Yes, obvious staple here. Efficient for its cost, plus great synergies. No need to take up a Boros slot for this, they are at a premium already and this card is easily good enough in non-R decks.
If you do have a red permanent lying around, X/1 creatures continue to become more of a liability in the era of stuff like Orcish Bowmasters and Wrenn and Six...
Figure this card is widely played and popular, so worth pointing out. This printing will also have the errata mentioned in the posts above (back in 2021 already), so it's worth replacing the original version in any case (unless you picked up the random errata'd printing from BG commander decks).
This was the only initial include for me from the set. Unblockable creatures have gone up in stock immensely to counter monarch/initiative and this one offers a reasonable rate and a ton of upside. It's a genuine control finisher as well as a nice aggressive pick. The synergies with stuff that cares about multiple permanents or artifacts for whatever reason is a nice bonus.
At first appraisal, I'd guess the rank as the #2 Dimir behind baleful strix.
It interacts favorably with all sorts of dimir synergies and is a legit powerhouse with draw 7's.
Curving this into echo of eons for example is particularly nasty.
Dimir is so good at disruption that getting this card to connect and become a 2 mana draw a card every turn is not that hard.
Mega bonus points for being a nostalgic throwback, cute and create interesting gameplay decisions.
Against creature heavy decks it's not that good, but threatens to be an annoying blocker, or swing back to draw an extra card if there's a tempo race.
Agreed on all counts! I'm very excited to cube with this one. Support for reanimator, tempo, draw-7s, Fires-via-Anger, and a bunch more.
Wow, this is definitely of interest. It's probably most obvious as a curve topper in a very low to the ground aggro deck, but surely there's interesting play around dumping 5 permanents (4 of which artifacts) into play at once.
Was thinking about trying him for a while, and I got a very cheap copy in silver foil (a really cool treatment) from the Holiday Release, so I guess it was meant to be.
I like both of Tidebinder and Carnosaur but struggled to find space.
Bonehoard Dracosaur showed up only in one game but he stonewalled an attack phase and gave me a treasure and a 3/1 next turn, whilst effectively drawing a couple cards. He got answered a couple turns later but the extra card advantage and lots of Dino tokens easily sealed the game. Did what I hoped and expected, basically, which is win if he's not removed straight away.
Scheme has been really good for me. Black creature decks love the connive triggers, and it both generates value and answers the opponent's best threat for cheap when you can turn the discarded cards into value for you.
This is my experience too. Big fan of the Scheme, at least for now. That it's much more interesting than the nth removal spell is a bonus.
It's great that he's a scalable threat, but he didn't do enough as 'just' a 3-drop. I'd absolutely run Sentinel of the Nameless City ahead of Adversary.
When ETB or attacks, put a -1/-1 counter on up to one target creature.
Creatures your opponents control with -1/-1 counters on them can't block.
3/2
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Seems very decent, no? Killing X/1s on ETB or attack, or anything bigger can no longer block and is permanently shrunk, messing with combat math in either direction. Should be interesting removal and good for forcing through damage. I may test as I'm lacking black 3 drops, and as much as the Jurassic Park tie-in doesn't interest me, this was an iconic scene and a great card design.
This is worth testing then, for cubes running fetches, baubles and decent amounts of looting effects. We don't get that many creatures that can grow continuously, and the menace keeps it more relevant as a failsafe, along with the removal mode later in the game. I much prefer it to things like Knight of the Ebon Legion.
I guess I'll cut Kolaghan's Command for this. Defiler is too good to cut, I think Daretti is too interesting a roleplayer to remove, and I don't want two generic value cards in the slot. This is just great especially in a powered cube.
Yoshimaru has entered the chat
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Yes, obvious staple here. Efficient for its cost, plus great synergies. No need to take up a Boros slot for this, they are at a premium already and this card is easily good enough in non-R decks.
If you do have a red permanent lying around, X/1 creatures continue to become more of a liability in the era of stuff like Orcish Bowmasters and Wrenn and Six...
Figure this card is widely played and popular, so worth pointing out. This printing will also have the errata mentioned in the posts above (back in 2021 already), so it's worth replacing the original version in any case (unless you picked up the random errata'd printing from BG commander decks).
Agreed on all counts! I'm very excited to cube with this one. Support for reanimator, tempo, draw-7s, Fires-via-Anger, and a bunch more.
I like both of Tidebinder and Carnosaur but struggled to find space.
Bonehoard Dracosaur showed up only in one game but he stonewalled an attack phase and gave me a treasure and a 3/1 next turn, whilst effectively drawing a couple cards. He got answered a couple turns later but the extra card advantage and lots of Dino tokens easily sealed the game. Did what I hoped and expected, basically, which is win if he's not removed straight away.
This is my experience too. Big fan of the Scheme, at least for now. That it's much more interesting than the nth removal spell is a bonus.
When ETB or attacks, put a -1/-1 counter on up to one target creature.
Creatures your opponents control with -1/-1 counters on them can't block.
3/2
-------------
Seems very decent, no? Killing X/1s on ETB or attack, or anything bigger can no longer block and is permanently shrunk, messing with combat math in either direction. Should be interesting removal and good for forcing through damage. I may test as I'm lacking black 3 drops, and as much as the Jurassic Park tie-in doesn't interest me, this was an iconic scene and a great card design.
This is worth testing then, for cubes running fetches, baubles and decent amounts of looting effects. We don't get that many creatures that can grow continuously, and the menace keeps it more relevant as a failsafe, along with the removal mode later in the game. I much prefer it to things like Knight of the Ebon Legion.