My impression from the people who are disappointed with the set is different from yours though. I think people are complaining that buying a low number of boosters is much more risky than in regular sets, which you point out in the end:
This means that for people not to lose when buying masters 25 they have to cash out on a box (or something close to that), which is already a high entry barrier for what is supposed to be a celebration set.Buying individual packs is much more of a gamble, given the higher price, but booster boxes will pay out their expected value.
I don't know, just leaves a bad taste in your mouth knowing that WoTC is basically forcing you to spend a lot of money for you to get a decent return on your investment. Not to mention that I'm a bit skeptical about the value retention capacity of many cards from the mythic and rare list after the market gets flooded with more copies. Anyway, I think the conclusion is that if you have the money to buy a box and wants to, there is no harm in doing that, but don't try to gamble on individual packs.
In any case you have a bigger creature with evasion that grants a powerful static ability to her tribe vs a smaller creature that commits you to more colors and gives a more powerful pump, but that is all. I think the rarity is fine. You could argue that maybe Arvad could be a rare, but I'm glad they put him at uncommon. Lyra is comparable (and probably better) to the likes of baneslayer angel, famous mythic white card.
Probably gonna consider for the Liliana, Heretical Healer deck I'm thinking of building.
EDIT: also, reanimates any target, including opposing graveyards. Glad to see that back.
The other cards feel unappealing, especially the UB one. So slow and clunky.
God damn this was hard.
EDIT: wrong again =]
There was a solution after all.
EDIT: no there wasn't. Sigh.
EDIT2: wait, there is. Even if your norn copies die, there will eventually be enough copies being made that, when the state-based actions are checked, they will kill all creatures from the opponent. There you go.
Beating Erayo + Eidolon is hard enough, the rest of the cards make it impossible. Not a very interesting puzzle one that has no solution.
With standard considerations aside, I've been tinkering with Sram EDH for duel commander in the last couple of days and this gal seems pretty nuts in the deck. Maybe she will be a little win-more, but I'm excited to try her.
We certainly have come a long way in artwork.
That said, you have to take the product's audience expectations into account. Magic players EXPECT of wizards to make an effort to produce more cards with interesting new designs and cool new concepts, while fostering a diversity of formats for players to participate. The fullfilment of this expectation makes for healthy business practice, because people will be happy and willing to spend their money on their product. Brawl is different. This format is being created during one of the worst standard eras of all time, and it signals to the players that WoTC is 'giving up' on making standard decent to sell their new products, instead trying to cater to a established player base of another suscessful format (Commander) to try and make money. In short, even if that's not their real intention, it breaks player's expectations when it comes to believing that WoTC is making an effort to improve standard. And they're breaking just to make a buck, which is bad practice. Good companies fullfill client's expectations while being profitable. The end result of not doing so, in this particular case, is fracturing the standard and commander playerbase and disenfranchising standard players who wanted their format to get better.