Without testing no one can know for sure, but I think Will is the only one of these cards that has survived the first round of actual scrutiny that happens when you take off the spoiler goggles. Looking forward to actual playtesting results on all of these though...
One of my group is really high on this one still and wants to give it a shot. I was thinking of swapping Sram's Expertise out for it. This creature is really cool, but it's incredibly mana intensive. I think it'll be mostly a control card where you'll likely have the mana to sink into it and be able to really leverage the abilities.
So... I've recently added Brightling to my cube on the strength of recommendations and test results from all around the broader cube community. Got to see it in action over the weekend in an Azorious tempo list and it was a pretty dominant creature. Has anyone else here had good experiences with the card?
Brightling was too slow and lack of evasion makes it a poor finisher. Having to re-cast it every time you need to protect it is a huge hinderance on top of activating its other abilities. White 3-cmc creature slot is stacked and both the 3-cmc Gideons just play the role of resilient beater much better.
It’s much more of a 4 cmc creature, like Aetherling was a 7 cmc creature. Playing it without W open for protection is not optimal.
I was fairly impressed with it in in my initial testing. Vigilance/lifelink + the ability to bash for 5 or block for infinity make a potent little package.
It’s much more of a 4 cmc creature, like Aetherling was a 7 cmc creature. Playing it without W open for protection is not optimal.
Not always true, there are many scenarios where it's optimal to play these types of creatures on curve because you don't have the luxury of waiting either due to pressure or wouldn't be able to race your opponent otherwise.
There's a few reasons why AEtherling is the last standing X-ling in my cube:
- Blue lends itself well to ramping strategies, so being able to play AEtherling with access mana up isn't that hard and at least has a sturdy body in case I don't. Also, AEtherling + Upheaval is super dumb.
- Unlike the other X-lings, AEtherling just completely ignores any interaction with your opponent. The only way to impede its offense is to stop it with a Maze of Ith type card, shut down its activated abilities with a Pithing Needle type effect, or blow up all of your opponent's mana (which can be difficult if they have an assortment of lands and mana rocks).
Brightling is a cubeable card, but I think it's severely outclassed in high powered environments. In the cheap / resilient win condition role, it is severely outclassed by all the ridiculous planeswalkers white has access to, especially in the 3 and 4-cmc slots.
Yea but you run a powered cube. Brightling is an extremely fair card and can really mess with fair decks and invalidate a lot of fair offensive/defensive options. I rocked it in a tempo/aggro deck over the weekend vs. control and it was able to dodge removal and put serious pressure on my opponent and their walkers. That is until it got Control Magic’d away from me because I tapped out like an idiot. It can have the same kind of board impact as Lyra type creatures in a lot of matchups (except flying obviously) in a mug cheaper and harder to kill package. My experience, though limited has been the polar opposite of what you guys report so I’m chalking it up to a difference in our cube metas.
MTGS Average Peasant Cube 2023 Edition
Follow me. I tweet.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
-
View User Profile
-
View Posts
-
Send Message
StaffMy High Octane Unpowered Cube on CubeCobra
I was fairly impressed with it in in my initial testing. Vigilance/lifelink + the ability to bash for 5 or block for infinity make a potent little package.
-
View User Profile
-
View Posts
-
Send Message
StaffNot always true, there are many scenarios where it's optimal to play these types of creatures on curve because you don't have the luxury of waiting either due to pressure or wouldn't be able to race your opponent otherwise.
There's a few reasons why AEtherling is the last standing X-ling in my cube:
- Blue lends itself well to ramping strategies, so being able to play AEtherling with access mana up isn't that hard and at least has a sturdy body in case I don't. Also, AEtherling + Upheaval is super dumb.
- Unlike the other X-lings, AEtherling just completely ignores any interaction with your opponent. The only way to impede its offense is to stop it with a Maze of Ith type card, shut down its activated abilities with a Pithing Needle type effect, or blow up all of your opponent's mana (which can be difficult if they have an assortment of lands and mana rocks).
Brightling is a cubeable card, but I think it's severely outclassed in high powered environments. In the cheap / resilient win condition role, it is severely outclassed by all the ridiculous planeswalkers white has access to, especially in the 3 and 4-cmc slots.
My High Octane Unpowered Cube on CubeCobra
It may be the card shines more in my environment than your high octane cube as I have less ways to go over the top.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!