Is there really nobody in Marvel comics who fits the Abzan color identity? We've had over 500,000 UB cards and so far Bilbo the Birthday Boy is the only Abzan card. Isn't that weird? There's not an issue of Black Panther where he's acting kind of Abzan about things?
I think they were being intentional to not make a black "Black Panther" for a lot of reasons that make sense to me, even if I don't fully agree. I haven't read his comics, but from the movies, I would 100% have made him Abzan.
The Doom deck is out and it's pretty interesting.
Molecule Manis a colorless card that gives you a free cast ~60% of the time. The problem here is that it's already at 6 mana, so you probably have the mana to play whatever you draw afterwards, and it doesn't actually give you any card advantage. Messing around with
Portent or
Brainstorm or
Consider makes it cool, but that's true for any deck that plays Miracles anyways. Still, I think it's an interesting enough design that there are some Cubes that will want to test it out.
It's super
Mai, Scornful Striker! I used to love
Ruric Thar, the Unbowed during the early days of my Cube, and this feels familiar.
I don't think it's that necessary, but I do like hate cards that are broad like this, even if it's often going to be a de-facto 4mv 4/4 with menace and ward - 2 life.
Now that's a
Magic card!
Helmut Zemo, Mastermind is what I wanted
Sphinx of Forgotten Lore to be. The 2/2 body makes it a lot weaker, but you get to cast off the attack trigger right away, before blockers,
for free. And it makes him more likely to survive combat when you do! I still like the upcoming
Bilbo, Thief in the Night more, but I'd be very happy to have them both together. Will test for sure.
EDIT: nevermind, reading is tech. You still have to cast it with mana. Still fine, but makes it
much worse than Bilbo and does not feel like as important of a test now.
I am fallible. I like goofy stuff like this. Would probably have needed to see the mayhem cost at 4 to seriously consider, but I'm picking up a copy for one of my Cubes at minimum.
Tri-Sentinel, Act of Vengeance is one mana cheaper on both cast and unearth than
Cityscape Leveler, but you certainly feel the loss of power. Only 3 damage --to only a creature!-- on enter is a big less exciting than destroying nonland permanents. But this has its place! Whether it is more appropriate for your power level or your ramp is such that it's substantially harder to get to 8 than 7, or you just want to avoid colorless Vindicate abilities, there's a lot to like here. If anyone's still running
Myr Battlesphere (like me), this seems like a pretty good swap for Welder/
Trash to Treasure strategies, since the Unearth ability here helps you as an out in case you lose your
Goblin Welder or have already blown your Trash to Treasure. Aesthetics are what's going to keep my power ball in for the time being, but it's a tempting change, for sure.
I'm a big fan of esoteric reanimation artifacts from UB sets.
Doom's Time Platform seems really really cool. I think I still like
Confession Dial and
Yggdrasil, Rebirth Engine more than this, and I'm not currently running either, but this one might actually be simpler than the other two, and is likely stronger, too. Will keep an eye out on this one.
Living Laser is a finisher for discard decks. I've been highly focused on these lately....and this seems like it's the equivalent to that archetype as
Cyberdrive Awakener is to the trinket deck. Yet, for whatever reason, against the advice of my players, I'm not running the Awakener. And I'm not jazzed about this, even though it's a great way to reward those decks and help them close out the game. It's not even that much worse than a
Glorybringer if you can get a single copy out of it during a game. Much to think about.
Hello?
Batroc the Leaper you say your name is? Now we're talking. A legendary
Flametongue Yearling that deals less damage to a single target but deals it to a scaling number of targets? Seems really sweet, and the lack of double red pips makes him much more attractive, even if I'd rather look at kavus in my Cube draft than this guy's crotch.
I like
Archnemesis thematically for EDH quite a lot, but I think its 1v1 qualities are nothing to sneeze at. Do I want to use a Dimir slot for a
Phyrexian Arena that drains for 2 each turn rather than costing you a life? Seems pretty reasonable, honestly. You also get a card and a drain the first turn you play it so long as you're attacking, and you'd be fine sending a solid soldier to their death to make sure you get the trigger almost any turn. The biggest issue I have with it is that it doesn't tie into any larger synergies I've got going on, but I'm intrigued.
Looking forward to the GW artifacts deck tomorrow.
hybrid prowess guy:
