To be fair, we did have Dominaria and Battlebond, both great for EDH. Perhaps C2018 is there to balance out.
And I like how introductory these decks are for newer players who want to get in.
Yeah that's pretty true. The thing that really bothers me is the price hike. Like how you gonna jump the price and then print this? It just feels slimy.
EDIT: Don't get me wrong either, I'm incredibly excited for the new cards. But the decks just aren't worth buying, I'll buy my Aminatou, my black miracle, and the manifest enchantment, and save myself like 20-25 dollars.
Did you guys read Aminatou's preview article? How she sparked is pretty great. She foresaw that she would someday, and just manipulated fate to do so prematurely.
Yea that was pretty cool, but I was waiting literally the whole time for Alison to actually talk about the card, and that just didn't happen. Really disappointed in a fluff piece when each other intro article has had mechanical relevance. I guess this is an apology for not giving us story this week?
"Fluff piece"? So nice to see that an article speaking out about gender disparities only rates as a "fluff piece" for you.
Moving on, I love the Aminatou card, I love her character, and I especially love the article.
The art, the card, the story, the "fluff piece" (which honestly added so much to her character). She might be my favorite PW of all time tbh.
Is the Jund deck the worst commander product made since the first commander products?
Yeah I'm gonna be honest, I was pretty annoyed at all the negativity earlier in the week and people saying "looks like it's only singles this year" but I think I'm probably only gonna be buying singles this year lmao. These decks are not great.
So far looks like Enchantress is strongest to me in terms of synergy/playability. Izzet also decent for theme. I am probably going to buy the esper one because its the most intriguing and pick upnsingles from rest. Jund...well its got Xantcha and Varchild. Doesnt seem that great to me, like wizards forgot what they were doing...
If I were to rate them today so far (not all spoilers/lists out yet I think) id give :
Esper 8/10
Bant 7/10
Izzet 7/10
Jund 4/10
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe Varchild will be printed in the Izzet deck.
I just can't see how anyone on the design team was happy with this design. Who is this for? Who would put this in their deck? Who would buy this product for this card? Contrast with this: 1W 2/2 Lifelink. Your commander has Lifelink.
I know what that card is, what it is doing, and why I'd play it. The ability to give a random commander lifelink might be quite relevant and open up interesting deckbuilding options. Lifelink encourages attacking too. But loyal unicorn doesn't feel like something anyone would ever want.
This new design is also quite simple; and would be ripe to create an easy cycle. Red could give haste (2/2 1R Haste; your commander has haste.); Black deathtouch (or menace if you're no fun), blue flying (or hexproof or shroud or skulk), and green trample or hexproof or devour 2 or the like. Of course, one'd want to pick up all the decks so they could put them all in a 5 color commander deck. And because they cost 2 mana, and not 4, they might see play when they're still relevant.
The important thing about THESE cards, of course, is that they're... useful. They're a variant for the voltron theme, and simple enough to design. Because they're 2nd ability is just giving the commander their keyword, then there's no real worry about them crossing over into other formats.
One of these things is a staple Wrath of God variant that gives a cool ability for one mana that creates interesting choices (do I wrath for W and kill 2 things, or wait...); the other is... a 5 mana zombify or 7 mana Ever After that creates no interesting choices (wait, I miracled, is my reanimation target in the graveyard? Yes, please. For the low low cost of Necromancy if I get lucky?).
4 mana, 2BB, Zombify with Miracle B, at (U).
A black miracle spell with an alternate miracle cost.
Even a 3 mana naturalize with Miracle G at (C).
So many untapped options.
So the thing is, the esper deck (U/W/B, meaning not green), in which Entreat the Dead is being printed, is "top of the library" matters. There are plenty of ways to set up the miracle to be beneficial, it's kind of the point of the deck. Like if you just want to complain for the sake of complaining sure, I get it, just please do a tiny little bit of research so you can complain about things that are actually worth complaining about.
EDIT: Don't get me wrong either, I'm incredibly excited for the new cards. But the decks just aren't worth buying, I'll buy my Aminatou, my black miracle, and the manifest enchantment, and save myself like 20-25 dollars.