Sets (MoM) April of the Machines Previews
- Thread starter Velrun
- Start date
Really cool white card! I like the "mini-batallion: draw a card" and the ability to turn lands (or any other dead card) into 2/2s.
More riot stuff, and also +1/+1 counter tribal. Is it any good in 1v1? Don't really know! Maybe in some GR +1/+1 Midrange deck?
Edit: lol didn't realize both these cards had been posted in the thread already. Anyway! Cool cards
So, I still have about 50 or so casual 60-card decks floating around, but the *OLDEST* deck of my entire collection is a red Dash deck. It is *so* old it was a Viashino deck for many years before that lolol. Dash made it quite decent so I am very happy to see this new guy from out of nowhere.. <3
Anything that requires additional tracking on the field with new objects or is a hassle to implement in paper. I don't think introducing these mechanics is good for paper Magic because it's just another logistical hassle. I don't mind new types of cards like Vehicles in recent years or cards like Archives or retro artifacts because they don't require additional upkeep on the field. I'm strongly against random counters that aren't +1/+1 because of the need for additional markers (another reason why Strixhaven wasn't my favorite), gameplay additions like Dungeons and Day/Night that require additional tracking, and any complicated DFCs that require constant flipping back and forth to understand what's happening. I have no qualms with anyone using them in something like EDH if they want to do all of that legwork, but I have zero interest in making my players interact with these because the juice isn't worth the squeeze to me.
Battles fall into that last category of DFCs for me because I'm just thinking of the headache of having to flip the cards to understand each side if they're sleeved up, both during draft and during gameplay, as well as the questions you're going to get from confused players for a long time. All for (mostly) mediocre cards that have effects that I could emulate with cleaner templates cards that are closer to traditional Magic.
Y'all are free to enjoy any and all of these mechanics, I'm just trying to posit why other designers like myself want nothing to do with them. I strongly disagree with the notion that we shouldn't call out things that we have issue with brought up earlier, that's a very slippery slope as we've seen in the past, but yeah whatever. I'll just treat this set like an Un-Set and keep my opinions to myself.
I honestly straight up forgot Foretell because I haven't played with any of those cards in nearly two years. That said, Foretell is simple enough for the player casting the card to keep track of and for the opponent it's basically no different than a card exiled facedown ala Gonti, Lord of Luxury. It's not really a new concept to the game with hidden cards in exile.
Learn and Lessons on the other hand require me to either find slots for mediocre cards or provide them as an additional resource post-draft with a lesson-board. I'd also have to explain the concept to people unfamiliar with that set during the draft (as many people did not play paper Magic for that 2 year stretch) and anyone who has never played with Wishes will probably want to know how this entire process works. All that for cards that are mostly overcosted by 1? I'm gonna pass.
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Fair enough. I disagree with your assessment of one being smoother than the other, but I'll chalk that up to a difference in opinion.
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I just realized that they missed an opportunity with Battles — they could've stuck all the rules info on the "back" of the card and made the front part a landscape art card.
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I just realized that they missed an opportunity with Battles — they could've stuck all the rules info on the "back" of the card and made the front part a landscape art card.
Convoke deck didn't really deliver, but I am mildly interested in this card. It looks kind of mediocre, but it's a decent mana sink at most points of the game, and a 3/2 for 3 that lets you tap all your creatures for a 1/1 isn't too bad. Can be pretty fun with the white "bounce to hand" cards.
There's also this, which I don't think I'm personally interested in, but looks like one of the more engaging repeatable blink cards as opposed to Soulherder
OH MY GOSH THIS WOULD ROCK
Honestly bafeld at how cool this commander set is
I'm in love with this one. I like being able to get a reanimation nearly as an ETB, which makes it much better than a Bishop of Rebirth, even without accounting for the flying (which makes attacking a lot easier). It's also not hard to get bigger things than 3 MV with this, so while there's a lower floor than Sun Titan, the ceiling makes up for it. I'm a fan.
The more I think about it, the more interesting overall I think it is than Sun Titan and that it probably promotes better gameplay, and maybe one of my favorite fatties in Cube is not long for this world? What a thought!!
Here is your white madness enabler I guess.
I'm very tempted by this one. It might be a bit too do-nothing, but hopefully you're able to at least get your card back the turn you cast it most games.
Death-Greeter Champion and Chivalric Alliance are great.
Another Commander design that I actually really like is:
Look at this little guy. It's his birthday, and he decided his present was going to be a crossover between all of the different Vampire things.
Honestly, would play this over Vampire Nighthawk these days. I'm tempted in general tbh...
Dom Harvey
Contributor
Love this so much, I didn't see anything that wowed me in the Commander decks so far but this by itself is everything I wanted
Now THAT'S a Baneslayer/Mulldrifter hybrid and a reanimation enabler and payoff all at once! Big fan of this cute, chonky little fellow--he gives me big Dragon Tales vibes.
All in all, the back half of spoiler season is looking great!
Now this is a clean design that I like. More ways to recur creatures is appreciated in Pod decks and this slots in neatly at the 5 slot which is a little barren with relevant ETBs to keep churning value. Can reset a Kitchen Finks for Pod chains, can give a beater ala Thrun, the Last Troll a one-shot hit of evasion, and plays well with Teleportation Circle and Thassa, Deep-Dwelling as additional blink support. The base case being a 4/5 flyer than can recur 4CMC or less noncreatures is a really cool Sun Titan impression.
And if it's an especially grindy game you can even Pod this into Titan, recur an E-Wit, then get it rolling with a big attack for 7 in the air with deployment the next turn.
This one creates a Treasure token and then cares for all artifacts in general
For all the battle lovers in this thread
https://scryfall.com/search?as=grid...&order=name&q=begin+the+invasion&unique=cards
https://scryfall.com/search?as=grid...&order=name&q=begin+the+invasion&unique=cards
Chris Taylor
Contributor
You went full EDH man, you never go full EDH!
I like it! As ever I wish populate could copy noncreature tokens, but I'll deal.
Look planeswalk or chaos ensues is peak "ignore this" text, but is this the first x spell that makes x 1/1 fliers? Stolen by the Fae and Occult Epiphany are both limited on what you can make with them.
We do have companions with updated reminder text! (I do run lurrus, I just have a sticky note over the companion text)
: Trigger your blood artists." Plus you can always cast it for more. Not that I'll be playing it, but seems easy to overlook.edit: Nothing to see here.
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Dom Harvey
Contributor
it's Incubate 3 X times, not Incubate X 3 times (yes, it's needlessly confusing) - if you cast it for 0 you get nothing extra
Not a card I thought much about on first glance, but if you're into artifacts, you can play this as a 1-drop that just gives you 3 junk tokens, and in aristocrat shells you get three shots at "
No. If you play this for one mana it incubates 3 zero times. So that is 0 tokens.
Oh, right. I read it wrong the first time, then I did a double-take and read it correctly, and then I forgot all about it and looped back to the wrong interpretation and hit post. Explains why I didn't think much of it on first glance I guess.
well uh, it kind of makes a blade splicer impression with a lot more words if you like reading
may have to proxy me some actual factual companions now that they are cool lookin
That's nice to have available as an option. It's rare, but every now and then one of my drafters will go mad scientist with drafting just to get that 8th card and that always leads to Companion clarification (some of them haven't paid attention to Constructed in years). I'll have to see this and Yorion in person before deciding whether or not I want to make the swaps as the online renders look real busy and too close to not looking like a Magic card.