This is a spicy Dimir card: ninjas / phasing / draw / looting. 3-cmc planeswalkers tend to play better than they look. This isn't on Oko / Grist level, but I'm always looking for more flexible discard outlets, I'll probably give this one a spin.
I could see giving it a try over The Scarab God since it curves well into Fallen Shinobi and works as a discard outlet. Not sure though, I find evaluating planeswalkers so hard.
The competition doesn't feel particular steep to me, and I'm always down for another versatile looter. In aggressive decks, the token isn't half bad, and a 3 mana Coercive Portal that draws on etb seems pretty good. It's a reanimator and aggro/midrange card covers enough bases that I'd have to imagine it's pretty decent. The phasing seems good too, and is nice to guarantee the loot+token for recurring nightmare.
Reminds me a bit of baby jace. A + that's often card parity, a way with - to get card advantage, and an ultimate you'll probably never get to. I don't think that's good enough to crack a guild section, but I really like that it protects itself on the first turn so you have a really good chance of ending up at least up 1 card.
It's a lot like a Shadowmage Infiltrator with a more modern design, better in certain ways, worse in certain ways. If your 1/1 lives, congrats, you have a 1/1 unblockable that cantripped. Else, you get a free turn to loot, then he dies. I don't think its ultimately that powerful, but we'll see. The best he can do is Phyrexian Arena with a card, a loot, or a ninja upfront. His loyalty rate does not scare me at all, though.
It'll be phased out during your opponent's turn, so it's pretty survivable. Immune to both combat damage and sorcery-based 'walker removal.
Unless the phase out only works the turn it resolves, and not the turns where it phased in. In which case it's not as survivable as I thought. Hm...
It won't be able to phase out the turn it phases in since phasing in / out doesn't cause you to enter / leave the battlefield.
That being said, getting the chance to untap and draw an extra card does better position you to defend Kaito in the long run. This is a design space we've never seen in a planeswalker, so it'll be interesting to see how this plays out.
Ya, I forgot about that and I was thinking that this would spend each opponent's turn phased out. That seemed interesting. As is, this feels less than exciting to me.
I think it's intriguing. Loots are good for control decks, and draws are good for tempo decks. It may not be a beefy token, but it's still an unblockable token. I will test it.
His abilities are too weak IMO, even if he can protect himself - I feel looters should really be 2 CMC or lower.
The easiest comparison is Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver - It doesn't have a strongest ETB effect, but he can easily run away with the game. I feel Kaito doesn't have that. Even if the opponent doesn't have relevant threats or Ashiok is constantly attacked, exiling 6-9+ cards out of the opponent's library is not nothing - it can often put a serious damper on combo decks.
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This looks good, but not broken. It cannot be killed the round it enters, so even in the worst case you always get your card back, ether through your opponent killing the ninja or drawing a card the turn after Kaito enters.
In a control deck, since it phases out, you can loot the turn you play it, then the next turn play a wrath and make a ninja, and then start drawing cards. In an aggressive black/blue deck, you can immediately start drawing cards, making this a far better Jace Beleren. In a reanimator deck, you can discard your reanimation targets. The card doesn't seem that great in a artifact-heavy UB deck, but should work well everywhere else.
@ Mangolassi i think thats a reasonable swap & i think that it'll actually be a surprisingly decent card; especially when compared to our other options. (i know thats not saying a whole lot)
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This is a spicy Dimir card: ninjas / phasing / draw / looting. 3-cmc planeswalkers tend to play better than they look. This isn't on Oko / Grist level, but I'm always looking for more flexible discard outlets, I'll probably give this one a spin.
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It'll be phased out during your opponent's turn, so it's pretty survivable. Immune to both combat damage and sorcery-based 'walker removal.
Unless the phase out only works the turn it resolves, and not the turns where it phased in. In which case it's not as survivable as I thought. Hm...
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It won't be able to phase out the turn it phases in since phasing in / out doesn't cause you to enter / leave the battlefield.
That being said, getting the chance to untap and draw an extra card does better position you to defend Kaito in the long run. This is a design space we've never seen in a planeswalker, so it'll be interesting to see how this plays out.
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My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 49th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from MKM!
The easiest comparison is Ashiok, Nightmare Weaver - It doesn't have a strongest ETB effect, but he can easily run away with the game. I feel Kaito doesn't have that. Even if the opponent doesn't have relevant threats or Ashiok is constantly attacked, exiling 6-9+ cards out of the opponent's library is not nothing - it can often put a serious damper on combo decks.
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In a control deck, since it phases out, you can loot the turn you play it, then the next turn play a wrath and make a ninja, and then start drawing cards. In an aggressive black/blue deck, you can immediately start drawing cards, making this a far better Jace Beleren. In a reanimator deck, you can discard your reanimation targets. The card doesn't seem that great in a artifact-heavy UB deck, but should work well everywhere else.
My current UB section is Baleful Strix, Master of Death and Tezzeret, Agent of Bolas. I think I'll cut Tezzeret for this.