The Mythic edition is nuts. I hope I can get my hands on a box!
Will you be playing the Elder Spell to kill other people's planeswalkers? I did realize recently that I had some difficulty dealing with other player's planeswalkers outside of Assasins trophy.
I just realized you can guarantee two cards with Deliver Onto Evil, which is awesome! It may still not make the cut though.
The new reanimation spell Command the Dreadhorde looks sweet! I'm pretty sure you can stack the triggers so that a Deepglow Skate would come in after your planeswalker, so you can use the ultimate immediately. I do like the flexibility of getting to target other player's graveyards too, but between the 6 cmc and the life payment it may just not make the cut.
Fair point about Jokulhaups, I only brought it in after my friend kept destroying all my lands with Ruination, so I thought I would return the favor haha
Humility is one of the best cards in the deck (I recently got Moat and The Abyss and it still tutor for it over them a lot of the time!)
Trav, I really like Urza's Ruinous Blast in theory, but I don't like that we would have to have a legendary in play to even cast it (we would presumably be casting this when behind), and as Lyonhaert said we won't be able to clear away any of the commanders in play. Also, it seems like most of the best creatures nowadays are legendary anyways (e.g. the new Boar God, etc.), so we'll be missing a lot, which makess this card pretty terrible for us given the stringent casting conditions.
I think the real secret tech is running Jokulhaups . It's pretty mean, but it is the best removal in the format for us: super cheap, and we get to keep all the best stuff, our enchantments and planeswalkers! Obliterate works too if you want to make this a win condition (which is probably what you should be doing if you don't want the table to hate you).
I have been playing with Sliver Hivelord as my main commander for a while now (whenever I'm not allowed to use Urza, Academy Headmaster ) , and I think and argument could be made that Hivelord is one of the best commanders for this deck. It is an indestructible blocker, it survives all our board while (except for Toxic Deluge), it doesn't die to The Abyss, and it basically guarantees that you can play Primeval's Glorious Rebirth whenever you want.
I know that he takes 5 hits to kill with commander damage instead of 3 with Sliver Queen, but I am not really interested in winning with commander damage with this deck, especially now that I run the trifecta of recently added win conditions (Dragon-God Bolas, Jace+Tainted Pact, and Approach of the Second Sun)
My deck has diverged quite a bit from yours at this point, Trav, but it is absolutely my favourite deck and I really appreciate your Primer. You brought together great info on superfriends in the format (before it was cool!)
The new Ashiok, Dream Render is quite good in graveyard based meta or even one with a lot of fetchlands and tutors. So I think it ranges from just under playable to A+ autoinclude depending on the meta.
Either way, a design like this is nuts as an uncommon. 3 mana hybrid planeswalker! This set is insane.
I tested the deck this weekend with a few new cards (Teferi 2.0, Labman Jace + tainted pact, and Nicol Bolas). The difference is night and day. The deck is just as good as ever, but way more explosive as you could win anytime you have 6 mana with Jace and Tainted in hand. I even found a sweet interaction between Manifold Insights and Tainted Pact: Jace was in the top ten cards of my deck, so I was given 3 other cards and jace was randomly placed in the bottom 7. Then I cast tainted pact, and jace was in the bottom 3 cards, so I got him and +1'd him for the win.
In terms of actually winning games, Jace and the new Bolas are amazing. I may actually try Demonic Consultation to see if its worth running (although it ks quite a bit worse because you have to name a card first. Call the Gatewatch might finally be worth it! Although I want to shy away from tutoring for combo pieces (a self imposed restriction so games don't end the same way every time).
I got exactly what I wanted from this set! I hope the new bolas and jace are in the mythic edition,so I can have shiny cool versions of my win conditions!
I actually misread Liliana's ultimate originally as referencing all players instead of just opponents. That's my bad. I will think about testing her, as the -4 is alright even if we don't get too much value from the other abilities.
Trav, I totally agree with you. There are a handful of new cards that will matter, but it looks like they will be really impactful. My first impression was of all of the cards revealed before the new Jace (before the leaks).
So now, for some card evaluations:
The new Bolas is literally everything we could ask for in a Planeswalker. Dragon God? Best day ever. I think this will be an autoinclude in this deck indefinitely.
Jace, Wielder of Mysteries is actually really good in my opinion. The upfront cost seems a little hefty, but if you add Tainted Pact you get a 2-card win condition where both cards are already very good in the deck. (You can go really deep with Demonic Consultation if you really want). Trav, you had mentioned before that you wanted your win conditions to be on your planeswalkers, and we got two in one day!
The only other cards that remotely interest me for now are Niv-Mizzet Reborn, Teferi, Time Raveler , and Nissa, Who Shakes the World.
Niv-Mizzet is really cool as a possible commander, but only works with 2-colored cards. My deck only has around 8 hits, and I think I would need around 15 before I would consider running this as a commander. Drawing 1.5ish cards is kind of the break-even point for me, otherwise I'd probably prefer to keep running something like Sliver Hivelord , especially because of the synergy with Primeval's Glorious Rebirth , which will be better than ever with these additions. Ideally with Niv-Mizzet, you can come up with a list where you can get enough draws on average that you can cut down on your draw spell count, and increase your ramp, to really maximize the value of him in the command zone.
Teferi seems really subtly powerful. I feel like there may be some cool plays that involve flashing in Doubling Season with the new Bolas or Jace for some cool wins. For 3 mana, this may be worth a slot, but I think it will require some testing or more thinking.
Nissa is super neat. The passive is great, and so is the ultimate, but the +1 is basically useless. So if you are running the completely optimal mana base for this deck, you may be able to get some good mileage out of the passive effect, and then ultimate to make your Tabernacle indestructible. Strangely, this seems like it will compete with Elspeth, Knight Errant or Mirrari's Wake for a slot, as I don't think it beats out Nissa, Vital Force .
P.S. I the leaked Gideon shows the full-art treatment from the Mythic Edition sets, so I am assuming that we will also have one for War of the Spark. If they include Jace and Bolas, I am buying it for sure. The new Bolas art would look absolutely amazing with the full-art treatment!
16 spoilers tomorrow! Hopefully we get something good.
Edit: Overall I'm pretty dissapointed with the spoilers today. 2 of the 3 mythic planeswalkers were spoiled, and nothing seems even close to playable for this deck. Liliana could be alright in a tokens build I guess...
Of the cards you mentioned, you could probably do just fine with Humility and a few ways to tutor it up. That would definitely increase the power of your deck, it's like a Torpor orb + Godhead of Awe as an enchantment for a mere 4 mana. Luckily Humility is cheaper than the rest by quite a margin, at least for now.
The new Serra planeswalker seems pretty bad in this deck for the most part.
However, if you run it with Sliver Hivelord as a commander, it could be a significant and resilient speed bump to slow down opponents, giving you some time to find your enchantments. You can even have the emblem out on turn 3 with a sol ring / mana crypt start, but there really isn't much urgency for getting out a Worship emblem, haha
I think its definitely a fine balance with this deck between completely shutting down the game and more aggressively pushing for some sort of win condition.
I was just thinking about running Stasis with Teferi, Hero of Dominaria, which seems super powerful but also possibly too mean...
I think the most proactive version of this deck runs ~25 planeswalkers, only packs the absolute best stax effects (tabernacle, humility, moat, abyss) and then pushes for a win with Deepglow Skate, Doubling Season, or a big Primeval's Glorious Rebirth turn.
I am hoping for a boatload of new planeswalkers in War of the Spark. Hopefully at some point we get some planeswalkers with etb effects or static effects, that would be super exciting.
What's been your experience with the new Teferi so far? I think I'm going to wait for a reprint before snagging him. How often is untapping land relevant? Does the ultimate ever make a significant difference? Do you ever actually use the -3?
I think there are better options than Sphere of Safety for this deck. I think the biggest downside it has is that they will never stop a determined player from killing your planeswalkers: Even if you have 5 enchantments out, someone can still pay 5 mana and swing in with their beat stick to destroy your planeswalker that's about to ultimate. With spreading plague, they could get creative with their creature ordering to really reduce the impact. I have had both of these cards for a long time in the ever-expanding maybeboard of this deck, but I think Spreading Plague is much better for sure.
There are a bunch of enchantments like Spreading Plague, Lethal Vapors, and Tainted Aether, which all seem more or less equally viable to me. I will swap out Tainted Aether and test out Spreading Plague, maybe it will perform better than I expect!
On the other hand, for the same mana cost as Sphere you can play Mystic Barrier , that will stop at least 2/3 players from attacking you in the worst case, and basically all attacks in the best case. Because you can change the direction on each of your upkeeps, you can always choose the player that can harm you the least, which also allows you to focus your removal and maze of ith activations and the like on keeping down one player at a time.
Cardkingdom had it at $175, so I used some credit and bit the bullet haha. I think my deck is shifting towards esper over time, with Red and Green acting as supporting colors. I've made lots of changes to the mana base to support these changes:
The effect of Invoke Prejudice is awesome at basically every point in the game, so there's not to much of a rush to cast it. Between Chromatic Lantern, Mirrari's Wake, and a good mana base I think casting IP on turns 5 or 6 is definitely doable. (You run Wargate, so it's even easier!)
In terms of cuts I would definitely recommend cutting Elspeth, Sun's Champion and Dovin Baan. I recently cut them myself for being too low-impact. The ultimates don't win you the game, and the other abilities are not exactly amazing. Also, I think Will Kenrith is better than Dovin in basically every way, it's a great one-to-one replacement.
Right now I'm testing Rowan Kenrith . It's certainly not amazing, but the -2 and the -8 are alright, and Will Kenrith is so good in the deck that just tutoring for him is really good value, and it makes Will even better!
Will you be playing the Elder Spell to kill other people's planeswalkers? I did realize recently that I had some difficulty dealing with other player's planeswalkers outside of Assasins trophy.
I just realized you can guarantee two cards with Deliver Onto Evil, which is awesome! It may still not make the cut though.
Fair point about Jokulhaups, I only brought it in after my friend kept destroying all my lands with Ruination, so I thought I would return the favor haha
Trav, I really like Urza's Ruinous Blast in theory, but I don't like that we would have to have a legendary in play to even cast it (we would presumably be casting this when behind), and as Lyonhaert said we won't be able to clear away any of the commanders in play. Also, it seems like most of the best creatures nowadays are legendary anyways (e.g. the new Boar God, etc.), so we'll be missing a lot, which makess this card pretty terrible for us given the stringent casting conditions.
I think the real secret tech is running Jokulhaups . It's pretty mean, but it is the best removal in the format for us: super cheap, and we get to keep all the best stuff, our enchantments and planeswalkers! Obliterate works too if you want to make this a win condition (which is probably what you should be doing if you don't want the table to hate you).
I have been playing with Sliver Hivelord as my main commander for a while now (whenever I'm not allowed to use Urza, Academy Headmaster ) , and I think and argument could be made that Hivelord is one of the best commanders for this deck. It is an indestructible blocker, it survives all our board while (except for Toxic Deluge), it doesn't die to The Abyss, and it basically guarantees that you can play Primeval's Glorious Rebirth whenever you want.
I know that he takes 5 hits to kill with commander damage instead of 3 with Sliver Queen, but I am not really interested in winning with commander damage with this deck, especially now that I run the trifecta of recently added win conditions (Dragon-God Bolas, Jace+Tainted Pact, and Approach of the Second Sun)
My deck has diverged quite a bit from yours at this point, Trav, but it is absolutely my favourite deck and I really appreciate your Primer. You brought together great info on superfriends in the format (before it was cool!)
On the upside now I won't feel bad about locking people out with Teferi, Hero of Dominaria & Stasis, or winning with the new Jace
Perhaps it's time to consider running faith's reward in addition to Teferi's protection?
Either way, a design like this is nuts as an uncommon. 3 mana hybrid planeswalker! This set is insane.
In terms of actually winning games, Jace and the new Bolas are amazing. I may actually try Demonic Consultation to see if its worth running (although it ks quite a bit worse because you have to name a card first. Call the Gatewatch might finally be worth it! Although I want to shy away from tutoring for combo pieces (a self imposed restriction so games don't end the same way every time).
I got exactly what I wanted from this set! I hope the new bolas and jace are in the mythic edition,so I can have shiny cool versions of my win conditions!
So now, for some card evaluations:
The new Bolas is literally everything we could ask for in a Planeswalker. Dragon God? Best day ever. I think this will be an autoinclude in this deck indefinitely.
Jace, Wielder of Mysteries is actually really good in my opinion. The upfront cost seems a little hefty, but if you add Tainted Pact you get a 2-card win condition where both cards are already very good in the deck. (You can go really deep with Demonic Consultation if you really want). Trav, you had mentioned before that you wanted your win conditions to be on your planeswalkers, and we got two in one day!
The only other cards that remotely interest me for now are Niv-Mizzet Reborn, Teferi, Time Raveler , and Nissa, Who Shakes the World.
Niv-Mizzet is really cool as a possible commander, but only works with 2-colored cards. My deck only has around 8 hits, and I think I would need around 15 before I would consider running this as a commander. Drawing 1.5ish cards is kind of the break-even point for me, otherwise I'd probably prefer to keep running something like Sliver Hivelord , especially because of the synergy with Primeval's Glorious Rebirth , which will be better than ever with these additions. Ideally with Niv-Mizzet, you can come up with a list where you can get enough draws on average that you can cut down on your draw spell count, and increase your ramp, to really maximize the value of him in the command zone.
Teferi seems really subtly powerful. I feel like there may be some cool plays that involve flashing in Doubling Season with the new Bolas or Jace for some cool wins. For 3 mana, this may be worth a slot, but I think it will require some testing or more thinking.
Nissa is super neat. The passive is great, and so is the ultimate, but the +1 is basically useless. So if you are running the completely optimal mana base for this deck, you may be able to get some good mileage out of the passive effect, and then ultimate to make your Tabernacle indestructible. Strangely, this seems like it will compete with Elspeth, Knight Errant or Mirrari's Wake for a slot, as I don't think it beats out Nissa, Vital Force .
P.S. I the leaked Gideon shows the full-art treatment from the Mythic Edition sets, so I am assuming that we will also have one for War of the Spark. If they include Jace and Bolas, I am buying it for sure. The new Bolas art would look absolutely amazing with the full-art treatment!
Edit: Overall I'm pretty dissapointed with the spoilers today. 2 of the 3 mythic planeswalkers were spoiled, and nothing seems even close to playable for this deck. Liliana could be alright in a tokens build I guess...
However, if you run it with Sliver Hivelord as a commander, it could be a significant and resilient speed bump to slow down opponents, giving you some time to find your enchantments. You can even have the emblem out on turn 3 with a sol ring / mana crypt start, but there really isn't much urgency for getting out a Worship emblem, haha
I was just thinking about running Stasis with Teferi, Hero of Dominaria, which seems super powerful but also possibly too mean...
I think the most proactive version of this deck runs ~25 planeswalkers, only packs the absolute best stax effects (tabernacle, humility, moat, abyss) and then pushes for a win with Deepglow Skate, Doubling Season, or a big Primeval's Glorious Rebirth turn.
I am hoping for a boatload of new planeswalkers in War of the Spark. Hopefully at some point we get some planeswalkers with etb effects or static effects, that would be super exciting.
What's been your experience with the new Teferi so far? I think I'm going to wait for a reprint before snagging him. How often is untapping land relevant? Does the ultimate ever make a significant difference? Do you ever actually use the -3?
There are a bunch of enchantments like Spreading Plague, Lethal Vapors, and Tainted Aether, which all seem more or less equally viable to me. I will swap out Tainted Aether and test out Spreading Plague, maybe it will perform better than I expect!
On the other hand, for the same mana cost as Sphere you can play Mystic Barrier , that will stop at least 2/3 players from attacking you in the worst case, and basically all attacks in the best case. Because you can change the direction on each of your upkeeps, you can always choose the player that can harm you the least, which also allows you to focus your removal and maze of ith activations and the like on keeping down one player at a time.
https://deckstats.net/decks/58876/1214734-superfriends-9-2
The effect of Invoke Prejudice is awesome at basically every point in the game, so there's not to much of a rush to cast it. Between Chromatic Lantern, Mirrari's Wake, and a good mana base I think casting IP on turns 5 or 6 is definitely doable. (You run Wargate, so it's even easier!)
In terms of cuts I would definitely recommend cutting Elspeth, Sun's Champion and Dovin Baan. I recently cut them myself for being too low-impact. The ultimates don't win you the game, and the other abilities are not exactly amazing. Also, I think Will Kenrith is better than Dovin in basically every way, it's a great one-to-one replacement.
Right now I'm testing Rowan Kenrith . It's certainly not amazing, but the -2 and the -8 are alright, and Will Kenrith is so good in the deck that just tutoring for him is really good value, and it makes Will even better!