General Fight Club

Jason Waddell

Jason Waddell

Administrator
Staff member
safra said:
Here's one I'm unsure about:
vs.

They're both above-the-curve blue fliers for 3, but Illusory Angel is a lot easier to cast 'normally' (including on turn two with a Mox Diamond). They're also both great in a CoCo or Pod shell, but in the absence of a real self-mill archetype I worry that the support for Ruinator isn't there. It's such a sweet card though! I'm also not running Gravecrawlers, where I assume a yard-castable Zombie has even more advantages.

Mostly I want someone to tell me to either keep Ruinator in my Tiny Leaders deck, or that it's workable without a graveyard theme and I can cut the Angel for it.
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I've been thinking about Ruinator a lot, and I think it will only see play in Pod decks. It's worth testing though. I'll put it in the list this weekend. Pod gets it on the board, then provides food for you to return it to the board.

Really I just want to pull off this chain:
 
Eric Chan

Eric Chan

Hyalopterous Lemure
Staff member
I like Dissolve a lot, at least a lot more than I initially thought I would - it's crazy how much Scry 1 adds to a basically unplayable cube card. Dissipate wasn't great here, because it's just Cancel 90% of the time, and needs a more graveyard-focused set before its extra clause is worthwhile. Haven't seen Scatter to the Winds enough to render a verdict, but I expect it to fall somewhere between the two, though closer to the Dissolve end.
 
ahadabans

ahadabans

Eric Chan said:
I like Dissolve a lot, at least a lot more than I initially thought I would - it's crazy how much Scry 1 adds to a basically unplayable cube card. Dissipate wasn't great here, because it's just Cancel 90% of the time, and needs a more graveyard-focused set before its extra clause is worthwhile. Haven't seen Scatter to the Winds enough to render a verdict, but I expect it to fall somewhere between the two, though closer to the Dissolve end.
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I just want to mention that I think Cancel is more playable than we give it credit for. It's like shock. Shock is very much a playable cube card if you were to look at it in a vacuum (i.e. not comparing it to other options). We don't play it because there are literally dozens of cards which are better. We don't play cancel for the same reason. But neither card is "unplayable" in the same sense that storm crow is unplayable.

As far as which is better from those options... it's probably preference. Dissolve always nets you scry 1, so the ACS is better than the others. Dissipate is so conditional on when the GY hate is beneficial, that it might as well be cancel. Scatter I haven't tested, but I'm pretty sure that is cancel 90% of the time. And in the BCS, is a 3/3 land on T6+ really all that spectacular? I'm not convinced.
 
Eric Chan

Eric Chan

Hyalopterous Lemure
Staff member
I don't actually think Cancel is playable at all; it's been printed in a half dozen draft formats over the years, and it's nearly always pure sideboard material, and very rarely correct to maindeck. Our formats tend to be a turn or more faster than retail limited, making it even harder to justify running Cancel.

However, Cancel is close to playable, which is why tacking on Scry 1 or having a split card mode for six mana are enough to push it over the hump. It's a very fine line dividing the two sides, though, more than for any other card I can think of - where else would adding Scry 1 turn a bad card into a good card?

Meanwhile, Shock is more than fine in cube - I cubed it for over a year at one point, and it was consistently maindecked by various people in my playgroup, and I think correctly so.
 
shamizy

shamizy

Dissolve is amazingly good, Scry 1 is so relevant in the decks that want it. You're pretty much always on the defensive and you're looking for your next big play to establish yourself or digging for your next answer. I didn't realize just how good when it was released, but I spent most of the time THS was in Standard playing blue-based control decks (whenever I actually did play Standard) and Dissolve always carried its weight. I like it better than both Dissipate and Hinder because I've never really had those corner cases matter against me. You're not really going to feel like you won the exchange if you're countering something like a Gravecrawler or Bloodghast with either. It just feels so good when you stop their big play then dig towards your next one.

Also I have FNM promo Dissolve so it's staying b/c it's pretty.
 
Eric Chan

Eric Chan

Hyalopterous Lemure
Staff member
Maybe Scry 1 is just way better than we give it credit for; nobody was all that impressed by the Temples when they were spoiled, but two years on, a decent number of us - myself included! - are running Temple of Epiphany & co. in our main cubes, while never having given Swiftwater Cliffs the time of day.

In wondering exactly how good Scry 1 is, I stumbled across this old thread... and now I'm more confused than before I read through that.
http://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/how-many-scry-is-worth-a-card.535/
 
RavebornMuse

RavebornMuse

Both, but I prefer Demise; it has a bit more strategic depth I think (since it adds complexity in regards to delve/graveyard strategies and requires consideration of the limited number of pumps available in my format), and I really value removal that has depth/conditionality in my format.
 
Grillo_Parlante

Grillo_Parlante

Contributor
Another vote for both: demise is valuable as a high power but reasonably conditioned removal piece, while cut provides raw power for black spot removal. Conditionality, as a form of deliberate imbalance to keep any one play style from becoming dominate or stale is important, but you also want some "noob cannon" removal that doesn't require much thought. Demise does the former, cut the latter, and cut has the additional benefit of having some depth to it, and can grow with the player.
 
Quirk

Quirk

Clever Impersonator.

There are trade-offs in power level to the point I don't know which will be better more of the time: Sakashima's Student can immediately hit your opponent as the thing it cloned and lets you recast something that hopefully has a neat enter the battlefield trigger. Clever Impersonator can be Batterskull or a planeswalker.

But... Clever Impersonator feels more elegant. It has less text, and a wider range of options outside the combat step - and I'm not convinced that having to factor in a combat step Clone as a possibility in your calculations any time a blue deck's in combat is a good thing.
 
Aoret

Aoret

Developer
This is a *really* good one Safra. I think I'm gonna take the opposite position from Quirk, but I'm a bit unsure of myself. For the sake of an interesting discussion, I'll take a stab:

Impersonator is certainly the more clean design, and I do like the breadth of interactions possible for the card. That said, I feel like it has significantly less play to it. All Impersonator asks of me is to choose the best permanent on the table in a given situation. It doesn't do anything more than just be a sweet Clone.

Student wants a bit more work from me (have a creature in play as a blue deck; something that actually does need a bit of encouraging at times). As mentioned, it interacts favorably with ETB/LTB abilities (which lets me feel clever). This is arguing a value judgement, but I like that it makes people have to worry about being in combat against a blue deck. I'm particularly bullish on tricky stuff lately and am actively working to create situations where you have to read your opponent and make difficult calls on things. I'm not sure whether I'll be happy with that direction ultimately, but it's something I'm trying right now. The overall ethos is something like "play with powerful cards so that anyone can win sometimes, but include strategic depth such that better players win more often". This brings up a lot about decision density, card complexity, and the vague term I keep throwing around about how much "play" there is to a card, but that's probably a subject for another thread.
 
shamizy

shamizy

If I had to choose one, I'd go with the Student b/c there's more play to it. I like cards that can be utilized differently in different scenarios (which is why I LOVE commands), and Student is clearly the winner in this scenario. Given the choice between raw power and interesting plays, I'll always go with the latter. Cards that are situationally more relevant, ones that you can leverage into generating advantages in corner cases, are a ton of fun for me. Clever Impersonator requires far less thought and is just more powerful as a catch-all, though way less interesting. I personally don't like many clone effects and the only two I've ever run were Phantasmal Image and Dack's Duplicate. Both of those provided enough interesting play to warrant inclusion, though Duplicate has since gone back into my cube binder b/c I've been trying out different options and it was basically just a super version of any bomb your opponent played.
 
ahadabans

ahadabans

vs.

Are people still running Suture Priest? Lone Missionary has 2 power and gets you 4 life right away, but I like the life drain on suture. What's particularly cool is that it punishes token decks (and rewards playing them at the same time). It just seems like a really interesting card. But the 1 power has me concerned it's just too useless outside some life gain combos or when facing deranged hermit.
 
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