This is a testing/includes thread. Post pictures using /ci or a text list using /c with what cards you plan to include and what cards you plan to test.
Well, since no one else wanted to...
I'm actually a fan of most of the Marvel movies having grown up watching them over over the past 15 years, but can't say I was too hyped for this set as a whole. marvel is really pushing the bounds for what I consider a set that works within Magic, but it looks like we're due for a few more of these over the years so it is what it is.
As always, for me UB driven sets mostly come down to how jarring the art or mechanics are so my inclusions are usually a short list. If it's flavor agnostic enough that it doesn't feel completely out of place within my cube then we're good to go. One point in favor of this set is that after a while at prerelease it all kind of blended together and the mechanics just felt like playing Magic in the long run. Will wait to see how the Limited environment shakes out to decide whether I want to dive any deeper into it.
There are four cards that I liked on the first passthrough:
Night Nurse is a really sweet design, A Samwise the Stouthearted without the Ring baggage (which made these cards all annoying to play with outside of their limited environment) makes for compelling gameplay. I love how much more flexible this card is not caring where the permanent came from. You can make full use of a turn cycle of Vraan, Executioner Thane triggers, grab back things that might be discarded ala Bitter Triumph or a looter, and there is always the failsafe of flashing in a body EOT to grab back something that died in combat or a fetchland. I can't wait to play this in my UW Control decks where every single part of this card will be incredibly useful.
I really don't see why we couldn't have had The Wondrous Wasp as a faerie back in Lorwyn Eclipsed a few months ago, but we'll take it here. This design is really sweet and exactly the kind of effects we could use more of in cube. Flash it in to clear a blocker EOT, blink it to tap down more than one body, you can put together a Karakas loop to enable some big swings in combat, and it can also shut down and/or neutralize cards like Sheoldred, the Apocalypse or big Construct tokens. Holding up the two mana lets you bluff a counterspell as well. Tishana's Tidebinder is in an awkward 3 mana slot for me so I never really gave it a run, but depending on how this performs we might bring it in for a run later this Fall.
I need to find a slot for Loki's Scepter, but this is a really exciting card to play with as a Threaten variant that is right on rate but leaves you with something after the fact. Having it on an artifact creates some really cheeky lines that can be pulled off with the likes of Goblin Welder and Goblin Engineer in additional to cool utility in the late game grind off something like an Academy Ruins + Legion Extruder. If you have a sac outlet, all of a sudden Teleportation + Scepter becomes an impression of The Abyss. A lot of really cool sequences and utility for this one, right in the vein of Cursed Mirror. Mana Rock+ is a cool niche for red to explore through these commander releases.
Mole Man, Moloid Master lets me get the best of both worlds from Springheart Nantuko and Ramunap Excavator in a single slot. Very cool design. Excavator was showing its age and on the chopping block for me, Nantuko has a giant fall of text, but this keeps that critical mass of Crucible effects and also supports self-mill GB decks. Green tokens = more ways to cast Hogaak, Arisen Necropolis (this might be the greatest enabler of all time) and I'm always looking for more support. Synergizes extremely well in a double fetch environment.
Curious to see what everyone else is planning to run (way too many cards in this set to keep track of) and it'll be fun to revisit this threat in a year to see what worked out long term.