So, I think a lot of us would agree that one of the most important things to work out early in a limited format is what the typical removal looks like... so let's discuss.
To help out, below is a list of EVERY common/uncommon creature removal spell in Avacyn Restored, as I would define it (I've included bounce, but not falter effects... feel free to let me know if I missed something). Since the cards aren't up on magiccards.info or gatherer yet, I've included their mana costs, and a short version of what they do.
By color and rarity:
White Common Defang - 1W, Aura. Prevents damage enchanted creature would deal.
Awful against decks with lots of flickers, but otherwise reasonable if your strategy is control and/or fliers. Righteous Blow - W, Instant. 2 damage to attacking/blocking creature. Uncommon Banishing Stroke - 5W, Miracle W, Instant. Puts target artifact, creature, or enchantment on bottom of library. Holy Justicar - 3W, creature, 2/1. Tapper for 2W, exiles zombies.
Blue Common Crippling Chill - 2U, Instant. Tap a creature, no untap next turn, cantrips.
I counted this since tapping for two turns and drawing a card feels more like a strong bounce effect than just a falter/fog. Mist Raven - 2UU, Creature, 2/2. Flying Aether Adept.
Seems really good. Peel from Reality - 1U, Instant. Bounces an opponent's creature and one of yours. Spectral Prison - 1U Aura that prevents untapping, has the "Ice Cage drawback" falls off if the creature is targeted by a spell. (Thanks, fnord) Uncommon Into the Void - 3U, Sorcery. Bounce two creatures. Vanishment - 4U, Miracle U - Instant. Griptides a nonland permanent.
The format looks slow enough, and most of the removal quality is bad enough, that this could be more playable than it may seem.
Black Common Bone Splinters - B, Sorcery. Sac a creature to destroy a creature.
Seems like black has a number of cards that will require black decks to keep some sacrifice fodder handy. Could make the 1/1 undying zombie more playable. Death Wind - XB, Instant. -X/-X to target creature.
Now we're talking. One of the least-conditional ways to just kill something. Ghoulflesh - B, Aura. Creature gets -1/-1.
Ping effect. Good for killing the tapper/zombie killer against white decks. Grave Exchange - 4BB, Sorcery. Raise Dead + target player sacs a creature.
It's card advantage, but it still seems miserable for 6 mana. Undead Executioner - 3B, Creature, 2/2. Gives -2/-2 (optional) to a target when it dies. Uncommon Barter in Blood - 2BB, Sorcery. Everybody sacs two creatures. Human Frailty - B, Instant. Destroy target human.
Sideboard material.
Red Common Guise of Fire - R, Aura. Creature gets +1/-1 and attacks each turn.
More ping, or highly situational removal for something with >1 toughness. Pillar of Flame - R, Sorcery. Shock that exiles.
Is Shock ever bad? Thunderbolt - 1R, Instant. Lava Spike your opponent or 4 damage to a flier. Uncommon Aggravate - 3RR, Instant. 1 damage to all your opponent's guys, forces them to attack.
Seems marginal overall, but situationally great. Gang of Devils - 5R, Creature, 3/3. Death trigger deals three damage divided as you choose.
Ability is a big upgrade on Pitchburn Devils, but 6 mana is a lot more than 5. Overall... decent, I think? Lightning Prowess - 2R, Aura. Gives a creature the abilities of Cunning Sparkmage.
The poor quality and conditional nature of the set's removal seems like it should really help the ability-granting auras like this one. Probably awful against blue, though. Thunderous Wrath - 4RR, Miracle R, Instant. 5 damage to creature/player.
Seems like a set where this would be fine even without the Miracle cost, very good with it. Vigilante Justice - 3R, Enchantment. All your humans ping for 1 on ETB.
Red always seems to get the build-around enchantment these days, doesn't it?
Green
Holy crap. Maybe I'm just spoiled by shatters being actual removal in SOM block, and then Prey Upon at common in Innistrad, but green's removal options are almost nonexistent this time around. Common Grounded - 1G, Aura. Loses flying. Uncommon Eaten by Spiders - 2G, Instant. Destroys a flier and all its equipment. Wolfir Avenger - 1GG, Creature, 3/3. Has flash and regenerates for 2.
It should ambush enough creatures that I think it counts as removal.
So what do people think about the removal overall? Besides being weak in general, it seems there are some cheap ways to deal with small aggro creatures, but dealing with expensive fatties will require equally/more expensive removal. That seems to suggest a very slow format, since you have some tools to fight aggressive starts, but you're rewarded for playing fatties by the absence of cheap answers for them.
Also notable that there aren't a lot of ways to break a Soulbond during combat, before damage... you're looking at only a few cards, most of which will require you to leave 5-6 mana open. Good news for green's Soulbond-pump guys. It shouldn't usually be too hard to keep from getting blown out there.
Green also has Ulvenwald Tracker, aka Prey Upon on a stick.
It's a rare.
(I agree it's very good, but the reason I chose Common/Uncommon removal was because those are what will be relevant to determining things like the speed of the format, whether Soulbond gets blown out with mid-combat removal, viability of auras, etc.)
The cheap 1-2 toughness removal seems like it's most useful for keeping red off it's 2-drops. I suspect that Red-X aggro curves out very well and then Lava Axes with various Thatcher Riot combos; there's like seven options and two in red at common. Dismantling the combo pieces early will save you chunks of life.
Spectral Prison seems quite sturdy unless they have equipment. There are very few positive auras compared to M12 and I'm having trouble coming up with non-equipment ways for this to fall off that wouldn't also deal with Pacifism. The bigger issue is that it requires the creature to be tapped first, which limits its usefulness.
1. Unlike many similar cards, Defang stops noncombat damage.
2. Spectral Prison does not quite have the Ice Cage drawback. It only breaks on spells, not abilities. So equipment won't break it.
1. Unlike many similar cards, Defang stops noncombat damage. Spectral Prison does not quite have the Ice Cage drawback. It only breaks on spells, not abilities. So equipment won't break it.
Huh, hadn't noticed those. Fixed on Spectral Prison.
Spectral Prison seems quite sturdy unless they have equipment. There are very few positive auras compared to M12 and I'm having trouble coming up with non-equipment ways for this to fall off that wouldn't also deal with Pacifism. The bigger issue is that it requires the creature to be tapped first, which limits its usefulness.
Agreed that requiring the creature to be tapped first is a significant drawback; we've seen those auras before, and they've generally been mediocre at best. This one is cheaper than most, but has a significant drawback. You're also right that most things that break Spectral Prison would also stop Pacifism, but I think Pacifism would be significantly weaker than normal in this set because of the flicker theme in blue and white, and the sacrifice theme in black. On the other hand, Pacifism-like effects do let you shut down half of a soulbond pair without freeing the survivor to re-bond, which is nice.
I think you under rate Human Frailty. There are a tonne of humans in this set (from all colours) and this card should always be in your main deck not sideboard.
I had good times with deathmark in limited and I think it is similar. Yes it is narrow, but it is so cheap that the times where you get to kill something for one mana will make it still worth it.
It is also easily side boarded if it does become dead in the first game
I had good times with deathmark in limited and I think it is similar. Yes it is narrow, but it is so cheap that the times where you get to kill something for one mana will make it still worth it.
It is also easily side boarded if it does become dead in the first game
I would run it main. There are plenty of Humans across all the colors (black perhaps being the least viable), and unlike Deathmark this one hits guys in Red and Blue as well as Green and White, all for a measly B. Seems pretty reasonable to me.
I had good times with deathmark in limited and I think it is similar. Yes it is narrow, but it is so cheap that the times where you get to kill something for one mana will make it still worth it.
It is also easily side boarded if it does become dead in the first game
It's more comparable to Victim of Night than Deathmark. And considering that Victim of Night was less narrow than this and still saw most of its play out of the sideboard, I'd imagine that's about as much as Frailty is going to be able to manage as well.
As for Malicious Intent - no. Red might want to be able to push through, but not at the expense of tapping a creature and using a card every turn. If this were just an enchantment that said "Enchanted creature can't block" then it would have some potential if you were desperate. That's basically what Spiteful Shadows from DKA was, and that was a justifiable 23rd card in extremely aggro decks. But requiring you to tap a creature on top of that, and exposing you to getting 2-for-1'd over such a weak effect, no less, makes this so far beyond not worth it that Intent is literally a card that should never, ever be played. Ever.
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
I think it's better than Spiteful Shadows.
Early in the game it's unplayable, but later in the game, and it seems late game is going to happen in this set, it can turn your Lightning Mauler (to give an example) into something useful.
Playing it on Scalding Devil looks fun too.
Removal seems really light this set. Stuff that permanently deals with a creature with a toughness of >=3
Defang (C) - I guess this counts. Considering the lack of other options. Banishing Stroke (U) - Which is either really cheap or really expensive.
Spectral Prison (C) - Which is really fragile, so not necessarily "permanent".
Bone Splinters (C) - Which requires you to give up one of yours. Death Wind (C) - Just requires the mana. Probably takes up your whole turn. Grave Exchange (C) - the chances this actually gets what you want it to get seem small. Barter in Blood (U) - at least the chances of getting what you want are better here. At the cost of having no dudes of your own. Human Frailty (U) - If it's a Human. Which limits it's effectiveness quite a bit.
Basically, any creature you cast that has a 3 toughness is going to be incredibly difficult for your opponent to deal with, unless he/she has a similar creature.
If it walks and isn't Human? There's like 6 non-creature ways for them to deal with it, and 3 of those are still Uncommon.
If your opponent isn't Black (which a lot won't be because Black seems pretty sucky) There's basically Banishing Stroke and Thunderous Wrath, both Uncommon.
It's going to be all about the creature trading this limited format. There are a bunch of combat tricks to keep that interesting, but not much removing creatures outside of combat.
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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.
It's more comparable to Victim of Night than Deathmark. And considering that Victim of Night was less narrow than this and still saw most of its play out of the sideboard, I'd imagine that's about as much as Frailty is going to be able to manage as well.
Whoa. You played Victim of Night out of the sideboard?
I mean, if you had 3 copies, sure, maybe play 2 maindeck.
For a white-focused set, I find weaker than normal. No good instant-speed one, no smite the monstrous or rebuke. The tapper is extremely expensive compared to what white usually gets.
Black is really nerfed. Nothing like a doom-blade or tragic slip. The removal is either sac-based or expensive. At least if you string a death wind into barter in blood (or the reverse) you can control the board. Unfortunately, white has a bettr late game, so bartering the early drops may not be in your favor.
In contrast, red seems really good. It's on-par, maybe a bit better than usual, but compared to other colors, it's stellar. I expect people to fight over red for removal. (Then again, this is true of pretty much any set.)
Victim of Night was a dead card way too often to be maindeck material, unless your draft went poorly. Fantastic sideboard card, yeah. Probably my #1 sideboarded card. But at the beginning of the format I lost plenty of games to it being dead in my hand, and I lost interest in maindecking it pretty quick. I would never consider maindecking 2, no matter how badly my draft went.
(And not to brag or anything, but I gained like 250 rating online thanks to ISD drafts, so I was pretty satisfied with my assessment of the format.)
Regarding Spectral Prison, white has Call to Serve and Zealous Strike and Cloushift as common, playable answers, blue has Ghostform, Ghostly Flicker, Peel from Reality, and Fleeting Distraction, black has Bone Splinters (lol), Necrobite, and Predator's Gambit, red has, uh, Guise of Fire and Uncanny Speed I guess, and green has Joint Assault, Natural End, Sheltering Word, and Snare the Skies.
Every color but red has multiple playable ways of dealing with it at common that make it completely irrelevant, and even red probably has some sideboard options if necessary. Definitely do not think of this as a permanent solution to anything.
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
Victim of Night was a dead card way too often to be maindeck material, unless your draft went poorly. Fantastic sideboard card, yeah. Probably my #1 sideboarded card. But at the beginning of the format I lost plenty of games to it being dead in my hand, and I lost interest in maindecking it pretty quick. I would never consider maindecking 2, no matter how badly my draft went.
(And not to brag or anything, but I gained like 250 rating online thanks to ISD drafts, so I was pretty satisfied with my assessment of the format.)
I also gained about 250 rating points, and I never put Victim of Night in the sideboard, and I also never wished I had. I cannot recall a single occasion on which it was dead for an entire game, and only a few situations where it was dead at all.
In fact, I almost never wanted to board it out.
Human Frailty is obviously narrower than Victim of Night. Nevertheless, every color except black has multiple playable common humans. There will be targets in 95% of decks, and at least 3 good targets in 75% of decks.
I cannot imagine ever putting the first one in my sideboard.
Yeah, but (just like with Victim of Night) just having a target doesn't make it good. You don't really want to spend a card to kill off just any creature. And the humans are not, as a rule, the cards in the set you most want to be able to remove. Yeah, sometimes you're going to snag a Goldnight Commander or Riders of Gavony with Frailty and it's going to be amazing. But what do you do when you're facing a Mist Raven and a Wingcrafter? Do you really want to have removal for the 1/1?
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
Removal for that particular 1/1? I'll take it, sure. It's almost certainly better than whatever dreck I might bring out of the sideboard. Plus, with removal for Wingcrafter I might be able to get a 2-for-1. There are a lot of Soulbond humans and instant speed removal for them seems especially good.
Now, if my opponent's only Human is, say, Midnight Duelist, then I'm not going to be terrifically happy to have Human Frailty in my hand. But if my opponent's only human is Midnight Duelist, it probably doesn't matter that I have Human Frailty in my hand, because he had Midnight Duelist in his.
With removal being so light, do combat tricks get even more valuable? If creatures are going to be sticking around a lot more it seems like they would get more valuable.
Removal for that particular 1/1? I'll take it, sure. It's almost certainly better than whatever dreck I might bring out of the sideboard. Plus, with removal for Wingcrafter I might be able to get a 2-for-1. There are a lot of Soulbond humans and instant speed removal for them seems especially good.
Now, if my opponent's only Human is, say, Midnight Duelist, then I'm not going to be terrifically happy to have Human Frailty in my hand. But if my opponent's only human is Midnight Duelist, it probably doesn't matter that I have Human Frailty in my hand, because he had Midnight Duelist in his.
I tried to come up with a plausible scenario. Let's try not to strawman each other, eh? Midnight Duelist is awful and will not be a commonly played card. But there are plenty of humans in the format who are playable but not worth spending a card removing. The example I gave seems like a fair one to me because both Mist Raven and Wingcrafter are cards that will see lots of play, and in the same deck, but killing the Wingcrafter will do absolutely zilch for you.
Cathedral Sanctifier (terrible target)
Devout Chaplain (conditionally a good target, but not reliably so)
Farbog Explorer (quite good as a target)
Goldnight Commander (great target)
Holy Justiciar (mediocre target until the very late game, at which point any removal will do the job)
Midnight Duelist (terrible target)
Moorland Inquisitor (pretty decent target, especially after they use the ability)
Nearhearth Pilgrim (okay target in a race, not really any good otherwise)
Riders of Gavony (excellent target, but rare)
Silverblade Paladin (excellent target, but rare)
Thraben Valiant (I guess it's okay if you're desperate)
Alchemist's Apprentice (worst target ever)
Captain of the Mists (good target, but rare)
Elgaud Shieldmate (never gonna happen)
Galvanic Alchemist (mediocre target, but not awful)
Gryff Vanguard (good target)
Lunar Mystic (good target, but rare, also practically any removal will do, no need to play super narrow stuff like Frailty)
Nephalia Smuggler (good target, but practically any removal will do)
Stern Mentor (conditionally okay, just because it might be worth breaking the pair, otherwise not good at all)
Tandem Lookout (good, but already fragile)
Wingcrafter (only worth it for the scenario where you can make something fall out of the sky during combat - less common than you might hope)
Corpse Traders (pretty bad target)
Fervent Cathar (terrible target)
Hanweir Lancer (usually a good target, not always)
Kessig malcontents (terrible target)
Kruin Striker (terrible target)
Lightning Mauler (maybe-ish, but probably a bad target most of the time)
Mad Prophet (good target)
Riot Ringleader (mediocre target)
Somberwald Vigilante (terrible target)
Stonewright (only for breaking pairs)
Zealous Conscripts (good, but rare)
Borderland Ranger (not awful, but super a lot worse target than you'd like)
Champion of Lambholt (good target, but rare)
Diregraf Excort (for breaking pairs only)
Geist Trappers (good target)
Nightshade Peddler (almost never the target you actually want, but decent nevertheless)
Somberwald Sage (great target, but rare)
Timberland Guide (terrible target)
Trusted Forcemage (decent target)
Ulvenwald Tracker (good target)
Out of 115 creatures in the set, this hits 41 of them, and of those 41, 11 of them are both non-rare and reliably worthwile cards to spend removal on.
That's it. You notice a trend? The spell almost never targets real bombs. It only hits enablers. The major reason to play it is for breaking bond pairs, which any bounce spell or flicker spell does as well. Good card to sideboard against decks with human rares (and white in general, maybe), occasionally good otherwise, and a fine substitute for bounce against a soulbond deck, but not maindeckable at all.
@Pahshowned: Good combat tricks should be at a major premium. Stuff like Zealous Strike or Joint Assault. The hefty number of tricks in the format should actually make the poorer ones worse than usual, since people will learn to play around tricks in general more often.
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
You're right. My expectations for 1-mana removal are pretty high. I expect it to contribute to my deck's plan. Most 1-mana removal in the set is toughness-based, designed to kill off early blockers and keep your opponent from stabilizing. Frailty is easily the worst option for this purpose, since it has by far the least consistency.
Late game removal is good because it tends to hit everything in the late game, and you don't care about the mana cost then. Early game removal is good because it tends to hit everything in the early game and you don't care about the late game uselessness. Frailty is not reliably good because it never reliably has a target - it's just a card that will usually trade up for a little tempo at some unspecified point in the game. You can't build a plan around it until you know very specifically what your opponent has.
Wit's End is the PERFECT answer to your opponent's Monomania however.
Just hold on to your Wit's End when they Monomania, so you can Wit's End them on your next turn!!!
I think this is fairly reminiscent of the "Jace Battles" we have seen in past standards.. My guess is we will soon witness the great Monomania-Wit's End battles.
Human Frailty is easily maindeckable for the first copy. The format is so light on removal that a cheap removal spell able to hit a decent portion of the creature pool (with targets in almost every color I might add) should not be undervalued. Beyond the first I could see starting to side them, but I'd still probably run at least 2 maindeck before sideboarding any additional copies. Even if you're just killing a 2/2, the removal is quite fine.
I'm far from a limited expert, but shouldn't a discussion of whether Human Frailty be maindecked revolve about what card one will be running instead? For example, if you were choosing one of Human Frailty, Bone Splinters, or Ghoulflesh, which (if any) would people be most likely to maindeck
Human Frailty: Destroy target human
Bone Splinters: Sac a creature, destroy a creature.
Ghoulflesh: Enchanted creature gets -1/-1 and is black zomibe
All three cost :symb:.
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To help out, below is a list of EVERY common/uncommon creature removal spell in Avacyn Restored, as I would define it (I've included bounce, but not falter effects... feel free to let me know if I missed something). Since the cards aren't up on magiccards.info or gatherer yet, I've included their mana costs, and a short version of what they do.
By color and rarity:
Common
Defang - 1W, Aura. Prevents damage enchanted creature would deal.
Awful against decks with lots of flickers, but otherwise reasonable if your strategy is control and/or fliers.
Righteous Blow - W, Instant. 2 damage to attacking/blocking creature.
Uncommon
Banishing Stroke - 5W, Miracle W, Instant. Puts target artifact, creature, or enchantment on bottom of library.
Holy Justicar - 3W, creature, 2/1. Tapper for 2W, exiles zombies.
Blue
Common
Crippling Chill - 2U, Instant. Tap a creature, no untap next turn, cantrips.
I counted this since tapping for two turns and drawing a card feels more like a strong bounce effect than just a falter/fog.
Mist Raven - 2UU, Creature, 2/2. Flying Aether Adept.
Seems really good.
Peel from Reality - 1U, Instant. Bounces an opponent's creature and one of yours.
Spectral Prison - 1U Aura that prevents untapping,
has the "Ice Cage drawback"falls off if the creature is targeted by a spell. (Thanks, fnord)Uncommon
Into the Void - 3U, Sorcery. Bounce two creatures.
Vanishment - 4U, Miracle U - Instant. Griptides a nonland permanent.
The format looks slow enough, and most of the removal quality is bad enough, that this could be more playable than it may seem.
Black
Common
Bone Splinters - B, Sorcery. Sac a creature to destroy a creature.
Seems like black has a number of cards that will require black decks to keep some sacrifice fodder handy. Could make the 1/1 undying zombie more playable.
Death Wind - XB, Instant. -X/-X to target creature.
Now we're talking. One of the least-conditional ways to just kill something.
Ghoulflesh - B, Aura. Creature gets -1/-1.
Ping effect. Good for killing the tapper/zombie killer against white decks.
Grave Exchange - 4BB, Sorcery. Raise Dead + target player sacs a creature.
It's card advantage, but it still seems miserable for 6 mana.
Undead Executioner - 3B, Creature, 2/2. Gives -2/-2 (optional) to a target when it dies.
Uncommon
Barter in Blood - 2BB, Sorcery. Everybody sacs two creatures.
Human Frailty - B, Instant. Destroy target human.
Sideboard material.
Red
Common
Guise of Fire - R, Aura. Creature gets +1/-1 and attacks each turn.
More ping, or highly situational removal for something with >1 toughness.
Pillar of Flame - R, Sorcery. Shock that exiles.
Is Shock ever bad?
Thunderbolt - 1R, Instant. Lava Spike your opponent or 4 damage to a flier.
Uncommon
Aggravate - 3RR, Instant. 1 damage to all your opponent's guys, forces them to attack.
Seems marginal overall, but situationally great.
Gang of Devils - 5R, Creature, 3/3. Death trigger deals three damage divided as you choose.
Ability is a big upgrade on Pitchburn Devils, but 6 mana is a lot more than 5. Overall... decent, I think?
Lightning Prowess - 2R, Aura. Gives a creature the abilities of Cunning Sparkmage.
The poor quality and conditional nature of the set's removal seems like it should really help the ability-granting auras like this one. Probably awful against blue, though.
Thunderous Wrath - 4RR, Miracle R, Instant. 5 damage to creature/player.
Seems like a set where this would be fine even without the Miracle cost, very good with it.
Vigilante Justice - 3R, Enchantment. All your humans ping for 1 on ETB.
Red always seems to get the build-around enchantment these days, doesn't it?
Green
Holy crap. Maybe I'm just spoiled by shatters being actual removal in SOM block, and then Prey Upon at common in Innistrad, but green's removal options are almost nonexistent this time around.
Common
Grounded - 1G, Aura. Loses flying.
Uncommon
Eaten by Spiders - 2G, Instant. Destroys a flier and all its equipment.
Wolfir Avenger - 1GG, Creature, 3/3. Has flash and regenerates for 2.
It should ambush enough creatures that I think it counts as removal.
So what do people think about the removal overall? Besides being weak in general, it seems there are some cheap ways to deal with small aggro creatures, but dealing with expensive fatties will require equally/more expensive removal. That seems to suggest a very slow format, since you have some tools to fight aggressive starts, but you're rewarded for playing fatties by the absence of cheap answers for them.
Also notable that there aren't a lot of ways to break a Soulbond during combat, before damage... you're looking at only a few cards, most of which will require you to leave 5-6 mana open. Good news for green's Soulbond-pump guys. It shouldn't usually be too hard to keep from getting blown out there.
Thoughts?
It's a rare.
(I agree it's very good, but the reason I chose Common/Uncommon removal was because those are what will be relevant to determining things like the speed of the format, whether Soulbond gets blown out with mid-combat removal, viability of auras, etc.)
The cheap 1-2 toughness removal seems like it's most useful for keeping red off it's 2-drops. I suspect that Red-X aggro curves out very well and then Lava Axes with various Thatcher Riot combos; there's like seven options and two in red at common. Dismantling the combo pieces early will save you chunks of life.
Spectral Prison seems quite sturdy unless they have equipment. There are very few positive auras compared to M12 and I'm having trouble coming up with non-equipment ways for this to fall off that wouldn't also deal with Pacifism. The bigger issue is that it requires the creature to be tapped first, which limits its usefulness.
Older Magic as a Board Game: Panglacial Wurm , Mill
1. Unlike many similar cards, Defang stops noncombat damage.
2. Spectral Prison does not quite have the Ice Cage drawback. It only breaks on spells, not abilities. So equipment won't break it.
Practice for Khans of Tarkir Limited:
Draft: (#1) (#2) (#3) (#4) (#5)
Huh, hadn't noticed those. Fixed on Spectral Prison.
Agreed that requiring the creature to be tapped first is a significant drawback; we've seen those auras before, and they've generally been mediocre at best. This one is cheaper than most, but has a significant drawback. You're also right that most things that break Spectral Prison would also stop Pacifism, but I think Pacifism would be significantly weaker than normal in this set because of the flicker theme in blue and white, and the sacrifice theme in black. On the other hand, Pacifism-like effects do let you shut down half of a soulbond pair without freeing the survivor to re-bond, which is nice.
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I had good times with deathmark in limited and I think it is similar. Yes it is narrow, but it is so cheap that the times where you get to kill something for one mana will make it still worth it.
It is also easily side boarded if it does become dead in the first game
I would run it main. There are plenty of Humans across all the colors (black perhaps being the least viable), and unlike Deathmark this one hits guys in Red and Blue as well as Green and White, all for a measly B. Seems pretty reasonable to me.
It's more comparable to Victim of Night than Deathmark. And considering that Victim of Night was less narrow than this and still saw most of its play out of the sideboard, I'd imagine that's about as much as Frailty is going to be able to manage as well.
As for Malicious Intent - no. Red might want to be able to push through, but not at the expense of tapping a creature and using a card every turn. If this were just an enchantment that said "Enchanted creature can't block" then it would have some potential if you were desperate. That's basically what Spiteful Shadows from DKA was, and that was a justifiable 23rd card in extremely aggro decks. But requiring you to tap a creature on top of that, and exposing you to getting 2-for-1'd over such a weak effect, no less, makes this so far beyond not worth it that Intent is literally a card that should never, ever be played. Ever.
Early in the game it's unplayable, but later in the game, and it seems late game is going to happen in this set, it can turn your Lightning Mauler (to give an example) into something useful.
Playing it on Scalding Devil looks fun too.
Defang (C) - I guess this counts. Considering the lack of other options.
Banishing Stroke (U) - Which is either really cheap or really expensive.
Spectral Prison (C) - Which is really fragile, so not necessarily "permanent".
Bone Splinters (C) - Which requires you to give up one of yours.
Death Wind (C) - Just requires the mana. Probably takes up your whole turn.
Grave Exchange (C) - the chances this actually gets what you want it to get seem small.
Barter in Blood (U) - at least the chances of getting what you want are better here. At the cost of having no dudes of your own.
Human Frailty (U) - If it's a Human. Which limits it's effectiveness quite a bit.
Thunderbolt (C) - If it's a flier.
Gang of Devils (U) - So conditional I don't know if to even count it.
Thunderous Wrath (U) - See Banishing Stroke
Eaten by Spiders (U) - If it's a flier.
Basically, any creature you cast that has a 3 toughness is going to be incredibly difficult for your opponent to deal with, unless he/she has a similar creature.
If it walks and isn't Human? There's like 6 non-creature ways for them to deal with it, and 3 of those are still Uncommon.
If your opponent isn't Black (which a lot won't be because Black seems pretty sucky) There's basically Banishing Stroke and Thunderous Wrath, both Uncommon.
It's going to be all about the creature trading this limited format. There are a bunch of combat tricks to keep that interesting, but not much removing creatures outside of combat.
I mean, if you had 3 copies, sure, maybe play 2 maindeck.
Black is really nerfed. Nothing like a doom-blade or tragic slip. The removal is either sac-based or expensive. At least if you string a death wind into barter in blood (or the reverse) you can control the board. Unfortunately, white has a bettr late game, so bartering the early drops may not be in your favor.
In contrast, red seems really good. It's on-par, maybe a bit better than usual, but compared to other colors, it's stellar. I expect people to fight over red for removal. (Then again, this is true of pretty much any set.)
(And not to brag or anything, but I gained like 250 rating online thanks to ISD drafts, so I was pretty satisfied with my assessment of the format.)
Regarding Spectral Prison, white has Call to Serve and Zealous Strike and Cloushift as common, playable answers, blue has Ghostform, Ghostly Flicker, Peel from Reality, and Fleeting Distraction, black has Bone Splinters (lol), Necrobite, and Predator's Gambit, red has, uh, Guise of Fire and Uncanny Speed I guess, and green has Joint Assault, Natural End, Sheltering Word, and Snare the Skies.
Every color but red has multiple playable ways of dealing with it at common that make it completely irrelevant, and even red probably has some sideboard options if necessary. Definitely do not think of this as a permanent solution to anything.
In fact, I almost never wanted to board it out.
I cannot imagine ever putting the first one in my sideboard.
Now, if my opponent's only Human is, say, Midnight Duelist, then I'm not going to be terrifically happy to have Human Frailty in my hand. But if my opponent's only human is Midnight Duelist, it probably doesn't matter that I have Human Frailty in my hand, because he had Midnight Duelist in his.
JAMMIT DIM! I'm a DOCTOR not a DECKBUILDER!
I tried to come up with a plausible scenario. Let's try not to strawman each other, eh? Midnight Duelist is awful and will not be a commonly played card. But there are plenty of humans in the format who are playable but not worth spending a card removing. The example I gave seems like a fair one to me because both Mist Raven and Wingcrafter are cards that will see lots of play, and in the same deck, but killing the Wingcrafter will do absolutely zilch for you.
Cathedral Sanctifier (terrible target)
Devout Chaplain (conditionally a good target, but not reliably so)
Farbog Explorer (quite good as a target)
Goldnight Commander (great target)
Holy Justiciar (mediocre target until the very late game, at which point any removal will do the job)
Midnight Duelist (terrible target)
Moorland Inquisitor (pretty decent target, especially after they use the ability)
Nearhearth Pilgrim (okay target in a race, not really any good otherwise)
Riders of Gavony (excellent target, but rare)
Silverblade Paladin (excellent target, but rare)
Thraben Valiant (I guess it's okay if you're desperate)
Alchemist's Apprentice (worst target ever)
Captain of the Mists (good target, but rare)
Elgaud Shieldmate (never gonna happen)
Galvanic Alchemist (mediocre target, but not awful)
Gryff Vanguard (good target)
Lunar Mystic (good target, but rare, also practically any removal will do, no need to play super narrow stuff like Frailty)
Nephalia Smuggler (good target, but practically any removal will do)
Stern Mentor (conditionally okay, just because it might be worth breaking the pair, otherwise not good at all)
Tandem Lookout (good, but already fragile)
Wingcrafter (only worth it for the scenario where you can make something fall out of the sky during combat - less common than you might hope)
Corpse Traders (pretty bad target)
Fervent Cathar (terrible target)
Hanweir Lancer (usually a good target, not always)
Kessig malcontents (terrible target)
Kruin Striker (terrible target)
Lightning Mauler (maybe-ish, but probably a bad target most of the time)
Mad Prophet (good target)
Riot Ringleader (mediocre target)
Somberwald Vigilante (terrible target)
Stonewright (only for breaking pairs)
Zealous Conscripts (good, but rare)
Borderland Ranger (not awful, but super a lot worse target than you'd like)
Champion of Lambholt (good target, but rare)
Diregraf Excort (for breaking pairs only)
Geist Trappers (good target)
Nightshade Peddler (almost never the target you actually want, but decent nevertheless)
Somberwald Sage (great target, but rare)
Timberland Guide (terrible target)
Trusted Forcemage (decent target)
Ulvenwald Tracker (good target)
Out of 115 creatures in the set, this hits 41 of them, and of those 41, 11 of them are both non-rare and reliably worthwile cards to spend removal on.
That's it. You notice a trend? The spell almost never targets real bombs. It only hits enablers. The major reason to play it is for breaking bond pairs, which any bounce spell or flicker spell does as well. Good card to sideboard against decks with human rares (and white in general, maybe), occasionally good otherwise, and a fine substitute for bounce against a soulbond deck, but not maindeckable at all.
@Pahshowned: Good combat tricks should be at a major premium. Stuff like Zealous Strike or Joint Assault. The hefty number of tricks in the format should actually make the poorer ones worse than usual, since people will learn to play around tricks in general more often.
Every flicker effect in the set only works on your own creatures.
Practice for Khans of Tarkir Limited:
Draft: (#1) (#2) (#3) (#4) (#5)
Late game removal is good because it tends to hit everything in the late game, and you don't care about the mana cost then. Early game removal is good because it tends to hit everything in the early game and you don't care about the late game uselessness. Frailty is not reliably good because it never reliably has a target - it's just a card that will usually trade up for a little tempo at some unspecified point in the game. You can't build a plan around it until you know very specifically what your opponent has.
Human Frailty: Destroy target human
Bone Splinters: Sac a creature, destroy a creature.
Ghoulflesh: Enchanted creature gets -1/-1 and is black zomibe
All three cost :symb:.