Card/Deck Single Card Spotlight

I agree that it doesn't really fit into a reanimator/delve type strategy, but note that the other player loses life from your reveal. So if you flip a Griselbrand you opponent takes 8.
Yeah just to be clear the idea was to flip your reanimation targets and shoot villain for a lot of damage.
 
Normally I'd agree with you, Ravnic, but I feel like the goblin actually scales a lot depending on whether or not your environment is full of 2/1s for 1 and on how many goblins you have. It always trades with a bear, and while it can be Rabblemaster for 2, it gets stonewalled by so much. It's the sort of thing where Isamaru is acceptable to good in higher-powered formats but is just okay in retail draft. Similarly, Goblin is powerful in that he's very efficient, but he's not very powerful.

Of course, if you can't guarantee that your decks are developing significant board presence by T3 at the absolute latest then yeah, it's going to steal games.
 


Is this a little too much to run as an incentive for delve/reanimation decks?
I think it works in aggro midrange delve kinda decks. Reanimator... maybe.

I'm more worried about how the opponent perceives the game when they take 8 damage in the upkeep from a 2 drop. Feels really swingy and maybe not that fun.
 

Jason Waddell

Administrator
Staff member
As in “Two different deck strategies can use the same card and this one can tie the two different deck strategies together”?
Personally I really liked Duskmantle Seer, and this card fills in a similar role of allowing UB decks to be aggressive in a very UB way. I don't think giving your opponents cards is as bad as some of the comments are making it out to be, but if you don't have both Delve (most of the creatures are pretty aggro-oriented to begin with) and top of the library as prominent mechanics in your environment then Keen Duelist is less of a glue card.
 
Personally I really liked Duskmantle Seer, and this card fills in a similar role of allowing UB decks to be aggressive in a very UB way. I don't think giving your opponents cards is as bad as some of the comments are making it out to be, but if you don't have both Delve (most of the creatures are pretty aggro-oriented to begin with) and top of the library as prominent mechanics in your environment then Keen Duelist is less of a glue card.
I would be playing the heck out of Keen Duelist if it was the Duskmantle Seer effect. Beyond the needlessly confusing way that it reads, I don't want to be punished because my opponent is running 8-drops when my curve tops out at a single 4-drop.

Still, if it read in a less confusing way, I'd still probably add it to my list, I do think the effect is quite strong.
 
Too janky IMO

If it was a repeatable fork for any spell then maybe, but as written it doesn't seem worth much. How many spells in your cube target the caster?
 
Too janky IMO

If it was a repeatable fork for any spell then maybe, but as written it doesn't seem worth much. How many spells in your cube target the caster?
Sadly what I thought. I just hadn’t known that card existed. Probably for a reason…
 
Lithoform Engine can do some cool stuff, like copy fetchland triggers; and the copy permanent mode can keep the pressure on later game, letting every creature cast be 2x that creature.

Mirari conjecture just really does so much. Good card.
 


Why keep lands on the battlefield? The spell you're copying could be anything — even a ramp spell to get out more lands!

(Harrow + Uyo potentially puts every basic land in your deck into your hand.)
 
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