(Reminder: See all the new cards as they’re revealed on DraftMagic.com’s Dark Ascension Visual Spoiler!)
Hello everyone.
Now that we’re all getting sick of triple Innistrad, Dark Ascension cards have finally started popping up on various websites, giving us a glimpse of what the next few months of draft magic (see what I did there) will be like. As usual, the first handful of cards spoiled are a mix of powerful mythics, new keywords, and interesting and unusually designed spells. What I’m going to do is discuss why “You’re a Mean One, Mister Grinch” is considered a Christmas Song. It’s irrelevant that the song is from a movie about Christmas; all it does is talk shit about the stupid Grinch these new cards and what impact they might have on the format.
BEFORE YOU START READING
Please comment on this article. I want to write much more often then I currently do, but the only way I know that my articles are being enjoyed/appreciated is from reader feedback. Thanks.
Also, I’ll be perfectly honest – I’m a comment whore. Every time I post a video or article I check back every 30 minutes or so to see if there have been any more comments posted. I crave article comments like a vegetarian vampire craves V8. So comment on this article, god dammit.
Strangleroot Geist
Undying seems like an insane keyword, and one that has some sick potential. Persist creatures were excellent in limited even though they came back smaller. Now not only do you get the original guy, but you get him back even bigger! Plus, one of the biggest drawbacks with persist is that it sucks against effects that use -1/-1 counters. Undying has no such problems, as your opponent is obviously not going to want to put a +1/+1 counter on your guy before they kill it.
Since undying is such a potentially annoying mechanic, most of the cards that have it will be designed very carefully. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a four mana 2/2 with undying, just as a base common in some color. This particular card, the Geist, seems like a very strong limited card to me. As a turn two play, not only does it instantly bash, but your opponent isn’t even going to want to trade with it. Why would you trade your Walking Corpse for this guy when he just comes right as a 3/2? I imagine this guy will be a reasonably high pick based, although I could be wrong, since he doesn’t really fit into any known archetype other than “attack you with my guys”.
I will admit, undying makes me a bit nervous. There is a ton of potential here, and Wizards tend to like to push the envelope these days. Persist was never a problem; sure, Kitchen Finks were everywhere, but they were just awesome, not oppressive. However, persist was back before mythic rares, and with mythics there is always the chance for the developers to throw caution into the wind and create something ridiculous just because they can. There is a lot of potential for abuse here, I just hope that they don’t get too carried away, because this could be a really great mechanic.
Thraben Doomsayer
Now we transition from a cool mechanic to a terrible one. It’s not so much the ability itself that’s bad; it’s the name of it – Fateful Hour.
First of all, that’s an awful name for a keyword. Just off the top of my head, they could have name it something like “redemption” or “reprieve”, and I’m sure if you thought about it for more than five seconds that you would be able to think of a much better name than fateful hour. I’m not at all ashamed that I play Magic, but terms like “the battlefield”, “planeswalker points”, and now “Fateful Hour” definitely push me in the direction of shame. There’s a limit to how much of a basement dwelling mouth-breather I want to sound like.
Secondly, the keyword Fateful Hour is not even a real keyword. Keywords for mechanics are supposed to explain what the card does, not make the explanation longer. When I tell you that a card has flying, trample, infect, dredge, soulshift, exalted, or most any other mechanic that makes sense, it gives you an idea of what the card does. The worst offender is the Eventide mechanic “Chroma”. Chroma is an example of how an unnecessary keyword actually makes the explanation of what a card does longer than it would be otherwise. Consider this exchange:
Player 1: I’ll pay six mana and cast a Speckled-Throated Burrowing Five-Toed Yak
Player 2: What does that card do?
P1: It’s a 1/1 with Chroma
P2: That doesn’t tell me anything other than it’s power and toughness. What does the card actually do?
P1: “Whenever your opponent casts a Treefolk spell, put X 0/1 Ferret Soldier tokens into play, where X is the number of hybrid mana symbols in the spells flavor text”.
P2: Get out of my house and never come back
The dialog could have been shortened significantly if Player 1 had just said what the card did, and didn’t feel the need to mention that it has chroma, which doesn’t even mean anything. Fateful hour is along those same lines. It offers no explanation of what the card actually does, other than it gets better when you are almost dead. Natural Spring is also better when you’re almost dead. Should that card have its own keyword?
From what I can see, the only reason they would need to have fateful hour listed as a keyword is so people who want to build a terrible deck with fateful hour cards can type it into a gatherer search and it makes their deck building slightly easier. I’m all for easy, but are you really going to build a deck that only functions correctly when you are at five life? Come on, don’t be a stupid jerk who sucks and is dumb.
Ray of Revelation
Ray of Revelation is a reprint from Judgment, and isn’t really anything special to begin with. The reason I’m mentioning it is because it might actually be a very key card in Block Constructed. With the printing of the new Burning Vengeance-type card (which I will get to later) as well as the Vengeance itself, Ray of Revelation is going to be a powerful weapon for players to fight that strategy with. Mark my words, children, mark my words.
Soul Seizer
This is a very well designed card, and potentially a very powerful one. Although Soul Seizer is almost strictly worse than a Mind Control, effects like this tend to create moments of tension, like when your opponent panics because they can’t block your one-power, five mana flier. This card is definitely good, but I’m not exactly sure how high I would pick it. There are so many creatures that stonewall it, and you can even throw something like a Dead Weight on it and effectively neutralize the Seizer. Even so. I imagine that I will be first picking this a number of times based on potential alone. Soul Seizer is yet another reason to main deck those Urgent Exorcisms.
Zombie Apocalypse
Now THIS is an interesting card. Off the top of my head, I can’t think of a card that has such a dramatic range of how good it can be. Zombie ‘Poc can be a one-side Twilight’s Call/Plague Wind, or it can do literally nothing at all. While the potential for insanity is clearly there, this is going to be a tough one to build around, mainly because it relies so heavily on what deck your opponent is playing. As of the time I’m writing this, there hasn’t been many zombies spoiled yet for Dark Ascension, and lets face it, it is really difficult to put together a viable zombie tribal deck in triple Innistrad. Plus, you have no guarantee that anything significant will even occur when you cast Zombie ‘Poc. Is it worth paying six mana to get back a Walking Corpse and destroy your opponent’s Hamlet Captain?
Still, we haven’t seen much of the set yet, and indications are that zombies are going to be heavily pushed as a tribe. My prediction for this card is that it will be first or second picked for a while at the beginning of the format, and then once people get let down by it a few times it will start to go much later.
Seacrest of the Dead
This is basically Burning Vengeance’s calmer, bluer cousin. It looks like a cool card to build around, but it is definitely worse than the Vengeance. Burning Vengeance is usually going have an impact on the game after only one or two uses. To get value out of Secrets you are going to need to be able to trigger it much more frequently, otherwise you just have a really slow Divination. Like Burning Vengeance, there will be times when this card tables out of your opening pack, and there will also be times when you say “fuck it” and just first pick Secrets and try to build around it.
Curse of Thirst
We’re going to try a visualization exercise:
Visualize your opponent playing a Curse of Oblivion.
Visualize your opponent playing another Curse of Oblivion.
Visualize your opponent playing a Curse of Thirst.
Now picture yourself not being able to kill them fast enough.
Picture yourself dying to this card.
Now visualize yourself throwing your computer out the window in a murderous rage.
Visualize drinking bleach.
Everwolf
I’ll translate the text for you non-Germans out there
Intimidate
Other Wolf and Werewolf creatures you control get +1/+1.
Werewolf creatures you control that aren’t Humans can’t transform.
This guys seems really, really good. Everwolf is this sets Imperious Perfect; an uncommon tribal “lord” powerful enough that no one would complain if it was a rare. I imagine that there will be a few times that you pick him highly and you get completely cut on werewolves, but the upside is huge. Probably a first or second pick, and definitely worth forcing the tribe.
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
This is not a card that I thought would ever get printed. I’m sure some of you remember Glowrider, and how it was just a bit too expensive to be playable. It turns out, all you need to do is take a mana off the casting cost (and arbitrarily add first strike as well) and the card becomes amazing. Out of all the cards spoiled so far, Thalia is going to have the biggest influence on constructed formats, especially when you consider all of Magic’s formats. She is going to be an instant player in Vintage, a key card in Legacy, and she might even make a splash in Modern. The Thorn of Amethyst ability is very powerful, and having first strike means that she can actually battle with other creatures, as opposed to just sitting there most of the time the way Gaddok Teag and Meddling Mage tend to do.
While I don’t think Thalia is an unreasonable card to print, I find it interesting to see this ability on a creature at the same converted mana cost as the original artifact (Thorn). Designing hundreds of new cards each year is a tough job, and it’s logical for designers to take inspiration from past cards. As more and more sets come out I’m sure we’ll see other cards in the same mold as Thaila. Even something like this:
Chalice of Life/Chalice of Death
While this is certainly not a good card, and under most conditions it is very unplayable, Chalice can actually be a surprisingly viable win condition for decks with one or more Gnaw to the Bone. Of course, since you draft the Dark Ascension pack first, you’re not going to know how many Gnaws you’ll end up with, but the Chalice should go around very late, so pick one up if your deck seems to be leaning in a graveyard-based direction.
Sorin, Lord of Innistrad
It should be no secret that I hate planeswalkers as a card type, and that I think introducing them into Magic was the single worst thing to ever happen to the game (in terms of game play, obviously not in terms of getting money from small children), but I’m going to let my own personal opinions fall by the wayside for this guy and review him semi-objectively.
This incarnation of Sorin is in many ways very similar to Elspeth, Knight-Errant. The +1 ability is almost exactly the same, except the token is better, and it accomplishes what a planeswalker needs most of all in order to be successful – the ability to protect itself. Other than Jace Beleren, who is really only good against control decks, any planeswalker that has been more than just a niche card in constructed has had the ability to kill or put a roadblock in front of opposing creatures. Sorin has that aspect covered. Like Elspeth, the second ability is also offensive, albeit in a very different way. Elspeth’s Angelic Blessing was not only powerful, but was another way to advance her in loyalty. Since Sorin’s is a -2, you are basically giving up any chance of reaching his ultimate, and commiting yourself to being aggressive with his +1.
The ultimate ability is the big prize on Sorin. Unlike Elspeth, who’s ultimate was often an afterthought, getting off Sorin’s -6 with the full three targets will be the main reason to play this card. The idea here is to use the +1 ability to protect Sorin long enough so that the ultimate fires off and you win. Seems fine in theory, but in application I’m not so sure.
Sorin is getting a ton of hype right now, and is pre-selling somewhere around $60. While I’m not even close to being an expert in standard (I haven’t played a match in a year and a half), I just don’t see where Sorin fits in right now. It’s not that he doesn’t have a deck, since he could probably be squeezed into Solar Flare, but what deck is he good against? Illusions doesn’t care about a 1/1 lifelink, and should easily be able to take out Sorin in one attack step, assuming you can even resolve him in the first place. Mono red laughs at Sorin, and the token can’t even block Stormblood Berserker. Wolf Run tramples or flies over to kill him. Tempered Steel swarms around him. Mirran Crusader… black vampire token… yeah. What about Geist of Saint Traft and his happy little angel token? I guess Sorin could be fine in the mirror, but is the mirror even good these day? I’ve hardly seen any lists with Forbidden Alchemy and Sun Titan in the several “Decks of the Week” lists that I’ve looked at.
I think the hype for this guy is way to overblown right now, possibly as a result of his similarities with Elspeth, also possibly because the card itself just looks like a Boss. Maybe there will be a new archetype created where he excels, but for now I wouldn’t let myself get too carried away.
Obviously he’s awesome in limited, but you know that already.
In summary:
The spoiler season has only just begun, and there will be plenty more card to go over down the line. For now we have some very powerful cards spoiled as well as a potentially metagame defining keyword. Seems like a good start.
Thanks for reading,
Egolf
Maybe I am still caught up in the flavor of the set more than most because I actually like the ‘fateful hour’. I agree that the mechanic probably will not have much impact on the game. However coming from behind to win a game is a thrilling experience. Going down to 5 or less life before stabilizing makes you very aware that you can lose the game at any turn in the future. ‘Fateful Hour’ brings a sense of do or die time.The clock is about to strike midnight and if your last effort to stay alive fails then darkness will overcome you.
And hey, its better than hexproof at least, right?
The rest of the article has been gone over enough with the people above.
Keep it coming.
Great article keep up the good work! maybe a new Chosen Five in the near future?
Zombie Apocalypse: should get more credit for limited. In U/B decks there should be plenty of opportunity to pick up some late Skab Goliath and Makeshift Mauler. Combine this with mill effects (Armored Skaab) and the and Zombie Apocalypse will be insane.
I know the focus of this article is more geared to limited. However have you considered chalice of life/death in martyr proc in modern? I just feel it has enough synergy with the deck that it could be used as an alternate win condition against control decks and the random teaching decks out there. Unsure if I want to main deck it as it seems poor against storm and jund or throw it in the sideboard. It is a huge consideration for the time being while I’m focusing on modern gps.
Hey Marlon, thanks for the informative, funny article. I know you mostly talk about draft, but with Dark Ascension Pre-release coming soon, could you write an article with tips for DKA/INS sealed? What cards in the two sets do you see interacting well together?
Egolf – play standard. I fucking hate standard too, but randomly and spontaneously/occasionally I find a deck that resonates with me. I’m sure you can do the same, somehow. I guess my name literally translates to “wolf lover”, so I’m actively trying to make werewolves (and elves, i fucking love elves but they’re extinct on innistrad, apparently. So they printed Ezuri and copperhorn scout to have a niche run when elf decks were less than popular and rotate out when more elves are finally released. Once again, fuck you wizards) work in standard. It’s a gimmick but it’s not total bullshit tribal, pretty much just Wolfrun Ramp with the ramp werewolf and other good wolves (mayor, daybreak ranger, huntmaster) to beef up the early game aggro and not be boring as hell.
But I digress. I really only started typing this comment because you mentioned how fiendishly you seek them out, but look what monstrosity you’ve constructed.
Thesis: play standard. LSV has shamelessly posted standard gauntlets and draft videos where he loses well greater than 50% of the games, so no one will judge you if you fall short. If still you maintain zero interest in standard, then fine, I will try to write a comment actually relevant to this article later. And no, I haven’t been drinking.
Happy friday the 13th
I’m brand new, only playing MtGO for a few days, so pardon me, but I don’t fully understand this text and it’s use from Immerwolf.
Werewolf creatures you control that aren’t Humans can’t transform.
This site and it’s videos have been a huge help and really have me anticipating taking part in a pre-release.
Shane. Creatures start as “Human Werewolves”, then transform into their pure “Werewolf” forms. Immerwolf prevents them from changing back into weak humans.
P.S. nice writing, you’re carving your path into the flesh of this world.
Thank you, that will be awesome. I just used a red/green werewolf deck on MtGO today and it was fun once I started getting the hang of when to not play spells.
I will watch your standard videos if you don’t play with planeswalkers. But alas, I’ll be forced to watch you play against planeswalkers. This must be why I really like the aggressive mana cost and functionality of Thalia. More expensive planeswalkers and Mana Leaks can only be a good thing for Magic as a whole. You’ve gone and done good Wizards! And of course, thanks for the article Marlon.
Marlon you comment whore you. Fantastic breakdown of these intro cards here. I love hearing your thoughts while analyzing cards/sets/drafting. I fucken die laughing through most of your vids and your articles are not much different lol. I laughed my ass off this whole damn article *while not visualizing myself drinking bleach*. Great time, great read, thanks again buddy! Keep ‘em up!
Damien
Keep posting things, you’re USUALLY the reason i come back to this site. Your draft content is the fullest, most informative and most entertaining. Your articles, while being less informed because you don’t play a lot of standard, they are still worth a read, and a chuckle or two. NEVER stop posting videos+articles.
Your article got a few audible laughs out of me. Great job.
Do you think they will or should start printing cards which directly interact with planeswalkers. Lets face it green has gotten the shaft on removal for years why not add destroying planeswalkers to greens slice of the color pie. Green likes life and nature and planeswalkers are thematically trying to control nature by casting spells and such why not allow green to destroy them ala naturalize. Is it conceivable that we could see more cards like despise except interacting with already played planeswalkers?
Great review. I think the drafts are awesome especially the older formats keep it up.
Good article. You are too kind to Sorin (did he threaten you in some way?). He just isn’t very good. Except in casual, where he is very cool. But really, I think he is just way worse than Elspeth, Knight-Errant. Being enemy color sure doesn’t help, since standard isnt very, well, friendly to non-friendly color combinations at the moment. He doesn’t even seem good in block. I think in the end he might even be slightly worse in practice than Ajani Goldmane, since pumping your guys toughness often is very relevant (Sorin, meet Curse of Death’s Hold), and if you are curving out with tokens then what you want is the pumping, not a 4 mana 1/1. And Ajani Goldmane is pretty lame, so what does that make Sorin…so you missed a great opportunity to get flamed here I think, now I get all the heat
Strangleroot Geist’s immediately visible drawback is that it won’t be as good with gtren white inn staples like travel prep, elder cathar, and gavony township, which sort of helps to balance the card a bit.
Sorin, while he will be decent isn’t justified at $60. Just a way for card stores to make money off of stupid people. In the current metagame he’s only even good in some sort of control mirror, but even then he can get hit by o ring. His -2 ability wants the deck to be aggressive but no black white deck can be all too aggressive so far.
Maybe this will change once all the cards are released and the environment shifts.
Curse of thirst or whatever is one of the worded cards they have printed this set. It’s like a terrible curse of pierced heart… Which is already pretty terrible…
Thanks for the article son.
Oh and scudder, green can already kill planeswalkers with beast within and bramblecrush.
Wow, thanks for commenting everyone! You guys kick ass! I’ll try and answer/address some of the comments in this long list.
@DanielWuso
I’m not really a fan of Hunger of the Howlpack. It’s essentially a creature enchantment with flash that will give your creature either +1/+1 or +3/+3, and I’m not sold on creature enchantments in limited unless they offer some sort of built in protection. Silent Departure is already amazing against green decks without giving them the opportunity for a 2-for-1. I would much rather have a Ranger’s Guile, since that doubles as a small combat trick and can also counter removal.
@Kit
Very nice. I appreciate the criticisms, both positive and constructive. A response to some of your points/questions
- The Thraben Doomsayer review was intended to be entirely a rant on the mechanic. The Doomsayer card itself is fairly boring; there are no nuances to what it does. You don’t need me to tell you that it’s a first pick in limited/bad in constructed.
-Curse of Thirst: if there wasn’t a joke to be made then I wouldn’t have put it in the article. That card is a pile of hot garbage.
Excellent comment though. I hope you post more in the future.
@Teraincognito
The thing about late Makeshift Maulers and Skaab Goliaths is that they exile creatures from your graveyard, which does not exactly synergize with Zombie Poc.
@Wcl
Interesting idea. That probably makes a viable win condition if there is room for it.
Thanks again everyone who commented!
Egolf
In regards to Fateful Hour, its not like conditional cards get played in constructed such as Timely Reinforcements.
I don’t think key words are suppose to say what something does. Just be a short cut for an ability that is going to get used on multiple cards. The only reason all those other key words are intuitive is because you have dealt with them for so long. Give this key words enough time and it will be an easy short cut.
Marlon,
Great job on the first run of reviews. Hopefully there’s more to come as the spoilers continue.
In addition to talking about how good/bad a card is depending on the format (e.g. “good in limited, bad in standard” types of comments) would you be interested in talking about a card’s potential in EDH? I know you’ve dabbled in EDH quite a bit, and it’d be interesting to hear your take on some cards…especially since every set seems to have “Praetor’s Council”-type cards (i.e. bad in both limited and standard, but fucking awesome in EDH).
Overall, I feel like the Innistrad block as a whole has helped to blow open the door for abusing the graveyard as an additional resource, and subsequently players may want to seriously consider devoting more deck space to Tormod’s Crypt-type effects.
@PC
Timely Reinforcements gets played because it gains you life and gives you guys. Fateful Hour has absolutely nothing to do with that
The entire purpose of keywords is to say what something does. It has nothing to do with how long I’ve been dealing with other keywords. I knew what trample, protection, flying, first strike, etc did as soon as I learned the game of Magic. In ten years you could tell me some new card has finest hour, and I still would have no idea what it does
Fatefull Hour really has a dumb name, but it isn’t a keyword at all. It is an ability word. Ability words are there so you can remember the circumstance (like “under 5 life) wich is needed for the static ability to be active, I don’t like ability words either but they are by no means keywords.
Btw. the article was fine and all, but I would much rather hear you talk :D
It’s like you mentioned in one of your more recent videos, most things can be better reflected upon when you are spontaneously talking about it.
What a about a Draft Magic Cast with you as some kind of host talking about new stuff with Josh, Scott, Abbey or Vito (or someone else if need be :P)? That would rule!
Good article, but I do have one criticism. You did say you wanted comments!
While you could certainly argue that “fateful hour” is a dumb name, and should be shorter or more intuitive, the alternative you suggested was to just not give it a name at all. That would be even more confusing, or if not confusing, a bit silly. The names aren’t there to explain the mechanic so someone doesn’t have to actually read about it first. They’re there more for convenience, so every time you describe a fateful hour ability you can replace “when you have less than 5 life” with “fateful hour” in your verbal or typed description. It’s not a massively helpful abbreviation as you still have to explain what happens when you get below 5 life, but it does help and gives more structure to the set as a whole.
You also compare it to a healing spell, saying that since that is better when you’re low on health, it may as well have a name too. I think you probably know that’s an irrelevant comparison and were just getting carried away trying to make an entertaining rant. I’m probably stating the obvious, but the reason it doesn’t have a name is there isn’t a specific trigger that makes it better, it’s something the player has to decide/figure out for himself. Imagine this as an ability description
“Fateful Hour: when you are low on life, this card is more relevant because it helps get your life total out of dangerously vulnerable levels.” That’s advice, not an ability.
Since in this case, there is a specific trigger (when you have less than 5 life) and indications are there will be a decent # of cards w/this trigger, it’s perfectly reasonable to give it a name. Comparing it to other conditional cards w/o names for their trigger also isn’t a valid comparison when those triggers are one-ofs in the set. I did enjoy the article, but that one bit irked me because it seemed like you were straying away from objective analysis into a knee-jerk anti-R&D rant (albeit an entertaining one).
I also feel like while your analysis of the new curse is probably correct, there is some indication (bitterheart witch) that they will have a significant quantity of new curses. Since we have one useful one already (curse of death’s hold) and one “curse fetcher,” it’s remotely possible that the card could be useful if they really went out of their way to try and make a “curse deck” viable. Like I said, unlikely, but you’re not being completely fair to the card by analyzing only in the context of what cards are already available. Spoiler cards should always get some leeway because of the potential for other cards that make the “bad card” good.
comment whore here you go love your vids you are the most fun to watch not bad on the article as well
Hi marlon. I’m a fan of your draft videos and I love your commentary as you play. This article is just as good as your commentary in your videos and I was really grateful to see some draft commentary on the spoiled cards as I find that a much more enjoyable format.
I’m still a very new drafter (started in like October) but wouldn’t the strangle root Geist fit really well into a green/black morbid deck as you can get morbid with him without losing a dude?
Thanks for all your great videos and I look forward to more spoiler commentary!
I’m really disappointed in all of these cards. I was expecting to good cards to take care of delver and human decks since they are all over the place and make the game unbelievably boring.
Marlon,
once again you’ve provided content that goes above and beyond expectations!! Good Job man keep it up!!
Egolf you’re the man. That is all. Comment out.
Fateful hour? hahaha tell me you can come up with a better name? Besides, theres so much flavvvvvor to the mechanic yanno? lol
Absolutely enjoy reading your article as well as your draft video. You always speckle your content with a witty sense of humor which is refreshing compared to other writers. Now…when is your next article coming out? Cant wait to get your view on the other cards in the set.
FYI I will not be drinking bleach
I don’t know why, but you are a hilarious being of a man. I literally sit there laughing out loud at your draft videos, there’s just something about how you sing the names of cards. Also, I’m not sure if you engineered it, but I like the name of the Chalice picture’s file. Chalice of Bad, original. Don’t stop being funny.
Good article, I like
When can we expect round 2?
Reading these in your voice was a treat
Praying to your Jewish god that he would move you to write more of these as the set is spoiled.
“Fateful Hour” definitely push me in the direction of shame. haha
Love the article Marlon. I think Sorin is overblown too, but I don’t play constructed. I hate this card because it is a pretty stupid bomb in limited, but I’ll be happy to open it to support my draft addiction.
vegetarian vampire craves V-8… That’s funny.