Sets Battle for Zendikar Spoilers

[Jason Waddell]

Boner.

 

[Enki]

Another countertheme. If it didn´t work with lands, I would be very disappointed. Titania, Protector of Argoth likes this

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

It'll be neat to see how they'll use the exiled cards with the other Eldrazi cards.

 

[Eric Chan]

I'm really excited about the mechanic awaken. Like kicker, it seems like both an excellent way to mitigate flood, as well as something that encourages people to run more lands, which they should probably be doing in the first place. Having a late game option to convert one of your lands into a live body, on top of the real spell effect, adds more dimensions to your deck than kicker or multikicker giving your original spell slightly more oomph. Eager to see what the uncommons and rares carrying this mechanic look like.

Also, everyone's favourite tribal mechanic, allies, are back! wooooooo!

I said, WOOOOOOOO

 

[RavebornMuse]

Those eldrazi duders look clownish...
I guess they may help support artifact themes at higher power levels, though, if their abilities are focused around colourless creatures? We'll see

Retreat to Kazandu looks like some durdlefest fun, though I wish it was maybe a bit more interactive.

 

[Diakonov]

It'll be neat to see how they'll use the exiled cards with the other Eldrazi cards.

Agreed. Happy to see that Ingest explains why Oblivion Sower looked so terrible at first.

 

[Eric Chan]

The best part about Return to Kazandu is that it's an (almost) strictly better version of this guy, who was fringe playable in standard.



Return plays well with both a land theme and an enchantment theme!

 

[Dom Harvey]

Oblivion Sower looked great at first!

 

[quanta]

Gotta agree on awaken looking sweet. It looks like it will come in various sizes. I'm all in favor of alternate cost mechanics and anything that gives lands more play. Makes for more interesting sequencing decisions and less bad topdecks.

I'm glad to see the new ally doesn't just have a triggered ability when an ally ETB. It's not a super exciting card, but I could see it in a low power tribal cube as a creature that get a nice but not critical bonus if you have other allies. Ally tribal in zendikar seems super poisonous (never played zendikar limited, but just judging from how they all trigger off other allies... yeah). I'm hoping that the new allies have better overlap with other mechanics.

I'm not sold on Devoid, but hopefully they'll do something more interesting with it than just making a bunch of creatures with the ghostfire ability. Nice to see the colorless matters theme right after morph.

I've got to see more stuff before I have any real opinion on ingest. I could see it being really cool or just awful, but it's definitely got potential. Some obvious things would be a nightvale specter eldrazi or some creatures that care about stuff in exile like warden of the beyond.

EDIT: and Retreat to Kazandu looks like it will be nuts in draft. Like a mini Citadel Siege if you can keep up your land drops (and hopefully you'll have some evolving wilds so you can add +1/+1 counters at instant speed).

 

[shamizy]

I'm really interested in Retreat to Kazandu. If I can ever finish my Zen Fetches, I'd love to go up to double Steppe Lynx sometime. Play that GW Landfall deck and topping with some insane turn where you use Titania, Protector of Argoth to bring back a fetch and hit someone with like a 8/9 cat. Or with a suddenly large Ajani's Pridemate off lands + Courser of Kruphix triggers. The archetype could just be called GW Cats.

 

[Jason Waddell]

I just really love the smalldrazi. I always wished there were cool Eldrazi that cost less than 9 or whatever. They're a great tribe flavor wise, and now we will get some non-Grim Monolith cubeable cards out of it.

 

[Onderzeeboot]

I hope to see some eldrazi colorless support that matches up nicely with the slowly but surely very playable nonpoisonous artifact theme in those colors, and maybe some nice playable cards with ingest that can support a nonpoisonous mill theme as well!

 

[Aston]

The problem with trying to mill them with ingest is that your creatures are going to be killing them faster with damage than with mill.

 

[Kuldahar]

I wonder if you could mix mill with aggro - mill being not the win condition, but resource denial. Control can't answer you if their answers are in the bin. Unless it's using graveyard spells. Then you are stuffed.

EDIT: i note the eldrazi are all Ulamogs brood. I wonder if koz and em will still be present.

 

[Jason Waddell]

I don't think we really have the full picture on Ingest yet, but I don't think it's at all meant to be a "mill" mechanic. More of an "interacts with exile" thing, as evidenced by Oblivion Sower. I also don't think it's any coincidence that they are bringing this in the block after they printed Delve.

 

[anotak]

what the actual fuck are these cards

 

[anotak]

http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/worst-limited-mechanics.609/

check out this sick first post in this thread

 

[Aston]

I wonder if you could mix mill with aggro - mill being not the win condition, but resource denial. Control can't answer you if their answers are in the bin. Unless it's using graveyard spells. Then you are stuffed.

EDIT: i note the eldrazi are all Ulamogs brood. I wonder if koz and em will still be present.

Problem is you're just as likely to mill them to their answers as milling their answers. Not to mention cards like Snapcaster Mage, Eternal Witness, Tasigur who want cards in the grave.

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

Mill is shuffling your opponents deck

 

[Jason Waddell]

http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/worst-limited-mechanics.609/

check out this sick first post in this thread

I still hate allies, but the new approach to them seems more reasonable. Look at Warleader. He cares about having other creatures primarily, and gets some incremental buffs as a function of having more allies. None of the text actually counts how many allies you have in play. It makes me marginally hopeful that the tribe is less linear this time around.

 

[Rasmus Källqvist]

From what I've seen in Origins it seems like they've gotten a good hang on the tasteful tribal design

 

[Onderzeeboot]

From what I've seen in Origins it seems like they've gotten a good hang on the tasteful tribal design

There certainly seem to be more less poisonous tribal cards lately. Risen Executioner is a great example, as I'm just as likely to just jam that card in my graveyard enabling deck. The zombie tribal support is basically just gravy.

 

[Chris Taylor]

This version of allies seems less "like slivers but worse".
I like this GW dude

 

[RavebornMuse]

Fingers crossed for an enchantment with "nontoken creatures you control are allies in addition to their other types. Allies get <effect>"!

 

[Chris Taylor]

Fingers crossed for an enchantment with "nontoken creatures you control are allies in addition to their other types. Allies get <effect>"!

Tap an untapped ally you control: tap target permanent