example of a terrible set.
I'm not calling this set a "bad set" power-wise, because I know very well many of these cards will see play at some point, but to back up the bad design thing I said earlier here are some things I just don't understand.
Why would they waste slots in a smaller "large" set reprinting cards that are still in standard, when they could stick them in 11th Edition and have the exact same effect?
And to add on to that what is the point of printing Spell Snip in the same set as Cancel?
Why exactly is Mindlock Orb an artifact and not an enchantment? They've really blurred the line between the card-types.
Why are the "Ultimatums" not mythic rares when they seem alot more special then Hellkite Overlord and his ilk?
Couldn't the flavor department think of a better name for the charms. Bant Charm, for example, is one of the laziest card names I've heard in some time.
Why does Broodmate Dragon create a red dragon, when (being his Mate) it should be BRG like him.
Why does Rhox Warmonk have U and G in his mana cost? I cannot find one aspect of him that belongs to either colors? Same question for Sedraxis Specter, Tower Gargoyle, Undead Leotau, and Wooly Thocter. I understand they need a prohibitive cost because of their power (Leotau aside ;)) but these should have been designed to fit their colors better.
Does the line "Artifact Creature - Illusion" bug anybody else but me?
On the flipside however Exalted is a very well designed mechanic.
Not sure if I read it right, but I think they plan to stop printing core editions because fewer people buy them? So they'll put some staples like naturalize in expansions.
Every set has to have "bad cards". Believe it or not, a few players like "bad" cards so every set has to have 1 or 2. Remember Soaring Hope? Yeah spell snip is REALLY subpar.
Functionally, I don't see a big point to colored artifacts. They might as well be enchantments. Yup. It's basically to have synergy with esper shard cards like Master of Etherium.
The charms...invasion charms based their charm names on the dragons. True, they should have named it something else.
The color costs. Each set has its own design philosophy. This set's costs seem more flavor based than function based. If every set followed the same philosophy, every expansion would be boring. Rhox war monk isn't very blue, but it's not like mono U can cast it so there's no color pie mess up whatsoever.
Wizards has a hard to pleasing the players. We're some of the hardest people to impress on this planet. If they follow the same design philosophy, players complain that there is nothing new. Yet when they do something new, some don't like it.
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"Wizards could put $100 bills in packs and people would complain about how they were folded." - from Dr Jeebus's Sig
I know I am. The ridiculous power level of creatures in Lor/Sha block has been scaled back it seems. The format is, with any luck, slowing down. While the design of the set really sucks, and there are admittedly only a handful of cards that tickle my fancy, there is something about everything being JUST OK or solid at best that I find relaxing. The whining every other post about "everything being crap, even in limited" on the other hand, isn't relaxing, but very, very amusing. So I am enjoying this set for none of the conventional reasons, but enjoying it nonetheless.
I think after the aggro-hybrid heavy environment that's flooded the meta here the last year, I'll be more than happy to see aggro take a hit. it really does say something when A good Build of Toast can roast an FNM or win a PTQ. the archetype loosing some speed, but that's how it should be; control suffered during lorwyn/shadowmoore block due to totally overpowerd undercosted creatures, and it will be nice to see slower, more thought provoking games come to play with the release of shards.
your right. many of the creatures are totally blah, but the spells are sick this time around. (ad Nauseum, anyone?)
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Actual Truth:
"You heard it here folks:
Anyone who disagrees with "Jack from NC" is an idiot."-The Dead Weatherman
1. There exists at least one card that is not constructed worthy in the set; or
2. There exists at least one Timmy card in the set; or
3. There exists at least one Jonny card in the set; or
4. There exists at least one reprint of a card in the set;
then this set sucks, is underpowered, and is the worst set ever.
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"Wizards could put $100 bills in packs and people would complain about how they were folded." - from Dr Jeebus's Sig
The problem I see is that people are still stuck in the land or lorwyn/shadowmoor blocks. It was a different design team, a different feel, a different focus, a different power level.
If you analyze the set at face value, yes you'll find some holes and things that don't make sense flavor wise (Ultimatums should have been mythic, yes)...but overall the set is okay.
It's slower than what we're used to, it's DIFFERENT than what we're used to, but I don't think it's Coldsnap 2.0 (I hope =\)
Bananahunter, that is a glancing generalization. I'm a spike and I don't agree with that kind of mentality.
You see Wizards isn't trying to focus in on any one group, it's trying to appeal to a larger array of folks. That might wind up alienating some people (tournament guys/gals who prefer a large selection of tier 1 cards), but all around Wizards hopes to make everyone happy.
There's still around 70 cards left to spoil, maybe the spikes will get their new goyf and thoughtseize, johnny will get his new mind's desire/heartbeat/etc., and well...Timmy better be happy with all the fatties in this set.
Seriously, there's more fatties in Shards of Alara than a Weight Watchers convention.
After LOR rotates, if the next block is this slow and... unwieldy... then it'll be balanced. You'll spend the first five turns playing tiny set-up spells or a creature that immediately dies, and then the bombs start dueling.
This set is underpowered compared to other sets, based on standard metrics of what you should get for a card at a given mana cost. For example, look at Incinerate vs Branching Bolt- the new card is a lot more random, 50% more expensive, more color dependent, and can't hit players. For three mana, we're used to an unconditional four damage, not three or maybe three to two different things. But it looks like '3 mana = 3 damage' is this set's standard, which becomes the new standard after all other standards rotate.
So, yeah, it's a bad, underpowered set; but that won't be true in 14 months.
I don't care what Chapin or your mother or anybody said about this card. 7 mana Sorceries that do not read "Win the game" in big bold letters do not see play. And no, Cruel Ultimatum does not say win the game. It says Edict you, make you discard three cards you don't have, and draw three.
First: Chapin is rarely wrong. I agree with his analysis and I think this is going to be a major card for 5 Color Control. The mana cost is actually laughably easy in a control deck with today's mana bases.
If opponent is aggro, edict + life gain + draw three is about 5 for 1. If you can't win from there you deserve to lose.
If opponent is control, he *will* have three cards and lose a good chunk of his life.
The card says "I win" as much as Tooth and Nail did.
Thank you! Exactly! Even in the much adored Ravnica block, people were stuck making pretty obvious Kamigawa heavy standard with a splash of obvious White Weenie "now improved with red cards." Then all of a sudden the Japanese came to town and it was the "BEST BLOCK EVAR!!!!!!" It amuses me to no end that people are automatically blinded by three color symbols in a mana cost, and refuse to see that they've been playing 5-color Toast for months.
But seriously, we've just been spoiled with Lor/Sha block, where we got an infy amount of 2/2s that cost one, char 2.0, demigod, oversoul, colossus, bitterblossom, doran,a better version of pyroclasm, a ridiculous life gain creature (finks), The majority of the commands were also ridiculous, teeg who was a super lockdown creature, and the whole faerie deck with it's steadfast rank among the decks. That kind of power level was over the top, I feel that wizards was not being responsible when they were doing that, you're also comparing four sets to one, wait for conflux and the other set to come out, I'm sure by the end of this block there won't even be any tribal decks left. However right now the power level of uncommons and commons are high, 3 mana 3/4 lifelink, 4 mana 4/4 flier, stop looking at the gold cost in the creature, do you know what kind of environment standard's going to be? Don't you remember how much fixing is in there? Theres a cycle of filter lands, tribal lands, and reflecting pool which goes into any deck, we're also getting the ability to use pain lands again fixing will not be a problem in standard, thats why we have infy gold cards in the same set as fixing that you would only use in limited.
Also what about these cards did you think were weak?
Order of the White Orchid
Knight of Eos
Salvage Titan
Hell's Thunder
Wild Nacatal
Charm Cycle
Emyprial Archangel, This thing is nuts with mannequin
Qasali Ambusher
Sarkhan Vol
Stoic Angel
The whole exalted thing put together, in particularly Rafiq
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Etherium Sculptor? Glaze Fiend? You have people talking about putting/testing these in extened Affinity builds. That's a pretty tuned and tough deck to begin with.
Wild Nacatl? That's generating some buzz as well.
Soul's Fire? That's going to be a casual favorite FOREVER, and it'd probably crack a competitive list as some point.
Magma Spray? While it'd need to find a deck, it seems like a wrecking ball in some environments. Oh Hi.. I hose Finks and Redcaps.
These are all commons.
Some already have places, some could very easily have them if a format shapes up a certain way.
Yes, I'm cherry picking, but those are five COMMONS that I could see getting play time in Standard and Extended.
It just puts flavour a bit higher on the design goals than usual. Cards are given colours fitting to their shard, if you have 2/2 flying card that is iconic for Bant, that card should be GWU
I love this approach to desing, and think Alara might be the most interesting set since Ravnica (which incidently brought me back to Magic).
I hope they keep this up with the next sets.
As always, people analyze out of context. The loads of fatties in this block implies wizards is pushing for mid-range. To make mid-range viable, wizards only has to make cards that allow players to stablize. I don't know why people think 5-6 mana is a lot. Games don't happen in a vacuum. With the power of creatures now, combat IS the way to go. Blocking IS relevant.
There are tons of cards in this set that have constructed potential. If anything, I see a powercreep. How is it badly designed? Unncessary colors? What does that mean? Just because a card has U in its cost, it doesn't mean it must have characteristics of that color. Every color has vanilla creatures. That's like saying "There is nothing blue about Merfolk of the Pale Trident" or "There is nothing red about Hill Giant".
Exactly....I was going to make a long list like that too. If anything, this set has MORE constructed potential than previous sets.
Buy this man a pint!
Dammit, everyone keeps saying what I want before I do.
(still, get this guy a mug too)
The new standard card pool will consist of 10E, LOR, MOR, SHA, EVE, and SOA which comes to a total of 1564 cards. SOA accounts for 249 of those cards, which is a scant 15.92% of the cards available, so for a small set to exceed that percentage of cards actually played in standard will be a pretty big feat.
Caveat: I am not a constructed player so I am not speaking about the overall "power" level of the cards, or whether or not they will result in some new super tier 1 deck type.
I am speaking about the overall design and the flavor and it looks good. And fun. And fun is the name of the game when I play.
There will be a lot of cards that will see play and we still have ~70 cards left to spoil. Hopefully we've seen the last of all these Timmy-tastic cards.
My thread = total success.
Why would they waste slots in a smaller "large" set reprinting cards that are still in standard, when they could stick them in 11th Edition and have the exact same effect?
And to add on to that what is the point of printing Spell Snip in the same set as Cancel?
Why exactly is Mindlock Orb an artifact and not an enchantment? They've really blurred the line between the card-types.
Why are the "Ultimatums" not mythic rares when they seem alot more special then Hellkite Overlord and his ilk?
Couldn't the flavor department think of a better name for the charms. Bant Charm, for example, is one of the laziest card names I've heard in some time.
Why does Broodmate Dragon create a red dragon, when (being his Mate) it should be BRG like him.
Why does Rhox Warmonk have U and G in his mana cost? I cannot find one aspect of him that belongs to either colors? Same question for Sedraxis Specter, Tower Gargoyle, Undead Leotau, and Wooly Thocter. I understand they need a prohibitive cost because of their power (Leotau aside ;)) but these should have been designed to fit their colors better.
Does the line "Artifact Creature - Illusion" bug anybody else but me?
On the flipside however Exalted is a very well designed mechanic.
Because this set is being designed with Shards in mind, and not the usual rules about gold cards in mind. The card is a Bant card, not a UWG card.
At any rate, why is noone mentioning Wooly Thoctar? Think about a world where we can have two dorans on the board at once...a doran that enjoys having warhammer on his face, etc...
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Did you read my post at all? I already said that about the RGB cards impacting the token deck. The charms are going to be played, you've got me there, but if I ever see Cruel Ultimatum at top tables, I'd probably eat my own food. A statement like that shows a gross misunderstanding of the way competitive constructed is played. If you really think that a 7 mana Sorcery that is near impossible to cast on turn 7, has absolutlely no relevent board presence when you cast is, and doesn't immediately win you the game when cast (see Tooth and Nail or Dragonstorm, which could be played on 4 easily), then you are sadly mistaken. I don't care what Chapin or your mother or anybody said about this card. 7 mana Sorceries that do not read "Win the game" in big bold letters do not see play. And no, Cruel Ultimatum does not say win the game. It says Edict you, make you discard three cards you don't have, and draw three. Was Twisted Justice played?
Mannequin was a deck that only existed because of the interblock synergy of Mannequin and Evoke. Faeries was not played as it is now, but U/G Fae was still a popular deck. Doran is a card, contrary to popular believe. The deck that won worlds if I remember correct. Lorwyn did have an impact on Standard, a much bigger one than Shards will have. I guess it's my turn to drive the "This set is the worst set" bandwagon around, ironic, isn't it?
He doesn't really have much backing him up. One drops outside of mana dudes don't exist, Wild Nacatl is a 1/1 in standard. I'd just rather play Doran over him, seeing as Black seems to be the more powerful color to play with others (Red these days just doesn't like playing with others, RDW can't even play Mutavault because of how red mana intensive the cards are) Green is a poor splash color in a post goyf world, but still a good main color. I just don't see where he fits.
This statement, while true, is the reason behind the problems in Shards. Cards do not need to be Multicolor just for the sake of being multi color. I could go on this too, but this is starting to look like a wall of text.
Way to set up the Straw man Argument there both of you guys. I don't see anywhere in that post where he stated that Lorwyn sucks, he merely contributed a card from Shards that fits the topic. He wasn't out to prove anything. You using hyperbole to try and make him sound like a fanatic is a bad way of arguing your point. Better luck next time.
So if I can name about fifty borderline playable cards from Champions of Kamigawa, does that become a good set? You also mistyped Eventide when you said a real junk set. It's a common mistake to make, though Shadowmoor is an example of a good set, while Eventide is an example of a terrible set.
Not sure if I read it right, but I think they plan to stop printing core editions because fewer people buy them? So they'll put some staples like naturalize in expansions.
Every set has to have "bad cards". Believe it or not, a few players like "bad" cards so every set has to have 1 or 2. Remember Soaring Hope? Yeah spell snip is REALLY subpar.
Functionally, I don't see a big point to colored artifacts. They might as well be enchantments. Yup. It's basically to have synergy with esper shard cards like Master of Etherium.
The charms...invasion charms based their charm names on the dragons. True, they should have named it something else.
The color costs. Each set has its own design philosophy. This set's costs seem more flavor based than function based. If every set followed the same philosophy, every expansion would be boring. Rhox war monk isn't very blue, but it's not like mono U can cast it so there's no color pie mess up whatsoever.
Wizards has a hard to pleasing the players. We're some of the hardest people to impress on this planet. If they follow the same design philosophy, players complain that there is nothing new. Yet when they do something new, some don't like it.
I think after the aggro-hybrid heavy environment that's flooded the meta here the last year, I'll be more than happy to see aggro take a hit. it really does say something when A good Build of Toast can roast an FNM or win a PTQ. the archetype loosing some speed, but that's how it should be; control suffered during lorwyn/shadowmoore block due to totally overpowerd undercosted creatures, and it will be nice to see slower, more thought provoking games come to play with the release of shards.
your right. many of the creatures are totally blah, but the spells are sick this time around. (ad Nauseum, anyone?)
Thanks, Heroes of The Planes! You guys are great!
Actual Truth:
If:
1. There exists at least one card that is not constructed worthy in the set; or
2. There exists at least one Timmy card in the set; or
3. There exists at least one Jonny card in the set; or
4. There exists at least one reprint of a card in the set;
then this set sucks, is underpowered, and is the worst set ever.
If you analyze the set at face value, yes you'll find some holes and things that don't make sense flavor wise (Ultimatums should have been mythic, yes)...but overall the set is okay.
It's slower than what we're used to, it's DIFFERENT than what we're used to, but I don't think it's Coldsnap 2.0 (I hope =\)
Bananahunter, that is a glancing generalization. I'm a spike and I don't agree with that kind of mentality.
There's still around 70 cards left to spoil, maybe the spikes will get their new goyf and thoughtseize, johnny will get his new mind's desire/heartbeat/etc., and well...Timmy better be happy with all the fatties in this set.
Seriously, there's more fatties in Shards of Alara than a Weight Watchers convention.
This set is underpowered compared to other sets, based on standard metrics of what you should get for a card at a given mana cost. For example, look at Incinerate vs Branching Bolt- the new card is a lot more random, 50% more expensive, more color dependent, and can't hit players. For three mana, we're used to an unconditional four damage, not three or maybe three to two different things. But it looks like '3 mana = 3 damage' is this set's standard, which becomes the new standard after all other standards rotate.
So, yeah, it's a bad, underpowered set; but that won't be true in 14 months.
First: Chapin is rarely wrong. I agree with his analysis and I think this is going to be a major card for 5 Color Control. The mana cost is actually laughably easy in a control deck with today's mana bases.
If opponent is aggro, edict + life gain + draw three is about 5 for 1. If you can't win from there you deserve to lose.
If opponent is control, he *will* have three cards and lose a good chunk of his life.
The card says "I win" as much as Tooth and Nail did.
I expect without the snow Phyrexian, Epochrasite, Cloudskate, Venser and *most of all* Damnation, that deck would have been dead in the water.
I forgot Doran, but that's only because it was an inferior deck overall to Elf, so I lumped it in with the other inferior G/B strategies.
Netdecking is Rightdecking
My latest data-driven Magic the Gathering strategy article
(TLDR: Analysis of the Valakut matchups. UB rising in the rankings. Aggro correspondingly taking a dive.)
Haven't you been saying that for, like, the past 4 sets at least already?
Netdecking is Rightdecking
My latest data-driven Magic the Gathering strategy article
(TLDR: Analysis of the Valakut matchups. UB rising in the rankings. Aggro correspondingly taking a dive.)