Card/Deck [SCD] Rosheen Meanderer

[Jason Waddell]

I added this card to my Eldrazi Domain cube, which cares about multicolored permanents, ramp and X spells. But the more I think about the card the more it intrigues me for other applications.

He/She/It is one of the most castable non-colorless cards ever printed, has stats that are not embarassing, and has an insane upside.

Anybody ever tried this card?

 

[VibeBox]

i've loved this card for a while now, glad to see it get a little attention. i remember brewing with it for extended before they axed it and it's way sweet.

i've never cubed with it (only have it in my basically theoretical "jank cube") but i'm heartened to hear a positive review on him.

maybe i'll give him a testing slot sometime. green ramp would probably be fine juicing a chord of calling with this

 

[Dom Harvey]

I love the idea, but I love most ideas.

Other cards it works with: Sigil of Distinction, Bonfire of the Damned (!), Condescend, Repeal, Skeletal Scrying, Who, Aurelia's Fury, Martial Coup, Chord of Calling, Entreat the Angels (!), Genesis Wave, Decree of Justice, Wargate, Stroke of Genius, Mind Twist/Shatter, Oona

 

[Jason Waddell]

Oh, jeez, I didn't realize it worked with Oona. I guess it works with Mirror Entity too then.

 

[Miasmir]

Clearly female, read the flavor text.

I play her in a casual big red deck to power out giant fireballs and she does good work. She's very close to one-sided mana flare in the right deck, and when she doesn't live up to that at least she battles reasonably well. It's hard to find a red 4 drop better at blocking.

Most multicolored sections make her have to compete with Bloodbraid Elf which is not a winning battle. If you only have three cards in your gruul section then you're probably playing cards like Boggart Ram-Gang and Kird Ape and ignoring the sweet sweet sweetness of Rosheen, and that might even be correct. I haven't put her in yet just because it's so disappointing when she's just a 4/4 because you weren't able to pick up any X spells. With the recent addition of Mikaeus, the Lunarch to my cube it's becoming more and more likely that she'll find a place here soon.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Clearly female, read the flavor text.

I play her in a casual big red deck to power out giant fireballs and she does good work. She's very close to one-sided mana flare in the right deck, and when she doesn't live up to that at least she battles reasonably well. It's hard to find a red 4 drop better at blocking.

Most multicolored sections make her have to compete with Bloodbraid Elf which is not a winning battle. If you only have three cards in your gruul section then you're probably playing cards like Boggart Ram-Gang and Kird Ape and ignoring the sweet sweet sweetness of Rosheen, and that might even be correct. I haven't put her in yet just because it's so disappointing when she's just a 4/4 because you weren't able to pick up any X spells. With the recent addition of Mikaeus, the Lunarch to my cube it's becoming more and more likely that she'll find a place here soon.

Yeah, but I have to get on my soapbox here and say that not running a hybrid card because of the limitations of a "multicolor" section is the dumbest thing ever.
http://www.channelfireball.com/articles/cube-design-declassified-information/

 

[Miasmir]

Sure, I mean, my cube stopped caring about symmetry ages ago. That doesn't mean it's not a consideration for other people though.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Sure, I mean, my cube stopped caring about symmetry ages ago. That doesn't mean it's not a consideration for other people though.

True, true. Good point.

I guess it depends on the environment, but in my current cube I'd likely slot it in as a pseudo green 4-drop. I guess you could also make some small changes to account for its presence. I currently run Mizzium Mortars, but I'd probably switch to Bonfire if I were running this card.

 

[CML]

mizzy is a less depressing thing to face than bonphire i think miracles are just a punch in the gunt

i've considered rosheen and i think she is a totally sweet design but meh-ish in cube. she suffers from the "gaddock teeg problem" where she can just be an underwhelming dude most of the time, though admittedly 4 for a 4/4 is way better than GW for a 2/2.

try it!

 

[FlowerSunRain]

4/4 for 4 is a super solid baseline to work with.

X spells tend to be hilarious.

Pretty sure you can't go wrong here, unless 4/4 for 4 is too much unconditional value for your cube.

I'm not sure I've seen the cube yet where that is the case.

 

[CML]

i mean too little yo. here's some of the competition to drive that bad boy home. unless we're partyin like it's 1994 with su-chi

edit: i love all these creatures a lot

 

[Dom Harvey]

If I asked myself what effect I'd want a 4/4 for 3(R/G) to have to make it viable for Cube, I'd probably set the bar much lower than Rosheen. Obviously her ability is very specialized, but I kinda like that: she doesn't just go in any deck, and when she's good she's very good.

 

[Lucre]

If I asked myself what effect I'd want a 4/4 for 3(R/G) to have to make it viable for Cube, I'd probably set the bar much lower than Rosheen. Obviously her ability is very specialized, but I kinda like that: she doesn't just go in any deck, and when she's good she's very good.

I hate to sound like MTGS but my RG decks or just red or green decks already have access to a billion good 4cc spells because that's where wizards feels comfortable making things feel pushed. I'd say a 4drop in rg has to do a lot of proving.

 

[Dom Harvey]

That's definitely true, but the fact that it's hybrid is really nice.

 

[Jason Waddell]

Well, for reference, my 4-drop green section:



I don't think Rosheen is too far off the curve. Off the curve, but not ridiculously so. Another option is something like Deadbridge Goliath. It's not huge in raw power, but I imagine when the synergies come together you feel pretty great about it. Adding 4 points of damage to Devil's play and flashing it back for 4 more feels fun. But maybe you could argue you'd rather just be attacking for those 4 points of damage?

I could see a Sphinx's Rev deck splashing for a Rosheen. I could even imagine Rosheen being a fun card to have in multiples in an environment, as you can draft around that synergy more. Are there other cards that care about X-spells like this? Aside from Frontline Medic, that is.

 

[CML]

i think that whole polarized performance thing -- 'when it's good, it's really good, and when it's not, it's not' -- is something that biases me against rosheen, actually. though my cube is certainly full of other cards that are like it.

edit: jason: beyond teeg i dunno

 

[Jason Waddell]

I don't think a 4/4 for 4 mana is "not good" though. Unexciting sure, but it can still get in there and affect the battlefield. In the same sense that I don't mind Ghor-Clan Rampager just being a 4/4 dude, but it's really nice that he provides other options and utility.

If Rosheen were a 3/3 it'd be an entirely different story.

 

[Chris Taylor]

a 3/3 for 3 or 4?

 

[Jason Waddell]

3/3 for 4.

 

[CML]

you guys are being silly. of course it's bad within the cube gestalt, even ours where we consciously do not power-maximize (unless it's some kind of pauper cube). jason! how can you say that and post at the 4-slot:

-a hasty 4/3 that recurs effortlessly
-a 4/4 that gains 4 and sometimes provides righteous blowouts
-a 4/4 that kills one of their swords
-a 4/4 that's all but impossible to interact with

rosheen's upside is so conditional and either marginally more busted or do-nothing compared to these cards. one could make a case for her too, but she's certainly on the lower side of our cubes' power levels

 

[Jason Waddell]

you guys are being silly. of course it's bad within the cube gestalt, even ours where we consciously do not power-maximize (unless it's some kind of pauper cube). jason! how can you say that and post at the 4-slot:

-a hasty 4/3 that recurs effortlessly
-a 4/4 that gains 4 and sometimes provides righteous blowouts
-a 4/4 that kills one of their swords
-a 4/4 that's all but impossible to interact with

rosheen's upside is so conditional and either marginally more busted or do-nothing compared to these cards. one could make a case for her too, but she's certainly on the lower side of our cubes' power levels

{Pardon me as i am in Spain after considerable cerveza. You are kind of providing BSC for all of those cards. Effortless recursion of Vengevine? Not in games I've seen. Righteous blowouts? Rarely. Like I said, below the curve, but might this be a question of how we are calibrating? Clearly he/she/it belongs in Eldrazi/Domain. And maybe her/his WCS is far too low. But I admitted she was below the curve. Perhaps this is a good place to explore the breakdown of raw card power versus synergistic card power.

Make no mistake, I would never run a 4/4 for 3(R/G). But how far do we need to dip the powerlevel to accept "on par" creatures with basic stats (CMC = P = T) with some synergistic upside? I mean Oracle of Mul Daya is an awful body tied to a card-advantage/filtering engine. How do we reconcile the two? Do we need an environment of sufficiently low powerlevel that a deck will run Rosheen for stats alone? It's a legitimate question.

 

[CML]

oh you know the odd lily tick-up now and again. if you can find the final video of the paul cheon recorded ptq on cfb i recommend watching it. it's a real treat to watch him thoughtseize (perhaps erroneously, and i should say after playing very well to get to the finals) into mpod's 3-card hand and be confronted with land land baloth surprise

aren't creatures, especially mid-sized ones, the kind of "raw card power" consistently that other card types aren't?

i think oracle has a nice body but green druids are my type

edit: i've always said 'try rosheen' and i still think 'try rosheen' might bear more fruit than talkin about this more. for the time being though you should drink more beer

meanwhile i will drink more beer.

 

[Jason Waddell]

 

[James Stevenson]

So did you ever actually run Rosheen?

 

[vennythekid]

I heard you were looking for X spells...