Quote Originally Posted by kombatkiwi View Post
1. Making creatures uncounterable doesn't seem that exciting because what creatures are you even playing? You don't care if they counter your Bloodghast or Nether Spirit and if you manifest Tombstalker or Angler then the 'uncounterable creature' aspect is irrelevant because you'll never have enough mana to flip them.
2. I don't think the deck would ever play Bane of the Living even if there is a combo that lets you play it facedown for 0 mana.
3. This point about jace is nonsense, if the 2/2 was a card that you really wanted to keep in hand then you wouldn't have manifested it in the first place.
4. Yup this is nice but will be awkward with Liliana sometimes.
5. Which ones?
6. Yes, this is the best reason to play the card.
7. Yeah this is cool, doesn't interfere with paying for Mishra's Factory / Cursed Scroll
8. Kind of? But a lot of the existing winconditions aren't very grave dependent anyway. For example you could argue this replaces Crucible, which is highly graveyard dependent, but Crucible acting as disruption by returning Wastelands is an extremely strong upside that this card doesn't have. PWs also are not graveyard dependent. So while I agree that not being GY dependent is good, I'm not sure how significant that is
9. Okay, but this is kind of marginal, it's only relevant after resolving a 3-mana artifact when you are otherwise hellbent in which case discardspells aren't going to be very effective against you anyway

1. Yeah being an artifact is worse than Enchantment/PW, K-Command isn't too popular at the moment but Abrade/Grudge are around
2. Yeah, being an activated ability is a downside, but the deck has so many other targets for needles (PW/Scroll/Waste/Factory) that I think it's probably ok
3. Yup this is a downside but applies to most cards

I think the biggest drawbacks are
1. Makes you choose between a 2/2 or a spell. You won't always topdeck a blank and every turn you do draw a relevant spell, this card won't do anything (or at least it forces you to make an awkward decision). It's also technically always going to be card disadvantage so you have to dig through a LOT of blanks for it to start to make sense.
2. Not disruption. In this slot there are many other cards you could choose that not only win the game but also interact with the opponent: Davriel, Last Hope, Crucible (indirectly), Cursed Scroll, etc. Most people are not playing cards that only win the game and do nothing else e.g. Underworld Dreams or Shrieking Affliction. This is arguably a bit better than those two, because the 2/2s can attack planeswalkers and also block, and a 2/2 every turn probably kills the opponent faster than Shrieking Affliction, but many of these other wincon options function as discard or removal (or as a mana source, in the case of Factory/Urami etc), while this doesn't.
3. You are still turning cards into creatures which can clash with the symmetrical anti-creature options like Smallpox/Innocent Blood/Toxic Deluge/Ensnaring Bridge etc

I think the card seems reasonable but I'm not totally sold on it
In response to your opposite attacking, you manifest Bane of the Living for free, then flip it for whatever, 3 Mana, 4 Mana etc. Seems pretty good to me. And I stated my post after play testing. You can argue the points, but I am speaking from experience, Jace bouncing creatues to hand is a lot less attractive when you could be bouncing a pw kill spell you didn't think you needed earlier, or a smallpox, etc.