Vizier of the Menagerie looks downright dangerous--if only I could figure out how to abuse its ability to let you chain creatures off the top of your library. He does a poor man's Glimpse of Nature impression with free creatures (although good luck casting anything like Burning-Tree Emissary the turn you resolve this 4-cmc guy).
I don't think it's that good. It has the same problem as Domri Rade. I've been running the numbers on it in Legacy Nic Fit, and even with 4 SDT's, and GSZ, clue tokens, and fetches I can't get it consistent enough in a 20 creature deck to be worth playing.
For this card to work, it's going to need CoCo numbers of creatures, probably alongside Courser.
people are just upset that it isn't as good as miscalculation
Oh well.
On second thought, I think Condescend is just better. Condescend counters everything Censor does for the same cost but can also scale up based on mana, in addition to scrying 2 afterwards. Rather than cycling for U it can scry 2 for U which isn't the same but pretty close.
I really think this is better than Condescend. Scry 2 is significantly worse than Cycling U, which makes sense because scrying is itself worse than actually drawing cards (see Mystic Speculation seeing zero play). Unlike Condescend, Censor is never quite a dead draw. You can cycle it for something new as early as T1, and if topdecked later after countermagic no longer matters, you can immediately cycle it away. Condescend for X=0 is bad on T1 and you can't Condescend at all later unless you have a spell to hit, and even then you aren't drawing the cards. Once people get over their initial annoyance at the two-mana Force Spike factor, they'll start focusing more on Cycling U and realize why this card is much better than it appears.
I agree that Censor seems good. Its great, easily cast, early interation, that cycles away almost painlessly at your convenience. Nice card, looking forward to it.
If embalm the counter hoser and prowling serpopard the anticouner hate creature are both in this set because Censor was expected to be the terror of standard i'll be a little disappointed. I think the card will be tested in modern but idk how much staying power it will have.
Pull from tomorrow isn't quite there I think, you need to pay 3 before it does anything more than cycle a card. That said it's and instant so maybe.
Oketra could maybe see play as a top end in tokens? Sorin, S.V. may just be better but an indestructible 3/6 w/ ds that can turn your late game mana into more creatures may be worth it.
Not sure if there's a deck for honored hydra but cool to have a roar of the wurm in modern
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
My Decks:
UG Merfolk RG 8-Whack BWG Abzan midrange GRB Living End UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin" RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!" BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
Let's not forget about Snapcaster Maqe potentially flashing it back to hard counter. Although it would be tough and only works if your opponent forgot about it in the yard. Still, it could happen! At least it is a hard counter vs everything. I'm glad it can at least do that. I think it would work alongside Serum Visions but I guess Thought Scour can do the same thing.
Commander GUR Maelstrom Wanderer BWU Sydri, Galvanic Genius BGB Meren of Clan Nel Toth WGW Nazahn, Revered Bladesmith RRR Feldon of the Third Path WWW Heliod, God of the Sun
censor is....fine. It is just frustrating that this is probably the "pushed" blue spell of the set. I think it is even good enough for modern, but it certainly is no fatal push and something tells me this is how they viewed it.
The inventions are crazy counter heavy, we are dealing with the smartest creature in the multiverse who just so happens to be blue and controlling, they made embalm which makes counters bad, and they printed prowling serpopard, all which point to having some sort of pushed counterspell or at least a meta where counters play a big part.
Again, censor is a fine card, it is just no where near the pushed status that would make it a staple of modern like abrupt decay or thoughtseize or fatal push. Here is hoping that it isn't meant to be and we have something better coming.
I feel like censor is going to be an unknown for 6 months. It will see reasonable play for that span, but after that it is tough to tell. "1U Force Spike" isn't great, but "U cycle" is soooo versatile. That versatility I think is the key to it's long term viability. Here's hoping!
Pull from tomorrow isn't quite there I think, you need to pay 3 before it does anything more than cycle a card. That said it's and instant so maybe.
Sphinx's Revelation would like a word with you. It's not a 3 mana play, its a "hold in your hand until EoT and if you haven't had to counter/answer anything you refill your hand" play.
Pull From Tomorrow is far and away the best control card printed in quite a while. Now Grixis Control and other non UW control decks have access to a better revelations. Sure they lose the lifegain, but they gain 1 extra card drawn, and then they chuck the worst card in their hand. (or they chuck a card for value, like Lingering Souls, or power up their delve-cast the next turn)
This will see play in pretty much any modern control deck that isn't pure UW. Hell, even UW decks may prefer this over revelation as it's less color intensive and for the benefits I described above.
As for Censor, it seems okay but I don't think it'll see much play. Early game it's okay if your opponent is fully tapped out, and late game it's easy to pitch, but honestly I'd rather a Mana Leak early game or a Remand late game. I doubt it will see much play.
I do think that the 2 most pushed cards from this set are 3 mana Gideon and Pull from Tomorrow, which will both see modern play (and might even end up in the same list).
Well Modern Minotaurs got another useful 3 drop with Naheb and combined with Metallic Mimic. Minotaurs might be a fine FNM viable deck (competitiveness of FNM's not included).
Pull From Tomorrow is far and away the best control card printed in quite a while. Now Grixis Control and other non UW control decks have access to a better revelations. Sure they lose the lifegain, but they gain 1 extra card drawn, and then they chuck the worst card in their hand. (or they chuck a card for value, like Lingering Souls, or power up their delve-cast the next turn)
I'm not sold on Pull yet. I agree that the rate is good, but an X draw spell needs upside, not downside. Rev works because of the lifegain, if it weren't for that it would just be Blue Sun's Zenith. Pull is very similar to BSZ in power level. Though putting 1 card into the graveyard might be enough of an enabler with shenanigans.
Pull from tomorrow isn't quite there I think, you need to pay 3 before it does anything more than cycle a card. That said it's and instant so maybe.
Sphinx's Revelation would like a word with you. It's not a 3 mana play, its a "hold in your hand until EoT and if you haven't had to counter/answer anything you refill your hand" play.
Pull From Tomorrow is far and away the best control card printed in quite a while. Now Grixis Control and other non UW control decks have access to a better revelations. Sure they lose the lifegain, but they gain 1 extra card drawn, and then they chuck the worst card in their hand. (or they chuck a card for value, like Lingering Souls, or power up their delve-cast the next turn)
This will see play in pretty much any modern control deck that isn't pure UW. Hell, even UW decks may prefer this over revelation as it's less color intensive and for the benefits I described above.
As for Censor, it seems okay but I don't think it'll see much play. Early game it's okay if your opponent is fully tapped out, and late game it's easy to pitch, but honestly I'd rather a Mana Leak early game or a Remand late game. I doubt it will see much play.
I do think that the 2 most pushed cards from this set are 3 mana Gideon and Pull from Tomorrow, which will both see modern play (and might even end up in the same list).
I'm not sure..I certainly think it could see play, but my math was wrong earlier, you actually need to spend 4 before this does anything more than cycle. At that rate Rev is better as long as you don't mind being in U/W. I suppose Grixis control might want it since it plays well with snapcaster and can be played eot, but i'm still leaning more towards cautious than optimistic.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
My Decks:
UG Merfolk RG 8-Whack BWG Abzan midrange GRB Living End UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin" RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!" BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
Pull from tomorrow seems nice for a deck with an emrakul, the aeons torn that it wants to recycle. Unfortunately, the main deck that I can think of wanting to do that is Nahiri and that's already in the colors for Sphinx's Revelation if you add blue.
Condescend just seems better than Censor. The fact that it's dead mode is cycling is better than the dead mode of condescend for 0 to scry doesn't seem like it outweighs the increased number of times that card is dead and not getting a scry 2 when you do counter a spell. It does seem nice for some kind of tempo deck where digging for a threat this turn instead of next turn might be important. Having played mana tithe not being able to interact with the first one drop on turn 2 is pretty feel bad.
I don't like Censor's inability to counter much. Silumgar's Scorn got useless too quickly without Dragons to access back when I tested it, and in Legacy, I've virtually always cast Daze for its alternate cost of bouncing an Island instead of paying 1U (which is the same as Censor's cost). IMO, Censor is better judged as a U-costing cantrip with upside (now, whether that upside is better than Architects of Will's Delirium-buffing...).
I dont think Censor is bad. I just think its not the counterspell everyone wanted it to be. And many people thought miscalculation would have been that.
Still I think it is strong enough, as others said, to bridge the gap between great early game remand to late game command. U to draw a now useless counter away for something you need more in response or at end of turn is really powerful.
No force spike for 2 is not good enough, it's barely good enough at 1 I'm sorry but you thinking this is a viable option even with cycle is too crazy. Miscalculation I can buy into this piece of garbage I cannot. This proves how bad blue has been for awhile.
They think this dumpster fire counter magic is decent.
Draw a card > scry 2. That's like the difference between Index/Mystic Speculation and a cantrip. When Probe got banned some people said "oh just play Surgical Extraction, you still get to see what's in your opponent's hand", now look how well that turned out. There's nothing quite like having your spell replace itself.
The discard on Pull from Tomorrow kills it. Some benchmarks: Glimmer of Genius: 4 mana, scry 2, draw 2 Jace's Ingenuity: 5 mana, draw 3 Dragonlord's Prerogative: 6 mana, draw 4
Pull leaves you 1 card down compared to all of the above. Even compared to Blue Sun's Zenith, the rate on Pull is the same: x mana for a net x-3 cards. Stick to the staple control draw spell.
Censor is a terrible card. Absolutely terrible. The only reason it looks good is because we haven't had a good counter spell in so long, people forgot what one looks like.
Imagine this card:
1B
Target player discards a card unless they pay 1.
Cycling(B)
OR this one:
1R
Target player takes 3 damage unless they pay 1
Cycling(R)
In what world would these be considered acceptable cards for an eternal format? Control/Blue players are so desperate, so starved for decent cards that THIS actually looks playable, when any equivalent card would be laughed at by the other archetypes.
Countering a spell is a more powerful effect than forcing the opponent to discard a card or dealing 3 damage to a target. You're seriously arguing that Lightning Strike is as good as Counterspell?
Countering a spell is a more powerful effect than forcing the opponent to discard a card or dealing 3 damage to a target. You're seriously arguing that Lightning Strike is as good as Counterspell?
Discarding ANY card for 1 mana is arguably equally powerful to counterspell. If the format is a proactive as modern, then Thoughseize can be better than counterspell.
Yep quite easy to enable with Goyf or Death's shadow in play. Also gives either of those creatures the trample they need. More playable Green cards in this set than anything else...
Commander GUR Maelstrom Wanderer BWU Sydri, Galvanic Genius BGB Meren of Clan Nel Toth WGW Nazahn, Revered Bladesmith RRR Feldon of the Third Path WWW Heliod, God of the Sun
Rhonas's pump ability also helps enable him to attack/block, combined with deathtouch it could result in some interesting combat strategies. He's definitely playable but I'm not sure what deck wants him.
Countering a spell is a more powerful effect than forcing the opponent to discard a card or dealing 3 damage to a target. You're seriously arguing that Lightning Strike is as good as Counterspell?
Discarding ANY card for 1 mana is arguably equally powerful to counterspell. If the format is a proactive as modern, then Thoughseize can be better than counterspell.
The post above mine referred to cards as I outlined them. Thoughtseize is not forcing an opponent to discard a card, it includes selection, and the post referred to a 2 mana burn spell.
I don't think it's that good. It has the same problem as Domri Rade. I've been running the numbers on it in Legacy Nic Fit, and even with 4 SDT's, and GSZ, clue tokens, and fetches I can't get it consistent enough in a 20 creature deck to be worth playing.
For this card to work, it's going to need CoCo numbers of creatures, probably alongside Courser.
I really think this is better than Condescend. Scry 2 is significantly worse than Cycling U, which makes sense because scrying is itself worse than actually drawing cards (see Mystic Speculation seeing zero play). Unlike Condescend, Censor is never quite a dead draw. You can cycle it for something new as early as T1, and if topdecked later after countermagic no longer matters, you can immediately cycle it away. Condescend for X=0 is bad on T1 and you can't Condescend at all later unless you have a spell to hit, and even then you aren't drawing the cards. Once people get over their initial annoyance at the two-mana Force Spike factor, they'll start focusing more on Cycling U and realize why this card is much better than it appears.
Pull from tomorrow isn't quite there I think, you need to pay 3 before it does anything more than cycle a card. That said it's and instant so maybe.
Oketra could maybe see play as a top end in tokens? Sorin, S.V. may just be better but an indestructible 3/6 w/ ds that can turn your late game mana into more creatures may be worth it.
Not sure if there's a deck for honored hydra but cool to have a roar of the wurm in modern
RG 8-Whack
BWG Abzan midrange
GRB Living End
UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin"
RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!"
BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
GURB Grixis/Jund Shadow
RBG Dredge
xUx U Ballista Tron
Commander
GUR Maelstrom Wanderer
BWU Sydri, Galvanic Genius
BGB Meren of Clan Nel Toth
WGW Nazahn, Revered Bladesmith
RRR Feldon of the Third Path
WWW Heliod, God of the Sun
The inventions are crazy counter heavy, we are dealing with the smartest creature in the multiverse who just so happens to be blue and controlling, they made embalm which makes counters bad, and they printed prowling serpopard, all which point to having some sort of pushed counterspell or at least a meta where counters play a big part.
Again, censor is a fine card, it is just no where near the pushed status that would make it a staple of modern like abrupt decay or thoughtseize or fatal push. Here is hoping that it isn't meant to be and we have something better coming.
Sphinx's Revelation would like a word with you. It's not a 3 mana play, its a "hold in your hand until EoT and if you haven't had to counter/answer anything you refill your hand" play.
Pull From Tomorrow is far and away the best control card printed in quite a while. Now Grixis Control and other non UW control decks have access to a better revelations. Sure they lose the lifegain, but they gain 1 extra card drawn, and then they chuck the worst card in their hand. (or they chuck a card for value, like Lingering Souls, or power up their delve-cast the next turn)
This will see play in pretty much any modern control deck that isn't pure UW. Hell, even UW decks may prefer this over revelation as it's less color intensive and for the benefits I described above.
As for Censor, it seems okay but I don't think it'll see much play. Early game it's okay if your opponent is fully tapped out, and late game it's easy to pitch, but honestly I'd rather a Mana Leak early game or a Remand late game. I doubt it will see much play.
I do think that the 2 most pushed cards from this set are 3 mana Gideon and Pull from Tomorrow, which will both see modern play (and might even end up in the same list).
BG Rock
Modern:
RW Sun & Moon
RBG Dredge
RWG Burn
Legacy:
W Death & Taxes
I'm not sold on Pull yet. I agree that the rate is good, but an X draw spell needs upside, not downside. Rev works because of the lifegain, if it weren't for that it would just be Blue Sun's Zenith. Pull is very similar to BSZ in power level. Though putting 1 card into the graveyard might be enough of an enabler with shenanigans.
I'm not sure..I certainly think it could see play, but my math was wrong earlier, you actually need to spend 4 before this does anything more than cycle. At that rate Rev is better as long as you don't mind being in U/W. I suppose Grixis control might want it since it plays well with snapcaster and can be played eot, but i'm still leaning more towards cautious than optimistic.
RG 8-Whack
BWG Abzan midrange
GRB Living End
UWB Spirit Control
GU Kruphix's "Hug Assassin"
RW Kalemne's "Play Fatties and Hope for the Best!"
BUGW Atraxa's "All counters, all the time"
Condescend just seems better than Censor. The fact that it's dead mode is cycling is better than the dead mode of condescend for 0 to scry doesn't seem like it outweighs the increased number of times that card is dead and not getting a scry 2 when you do counter a spell. It does seem nice for some kind of tempo deck where digging for a threat this turn instead of next turn might be important. Having played mana tithe not being able to interact with the first one drop on turn 2 is pretty feel bad.
Still I think it is strong enough, as others said, to bridge the gap between great early game remand to late game command. U to draw a now useless counter away for something you need more in response or at end of turn is really powerful.
They think this dumpster fire counter magic is decent.
The discard on Pull from Tomorrow kills it. Some benchmarks:
Glimmer of Genius: 4 mana, scry 2, draw 2
Jace's Ingenuity: 5 mana, draw 3
Dragonlord's Prerogative: 6 mana, draw 4
Pull leaves you 1 card down compared to all of the above. Even compared to Blue Sun's Zenith, the rate on Pull is the same: x mana for a net x-3 cards. Stick to the staple control draw spell.
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.
Imagine this card:
1B
Target player discards a card unless they pay 1.
Cycling(B)
OR this one:
1R
Target player takes 3 damage unless they pay 1
Cycling(R)
In what world would these be considered acceptable cards for an eternal format? Control/Blue players are so desperate, so starved for decent cards that THIS actually looks playable, when any equivalent card would be laughed at by the other archetypes.
And of course the comparison is not between Lightning Strike and Counterspell but between Counterspell and Lightning Bolt
UB Faeries (15-6-0)
UWR Control (10-5-1)/Kiki Control/Midrange/Harbinger
UBR Cruel Control (6-4-0)/Grixis Control/Delver/Blue Jund
UWB Control/Mentor
UW Miracles/Control (currently active, 14-2-0)
BW Eldrazi & Taxes
RW Burn (9-1-0)
I do (academic) research on video games and archaeology! You can check out my open access book here: https://www.sidestone.com/books/the-interactive-past
WGUBR 5c Humans
GWR Naya Zoo
Legacy:
GW GW Maverick
R Goblins
This guy is Modern playable, I believe...
Anything, but nothing at the moment...
Modern:
WUBRGAmulet Titan, WUBRGHuman
WUBRAd Nauseam, WBRGDeath Shadow, UBRGScapeshift, UBRGDredge
WURJeskai Nahiri, WURCheeri0s, WBGCounter Company, WRGBurn, UBRMadcap Moon, BRGJund Midrange
UBTurn,BRGriselbrand Reanimator, WGKnight Company, RGRG Tron, RGRG Ponza, XAffinity, XEldrazi Tron
GURB Grixis/Jund Shadow
RBG Dredge
xUx U Ballista Tron
Commander
GUR Maelstrom Wanderer
BWU Sydri, Galvanic Genius
BGB Meren of Clan Nel Toth
WGW Nazahn, Revered Bladesmith
RRR Feldon of the Third Path
WWW Heliod, God of the Sun
The post above mine referred to cards as I outlined them. Thoughtseize is not forcing an opponent to discard a card, it includes selection, and the post referred to a 2 mana burn spell.