Thank you for helping me put this into words. What boros wants to be doing is stuff that only works in limited. I think you've described my problem with boros very well. constructed players, we need the red - white color combination to start including some cards that actually have constructed application.
I expected that RW would get a reasonably powerful mythic creature that probably has no Modern applications at all and I wasn't disappointed.
Hope is fading for something that I can use. She's a good card. Just not what I need.
Blah
Did you want her to have haste too? She buffs a creature the turn she comes out then starts the beating the following turn.
I don't play aggro. I play RW. I want a strong answer card or maybe a global enchantment or some good stuff. Every time Ravnica comes around they force these "strong in standard" creatures in Boros colors and that ensures that neither this set nor any of the following ones can have the sort of stuff that I enjoy, because it would likely make RW too powerful.
It's great for people who like that sort of stuff but I'm realizing that I probably have very little to look forward to until these aggro cards rotate out of standard.
I mostly hate it but I do wonder if there's almost enough of this sort of creature to build a Blasphemous Act deck in Modern yet... It was definitely too fragile to build that deck around just Boros Reckoner but a second redirector might make it...ummm... plausible?
spitemare is also a decent card, dunno about for modern though.
Yeah I put a basic frame together and realized that Blasphemous Act might work as a curve topper but the whole concept seems really weak against permission. It would have to be a strange sort of aggro deck that starts immediately but curves up to five instead of three. Those usually end up being strictly worse versions of RDW in my experience. I'm not feeling it.
Here's the first Johnny card in RW - Truefire Captain - RRWW for a 4/3 with the Boros Reckoner damage redirection ability plus the new Mentor ability. I think the following concept still needs a lot of help before it's ready for more than casual play but I'll lay it out because it seems interesting to me.
Truefire Captain is definitely not a Lockdown card unfortunately, bit it is a sort of control card. It can trade well against creatures and it can double as a win condition in a Blasphemous Act strategy. You curve through pyroclasm into Boros Reckoner, Spitemare and Truefire Captain. Pyroclasm doubles as an early-turn aggro answer and it also becomes enhanced by the redirect ability. The three creatures are all must-answer - they can't be allowed to stay on the board at all. The concept has a definite weakness to permission and is probably too slow if you try to play it as a combo or aggro but probably doesn't have strong enough answer cards to go control or midrange.
Don't expect much unless you can find at least a few additional synergies but going from 8 copies of a key effect to 12 copies is sometimes significant. For example Bogles ideally wants to have at least 10-11 first-turn hexproof creatures and suffers from only having 8.
Just spinning wheels...
Oh and if I'm not mistaken this would be the one case where Deafening Clarion provides an advantage over other 3 cmc sweepers since Reckoner effects have the creature deal the damage.
I mostly hate it but I do wonder if there's almost enough of this sort of creature to build a Blasphemous Act deck in Modern yet... It was definitely too fragile to build that deck around just Boros Reckoner but a second redirector might make it...ummm... plausible?
Intervention seems fine for formats where you don't have any better choices.
The more bad spells we see the more I think the RW color combination is going to have to be centered around a specific creature card or two that plays well enough in standard weenie aggro but isn't going to do jack-all for Modern players.
Man I hate Boros. I just want some decent control cards in my colors again. I grew up with Moats and Armageddons and StP and Balance. RW was a control pairing long before it was turned into this second-rate weenie crap.
Those are monowhite cards not Boros Cards to be Boros it needs RW in the casting cost. My point was RW gets the shaft compared to BG even though RW could based on the color pie get removal just as good. Meanwhile great removal is only one of BG numerous strengths.
So you don't use Path in your Boros deck because its not RW?
Considering Black is the best at creature removal, and green is the best at non-creature permanent removal, how does this card not make sense? Why should RW get this as well? Because creature removal is supposed to be a strength to red and/or white? Nope. It's there, but SHOULD not mitigate other color's strengths. You're arguing to make Magic flavorless.
GY hate is available to every color, with arguably the highest power level being Rest in Peace, White, as well it should be. And it should be available to every color. Graveyard decks are also the easiest to completely blow out. In other words BG's best strength is arguably better than card draw... but this degenerate strategy is counter-able by every color... because its degenerate. That makes it much less of a strength.
Burn is still the best aggro deck. Good luck arguing against that.
What do you want to talk about next, Green's best walker STILL being Garruk Wildspeaker?
This set has been a long time coming for green, and well deserved to balance the color pie. Hush.
You're starting to make a spectacle of yourself. Red and White had the strongest creature removal in Magic since day one with Swords to Plowshares and Lightning Bolt. Not to mention Wrath of God and the multitudes of direct damage red spells. White had the best artifact and enchantment removal with Disenchant. Red also dabbled with artifact removal. Land destruction wasn't really a white thinnnnn... Oh wait - Armageddon. Duh. Yes it was. And Land Destruction was strong in red too.
Trying to argue that these effects aren't supposed to be in RW just makes you look uninformed. I won't go into color shifting but I'll tell you this - Green has always been a Timmy color. That's what it was, is and probably always will be. Crap like this card is the real color shifting. You're just lucky that there was some shifting of the color pie or else you'd still be stuck trying to ramp Elves into Craw Wurms and getting your ass beat.
This is obviously a control card. With return of shocks it seems quite feasible to play jeskai control. The lifelink will rarely come up but if you side in creatures that do not have lifelink the second line seems very reasonable. The UR counter should also make jeskai control a little easier on the mana. I suppose some WR decks that intend to go big vs other aggro decks will want this as well. I think the real question here is not why is this worse that Assassin's Trophy but why is Assassin's Trophy as good as Assassin's Trophy.
Naw. There's still a question about why this card doesn't get anything good from the white side. Example: Assassin's Trophy - combine one B and one G, you get a 2 cmc effect that no 2 cmc green card or black card could come close to duplicating.
Now do Clarion: replace one red mana with one white mana - get essentially the exact same 3 cmc Red sweeper that Red's always had. Is a lifegain combat trick really enough to justify the white? Try to keep in mind that the cards you're comparing this to generally include extra abilities themselves - stuff like cycling-3.
This isn't a letdown compared to Assassin's Trophy. It's a letdown compared to anything.
That said - people who play standard probably like it a lot more than people who play modern.
I am known for getting overly excited about Johnny cards and then having to walk it back later. Even a guy like me can't drum up any enthusiasm for testing this. I already tested 3 cmc sweepers extensively - I never once wished I could tack Lifelink onto any of the existing cards - not even as a dual-mode. If your board-state is behind or even it's just a bad Anger. If you're ahead it's a win-more. If you're imagining using it for creature combat tricks then you're not playing Lockdown.
Thoughts about the just-announced Deafening Clarion ? Looks like a good swap-in for a sweeper or two.
Card Type: Sorcery
Casting Cost: 1 colorless / 1 red / 1 white
Card Text: Choose one or both —
• Deafening Clarion deals 3 damage to each creature.
• Creatures you control gain lifelink until end of turn.
Rarity: Rare
I love the potential to combine with an attacking Gideon.
I hate it. It's just barely powerful enough to be the Boros rare but not nearly powerful enough to help us. It's not like a lack of lifegain was the missing element keeping Anger of the Gods from dominating the format. It is crap.
The fact is, Boros is the army guild, and army aggro is where RW overlaps the most. What else are they supposed to do? Gain life? Burn stuff? Destroy permanents? Asking for RW control is like asking for UB aggro; it grinds against the color pair's natural grain. Besides, we don't know what all Boros is getting in GRN yet. I presume some manner of Helix spell will be appearing; we might even get strictly-better Energy Bolt, as in an X-cost instant that deals X damage and gains you X life. Or maybe even a XRRWW wrath that deals X damage to each creature and gains you that much life.
I'm ready to move on with my life but I think all of the cards you listed are crap and I don't agree in the least with your perception about RW control. RW control is OG. It was a control pairing long before Boros. It was about symmetric effects and/or taxes from white, with Red providing muscle. I miss locking *****es down and I think the decks that allowed themselves to get locked down - decks that Wotc protect - are just stupid decks that deserved to be locked down.
I don't play aggro. I play RW. I want a strong answer card or maybe a global enchantment or some good stuff. Every time Ravnica comes around they force these "strong in standard" creatures in Boros colors and that ensures that neither this set nor any of the following ones can have the sort of stuff that I enjoy, because it would likely make RW too powerful.
It's great for people who like that sort of stuff but I'm realizing that I probably have very little to look forward to until these aggro cards rotate out of standard.
Hope is fading for something that I can use. She's a good card. Just not what I need.
Blah
Yeah I put a basic frame together and realized that Blasphemous Act might work as a curve topper but the whole concept seems really weak against permission. It would have to be a strange sort of aggro deck that starts immediately but curves up to five instead of three. Those usually end up being strictly worse versions of RDW in my experience. I'm not feeling it.
Truefire Captain is definitely not a Lockdown card unfortunately, bit it is a sort of control card. It can trade well against creatures and it can double as a win condition in a Blasphemous Act strategy. You curve through pyroclasm into Boros Reckoner, Spitemare and Truefire Captain. Pyroclasm doubles as an early-turn aggro answer and it also becomes enhanced by the redirect ability. The three creatures are all must-answer - they can't be allowed to stay on the board at all. The concept has a definite weakness to permission and is probably too slow if you try to play it as a combo or aggro but probably doesn't have strong enough answer cards to go control or midrange.
Don't expect much unless you can find at least a few additional synergies but going from 8 copies of a key effect to 12 copies is sometimes significant. For example Bogles ideally wants to have at least 10-11 first-turn hexproof creatures and suffers from only having 8.
Just spinning wheels...
Oh and if I'm not mistaken this would be the one case where Deafening Clarion provides an advantage over other 3 cmc sweepers since Reckoner effects have the creature deal the damage.
The more bad spells we see the more I think the RW color combination is going to have to be centered around a specific creature card or two that plays well enough in standard weenie aggro but isn't going to do jack-all for Modern players.
Man I hate Boros. I just want some decent control cards in my colors again. I grew up with Moats and Armageddons and StP and Balance. RW was a control pairing long before it was turned into this second-rate weenie crap.
OR it means this is an answer for some strong red card that we haven't seen yet.
You're starting to make a spectacle of yourself. Red and White had the strongest creature removal in Magic since day one with Swords to Plowshares and Lightning Bolt. Not to mention Wrath of God and the multitudes of direct damage red spells. White had the best artifact and enchantment removal with Disenchant. Red also dabbled with artifact removal. Land destruction wasn't really a white thinnnnn... Oh wait - Armageddon. Duh. Yes it was. And Land Destruction was strong in red too.
Trying to argue that these effects aren't supposed to be in RW just makes you look uninformed. I won't go into color shifting but I'll tell you this - Green has always been a Timmy color. That's what it was, is and probably always will be. Crap like this card is the real color shifting. You're just lucky that there was some shifting of the color pie or else you'd still be stuck trying to ramp Elves into Craw Wurms and getting your ass beat.
Naw. There's still a question about why this card doesn't get anything good from the white side. Example: Assassin's Trophy - combine one B and one G, you get a 2 cmc effect that no 2 cmc green card or black card could come close to duplicating.
Now do Clarion: replace one red mana with one white mana - get essentially the exact same 3 cmc Red sweeper that Red's always had. Is a lifegain combat trick really enough to justify the white? Try to keep in mind that the cards you're comparing this to generally include extra abilities themselves - stuff like cycling-3.
This isn't a letdown compared to Assassin's Trophy. It's a letdown compared to anything.
That said - people who play standard probably like it a lot more than people who play modern.
I hate it. It's just barely powerful enough to be the Boros rare but not nearly powerful enough to help us. It's not like a lack of lifegain was the missing element keeping Anger of the Gods from dominating the format. It is crap.
Why do they hate us?
I'm ready to move on with my life but I think all of the cards you listed are crap and I don't agree in the least with your perception about RW control. RW control is OG. It was a control pairing long before Boros. It was about symmetric effects and/or taxes from white, with Red providing muscle. I miss locking *****es down and I think the decks that allowed themselves to get locked down - decks that Wotc protect - are just stupid decks that deserved to be locked down.
/getoffmylawnrant
Karn though. I think Tron is in trouble and that should ripple down through the format.