Soon it’s going to be time to invite your friends over and have an Ixa-LAN party!
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Any shrewd Magic player is looking for the next breakout card. This
isn’t the stock market; it’s the preview season Magic Market.
I Shaun McLaren, Expert of Finances, will be your guide. I’m here to
give you the tips and tricks necessary to thrive in a competitive
preview season.
Move over,
Chas Andres! I’m here to give you the steamiest, the craziest, the loudest tips about Ixalan. I’ll tell you
which cards are hot and which cards are not, what’s worth sleeving and
what’s worth donating to the new players’ pile after your Prerelease
finishes.
Let’s begin!
Just when I had sunk a bunch of shares in Open Fire, it becomes
obsolete! The market is crashing! I can’t take this rollercoaster of
emotions! It seemed like the Lightning Bolt economy would never turn
around, but here we are. We can project Lightning Bolt to be reprinted
by Q3 2018.
If you haven’t already, it’s time to further diversify your Burn
portfolio, since Harnessed Lightning and Abrade are getting another
major player added.
Especially good in Ramunap Red, since it can go face.
Verdict: Buy! (And then toss at your opponent’s face.)
Jace has always been the flagship face of Magic, but never before has
he been so flagship, now that he’s actually on a ship with
flags.
Jace has traditionally been a big player and blue-chip planeswalker,
but times have changed. Jace stocks have taken a massive hit since
Jace, the Living Guildpact irreparably damaged the once-illustrious
Jace brand.
Back up a minute as I try to understand what’s happening to Jace based
on my limited knowledge of Magic lore and storylines. Why is Jace on a
boat and assuming his new role as Captain Ziggy Stardust? Well, I’m not
sure, but the only explanation I can think of is that Nicol Bolas,
God-Pharaoh caused Jace to suffer a Jace’s Defeat and Jace bumped his
head and got amnesia and did what you do when you get amnesia, which is
become a Pirate.
You only loot once no matter how many creatures you hit your opponent
with? That seems like an unnecessary drawback on an already mediocre
ability. Looting just isn’t that great in the first place, and when you
have to attack, leaving your planeswalker defenseless to get the
benefit, the proposition gets even worse.
Thassa, God of the Sea and Saheeli Rai were not so demanding to give you
access to card selection! Looting is better than scrying, but come on.
I think Jace, Cunning Castaway belongs in (or at least has a chance of
fitting into) a really specific archetype, and this ability pretty much
sums up what that archetype should be: tempo beats. I think it also sums up
why I don’t like this card, because I don’t like the archetype. Who knows,
though, maybe Merfolk and some sort of Mono-Blue Devotion deck are back on
the menu.
This is a pretty poor middle ability. Spending three mana for a 2/2
Illusion and a planeswalker on one loyalty just doesn’t seem like a good
deal in many situations. Jace’s subpar middle ability isn’t just making
this a bear market, he’s making it a Phantasmal Bear market!
“Rawr, maybe!”
Playing Jace and immediately using his -2 is like being the little pig who
built his house out of straw, because if your opponent so much as breathes,
let alone huffs and puffs, they’ll blow your battlefield position out.
It does make me wish for a simpler time when Electrolyze was legal to
punish such shenanigans.
At least give the Illusion flying! Evasion would be perfect for the loot
ability. It seems like Jace could’ve had some very minor tweaks to be
upgraded, so maybe he’s much better than he looks, but sometimes a weak
card is just a weak card.
I think this ultimate is actually pretty good for the low price of a mere
five loyalty.
What’s better than one mediocre planeswalker? Two mediocre planeswalkers!
Just plus for two turns and then copy Jace, Cunning Castaway and then plus
those for two turns and then copy those and…
Jace goes absolutely mental with Doubling Season, giving you an arbitrarily
large number of Jaces and an arbitrarily large number of Illusions. Excuse
me, double that arbitrarily large number of Illusions, thanks to
Doubling Season.
Doubling Season was already a solid holding for meme planeswalker decks,
and that position only got better.
Verdict: SELL!
Jace fatigue.
Adding another Jace to the already hyperinflated Jace market? I’m gonna be
lucky to trade a Jace, the Mind Sculptor for a loaf of bread at this rate!
Stop forcing Jaces on us. We don’t want them anymore! At least there’s
little chance of the prices of all these Jaces to explode in a speculative
bubble, since no one wants them. If I wanted my planeswalker investments to
bubble, I’d have invested in Kiora, the Crashing Wave.
Verdict: Sell all your Jaces! SELL THE IXALAN STORYLINE! SELL
SELL SELL!
New planeswalker, who dis? Huatli? I’ve never heard of you or
anyone like you before
, [“La” means “fire.” “Vos” means “big.”–Ed.] and Huatli sounds
like a repressed sneeze.
So Huatli is supposed to be a cheap Garruk knock-off that uses Dinosaurs
instead of Beasts? I can’t wait for their romantic storyline.
Garruk, Primal Hunter at least had the decency to increase his loyalty when
he gives you a 3/3. The whole planeswalker sector is on the decline.
I’ve got a poem for you, Huatli, Warrior Poet:
Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
Lifegain is bad,
And Huatli is too.
Look at that, I’m a poet and I wasn’t even aware of it.
This ability is solid, but Huatli starts with a pretty low loyalty and it’s
hard to increase Huatli’s loyalty without taking a turn off doing pretty
much nothing. Creating a Dinosaur every turn is all well and good, but she
will likely remain fragile for pretty much the entire time you control her.
This third ability is versatile and can help deliver a killing blow, but as
straight removal it’s not very good. How much play did Samut, the Tested
see? You probably already forgot Samut, the Tested was even a card, that’s
how much. Huatli actually has a useful ability and Samut didn’t, but Huatli
also costs one more mana.
Huatli’s abilities also don’t really synergize well together either. Why
bother making Dinosaurs with trample if your opponent’s creatures can’t
block anyway?
Listen, Huatli, I like you, I do. You’re interesting and make Dinosaurs,
but I’m skeptical you have the raw power necessary to give me a solid
return on investment.
Verdict: Pass on the Initial Planeswalker Offering, wait to buy if
there’s a deck for it, and then invest cautiously.
I think people are massively undervaluing this card, and it’s one of my
favorites, and possibly one of the best, previewed so far.
The big comparison point and argument against it is how good Cast Out is.
Ixalan’s Binding isn’t instant speed and can’t be cycled, which makes it
much lower on the versatility scale, but I think its upside is massive.
Attaching a Cranial Extraction effect to a removal spell, one that can hit
any nonland permanent, is not an effect we’ve really seen before. Well, we
have, almost exactly, in Exclusion Ritual, but it cost six mana, which
shows you how valuable this effect might be if that was the original price
for it.
If Ixalan’s Binding is left unchecked, it’s even much better than a Cranial
Extraction, since your opponent can draw more dead copies of the card you
exiled that they can’t cast.
Gideon’s Intervention is similar, but terrible against planeswalkers,
whereas Ixalan’s Binding is an excellent answer to planeswalkers. It’s good
against legendary permanents in general, since your opponent can’t have
more than one on the battlefield, and then when you remove it with Ixalan’s
Binding, they can’t cast any that were already stranded in their hand.
Verdict: Buy and hold! Don’t cycle your shares of Cast Out either,
since they can go in the same decks and might be better in the new
Standard.
Ya-ha-har! Now we be talking!
If you’ve come to parley,
you’ve to the right place.
Boneyard Parley only returns creatures, but other than that, the ball’s in
your court. You get to choose which pile o’ bones you return, and you can
even return your opponent’s creatures. It could be used in grindy mirrors,
or as a dedicated reanimator spell, albeit an expensive one.
Verdict: Grave Fact or Fiction is cool. Buy.
Interesting. Most people are way too afraid of random effects. Don’t you
know that chaos is a ladder? I think drawing three and discarding two is
straight-up better than just drawing a card, especially when graveyard
benefits are involved.
If we’re looking at Rowdy Crew being a 5/5 approximately 20% of the time as
a guess off the top of my head, that’s not bad, since a 5/5 for four mana
that draws you a card is some incredible value, and just as a 3/3 it ain’t
bad.
Verdict: Might look like a chaff mythic to some, but could end up being
something. Risky pick of the day!
Kills Gods, kills planeswalkers, instant speed, gains life.
Nice solid removal that’s going to pay dividends like an Utter End.
Verdict: Buy a little and add to your portfolio of decent four-drop
removal spells that exile.
Prowling Serpopard was a failure for beating control decks, since you could
simply cast a removal spell on it. The solution was to staple Scaled
Behemoth onto the kitty and create Carnage Tyrant.
Dodges Hour of Devastation and beats Torrential Gearhulk in a fistfight.
Kind of unkillable. Kind of unstoppable. Kind of unbelievable.
It all depends on how the metagame shakes out, since this seems like a
great answer to control decks or for the top-end of midrange mirrors.
Verdict: Sell! Buy! Sell! Buy? Sell! Good card, though.
Finally, a great answer to Aetherworks Marvel that we’ve all been waiting
for.
I think it’s time to gently begin offloading your Aetherworks Marvel
stocks, since this could finally be the card that keeps the deck in check.
…
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Aetherworks Marvel was banned?
Four months ago?!
My portfolio! I’m ruined!
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