another answer or not perplex is still a decent card for a common. I mean there are much worse cards out there and while muddle is overall a better card Perplex is still solid for budget. I think another question would be are you playing U/B, mono U, or U with another color or 2. Granted yeah Muddle can nab counterspell, signets, and a long list of other stuff. Perplex can nab up staff, trinket mage, labman, ingot, buried alive, etc etc... now let's talk about how horrible Dizzy Spell is.
another answer or not perplex is still a decent card for a common. I mean there are much worse cards out there and while muddle is overall a better card Perplex is still solid for budget. I think another question would be are you playing U/B, mono U, or U with another color or 2. Granted yeah Muddle can nab counterspell, signets, and a long list of other stuff. Perplex can nab up staff, trinket mage, labman, ingot, burried alive, etc etc... now let's talk about how horrible Dizzy Spell is.
I'd pick Sophisticate over most all other land walk dudes out there in EDH seeing how 99.9% of the time there will be a non basic land on the table, turn 3 attach a blanchwood armor and start swinging for big damage across the board and yes that sophisticate will be a giant quickly until she gets removed or enchant does but still by turn 4 or 5 with ramping you should have enough to cast better stuff. Just my opinion on it.
Slaver isn't a static effect if you aren't recurring it, it's expensive to cast & activate and it only allows you to take an opponent's turn. I know much about Slaver, worst fears is pretty much the same thing as slaver. I am not talking about a card that controls an opponent's turn. I Am talking about a static enchant or artifact that allows you to choose your opponent's choice effects minus attack/block included would be tutors and anything that has the word choose, search, or similar effects...so for example if somebody tutors with said card on table and I control the card I would get to look through that person's deck and pick the card for them. This is not a card that allows you to take an opponent's turn, but simply states that I get to pick what you target and what you search for or if I decide to play a card with the words opponent chooses this or that I get to pick for them...come on with all the degenerate combos and cards out there WotC never thought a card like this? Would it be overly broken? Ok you got lotus on the board and you want to pick black nah brah you get purple instead.
While Arcanis isn't exactly free because you gotta tap him he is all around one of the best MUC commanders imo, I'm not fond of kaho because you still gotta pay X CMC and if he gets removed your spells go too. If I play U in commander I go heavy bounce + Scrivener type creatures to repeatedly fetch spells back.
They should just create an enchant or artifact on the cheap side that states "If a card forces an opponent to choose, you make that choice instead" I think they have similar cards but hey say good bye to green mana ramping and tutoring all together. Demo Tutor you say? Yeah go fetch this other card for me. Would that be a bit rough seeing how you could systematically ruin any choices they have?
Also, I am by no means comparing Perplex to Force of Will or Remand or other sought after counters/tutors. But if I recall correctly (not having played during Alliance) people always talked about at those times Force of Will was simply not thought of as a good counter, same happened with Remand. Again Perplex while not being a great card it does give more flexibility as far as choosing what you want to do with it whereas FoW & Remand do not despite those cards being more powerful as far as countering goes they do just that. EDH has plenty of pieces you can fetch for 3 as well so saying Perplex is a horrible choice or not optimal imo is showing ego. Yeah sure it will never be a $$ card or even as good, but in early to mid '00s people were saying Kiki-Jiki & Glimpse of Nature were horrible cards too. I'm just a little shocked that anyone would call a card like perplex horrible, maybe not great but of all the ultracrap commons and uncommons out there why is this even being mentioned?
Well, if you're playing "high" dollar tutors then that's fine, I got out of being competitive in magic years ago. Sold off anything that would remotely get me back into Magic, 3 years later met my g/f who USED to play it with me all the time and now she gripes about how I talk about it too much. If I still had my collection i'm sure I wouldn't be arguing about a "suboptimal" choice. Not being a prick or anything just stating my opinion on this discussion. I'm sure alot of people play it even if they don't use it as a counter. That being said it's a step up from normal cycling imo and in EDH I see plenty of cycle cards being used.
I've always wanted to throw in a Camouflage just to make it even more crazy.
Holy crap, I'm going to need a step-by-step Powerpoint presentation to understand what that card does. It looks like players separate their creatures into piles and have them block each other randomly, but there's more to it than that, isn't there?
I think you hit the nail on the head...if a creature can block multiple creatures you just separate it into it's own pile...gotta love those old school "let me grab a lv 20 judge" wordings. Back when I was playing 1.5 in '06 when cards were relatively cheap I had built train wreck and had everything except for Chains of Mephistopheles even though it's not confusing and pretty straightforward I simply do not like reading a card that seems more like a book.
While Labman is awesome when you build around him, he's not exactly a good card either. Depending on your group size and such I guess you could go Lore Broker + Geth's Grimoire + Freed from the Real or just go classic with Arcanis with back up from the likes of prosperityTolarian winds. Not quite sure if I want to go Arcanis with my build or keep Oona, i'm sure there are much better options but the extra board control + Heartless Summoning with Scrivener & friends is really nice. Not to mention how ridiculous a Peregrine Drake could get if you go high tide as well. Anyways back to topic, yeah Labman is great, but as I said he's a dud if you don't have some form of milling yourself or some degenerate draw as much as you want engine/combo. If I had access to Mimeoplasm i'd probably use him actually. as far as primespeaker is concerned what creature would you play with 50 power that's not late game, or are you speaking over time?
Why not just go Golgari for Jarad? Well more train wreck style and do the typical infistaff combo elves or go with coffers too, just to switch it up a bit. Just a thought
Why all the confused hate on perplex? Honestly it depends on style of play, but it can counter with that "opponent's choice" clause or tutor up something more viable. I always loved the transmute ability and having a counter in a pinch is nice too, I don't think people would dump their hands for 1 card unless it's the final piece to a combo or they fudge it. Can't beat cards that give lots of options in EDH. Don't like the card? Don't use it. Even if I still had my $14k+ collection of rares sitting around i'd probably fit Perplex in every U/B deck I make just because I still have 50 million of them laying around.
Honestly in a format such as EDH imo CMCs are irrelevant unless you play nothing but 6 or 7 CMC that is, but I don't think anybody in their right mind does that. Also relying on a single card is a no no anyways.
I think you hit the nail on the head...if a creature can block multiple creatures you just separate it into it's own pile...gotta love those old school "let me grab a lv 20 judge" wordings. Back when I was playing 1.5 in '06 when cards were relatively cheap I had built train wreck and had everything except for Chains of Mephistopheles even though it's not confusing and pretty straightforward I simply do not like reading a card that seems more like a book.
While Labman is awesome when you build around him, he's not exactly a good card either. Depending on your group size and such I guess you could go Lore Broker + Geth's Grimoire + Freed from the Real or just go classic with Arcanis with back up from the likes of prosperity Tolarian winds. Not quite sure if I want to go Arcanis with my build or keep Oona, i'm sure there are much better options but the extra board control + Heartless Summoning with Scrivener & friends is really nice. Not to mention how ridiculous a Peregrine Drake could get if you go high tide as well. Anyways back to topic, yeah Labman is great, but as I said he's a dud if you don't have some form of milling yourself or some degenerate draw as much as you want engine/combo. If I had access to Mimeoplasm i'd probably use him actually. as far as primespeaker is concerned what creature would you play with 50 power that's not late game, or are you speaking over time?