Metalworker seems like an absolutely busted card, but I don't know how deep an artifact section needs to be to make it work. I'm currently sitting at a 450 cube, and my artifact section is 57 cards strong.
If you support the artifact deck and have a good amount of mana rocks, the card is nuts. You don't need an unusually large artifact section; one as big as the rest of your sections is enough. Just make sure you have big payout colorless cards to make it worthwhile.
I am interested in those who have success with it in unpowered cubes. I think the card is narrow but very powerful in the right deck, I don't think it will be very successful in my cube without additional support.
That would be me! It certainly only fits in one deck, but it is pretty spectacular and a must-kill in that deck. I am helped by the fact that I run all 10 signets plus other mana rocks, so there isn't a lack of support as far as the mana rocks go.
This is how I feel about the card: if I reveal 1 card, it's at least a Palladium Myr. Any more than that and it's just pure value. However, by holding onto these artifacts in my hand I'm not advancing the board state, and I take a huge risk holding things like Signets because a single Lightning Bolt would set me behind where I can be in terms of acceleration. It reminds me a bit of Rofellos, actually, in that he can be absolutely explosive; however, he's also a bit weaker, in that Rofellos is still relevant late game, but Metalworker depends on you having artifacts in your hand, if any, at that stage in the game.
This used to be one of my favorite cards. I have never ran it in cube but had a really fun casual artifact deck with four of these. Iv'e thought about including it before, but I would think Palladium Myr is much more efficient mana-wise and attacking-wise. I wish it was a little better for cube because the artwork is awesome.
I'm running it in an unpowered 450 list with 55 artifacts.
It's yet to make main deck even in largely brown decks, but I want to play with it a little more before making a decision. Tapping for four mana is stupid fun.
I love this card. You can reveal the card you're about to cast with it, so in artifact heavy lists, it's almost always better than Paladium Myr. If I had to cut one of those two cards from my cube, I'd definitely cut the Myr first. T4 Sundering Titans are just too fun to pass up, and that's really not that hard to do.
Seems way less reliable than the myr. You have to have an artifact in your hand just to make it as good as the myr. The chances of having 2 artifacts in hand to make it better than the myr doesn't seem too likely. I'm sure it happens but I would assume not very consistently. Not consistent enough for me to take the chance of it not doing anything. I feel most artifacts in someones deck want to come down earlier than turn three too as well.
Dropping any fat artifact creature off this guy turn four has to be awesome, but how many fat artifact creatures are in the cube that would need the extra two mana turn four? Two? Maybe three? I don't feel thats enough to warrent running this guy as dropping fatties into play is what his role is. With the myr I can still drop wurmcoils and such turn four and I don't have to rely on needing another artifact in my hand. I can also use that mana late game for x-burn spells.
That being said I still love metalworker and would even be down to try him out. It would be more because I like that card though than the fact that I think it's really powerful.
It's pretty likely, since artifact counts are close to any color count. Artifact decks aren't hard to draft, even if the cube doesn't push the theme that much.
Artifact decks are pretty control-centric, so busting four mana out of this guy on turn four allows you to lay down a fatty and protect it with your leftover available mana.
But outside artifact.dec I don't see it being as consistent. It's a build-around-me card for sure.
I've been running him since my pile took shape but he has yet to be a big factor in a game. He just seems to eat removal immediately or be just a tad bit too slow. That said, he's iconic and blessed with sweet art, so he's not on my chopping block.
It's not usually as easy to draft a lot of artifacts as it is to draft a lot of cards from a particular colour as they can go in any deck. My group often tend to draft artifacts quite high pack 1 to delay committing to a colour. Having said that, artifact heavy decks do show up, I'm just not convinced they have enough artifact density to make this guy good. I absolutely agree that the card and its art are iconic and evocative.
The art reminds me that I rematches a superhero movie the other night where a genius billionaire was working away in a cave with a glowing light on his chest. The movie was Batman Begins. I'd never noticed the similarity to another superhero movie before.
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Sorry if I'm improperly dredging an older thread, but I wanted to post here because someone mentioned the idea of adding Metalworker to my cube when we ran it last night. In the past, I had assumed that the card was a little too narrow to be included in a 450-card unpowered cube, but I'm wondering if that opinion has changed recently?
What overall percentage of artifacts constitutes "support"? Above 10%? Higher than that? Are we also including under support things like the Tezzerets, Tinker, and Welder? Anything else I should look for?
I'd like to try this card out in our 360. I think I might make this change in the next update, but it may miss out on being tested. I'm definitely interested in trying him though.
What overall percentage of artifacts constitutes "support"? Above 10%? Higher than that? Are we also including under support things like the Tezzerets, Tinker, and Welder? Anything else I should look for?
It's less about the number and more about the support guys you mention later. And it also depends a lot on the playgroup and how you prioritize colorless cards. But if you're looking for a number, my cube is like ~15%?
And ya, both Tezz cards, Welder, Tinker, Tolarian Academy/Academy Ruins, Metalworker would be a good start. There are more that are potentially playable, but those are the best ones, IMO.
We added it for a while, but found it underwhelming. Even in the decks where it is supposed to shine, it just consistently underperformed when compared to straight mana producers or even the 2/2 Myr. Too many things had to go just right for it to be busted.
Maybe if you play in a list with a ton of 5+ cost artifacts? We currently run ten (plus five swords), and they are all fought over.
I ran it and the Tezzes trying to support the brown deck but it never came together with my group so he hit the bricks. The problem I found was you want to cast a lot of the utility artifacts early in the game which limits his explosiveness. I think he's borderline at 540 unless you really support artifact.dec.
@wtwlf: the last 2 posts explains why I found it meh.
In theory, it looks really good. In actuality, Legacy MUD decks sport many 4-ofs. Many rocks in cube do the same amount of work that Metal guy tries to do. But falls flat.
Things might be different if we've metal basics. lol
I didn't rate this card at all, even when I pushed the artifact deck heavily. (I've since scaled back on it.)
Then I did the forum draft with ExpiredRascal's cube, and wound up with this deck. Metalworker was pretty easily the best card in there, winning lots of games we probably shouldn't have. Heck, you can goldfish that deck and see what I mean--any hand with Metalworker is insane.
If I sub the artifacts back in, I'm definitely getting a (gold-bordered) Metalworker.
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It's yet to make main deck even in largely brown decks, but I want to play with it a little more before making a decision. Tapping for four mana is stupid fun.
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Dropping any fat artifact creature off this guy turn four has to be awesome, but how many fat artifact creatures are in the cube that would need the extra two mana turn four? Two? Maybe three? I don't feel thats enough to warrent running this guy as dropping fatties into play is what his role is. With the myr I can still drop wurmcoils and such turn four and I don't have to rely on needing another artifact in my hand. I can also use that mana late game for x-burn spells.
That being said I still love metalworker and would even be down to try him out. It would be more because I like that card though than the fact that I think it's really powerful.
Ramp targets for this guy: Sundering Titan, Myr Battlesphere, Steel Hellkite, Wurmcoil Engine, Sphinx of the Steel Wind, Inkwell Leviathan
Others: Batterskull, Precursor Golem, Razormane Masticore, Karn Silver Golem, Darksteel Colossus, Blightsteel Colossus
Artifact decks are pretty control-centric, so busting four mana out of this guy on turn four allows you to lay down a fatty and protect it with your leftover available mana.
But outside artifact.dec I don't see it being as consistent. It's a build-around-me card for sure.
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The art reminds me that I rematches a superhero movie the other night where a genius billionaire was working away in a cave with a glowing light on his chest. The movie was Batman Begins. I'd never noticed the similarity to another superhero movie before.
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I don't know exactly. 8 or so? ABout the same concentration you'd want for Academy, Tezz 2.0 and other similar cards.
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1x Baleful Strix
1x Crypt Ghast
1x Inkwell Leviathan
1x Lodestone Golem
1x Metalworker
1x Perilous Myr
1x Solemn Simulacrum
1x Sundering Titan
1x Trinket Mage
1x Triskelion
1x Black Lotus
1x Erratic Portal
1x Grim Monolith
1x Mind Stone
1x Scroll Rack
1x Worn Powerstone
1x Zuran Orb
Planeswalker (3)
1x Karn Liberated
1x Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas
1x Tezzeret the Seeker
1x Impulse
Land (19)
1x Bad River
9x Island
1x Maze of Ith
1x Mishra's Factory
1x Shelldock Isle
5x Swamp
1x Tolarian Academy
Deck was a beast.
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It's less about the number and more about the support guys you mention later. And it also depends a lot on the playgroup and how you prioritize colorless cards. But if you're looking for a number, my cube is like ~15%?
And ya, both Tezz cards, Welder, Tinker, Tolarian Academy/Academy Ruins, Metalworker would be a good start. There are more that are potentially playable, but those are the best ones, IMO.
Hm, going to have to disagree with this statement.
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Maybe if you play in a list with a ton of 5+ cost artifacts? We currently run ten (plus five swords), and they are all fought over.
http://cubetutor.com/cubeblog/993
http://www.cubetutor.com/cubeblog/23690
In theory, it looks really good. In actuality, Legacy MUD decks sport many 4-ofs. Many rocks in cube do the same amount of work that Metal guy tries to do. But falls flat.
Things might be different if we've metal basics. lol
UR Melek, Izzet ParagonUR, B Shirei, Shizo's CaretakerB, R Jaya Ballard, Task MageR,RW Tajic, Blade of the LegionRW, UB Lazav, Dimir MastermindUB, UB Circu, Dimir LobotomistUB, RWU Zedruu the GreatheartedRWU, GUBThe MimeoplasmGUB, UGExperiment Kraj UG, WDarien, King of KjeldorW, BMarrow-GnawerB, WBGKarador, Ghost ChieftainWBG, UTeferi, Temporal ArchmageU, GWUDerevi, Empyrial TacticianGWU, RDaretti, Scrap SavantR, UTalrand, Sky SummonerU, GEzuri, Renegade LeaderG, WUBRGReaper KingWUBRG, RGXenagos, God of RevelsRG, CKozilek, Butcher of TruthC, WUBRGGeneral TazriWUBRG, GTitania, Protector of ArgothG
Then I did the forum draft with ExpiredRascal's cube, and wound up with this deck. Metalworker was pretty easily the best card in there, winning lots of games we probably shouldn't have. Heck, you can goldfish that deck and see what I mean--any hand with Metalworker is insane.
If I sub the artifacts back in, I'm definitely getting a (gold-bordered) Metalworker.
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