Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
I believe so, yes.
Sets Battle for Zendikar Spoilers
- Thread starter Eric Chan
- Start date
It makes sense, many of our cubes lend to a more legacy-lite composition valuing curve and the ability to play multiple spells in a turn. This naturally leads to more 2s and 3s than most lists. Often times Inquisition has been better than Thoughtseize in my drafts just based on the sheer number of targets. I do like the new spell though so I'll give it a try and see if it's actually any good. I'm more excited for it in Standard than anything. I really want to go T1 Bloodsoaked Champion, T2 Dragon Fodder, T3 rip away your wrath, T4 Brutal Hordechief.
FlowerSunRain
Contributor
What's the appeal of brutal expulsion? I'm not seeing it.
it's venser but instead of a 2/2 it gets to shock instead
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
No, it gets to Magma Spray instead. Not being able to damage players is quite a big deal.
I love the card, but I don't think it's any better than Jilt, which has a more flexible mana cost, but can't Venser spells.
Brutal expulsion reads weird. Does the spell get countered when returned? I assume so. Still doesn't seem very exciting.
But let's talk about Transgress the Mind. I dislike it. Why? I'm glad I asked myself that.
Now with every return to X, we're bound to see familiar things that instill a feeling of nostalgia. But this is the beginning of a new age in MtG without core sets. So why not just reprint nostalgic things that people like or may need for your overpriced Modern format? I dunno, stuff like Inquisition of Kozilek? Sure, Kozilek and Emrakul left according to the lore, but Kozilek still has grunts running around. I mean really, this isn't even as good as IoK. They could've easily just made a better Appetite for Brains. I don't think ANYONE would've screamed "power creep" at that. Now sure, maybe a couple admirers of the 3cmc stuff would be upset that cards at their favorite point on the mana curve are vunerable to 2 separate one mana eldrazi discard spells, but that's not a big deal. Don't even get me started on the damn art. It's a shallow attempt at trying to be IoK, but "more disturbing". IoK was already nailing diturbing and horrifying quite well without seeming too try hard. This reeks of "tryhard" edginess on the same levels as angsty deviantart sonic fursona types and all the sad cringe stuff they put out. Now obviously a lot more work went into making this art than opening up Windows Paint to add more spikes and chains to shadow the hedgehog before recoloring him as their "original fursona character", but it still feels like the same type of knock off crap. I don't care how magical this game is or how alien the eldrazi are supposed to be, reaching through what appears to be the lower back part of someone's skull with two arms to pry open their mouth would not only kill said person, but probably help very little with tearing something out of their thoughts. It's just way too over the top and ridiculous. Looks more like a Chris Angel stunt than a nightmarish monster attack. It doesn't help that Ulamog's brood lacks scare factor. You dropped the ball on this one, WotC. Get your head in the game.
But let's talk about Transgress the Mind. I dislike it. Why? I'm glad I asked myself that.
Now with every return to X, we're bound to see familiar things that instill a feeling of nostalgia. But this is the beginning of a new age in MtG without core sets. So why not just reprint nostalgic things that people like or may need for your overpriced Modern format? I dunno, stuff like Inquisition of Kozilek? Sure, Kozilek and Emrakul left according to the lore, but Kozilek still has grunts running around. I mean really, this isn't even as good as IoK. They could've easily just made a better Appetite for Brains. I don't think ANYONE would've screamed "power creep" at that. Now sure, maybe a couple admirers of the 3cmc stuff would be upset that cards at their favorite point on the mana curve are vunerable to 2 separate one mana eldrazi discard spells, but that's not a big deal. Don't even get me started on the damn art. It's a shallow attempt at trying to be IoK, but "more disturbing". IoK was already nailing diturbing and horrifying quite well without seeming too try hard. This reeks of "tryhard" edginess on the same levels as angsty deviantart sonic fursona types and all the sad cringe stuff they put out. Now obviously a lot more work went into making this art than opening up Windows Paint to add more spikes and chains to shadow the hedgehog before recoloring him as their "original fursona character", but it still feels like the same type of knock off crap. I don't care how magical this game is or how alien the eldrazi are supposed to be, reaching through what appears to be the lower back part of someone's skull with two arms to pry open their mouth would not only kill said person, but probably help very little with tearing something out of their thoughts. It's just way too over the top and ridiculous. Looks more like a Chris Angel stunt than a nightmarish monster attack. It doesn't help that Ulamog's brood lacks scare factor. You dropped the ball on this one, WotC. Get your head in the game.
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
The spell leaves the stack when it is returned to its owner's hand, so yeah, it's "countered". It's worth noting that it doesn't technically counter the spell though, so you can "counter" stuff like Obliterate with Brutal Expulsion.
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
My god, I only just saw the rarity symbol on Fathom Feeder. How is a bad Azure Mage worthy of a rare slot? I mean, it has deathtouch, but the downgrade to 1/1 and making the activation cost a man more expensive, and oh, making it two colors is more than enough to compensate that ability, right? Sheesh! There are better gold uncommons in the set, multiple better uncommons... Is ingest on a deathtouch creature really that good that they had to make this a rare?
Ingest deathtouch was probably deemed too powerful to be showing up all over the place in limited. That's a sign that ingest is actually going to be a powerful and relevant thing in this environment. I expect some powerful (in limited) ingest-utilizing commons if that's the case. And that makes me think this set might feel a lot like Kamigawa in that the archetypes are very specific to the block and aren't going to be relevant to eternal formats. At least we still get some planeswalkers, lands and a few rares/mythics like Doubleternal Witness so the set isn't a whiff for cube, but I wouldn't expect a lot.
Unfortunately it's probably more likely to do with deathtouch holding off large eldrazi in limited I would imagine, but we shall see!
M-m-mythic repriiiiiiint (at least it isn't comet storm tier)
Sorcery
Converge - Draw x cards and lose x life, where x is the number of colors spent to cast ~
I don't really know how I feel about this being rare... I mean at anything but 3 colors it's just worse than read the bones, a common, and it's not like a third color even makes it necessarily better... I double-checked that it was a sorcery, and alas.
Chris Taylor
Contributor
Dragonmaster was a mythic beforehand
New Read the Bones: Eh, I get it. It's a 3 for one after all, and I've run many an EDH deck with Ancient Craving. I don't think it's a great rare, but I can see it not being an uncommon
New Read the Bones: Eh, I get it. It's a 3 for one after all, and I've run many an EDH deck with Ancient Craving. I don't think it's a great rare, but I can see it not being an uncommon
Yeah, by 'mythic reprint' I just meant they were reprinting a mythic card. That didn't happen often outside of core sets (walkers, titans, godforsaken cards like time reversal) but I guess we'll see it often-ish now that core is dead.
I get that "draw three" might be a bit better than they want an uncommon to be in this particular limited format, but I don't subscribe to the "just bump it to rare/mythic" school of design.
I get that "draw three" might be a bit better than they want an uncommon to be in this particular limited format, but I don't subscribe to the "just bump it to rare/mythic" school of design.
I am all about that Dragonmaster reprint! Should put it into pick-up range for my cube. Tasty.
I'd rather Pain's Reward if I wanted a Read the Bones variant. If it were instant speed, maybe, but... It ain't. So. Meh.
I'd rather Pain's Reward if I wanted a Read the Bones variant. If it were instant speed, maybe, but... It ain't. So. Meh.
No Pyromancer's Goggles synergy to the new card, though. Stick with Sowing Salt for maximum screaming.
Yeah great timing on Pyromancer's Goggles.
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
This is a nice one!
Pretty sweet
Dom Harvey
Contributor
It isn't uncountably infinite!
Chris Taylor
Contributor
This is a nice one!
Card seems good. I like that it pitches to force of will.
Onderzeeboot
Ecstatic Orb
Pretty sweet
That is actually a pretty great land for the ULD if there are enough playable allies floating around in this and the next set (and original Zendikar of course).
Time for another misplaced Fight Club post!
Can we compare/contrast Endless One with Chronomaton and Hangarback Walker?
Can we compare/contrast Endless One with Chronomaton and Hangarback Walker?
Somehow a guy that is always on curve just doesn't sound exciting to me. Whish it had some way to spend those counters. So I'd pick hangerback!