Card/Deck Single Card Spotlight

Dom Harvey

Dom Harvey

Contributor
Here we discuss individual cards in more detail than the passing mentions we often give them in threads.

I'll start:

283.jpg


Man, everyone loves Young Wolf Wild Mongrel! What a guy.

Wild Mongrel's a card I'm going to be a running a full pack of. It's one of the premier 2-drops not just in green but across all colours, and unlike most of its competition it lets you go very deep. Wild Mongrel is:

- busted with draw-7s (Wheel of Fortune, Time Spiral, Timetwister, Memory Jar)
- able to kill the opponent out of nowhere if granted evasion/double strike/a free path through combat
- rather amusing with Prime Speaker Zegana
- an on-demand discard outlet for all your reanimation needs (or madness, Vengevine, dredge, etc.)
- the last dog standing after Wildfire
- not blunted by a lot of traditional aggro cards (Walls, Augur, large creatures)
- resistant to burn
- a source of interesting decision points for both players in combat
- the life of the party
 
  • Like
Reactions: Tom
Lucre

Lucre

I'm not sure if this is the right place for this but here goes:

I was considering posting on the salvation card evaluation thread but I don't think too many players there nurture environments where a card like Orzhov Pontiff can excel or even really be considered for a multicolored slot.

I was thinking about BW aggro today, and how much better it might be with a utility land draft and a real wealth of ways to make use of tokens, revilark and ranger which got me wondering about anthems and holy light type cards and I remembered that little block constructed gem.

Does anyone have a lot of experience with this guy? I assume lingering souls and sorin and cards like procession really fill in for belfry spirit and the like. I always felt like what was holding the card back was that it couldn't do both abilities at once, certainly seems a lot better with all the 2/1s running around right now and the inclusion of restoration angel, but does this cleric still suffer from doing too little?
 
CML

CML

Contributor
pontiff is a 1-of in 100% of melira pod decks in modern. probably not cube-able, though -- if you're looking for a strong (and also omnipresent-in-modern) effect like this, try zealous persecution
 
Lucre

Lucre

Yeah I was considering that in my perusal of holy light effects but I was wondering if pontiff would equate to a more interactive version of that in cubes that were excited about spawn tokens and sac effects like bombardment.

Like I can imagine sacing this guy and a spirit to bombardment or phyrexian plague lord type of thing would feel like a real wild ride.
 
CML

CML

Contributor
right, part of its strength in m-pod (beyond tutorability with chord / pod) is the range of tricks you can do with that deck's sac outlets. i'm not totally clear on them, but sam pardee's primer on cfb can't be a bad place to start.

as far as 39¢ cards go, this one is pretty good:
15.jpg


it annoys me that there exist cubes without this balla. it's like restoration angel, except far funnier, and with a bit of flickerwisp added on.
galepowder swings through a single flying blocker.
galepowder pegs a token a turn.
galepowder blinks that which deserves to be blinked. (considering the shortage of blink effects beyond venser, the sojourner, restoration angel, and legacy role-player flickerwisp, i dunno why anyone who's interested in that kind of cube effect would exclude him. momentary blink is a cool card but infinitely narrower.)
galepowder lets you 'venser venser' without the pw venser.
my only beef with g'powder is that, like every other sweet white card ever, it costs 4. ah well.

since we were talking about sac themes...
166.jpg


i love this card, it's a classic example of the unrestrained, flavorful, and bold designs of urza's saga, without the shit development that led to such fair and interactive hits as tolarian academy, sneak attack, show and tell, and -- now -- our friend the gaea's cradle. three cheers for saga!
victimize is aggressively costed, but not punishingly so -- you can't just pass on the draw, dump a woodfall primus, and reanimate it.
victimize is more of a value card than the classic reanimator spells, requiring a dude to bin -- but the value can be quite something.
victimize is fun to build around. linear reanimator decks don't like it as much, but they'll warp themselves in a fun way (i think) to accomodate the 3-CMC sorcery.

finally a submission from magic's finest color...
191.jpg

the 'other' huntmaster has a colorful history, having once been involved in a bogus disqualification story. huntmaster of the fells is a fantastic design with a lot of decisions to it -- werewolves are just so sweet -- but this dude's activated ability is a chinese puzzle in and of itself.

as far as more conventional choices go, some of my favorites are bitterblossom and liliana of the veil
 
Chris Taylor

Chris Taylor

Contributor
You know, Maybe Victimize is Recurring Nightmare #2 for my cube! I've been looking for another effect like it, and I'd subconsciously filed the card in my EDH brain database instead of the cube one (Not to say that there isn't overlap) with people sacing genesis to bring back Woodfall Primus and Angel of Dispair.

Love master of the wild hunt, I was about to throw him up on this thread myself. Green doesn't get much in the ways of tokens or removal, and this guy is both in a sweet package. Also sometimes you live the dream and beat up Emrakul with a bunch of wolfbriar elemental tokens. The only way I would love him more is if he was a 1/1 which made a wolf when he came in (Opening up Reveillark shenanigans as well)
 
Dom Harvey

Dom Harvey

Contributor
idk, I've found myself souring more and more on cards that don't do something immediately. Sure, Master is good if it lives, but the same could be said for a lot of cards.
 
Chris Taylor

Chris Taylor

Contributor
I'll admit he is dependant on the type/density of removal in your cube. I've been trying to play with less removal and more sorcery speed stuff among that, since it opens the door for a lot of other creatures to be good.
That being said, his average case is hardly end step bolt.
 
CML

CML

Contributor
barrin -- prettay, prettay, prettay good? i'll throw it in mine and see what happens
 
CML

CML

Contributor
hey doodz i played a power cube last night and inspired by its wanton degeneracy i have compiled a list of 'banned legacy cards that might be fun in a riptide style cube' (in addition to such classics as tutors and multiple-use tutors that get value out of vengevine)

mainly i'm curious about jar and yawg will

116.jpg
27.jpg
58.jpg
8.jpg
70.jpg
70.jpg
54.jpg
171.jpg


honorable mention
252.jpg
 
FlowerSunRain

FlowerSunRain

Contributor
Yawgmoth's Will is a pretty fair card in non-combo cube. Generally it lets you get back a land, a two mana spell or two one mana spells for 5 mana or a little more for 6. Obviously the best case scenario gets pretty impressive, but usually it plays as a very convoluted regrowth/divination/cultivate.
 
FlowerSunRain

FlowerSunRain

Contributor
Also I like both wheel and twister in cube. Everyone gets free cards, inspiring tons of immediate and furious interaction. Much more interesting then Vortex, Winter Orb, et al for giving aggro decks more "punch".
 
Chris Taylor

Chris Taylor

Contributor
Assuming you don't run squirrel nest, earthcraft is a fine card, essentially good Citanul Hierophants.
Hermit Druid is also sweet support for gravecrawler synergy, as well as any other green based dredge stuff you wanna do.
Yawg's Will seems slow. Could be sweet, I've been out of touch with the big spells thing for a while now, but I'll say this: Snapcaster Mage would have been a whole different card if it cost 3.

I've only found that the draw 7's are good in combo, and pretend to be good in aggro decks (the old bolt you x4 then wheel)
Mishra's workshop is like Tinker. Kinda exactly, actually. Plan accordingly.

Tabarnacle is a horrible card for cubing if you play creatures. Like Maze of Ith level.
 
Alex Blanton

Alex Blanton

Hermit Druid and Gush can be pretty fair too. On a much less powerful note, is this thing playable at all?

"Wizard" is a five-color tribe, after all... Magus of the Library, Bob, Lavamancer, Disciple of Bolas, Galepowder Mage, half of the good blue creatures... I'm sure I missed some good ones, but the sage gives them a huge boost. Why yes, I'd like a 3/2 Snapcaster.

Edit: Ok, it really is terrible. Too weak to be a build-around and too narrow to be a nice late pickup. Good thing I realized now, I suppose...
 
anotak

anotak


So I have one of these, I saw it again looking through my random unused cards. And I was thinking about how blue control seemed pretty awful in the past few drafts we've had... so for a brief brief moment I considered it. But I feel this card is probably way beyond the power level of the rest of my cube, but I could be perhaps wrong. I've never really had serious chances to play with or against this card, I've just heard the stories.

Can stasis be a fun card? If so, what is needed to make it not just be stupid?
Or is it just 'game ruining bullshit'?
 
anotak

anotak

how do yall feel about bow of nylea? i opened my 1-pack per set and it had a foil one in there so i'm trying to decide if i want to use it or just trade it for something
 
James Stevenson

James Stevenson

Steamflogger Boss
Staff member
I like Bow, though I haven't gotten one yet. I'm looking for durdly midrangey things for green to do. I also have a custom card that searches your library for a legendary card, so legends are always good. Also I like that it negates Nephalia Drownyard for the sake of interaction. On the other hand, too many durdles are not good, so I'll have to see.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top