Sets [IKO] Ikoria: Lair of Behemoths

Velrun

Velrun

Onderzeeboot said:
No, I think this is less cool than you and Safra think it is in Cube...
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Once again. I just said if those were the options, then it is cool. I didn’t say super, super cool or anything.
And I guess I also said it wasn’t random because it isn’t. You should know SOME about your opponent’s deck.

You cast it and have the option to choose between protection from the even-costed blockers you see in front of you or the oddly-costed spells you know villain has in deck. This is a second example out of many where it is not as dull and random as the Swords of X and Y. (The first example in my reply above)
 
Velrun

Velrun

Exactly! Thank you Onde <3

I think I have the cube for it because my players’ card pool changes all the time and their decks, themes and colors change throughout the tournament which makes this card interesting if you ask me.

Has anyone found any mutate cards they want in their cube? I think the mechanic is better than the execution for these two sets.
 
Mondschwein

Mondschwein

seadasheroctopus.jpg
loredrakkis.jpg


Two new mutating spoilers that look pretty cool. RUG already has so many things going on, I don't know if I want Mutate to become another thing for it.

cunningnightbonder.jpg


Cunning Nightbonder
Creature - Human Rogue
Flash
Spells you cast with flash cost 1 generic less and can't be countered

I really don't know if this is interesting enough for my big Flash section (that's RUGW), I also don't like that 'can't be countered' clause.
 
Mondschwein

Mondschwein

Velrun said:
“Listige” means “Sneaky” in my language :)

Sea-Dasher Octopus is perfect. An aura with flash that can be a 2/2 for 3 if you want instead.
I don’t think Lore Drakkis does anything unless you are running many mutate cards.
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What is your mother tongue? Mine is German.

Doesn't Lore Drakkis trigger at least once if you cast it for its mutate cost and the creature it mutates/mutates into it doesn't eat removal before Drakkis hitting the battlefield?
 
ravnic

ravnic

Wow, that would be already 3 germans in this forum.

Also, that Octopus is half a ninja, it just doesn't tell you. Sucks though, that they had to add that stupid non-human clause.
 
Mondschwein

Mondschwein

@ ravnic: I guess you are German? Who's the third one?

Savai Thunderlion
mana_rot.gif
mana_weiss.gif

Creature- Elemental Cat
Whenever you cycle a card, you may pay
mana_2.gif
. If you do, Savai Thunderlion deals 2 damage to target creature and you gain 2 life.
3/2

Looks like another sweet cycling payoff, and a WR signpost, too. Might implement UWBR Cycling/Discard Matters as a big archetype into my cube after Ikoria, there are some really nice payoffs.
 
TrainmasterGT

TrainmasterGT

They haven't really previewed anything thats super exciting since the Sharknado IMO... That is, until they showed off this:
cryptictrilobite.jpg

I don't know if this card has a home in cube, but he is really cute! He's like Walking Ballista but for mana to activate abilities. A thing to note is that
the mana he produces can be used to add back +1/+1 counters on to this guy. So if you only need 1 mana to activate, say a Law-Rune Enforcer, you can spend the other colorless to pump back up your trilobite. In addition, this mana doesn't specify abilities of permanents, so you can use it to help paying cycling. Not sure this is good enough to test, but it is fun enough to mention.
 
Velrun

Velrun

Mondschwein said:
What is your mother tongue?
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Danish (aber ich sprechen ein bisschen deutch.)


Mondschwein said:
Doesn't Lore Drakkis trigger at least once if you cast it for its mutate cost and the creature it mutates/mutates into it doesn't eat removal before Drakkis hitting the battlefield?
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Yes. Sorry I was exaggerating. It is a Relearn for 2 mana that can do more stuff if your cube is geared towards it. So the question is: Will you gear your cube towards it? I think I can’t find room for much mutation. Maybe a few.


TrainmasterGT said:
A thing to note is that
the mana he produces can be used to add back +1/+1 counters on to this guy. So if you only need 1 mana to activate, say a Law-Rune Enforcer, you can spend the other colorless to pump back up your trilobite. In addition, this mana doesn't specify abilities of permanents, so you can use it to help paying cycling.
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Really nice catch on both of them!
Also it has the Eldrazi colorless non-artifact template. I guess they wanted the ability available in all colors but without making a Trilobite an artifact?
 
Rasmus Källqvist

Rasmus Källqvist

For those who are curious about the Mutate mechanic, Marc Rosewater wrote an article about the design process behind the mechanic:

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/making-magic/more-meets-ikoria-2020-04-06

I'm actually quite intrigued by it now. Seems fun, didn't really think about the fact that you would probably always mutate the biggest creature on-top since the creature has all text on all the cards in the pile anyway.
 
Velrun

Velrun

Rasmus Källqvist said:
For those who are curious about the Mutate mechanic, Marc Rosewater wrote an article about the design process behind the mechanic:

https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/making-magic/more-meets-ikoria-2020-04-06

I'm actually quite intrigued by it now. Seems fun, didn't really think about the fact that you would probably always mutate the biggest creature on-top since the creature has all text on all the cards in the pile anyway.
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The ‘put on top’ was always how it was told to us when mutate was first spoiled. The article is describing the situation where MARO plays the game where he and Andrew keep growing their biggest dude into an even bigger dude. How is that possible with mutate?

All you get is the highest p/t of a printed Magic card in Ikoria: Lair of the Behemoth.
This means you can’t mutate your 6/6 into a 7/7 into a 9/9 into a 12/12. Unless new cards will get spoiled that leads to this situation. You can mutate your dude bigger if you started with a 2/2 and then later draws a 6/6. But then the growth stops. Someone correct me, please?
 
Rasmus Källqvist

Rasmus Källqvist

Velrun said:
All you get is the highest p/t of a printed Magic card in Ikoria: Lair of the Behemoth.
This means you can’t mutate your 6/6 into a 7/7 into a 9/9 into a 12/12. Unless new cards will get spoiled that leads to this situation. You can mutate your dude bigger if you started with a 2/2 and then later draws a 6/6. But then the growth stops. Someone correct me, please?
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Importantly, MaRo is giving the history behind the mechanic. I think that description was from the play testing from the vision team, not the set development team.
 
Mondschwein

Mondschwein

All the creatures in the pile are mutated into one big creature. That creature does have all the abilities of the creatures in that pile, but it only has the p/t of the creature on top. It is possible that you mutate with a non-human creature that doesn't have mutate, which would be the first time you mutate as creatures without mutate can't mutate to an already mutated creature. Everytime you mutate, you choose wether the mutating creature goes on top or bottom of the pile. The difference is, if you choose top, the whole mutated creature gets the p/t of the now played creature.

Something I'm not sure about is counters. If younters are on one of those creatures, they are on the whole creature, I think. Cards like the spider that gets 2 +1/+1 counters everytime it mutates wouldn't make any sense otherwise.

Right now, I find the whole mechanic pretty damn interesting, as Simic is exactly my flavour, but it still looks quite weak, and also like a big trap for cube designers.
 
Onderzeeboot

Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
Mutate reads like auras and is probably quite bad in most cases. There have been successful auras in the past, but they are either really powerful, or have some way to counteract the innate card disadvantage of having an enchanted creature destroyed. For a second today, MaRo's article said only the top card of a mutated creature is put into a graveyard when it is destroyed, but turns out they changed that in development and now the whole stack is put into your graveyard when it is killed. So, basically mutate has all the disadvantages of auras, with the exception of having your target destroyed in response to casting a card with mutate (in that case the card with mutate enters the battlefield as if you had cast it as a creature, and doesn't trigger its mutate abilities).
 
Mondschwein

Mondschwein

So, what do the spoilers tell us what we could expect from the upcoming spoilers?

- blue mythos
- 2 mythics (mono U and mono B)
- 5 companions (BW RW GW RG UW)
- 2 uncommons with mutate in enemy colours (RW BW)
- rare duals: completing bicycles aus Amonkhet? seriously, it HAS to be this cycle! Cycling is back, and even Cycling matters, and we have an emphasis on Wedges/enemy colours, which is the other part of AKH bicycles. If it's not them, I'm very disappointed, because I want to add the full cycle to my cube!
 
Rasmus Källqvist

Rasmus Källqvist

Onderzeeboot said:
Mutate reads like auras and is probably quite bad in most cases. There have been successful auras in the past, but they are either really powerful, or have some way to counteract the innate card disadvantage of having an enchanted creature destroyed. For a second today, MaRo's article said only the top card of a mutated creature is put into a graveyard when it is destroyed, but turns out they changed that in development and now the whole stack is put into your graveyard when it is killed. So, basically mutate has all the disadvantages of auras, with the exception of having your target destroyed in response to casting a card with mutate (in that case the card with mutate enters the battlefield as if you had cast it as a creature, and doesn't trigger its mutate abilities).
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I have a really hard time imagining they would go this hard on the mechanic if it's "just auras". To me it seems like it would end up working like creatures being modal bodies / spells, since when you mutate you'd hopefully get a pretty big effect immediately. You might be right, but that seems like too obvious of a gotcha that they wouldn't have play tested around it.

sanctuarylockdown.jpg


More fun stuff for the human deck! White already has quite a lot of humans, and tapping down opposing creatures seems pretty good?
 
TrainmasterGT

TrainmasterGT

lurrusofthedreamden.jpg

Unlike the Hippo Dinosaur, which is very good in the mainboard but questionable as a companion, this cat thing seems like it is very good in both roles. Remember, White and Black are the two colors most likely to be chock full of permanents with CMC 2 or less. Just counting White and Black in my cube, I have about 42 permanents with CMC 2 or less for this deck. That number balloons to 118 when we include cards of every color. This is a hybrid card, so it can go into Boros or Rakdos strategies as well.

Note that this card specifically counts permanents with converted mana cost 2 or less, so important removal like Murderous Cut and Hero's Downfall still function. This card seems very playable and even workable as a companion. Definitely one of the best cards in the set so far.
 
Mondschwein

Mondschwein

This one is pretty damn strong. Can't play it as Companion and in your mainboard at the same time, which is something I dislike, but you also can't play multiples of the otter elemental.

We still haven't seen the nightmare squirrel, have we?
 
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