Not digging the legendary uncommon cycle. The legendary brand was already being diluted when they started to add a bunch of legends who were not established characters, had no place in the story, have very generic design and did not even had quotes on flavor text. And now they are not even rare ?
Searing Barrage being instant is pretty nice. I always found sorcery speed on Reduce to Ashes unnecessary. More reach on red is also cool, helps keep the color in character.
Very nice design for the Flyers and Tempo standard archetypes, but the power level feels on the short end. It should really counter CMC 4 or less to catch Kaya's Wrath. The flyers deck could really use a main board answer to wrath that did not dilute the game plan.
Wintermoor Commander is a limited star and fringe standard playable depending how useful the attack trigger end up being.
The Circle of Loyalty looks like a Commander card and not remotely good in standard. Typically Crusade effects have to cost 2 to be any good and this will typically cost a lot more. The middle ability is quite bad in a card that is suppose to top the curve aside from being narrow.
The last ability does a nice Legion's Landing impression but this sort of ability is not working that well in standard lately because by playing this thing you dilute your game plan (win fast) in order to improve your chances outside of your plan. However one 3/3 token for 4 mana per turn will not keep up with Experimental Frenzy, Bolas's Citadel or Hydroid Krasis.
All four decks are inconsistent.. I find hard to tell which one is good or not or if they are balanced.
But all in all I find Gwyn slightly worse then the other three. Decks in those colors really need more spot removal because they cant compete with green and blue decks in terms of value.
Return to Theros is nice. We got many hints, so its no surprise. I wonder what different things they can do with it.
Monster World is not my thing but I will welcome the set if they can keep the visuals from going stale.
Core 2021 is my favorite if its a Mirage throwback.
Zendikar 3 could be cool. ZEN is a great, great set and it has plenty more to give. I think BFZ block beign a failure is reason to be optimistic. They know they screwed up and are coming back to fix the mess.
if this is real, Jeskai Hero may become a real big player post rotation. HoP1 and Swiftblade Vindicator as workhorse 2-drops, this and Baby Teferi on 3 -- sounds like a very solid core to build around.
I'm not sure I like this over Saheeli there. And UR/WR cards would have to be nuts in order to compete against the UB/WB package.
Looks strong and quite comparable to Ugin as both are 6 CMC walkers that act as token makers and removal. Ugin is much more versatile with it's static ability, no color requirements and being able to remove any non-colored permanent. Garruk makes two tokens per turn and have a proper ultimate, so he is better both at finishing games and protecting himself.
Making treasure tokens with fixed rules. I had argued for it a lot in a old thread where someone posted a token that did exactly what treasures did but was flavored differently. With Food now in ELD, it's pretty clear artifact tokens will have fixed rules attached to then and thus no two artifact tokens will do the same thing.
More importantly 'Adamant' from ELD is virtually the 'Purity' mechanic that I posted a few months ago.
Example Card:
Angelic Arrow1W
Instant (C)
~~ deals 3 damage to target attacking or blocking creature.
Purity - You gain 3 life if only white was spent to cast ~~.
EDIT: It appears 'Adamant' is a "fixed" version of my mechanic. Too soon haha
It's estimated that about ~3.5% of the population in the US is gay (broad sense).
If 1 out of 30 characters are gay, they are just being accurate and nothing more. Gay people exist, making characters based on demographics that exist is not "pushing an agenda", catering to a group or anything like that.
NOT making then on the other hand would be an agenda - miss representing demographics to cater to one belief system.
Ignoring the last ability, this card is already on par with goblin guide (the best red 1 drop ever). The drawback is much weaker at early game but much worse latet on... Yeah this is probably better then GG.
Now, the third ability alone is completely utterly btoken. Dtedge + mill spells + looting spells means unlimited mana as early as turn 2 (modern) or turn 1 (legacy).
The "butt bite" makes sense mechanically but the flavor is off. I think a normal bite is better. 2 damage is enough to take down many utility creatures and cheap flyers and for the bigger creatures 2 damage is enough to have a significant impact on combat math. This way it also means you have extra synergy with pumps, +1/+1 counters and equipment since this spider is a prime target for those.
So my suggestion is bring the cost down to 2GG and have a usual bite or keep the cost and make it 3/5. Either way this card should be rare if it's printed in a draft set.
Another suggestion to represent the webbing is taking inspiration from Root Snare:
Giant Weaver3GG
Creature - Spider {C}
Flash, reach
When ~~ enters the battlefield, you may tap ~~. If you do, prevent all combat damage that would be dealt this turn.
2/4
Searing Barrage being instant is pretty nice. I always found sorcery speed on Reduce to Ashes unnecessary. More reach on red is also cool, helps keep the color in character.
Claim the Firstborn is very neat. Good SB card for aristocrats decks.
Worthy Knight is very good but I think it's too soon for another spin on hero. Feels repetitive.
I hope the quality of rares gets up there with M20 and WAR otherwise draft could get pretty hard to afford.
The Circle of Loyalty looks like a Commander card and not remotely good in standard. Typically Crusade effects have to cost 2 to be any good and this will typically cost a lot more. The middle ability is quite bad in a card that is suppose to top the curve aside from being narrow.
The last ability does a nice Legion's Landing impression but this sort of ability is not working that well in standard lately because by playing this thing you dilute your game plan (win fast) in order to improve your chances outside of your plan. However one 3/3 token for 4 mana per turn will not keep up with Experimental Frenzy, Bolas's Citadel or Hydroid Krasis.
Never forget Braids.
But all in all I find Gwyn slightly worse then the other three. Decks in those colors really need more spot removal because they cant compete with green and blue decks in terms of value.
Gwyn being Knight's tribal commander feels more then a tiny nod to me.
Monster World is not my thing but I will welcome the set if they can keep the visuals from going stale.
Core 2021 is my favorite if its a Mirage throwback.
Zendikar 3 could be cool. ZEN is a great, great set and it has plenty more to give. I think BFZ block beign a failure is reason to be optimistic. They know they screwed up and are coming back to fix the mess.
I'm not sure I like this over Saheeli there. And UR/WR cards would have to be nuts in order to compete against the UB/WB package.
Example Card:
Angelic Arrow 1W
Instant (C)
~~ deals 3 damage to target attacking or blocking creature.
Purity - You gain 3 life if only white was spent to cast ~~.
EDIT: It appears 'Adamant' is a "fixed" version of my mechanic. Too soon haha
If 1 out of 30 characters are gay, they are just being accurate and nothing more. Gay people exist, making characters based on demographics that exist is not "pushing an agenda", catering to a group or anything like that.
NOT making then on the other hand would be an agenda - miss representing demographics to cater to one belief system.
Now, the third ability alone is completely utterly btoken. Dtedge + mill spells + looting spells means unlimited mana as early as turn 2 (modern) or turn 1 (legacy).
So my suggestion is bring the cost down to 2GG and have a usual bite or keep the cost and make it 3/5. Either way this card should be rare if it's printed in a draft set.
Another suggestion to represent the webbing is taking inspiration from Root Snare:
Giant Weaver 3GG
Creature - Spider {C}
Flash, reach
When ~~ enters the battlefield, you may tap ~~. If you do, prevent all combat damage that would be dealt this turn.
2/4