Sets The Hobbit
- Thread starter Velrun
- Start date
Lovely bird. I think it's just shy of what I'd need, partially because I worry folk will whiff on the Speak Secrets half of the card too often. I love a dude that will help me fill up my graveyard, and I especially like it with ninjutsu/sneak, so I'll keep my eyes on it, but I'm not quite sold yet.
I'm really pleased with all the forest animals in the set. Feels like an organic way to fill out the set with creatures besides legendary dwarves and the like.
Love this Nasty Little Rabbit, these names are great. Nessian Hornbeetle has been enough of a menace in every limited format I've played it in that version with just one less power for half the mana is kind of interesting to me. I think it's going to be relegated to my Champion's League rather than the Premiership, but an excellent design nonetheless.
Thrór's Map is surprisingly close for me. This 2mv artifact essentially draws you a card/fixes you on ETB, and then turns into most of a Currency Converter after the fact. I still prefer the recurring treasure tokens out of Collector's Vault more than this, but I won't pretend I'm not compelled by this, and may be willing to play all 3 looting artifacts.
Yet another Terramorphic Expanse variant. I'm always surprised to not see at least one or two of these in Cubes that don't double up on proper fetches, at least an Evolving Wilds or something. Even with the Landscapes, I still run that one plus Fabled Passage and Prismatic Vista. I think for any Cube that has more than a few Halflings, this is probably competitive with Fabled Passage, as that fifth land coming in untapped could instead be a Bilbo. I'm currently at eight halflings, so I think if nothing else, I'll give this a try over Evolving Wilds. It's got nice art, and though I don't really expect its cycling ability to come up that much, I do like it.
Hell yeah. These are some A+ art, and I love the flavor text basics. It's a competitive year, but all five of these are making my increasingly-tight singleton basic land box I use with my Cube.
for those supporting Kiki/Twin, you have another piece here.
For those who like hybrids, simple cards and good all around stats (everyone??). Doesn’t feel very Black though.
A hybrid TukTuk with counters is pretty cool. I’ll be adding this to my cube with Vesperlark and be pretty happy about it.
To be clear, the bird is for my lower powered cube, agree with you it isn’t it for higher powered.
Gruul has always been the primary Stompy colors but I am kind of excited seeing pieces like this that dip the archetype deeper into Jund. Garruk, Veiled Butcher's Tokens being another recent example.
I feel like 'Fires' follows 'Stompy' historically, sort of curious if we will eventually get some better support in Black as well.
I guess I associate Black with big creatures with a downside like Rotting Regisaur or Titania, Rugged Rumbler. I’m not a stickler for colour pie though, so don’t mind seeing new space being explored.
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It's never too late to heal the world and cut a Mh3 card from your cube.
Maybe I'm overrating it, but this looks great for a wide range of cubes. Scorching Dragonfire is a card more of us probably should run, just so red has a way to deal with annoying black recursive creatures ... but it's just such a boring card. If losing the ability to hit a planeswalker isn't much of a downside for you, I really like what this brings to the table.
In higher power cubes killing a karnstruct and another creature is just solid value, but there are just so many low MV creatures that bring an artifact token with them (Thraben Inspector, Astrid Peth, Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student, Ivora, Insatiable Heir, Generous Plunderer, Marionette Apprentice, Sharp-Eyed Rookie, the Provisioners, the Michelangelos) that I think it's great red now has a clean answer for both game objects.
(This is also a cheeky way to 'sacrifice' Munition tokens)
And maybe I'm speculating a bit much, but if there is a single good Dilemma card that comes out of Star Trek (i.e. something better than Seven of Nine) I already know I'm 100% jamming it, so I see anything with a modal option now as having more synergy potential in the future.
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I don't know if I underestimate the fail case of you not having anything relevant to bounce, but this card seems kinda decent to me. If you support both a blink and a landfall theme, this can work in a variety of decks. I don't think this would be like a high pick, but it could be a solid roleplayer in my cube, maybe.
I like it too. In my lower power environment I have plenty of Adventure creatures, Abundant Growth or Sarcomancy type cards in addition to lands as you mention. I’d like to squeeze in a few more sagas to really set up a value engine.
Today's already been pretty interesting.
First, we got 9 cards from the upcoming 2027 "Battle of Five Armies Co-Op Kit", the new Bilbo of which seems to imply that a "battle" box set will be our first return to the battle card type since MOM came out 3 years ago. That's interesting. Less interesting but still notable is the new Azorious bomb:
Bard, Heir of Girion is very boring. When we asked for simpler cards to allow the complexity of the game to come from their interactions, this isn't really what we meant, but it's a compelling design all the same. I thought Bard's Company was worthy of Cube consideration as well, but this kind of shows what it was missing in terms of stats.
It generally draws you an extra card every turn and pumps your team, attacking and blocking like a champ all the while in a way that's rare for UW. My issue is that I like my gold cards to say something about what the color pair is trying to do, or be a goal to work towards. Yeah, this is better in a go-wide token deck, but hardly so. Firemane Commando does a much better job at communicating that, and even that felt a little too "here you go, commander players". There's no real synergy here. It's just good.
I don't hate it, but it certainly doesn't spark joy.
Fíli the Pathfinder seems like a great card, reminds me of Dion, Bahamut's Dominant and Splinter & Leo, Father & Son, in that it's a pushed Gallant Cavalry variant that feels appropriate for a rare. It's totally fine even without any other dwarves going on. Mighty Mutanimals has recently shown that this kind of effect is reasonable at even more competitive power levels, too. These days, I prefer something like Fili to a card that needs to get an attack in to generate tokens like Myrel, Shield of Argive, Hero of Bladehold, or Leonin Warleader.
That said, my issues are three-fold: 1) I'm already happy enough with Dion...though I can't pretend I wouldn't mind replacing him with a non-DFC card), 2) as much as I like the way "storied" would play out in my Cube, I don't like bad tracking mechanics like this, and 3) it implies that dwarves-matter is something that's happening in my Cube. I think my annoyances with this guy are just slightly more than that of Dion, but who knows, maybe I'll swap the two at some point.
"Think Thrice" indeed! Plunder the Trollshaws is such a lovely Cube card, and I imagine it'll be one of the set's most popular cards on these boards. I like this more than Deep Analysis, Memory Deluge, Secrets of the Key, or Start the TARDIS, but to be fair, all of those cards, as well as Think Twice, are currently in my on-deck binder, not in my Cube. Still, I would love to make room for this one.
Confusticate and Bebother is a side grade to Confounding Riddle, a solid tier 2.5 counterspell for large Cubes like mine. If you're in my shoes (someone already playing Riddle), I think this is going to be more a decision of which art you prefer, as I'm more or less equally happy with their draw effects. I like that it's a common!
Balin, Loremaster is another personal gripe of mine thanks to storied showing up on a card that makes a ton of sense for my Cube. Treating this as the only dwarf, how much better or worse is it than long-time-favorite-but-current-bench-warmer Bedlam Reveler? It's about the same, in my Cube at least. It tells players to play legends and artifacts instead of instants or sorceries, but I find that to be much more common/less competitive in my list. I like that it'll generally ping your opponent for a few damage, but it's probably not worth all the extra text just to do that unless you do have a few more dwarves running around.
First, we got 9 cards from the upcoming 2027 "Battle of Five Armies Co-Op Kit", the new Bilbo of which seems to imply that a "battle" box set will be our first return to the battle card type since MOM came out 3 years ago. That's interesting. Less interesting but still notable is the new Azorious bomb:
Bard, Heir of Girion is very boring. When we asked for simpler cards to allow the complexity of the game to come from their interactions, this isn't really what we meant, but it's a compelling design all the same. I thought Bard's Company was worthy of Cube consideration as well, but this kind of shows what it was missing in terms of stats.
It generally draws you an extra card every turn and pumps your team, attacking and blocking like a champ all the while in a way that's rare for UW. My issue is that I like my gold cards to say something about what the color pair is trying to do, or be a goal to work towards. Yeah, this is better in a go-wide token deck, but hardly so. Firemane Commando does a much better job at communicating that, and even that felt a little too "here you go, commander players". There's no real synergy here. It's just good.
I don't hate it, but it certainly doesn't spark joy.
Fíli the Pathfinder seems like a great card, reminds me of Dion, Bahamut's Dominant and Splinter & Leo, Father & Son, in that it's a pushed Gallant Cavalry variant that feels appropriate for a rare. It's totally fine even without any other dwarves going on. Mighty Mutanimals has recently shown that this kind of effect is reasonable at even more competitive power levels, too. These days, I prefer something like Fili to a card that needs to get an attack in to generate tokens like Myrel, Shield of Argive, Hero of Bladehold, or Leonin Warleader.
That said, my issues are three-fold: 1) I'm already happy enough with Dion...though I can't pretend I wouldn't mind replacing him with a non-DFC card), 2) as much as I like the way "storied" would play out in my Cube, I don't like bad tracking mechanics like this, and 3) it implies that dwarves-matter is something that's happening in my Cube. I think my annoyances with this guy are just slightly more than that of Dion, but who knows, maybe I'll swap the two at some point.
"Think Thrice" indeed! Plunder the Trollshaws is such a lovely Cube card, and I imagine it'll be one of the set's most popular cards on these boards. I like this more than Deep Analysis, Memory Deluge, Secrets of the Key, or Start the TARDIS, but to be fair, all of those cards, as well as Think Twice, are currently in my on-deck binder, not in my Cube. Still, I would love to make room for this one.
Confusticate and Bebother is a side grade to Confounding Riddle, a solid tier 2.5 counterspell for large Cubes like mine. If you're in my shoes (someone already playing Riddle), I think this is going to be more a decision of which art you prefer, as I'm more or less equally happy with their draw effects. I like that it's a common!
Balin, Loremaster is another personal gripe of mine thanks to storied showing up on a card that makes a ton of sense for my Cube. Treating this as the only dwarf, how much better or worse is it than long-time-favorite-but-current-bench-warmer Bedlam Reveler? It's about the same, in my Cube at least. It tells players to play legends and artifacts instead of instants or sorceries, but I find that to be much more common/less competitive in my list. I like that it'll generally ping your opponent for a few damage, but it's probably not worth all the extra text just to do that unless you do have a few more dwarves running around.
Full set is now revealed. It's a small set, with only a few clear power level outliers intended for eternal formats in a way that feels extremely calculated to be lower power-level besides a few specific constructed plants (more than most sets, I mean), similar to how I felt about the last Middle Earth set. However, that one came with the double advantages of releasing with a full slate of Commander decks and a cycle of 1mv land cyclers. I'm disappointed to get our third five-archetype draft expansion of the year, and wish this could've been a large set for many reasons.
And yet! I love the art. I love The Hobbit. The basic lands are A+++, even if you don't have any relationship with Middle Earth. The cards I do like are seriously delightful and will largely be in my Cube longer than the average new addition. I love having Middle Earth cards without the awful, awful UB frame of yore.
For context, my Cube is 720 cards, so I both try out more cards and have a lower standard for inclusion as a matter of practicality.
Smaug's Greatest Treasures
Surefire long-term favorites.
Riddles in the Dark
Cards that I'm interested in, but with outstanding question marks.
Lake Town Layabouts
Cards I'm keeping an eye on but am not confident they'll make it in my testing list.
I've talked about most of these already, but Bejeweled Warg and Bofur, Reliable Guardian are some of the more interesting standouts from the last day of spoilers. The Warg is a pretty generic pushed card, which I normally wouldn't care about that much, but the ability to contribute to two different archetypes I want to find new and exciting ways to support helps it get over the edge for me. Bofur is much weaker, but I'm a big fan of the Snakeskin Veil-style cards in Cube (the kind of combat trick most likely to justify their inclusion, especially in more powerful lists) and this comes with a 1/1 lifelinking legend as a B-plan.
In my all-too-many practice drafts I've done this week as a procrastination tool to test my gut with the early inclusions on CubeCobra, I have found a couple things: The Arkenstone works great in my Cube, even better than expected. It being a mini The Endstone/Mirari's Wake as its main mode means that I don't mind playing it outside of white decks, but I'm still very happy to have that mode as well. Queen of Dale, Bilbo, Thief in the Night, and Riddles in the Dark suit my Cube perfectly. Smaug the Magnificent is very powerful, but doesn't feel essential (I can always just run Knuckles the Echidna again), and so I may hold off on picking up a copy if he stays expensive and I don't open one organically.
As for under-performers: Bilbo's Gambit is probably not sticking around. For as good as Remand is, there's a reason I don't play Unsubstantiate, and even though white likes the effect more and appreciates the ability to Silence opponents as a zero-mana-down kicker, I am unsure I want to use a card for this. Maybe I'll just put back in Lapse of Certainty after all these years if I'm so hungry for that effect. Bothersome Noisemaker never feels essential, and the token it creates, since it just stacks, makes the card feel like a worse Aether Chaser unless you're running a bunch of sacrifice outlets. It may stick around all the same. Bilbo, Luckwearer similarly never feels important to pick up in draft, but if you do, it will likely make the final deck. Gandalf, Goblin's Bane feels just a touch slow compared to other 3-drops, even with the Flameshape add-on. I only run so many Wizards, so it's a little inconvenient to spend the mana and feel like you're getting nothing out of it for a few turns. I wish the +1/+1 trigger gave you counters.
Overall, I wish the set was slightly more juiced, and that we got a few more impressive cards with recruit, but I shouldn't complain too much, as I am pretty happy with many of the designs here.
EDIT: I just realized they reprinted 4/5 of the landcyclers with the proper frame!! I am somewhat annoyed to not have Generous Ent in this style, but I will be happily to "upgrade" a few of these from the Welcome Decks.
And yet! I love the art. I love The Hobbit. The basic lands are A+++, even if you don't have any relationship with Middle Earth. The cards I do like are seriously delightful and will largely be in my Cube longer than the average new addition. I love having Middle Earth cards without the awful, awful UB frame of yore.
For context, my Cube is 720 cards, so I both try out more cards and have a lower standard for inclusion as a matter of practicality.
Smaug's Greatest Treasures
Surefire long-term favorites.
Riddles in the Dark
Cards that I'm interested in, but with outstanding question marks.
Lake Town Layabouts
Cards I'm keeping an eye on but am not confident they'll make it in my testing list.
I've talked about most of these already, but Bejeweled Warg and Bofur, Reliable Guardian are some of the more interesting standouts from the last day of spoilers. The Warg is a pretty generic pushed card, which I normally wouldn't care about that much, but the ability to contribute to two different archetypes I want to find new and exciting ways to support helps it get over the edge for me. Bofur is much weaker, but I'm a big fan of the Snakeskin Veil-style cards in Cube (the kind of combat trick most likely to justify their inclusion, especially in more powerful lists) and this comes with a 1/1 lifelinking legend as a B-plan.
In my all-too-many practice drafts I've done this week as a procrastination tool to test my gut with the early inclusions on CubeCobra, I have found a couple things: The Arkenstone works great in my Cube, even better than expected. It being a mini The Endstone/Mirari's Wake as its main mode means that I don't mind playing it outside of white decks, but I'm still very happy to have that mode as well. Queen of Dale, Bilbo, Thief in the Night, and Riddles in the Dark suit my Cube perfectly. Smaug the Magnificent is very powerful, but doesn't feel essential (I can always just run Knuckles the Echidna again), and so I may hold off on picking up a copy if he stays expensive and I don't open one organically.
As for under-performers: Bilbo's Gambit is probably not sticking around. For as good as Remand is, there's a reason I don't play Unsubstantiate, and even though white likes the effect more and appreciates the ability to Silence opponents as a zero-mana-down kicker, I am unsure I want to use a card for this. Maybe I'll just put back in Lapse of Certainty after all these years if I'm so hungry for that effect. Bothersome Noisemaker never feels essential, and the token it creates, since it just stacks, makes the card feel like a worse Aether Chaser unless you're running a bunch of sacrifice outlets. It may stick around all the same. Bilbo, Luckwearer similarly never feels important to pick up in draft, but if you do, it will likely make the final deck. Gandalf, Goblin's Bane feels just a touch slow compared to other 3-drops, even with the Flameshape add-on. I only run so many Wizards, so it's a little inconvenient to spend the mana and feel like you're getting nothing out of it for a few turns. I wish the +1/+1 trigger gave you counters.
Overall, I wish the set was slightly more juiced, and that we got a few more impressive cards with recruit, but I shouldn't complain too much, as I am pretty happy with many of the designs here.
EDIT: I just realized they reprinted 4/5 of the landcyclers with the proper frame!! I am somewhat annoyed to not have Generous Ent in this style, but I will be happily to "upgrade" a few of these from the Welcome Decks.
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There's a lot to like in this set for the die-hard UB disliker. My own current favorite, Landfill, will be running a surprising number of new cards, and I got a last-minute hit with Troop of Ponies. His buddy Old Thrush might make the cut, too.
I have never been more tempted to run some Adventure cards in this environment (even though I already run a stack of Prepared cards), JUST so I can play Most Decrepit Old Bird, which is tied with Nasty Little Rabbit for my favorite card name in the set. These cards must find homes. I must play them.
I have never been more tempted to run some Adventure cards in this environment (even though I already run a stack of Prepared cards), JUST so I can play Most Decrepit Old Bird, which is tied with Nasty Little Rabbit for my favorite card name in the set. These cards must find homes. I must play them.
I don't think that's true. This set has a few fishermen as a 6/5 with ward and Ordinary Bear who eats Smaug the Magnificient in combat. Actually, I wish they would do bolder top-down designs and not hold onto mechanical needs that much.
How does a bear jump into the air to eat a flying dragon in combat?
I didn’t specific mention this set. I said UB. So that means the sets in general.
The UB sets have flooded blue cards with vigilance. Something we’ve had soooooo few of in 30 years and suddenly we have tripled the amount of blue vigilance because it’s UB lore.
https://scryfall.com/search?as=grid&order=name&q=oracle:Vigilance+color=U+(game
aper)+prefer:best
Another good example! How does a large bear fly into the air to catch a dragon? The answer = Universes Beyond.
Did you just call me stupid?
Oh, please tell me which part of The Hobbit lore is responsible to give that bear reach!
Ask Lumra, Bellow of the Woods. Or similar earthbound creatures with random reach like Dusyut Earthcarver or Fecunt Greenshell or Fang-Druid Summoner.
are you guys really doing this again
There's been 45 non-UB blue cards that say vigilance since 40K's release. 15 are common.
There's been 37 UB blue cards that say vigilance since 40K's release. 8 are common.
There's valid reasons to dislike UB, but this one statistically doesn't hold up.
Similarly, there's two non-UB bears with reach and only one UB bear with reach.