Hello everybody, and welcome to another edition of the Magic Show.
[The following is a transcript of the show, which you really should check out.]
I’ll be honest, I’ve felt a lot better. This past Friday my appendix and I parted ways, and I’ve been ornery and sore ever since. So please forgive me if this episode is a bit shorter or less coherent than others, I’m trying to slog my way through here.
But no matter. Today we’re going to go over the Biggest and Brightest Stars Of Future Sight!
That’s right, we’ll be running down my personal list for the best cards to pick up and trade for this Saturday. Now I know I’m slightly treading on my buddy Ben Bleiweiss‘ toes on this one, but I can’t help myself. This is my favorite time period in Magic, just before a prerelease, when the rumor mills are on tilt and everyone is salivating for the new ideas that come from Washington State.
Rumored Dilemma
Last Friday, Mr. Bleiweiss discussed his views on spoilers. He said, “The people writing those spoilers do not always have the best interest of the game at heart, often spoil cards incorrectly, and ruin the excitement of articles from people who put a hell of a lot more effort into spoiling a card then hitting cut, paste, and submit.”
And you can’t really disagree with him. The ethics of this practice alone are enough to get you shifty in your seats. I can certainly understand being very upset when Timbermare was spoiled incorrectly or when you spend weeks working on a preview article only to see it on MTGSalvation a week beforehand.
The final verdict? I still think that the rumor mill is the best sales tool ever devised. And better yet, in our Web 2.0 world, it’s not the company that’s selling the product that makes this possible! Nay, in complete contrast, they are legally bound to try and stop such practices!
Now I’ve been through a lot of set releases and each one is almost identical: You see something fantastic that turns out to not be true, you see something fantastic that turns out to be not-fantastic, and you get a good idea of how to play the set before you get there.
Is this competitive advantage? Yes. Could this also be seen as customer loyalty? I say yes. Do you have any idea how many hours of my life have went into checking and rechecking the rumor mills? I can imagine that thousands of other people are putting their time and effort into finding, speculating and talking about spoilers. Things that don’t even exist for purchase yet!
We gamers are a spoiled bunch, excuse the pun. While Planar Chaos seemed to be a strange exception, we’ve generally gotten our spoilers complete three or four days before the prerelease. This is no different. We have, as of this writing, a mere fourteen cards to go before we know everything in Future Sight. This is still days before the prerelease, weeks before cardboard will be sold, a month or more before the online players get a crack at it. Just imagine the customer loyalty and marketing genius that is a spoiler list.
The only thing that can make spoilers bad is a bad set. Poor Saviors of Kamigawa, you really were godawful, weren’t you? Even misleading information leads to discussion, debunking, and rethinking. It makes you realize how Wizards balanced things before letting them go into the wild (such as a 4/3 Cap’n Tickles) and after playing with the cards you almost always agree with their decisions.
The simple truth is, if we’re going to be fanboys, we’re going to act like it. That means pressuring others to breaking NDAs and only the strongest of advocates can resist the temptation to let others in on what will be rocking the game for the next few years.
I’ve kept such secrets myself, but I tell you it is no fun. So for what is fun, let’s go over my favorite new cards.
New Favorites
Here are the cards you want this Saturday:
Oriss, Samite Guardian
1WW
Legendary Creature – Human Cleric
T: Prevent all damage that would be dealt to target creature this turn.
Grandeur – Discard another card named Oriss, Samite Guardian: Target player can’t play spells this turn, and creatures that player controls can’t attack this turn.
1/3
Oh, I’m sorry, is that Orim’s Chant on a stick? At instant speed, and free to boot? This and the other Grandeur creatures are really, really awesome. They’re all “upside”, as they say, meaning there’s nothing bad about them. The green one, which we’ll get to, is even more nuts. If I were you, I’d pick up my playset of Infernal Tutors while they’re still in reasonable territory.
Seht’s Tiger
2WW
Creature – Cat
Flash (You may play this spell any time you could play an instant.)
When Seht’s Tiger comes into play, you gain protection from the color of your choice until end of turn. (You can’t be targeted, dealt damage, or enchanted by anything of the chosen color.)
3/3
I spoke of Hobbes last week, but make sure you get every copy you can. This guy will be hot, hot stuff for quite awhile. He simply hoses and hurts too many decks and strategies not to be a commodity for some time. From Standard to Extended, this guy could have a very lasting impact.
Delay
1U
Instant
Counter target spell. If the spell is countered this way, remove it from the game with three time counters on it instead of putting it into its owner’s graveyard. If it doesn’t have suspend, it gains suspend.
Delay is way, way stupid. It’s going to replace Remand when Remand finally leaves, and may do so before that. This card is incredibly unfair and frustrating, meaning it will be one of the Blue mages’ favorite weapons. This will end up being a chase uncommon, like Remand, which like former uncommon chase cards like Eternal Witness will eventually demand $3-$5 a pop. Foils of this card will be $10 or more. Get yours early.
Pact of Negation
0
Instant
Pact of Negation is Blue.
Counter target spell.
At the beginning of your next upkeep, pay 3UU. If you don’t, you lose the game.
Well, they went and did it… they gave us Force of Will back. Now, for those who haven’t played with Force of Will, it’s a ridiculous card that was just reprinted with a mana drawback instead of a discard one. This is a perfectly acceptable trade-off. This will be a chase rare for Vintage players, whose combo decks got ri-donk-you-luss, and Standard and Extended Tron players… well, they dine in hell with this and Delay on their dinner plates.
Take Possession
5UU
Sorcery
Split Second (As long as this spell is on the stack, players can’t play spells or activated abilities that aren’t mana abilities.)
Gain control of target permanent. (This effect doesn’t end at end of turn.)
I don’t know if people realize why Confiscate isn’t played as much anymore, and it’s because there’s so much enchantment removal, particularly the uncounterable kind such as Krosan Grip, that keeps it away from the meta. Well, with this spell, for a mere one more mana you get the permanent of your choice and it’s uncounterable and they can’t sacrifice it in response such as when you get their Loxodon Hierarch. This is one that may slip under the radar but is a control player’s best friend. It owns the mirror and it owns tricks such as Rebuff the Wicked or Avoid Fate. Foils of this will be very expensive in the years to come.
Nix
U
Instant
Counter target spell if no mana was spent to play it.
Damnit, I didn’t know this was rare. I thought this was a great common, but instead will be a chase rare. Why? There are plenty of suspend spells you want to take care of in block, but there’s also the new pact spells, there’s lot of things in Extended you’d like to take care of, like spells played via Mind’s Desire, and as far back as Vintage you’ll have Moxen, Land Grant, and Force of Will – er, I mean, “Pact of Negation” – to counter. This is a spell that has a long reach and doesn’t rely on the Suspend mechanic to keep it playable.
Minions’ Murmurs
2BB
Sorcery
You draw X cards and you lose X life, where X is the number of creatures you control.
While just an uncommon, Minion’s Murmurs will be popular in the Mono Black X archetype, which is either control or aggro depending on your outlook right now. Either way, good, solid card draw hasn’t been available in black in awhile, at least not tied to an Enchantment, so we’ll take what we can get. It’s no Night’s Whisper, but what is?
Korlash, Heir to Blackblade
2BB
Legendary Creature – Zombie Warrior
Korlash, Heir to Blackblade’s power and toughness are each equal to the number of swamps you control.
1B: Regenerate Korlash.
Grandeur – Discard another card named Korlash, Heir to Blackblade: Search your library for up to two Swamp cards, put them into play tapped, then shuffle your library.
*/*
Korlash was noted as ridiculous last week. He remains as ridiculous as he was back then. Get a set and enjoy. If it takes four prerelease events to get your shiny, Richard Kane Ferguson-esque playset, I would do so. They’re that good, that cool, and a great choice for the prerelease foil card.
Yixlid Jailer
1B
Creature – Zombie Wizard
Cards in Graveyards lose all abilities.
2/1
Ah, Yixlid Jailer. Get a set, grab every foil you can. This will definitely be a $5 uncommon before the year is out. Mark my words.
Magus of the Moon
2R
Creature – Human Wizard
Nonbasic lands are Mountains.
2/2
One of the creatures that me and Ben disagree on, I think this card is going to be a must three-of or four-of for Gruul builds, as it does exactly what we want Blood Moon to do but can also kill a person, something that Blood Moon can’t. Now I recognize that Enchantments are 1,000 more difficult to deal with than creatures, but there’s also these things called Signets that cause Gruul a lot of problems. Between Tin Street Hooligan and Magus of the Moon, we Gruul mages may still one day triumph over the evil Tron Overlords.
Molten Disaster
XRR
Sorcery
Kicker R (You may pay an additional R as you play this spell.)
If the kicker cost was paid, Molten Disaster has split second. (As long as this spell is on the stack, players can’t play spells or activated abilities that aren’t mana abilities.)
Molten Disaster deals X damage to each creature without flying and each player.
This spell is absolutely ridiculous. Easily one of the best spells in the set, this does what Demonfire couldn’t: deal with a creature swarm. The mono-Red decks, the mono-Green decks, they could all swarm the Tron player by virtue of the fact that Demonfire can only deal with one dude at a time. No longer. This gives Tron its strongest X spell to date – even stronger than Demonfire – giving the control player a board sweeper and an uncounterable win condition all in one. Wow, what in the world were they thinking with this thing? As if triple Red mana was tough to do in a world of Signets, duals, and Karoos?
This will be a $10-$12 spell overnight. $25 foils. You know the drill. This will probably end up as the chase rare from the set.
Pact of the Titan
0
Instant
Pact of the Titan is Red.
Put a 4/4 red Giant token into play.
At the beginning of your next upkeep, pay 4R. If you don’t, you lose the game.
Thanks to reader Douglas Bushong, we now have a fun Johnny/Timmy-esque combo: Djinn Illuminatus + this spell + Angel’s Grace. Enjoy winning in the casual room with that one.
Tarox Bladewing
2RRR
Legendary Creature – Dragon
Flying, haste
Grandeur – Discard another card named Tarox Bladewing: Tarox Bladewing gets +X/+X until end of turn, where X is its power.
4/3
Despite being the old Cap’n Tickles stats, despite being a bit tougher to cast, I think this guy is going to be making waves and an angry aggro deck could do worse than stick with Tarox. Three in hand is sixteen damage for five mana. When the Red/Black deck can Infernal Tutor a copy, eight damage for five mana isn’t a bad deal, and will frequently knock a player to single digits.
Tarox is solid, he’s a dragon so the Timmies love him, he’s got the Grandeur bonus for the Johnnies, and he’s a tournament-worthy card. I’d call this one a home run.
Thunderblade Charge
1RR
Sorcery
Thunderblade Charge deals 3 damage to target creature or player.
Whenever one or more creatures you control deals combat damage to a player, if Thunderblade Charge is in your graveyard, you may pay 2RRR, If you do, play it without paying its mana cost.
Despite being a Sorcery, this card remains created of pure awesome and will be the premier burn spell for some time. Incinerate may push this one to less than four-of, but it’s still going to get Radha to the top tables. Pick up you set soon.
Heartwood Storyteller
1GG
Creature – Treefolk
Whenever a player plays a noncreature spell, each of that player’s opponents may draw a card.
2/3
You know, they tell me great minds think alike. Take a look at this card:
War of Favors
2UU
Enchantment
Whenever a player plays a spell, all other players draw a card.
Know what that’s from? My own Magic fan set, Fires of Heaven, originally released in 2004. Yep, three years ago and this idea was already floating around. It looks like it’s been balanced in two ways: One, it’s on a more fragile permanent, i.e. a creature. Second, it only triggers on noncreature spells. This means that Mono-Green Aggro featuring our friends Scryb Ranger and Spectral Force will want this guy as a four-of sideboard card for the control match. You play or flashback Mystical Teachings and I draw a card? All while swinging for two? This guy is a fantastic casual and competitive card, I think.
Baru, Fist of Krosa
3GG
Legendary Creature – Human Druid
Whenever you play a land, creatures you control get +1/+1 and gain trample until end of turn.
Grandeur – Discard another card named Baru, Fist of Krosa from your hand: Put an X/X green Wurm creature token into play, where X is the number of lands you control.
4/4
Baru is a house. I mean a structure with four walls, a roof, and a central heat and air unit. The guy owns the board. His Grandeur ability is, arguably, better than all of the others combined, even the Orim’s Chant guy. Wizards is finally ready to give the best creature in the set this side of Venser to Green and I’m all for it. Baru is ridonk, he will be a mainstay in G/x beatdown decks for years, and his ability virtually forces you to get four of him. Get your set as soon as possible. Timmy and Spike just got a new best friend.
Glittering Wish
GW
Sorcery
Choose a multicolored card you own from outside the game, reveal that card, and put it into your hand. Remove Glittering Wish from the game.
You can’t review the set and not mention this bomb. It will greatly improve the value of your Temple Gardens and will be giving us G/W/B Rock decks for years to come. Thanks Wizards!
As for the new lands, you’ll need playsets of Keldon Megaliths, New Benalia (a.k.a. the Scry land) and of course the scourge of the east, Tolaria West. Also plan on getting sets of Grove of the Burnwillows, because first it looks badass and second it made Kavu Predator awesome, and Dryad Arbor because, not only is it the first creature land ever, it simultaneously made the dreams of many an amateur set designer come true. And that’s gotta be worth something.
Nimbus Maze is another big rare. It’s a dual land whose dual land-ishness is just enough to make it over ten bucks. As if those $22 Hallowed Fountains weren’t enough.
And that’s enough for this week. I think I’ve went over every highlight I saw in the set, and overall I think Future Sight is really exciting. It’s basically the keyword set, as we’ll look back on it, and I for one love the direction of the new card frames, the new card types, and even if we don’t see what a Planeswalker is, we have plenty to talk about in the meantime.
So until next time, this is Evan Erwin, tapping the cards so you don’t have to.
Evan “misterorange” Erwin
dubya dubya dubya dot misterorange dot com
eerwin +at+ gmail +dot+ com
Written while on pain meds. The good kind.