[SCD] Batterskull

[bruizar]

In that situation, is it better than Argentum Armor?

This just shows how you don't understand how important the living weapon aspect of Batterskull is.

[Koby]

Do it. This thread goes in my personal archive of mtglolz.

PS: For those that thought 5 mana was too much. Yesterday at SCG a Batterskull was blocked by a Silvergill adept and a Lord of Atlantis, killing germ, lord and adept. He then passed the turn and EOT bounced Batterskull / Replayed it for more beats. This was against Merfolk, a deck known for its combination of pressure / permission.

This scenario sounds no different than a SFM equiped with Sword of Fire/Ice attacking, killing the Lord of Atlantis, and drawing a card. final card counter: +2 SFM player.

I'm 100% certain that the deck with Equipment will beat the deck w/o Removal.

EDIT: and it doesn't require 8 mana reset either.

[Gheizen64]

White worse color in legacy?

As a red mage i'm crying in a corner :(

[Koby]

White worse color in legacy?

As a red mage i'm crying in a corner :(

Cards like Sulfuric Vortex and Everlasting Torment and Flames of the Blood hand exist you know.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

This just shows how you don't understand how important the living weapon aspect of Batterskull is.

Now don't be snippy.

I understand it; in fact that's the point. If you have lots of mana, Argentum Armor is clearly the much better card. So the selling point on Batterskull is that if you get to untap with Stoneforge you can, for two mana, put a 4/4 lifelinker into play.

But 4/4s aren't particularly big in Legacy, especially when they cost four mana in total, even spread over two turns.

I mean it's worth running a Progenitus when you can't cast it because if you cheat it into play you should very often just win right and there. This doesn't seem to be true for Batterskull. Certainly it seems less reliable than SoFI and Jitte, and very probably SoLS and SoFF.

[Rune]

We saw how bad the batterskull was in the top 8 of the legacy yesterday at starcity games. Sure dude punted but if he would have just gotten sword or jitte he could have equipped his crusader and swung in for major damage/counters. Instead he was stuck with a 4/4 that got wrecked by tombstalker and no 5 mana to equip to the crusader to win the game.

I was even wondering, why doesn't he just equip to the crusader and own everything.. Oh wait it costs 5 mana

He didn't have Crusader in hand when he cast SFM, he drew it later. Batterskull held Tombstalker back for 2 turns until the TA player found a 2nd Tombstalker. If he had fetched SoFaI in that situation he would just have taken 10 damage from a TStalker before even being able to attack back with an equipped guy. The Deadguy Ale player didn't punt by fetching Batterskull, he punted by making a terrible attack later in the game. IIRC, board looked like this:

16 life (active player)
SFM, Batterskull, Mirran Crusader

vs

12 life
2x Tombstalker

He chose to attack with both Batterskull and Crusader, and then bounced the equipment back to his hand at the end of his opponent's turn and put it into play again on his own mainphase via SFM. If he had attacked with just the Crusader, the TA player would have to topdeck something to win. Instead 2 swings from the double TStalkers ended up winning... So, the card was actually insane in this situation, but the Batterskull player punted, so it didn't matter.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

He didn't have Crusader in hand when he cast SFM, he drew it later. Batterskull held Tombstalker back for 2 turns until the TA player found a 2nd Tombstalker. If he had fetched SoFaI in that situation he would just have taken 10 damage from a TStalker before even being able to attack back with an equipped guy. The Deadguy Ale player didn't punt by fetching Batterskull, he punted by making a terrible attack later in the game. IIRC, board looked like this:

16 life (active player)
SFM, Batterskull, Mirran Crusader

vs

12 life
2x Tombstalker

He chose to attack with both Batterskull and Crusader, and then bounced the equipment back to his hand at the end of his opponent's turn and put it into play again on his own mainphase via SFM. If he had attacked with just the Crusader, the TA player would have to topdeck something to win. Instead 2 swings from the double TStalkers ended up winning... So, the card was actually insane in this situation, but the Batterskull player punted, so it didn't matter.

Um.

Unless he had removal, Jitte, SoFI and SoLS would all have raced Tombstalker in that situation with a SFM in play to equip.

If you're playing around removal and have infinite mana, Batterskull is great. So is Wurmcalling. In the scenario where you don't have lots of mana open and need to win faster, Batterskull isn't particularly powerful.

[tsabo_tavoc]

White worse color in legacy?

As a red mage i'm crying in a corner :(

As a red mage, I am proud of Red Elemental Blast.

[TheInfamousBearAssassin]

White is clearly not the worst color in Legacy, and is a solid contender for second with the rise of Landstill.

[Gheizen64]

As a red mage, I am proud of Red Elemental Blast.

REB is a fantastic sideboard card against blue... in blue decks :/

[SpikeyMikey]

REB is a fantastic sideboard card against blue... in blue decks :/

As a Bant aggro player, I've been wrecked by REB out of Zoo on several occasions. Swinging in with a double exalted RWM only to have it REB'd makes me cry.

[SpikeyMikey]

Um.

Unless he had removal, Jitte, SoFI and SoLS would all have raced Tombstalker in that situation with a SFM in play to equip.

If you're playing around removal and have infinite mana, Batterskull is great. So is Wurmcalling. In the scenario where you don't have lots of mana open and need to win faster, Batterskull isn't particularly powerful.

This. 2 turns of SoLS beats would've been pretty devastating. I didn't see the game, but I'd have to imagine against anything packing Tombstalker, you've had creatures put into the yard, either through Hymn, Snuff Out, Dismember, GftT or whatever. Usually decks packing Tombstalker don't pack StP. So SoLS reduces stalker damage to 2/turn (a relatively insignificant clock) and gets you creatures back. Then when you drop Crusader, it gets really nuts, since you're dishing out 8 a turn and gaining 6 life. 14 point swings are good. 8 point swings (Batterskull) are passable, but again, RWM will usually do that without nearly as much work setting it up.

Although if he has 5 mana to bounce and replay and a Crusader on board with the opponent at 12, why wouldn't he just equip Crusader and swing for 12? Crusader has prot: TA to begin with. Was this Joe or Caleb that we're talking about?

[GGoober]

REB is a fantastic sideboard card against blue... in blue decks :/

Lol, sigg'd!

I will chime in and say that I don't doubt that Batterskull + SFM combo is weak. In fact, in the situatino that demands a fresh body for 2WW over 2 turns, it's ideal and very strong, however the same can be said for many other equipments e.g. Sword of Body and Mind. The benefit that Batterskull has over such other examples is because a vigilance lifelink 4/4 is in MOST situation better. Yet however, the very same principle applied to Batterskull v.s. Jitte will tell you that you would usually want to tutor up Jitte in most games because it's the best card in xyz matchup. Batterskull will shine in certain matchup, but the whole point boils down to: is it worth a slot in the 75? That is a question of picking equipments for metagame purposes.

However, the proponents who love Batterskull tend to want to justify that this card should be played in every, if not most SFM list. This is where the people who don't support Batterskull are chiming in: how often do you want this equipment over something like Jitte/SoFI/SoLS? (I would say that SoLS is one of the best swords against TA because it recurs the threats that got discarded/countered/destroyed, it also races Tombstalker at every point in the game)

Also, don't forget that the people against Batterskull in this thread were also not pleased with the proponents comparing this card to vintage bombs in vintage, or other legacy bombs in legacy of 'equivalent' mana cost.

[Offler]

Trust me or not this reminds me my early beginnings with Arcanis. He is walking Ancestral Recall with possibility to bounce. Ou yeah. Allmighty card... or not?

batterskull is not colored... batterskull costs 1 mana less for playing, bouncing, and its "splashable" in each color. it does not draw cards, but deals damage and heals wounds...

damnt it. I wish, I would never see another Sensei's Divining top...

[Koby]

This is where the people who don't support Batterskull are chiming in: how often do you want this equipment over something like Jitte/SoFI/SoLS? (I would say that SoLS is one of the best swords against TA because it recurs the threats that got discarded/countered/destroyed, it also races Tombstalker at every point in the game)

To be fair, I don't even consider SoFF, SoBM, and SoWP to be playable either. SFM decks can also play Mirran Crusader who mimics SoFF's protection, and being a double striker actually has more utility than the sword. More to the point, SoLS gives protection from 2 common removal colors, which SoFF does not. The remaining swords don't give you a good ability for the card, whereas SoFI and SoLS do. SoLS is indeed weaker, and I usually run in the SB against specific matchups (TA, Junk).

I could potentially see myself playing Batterskull in those same bad matchups where Attrition matters, but not typically. It requires too many active components to actually become useful: 3+ mana, protection from discard, SFM staying alive to cheat it into play. That's a tall order against decks that run rampant spot removal and mana disruption.

I certainly don't care about Batterskull against Merfolk/Goblins, that is for sure.

[GGoober]

Rukcus: precisely my point. I was saying if you can make an argument for Batterskull to be great in certain matchups, then the same principles can be applied to the weaker equipments (SoBM) because in those specific scenarios, SoBM/equipment-X is amazing.

Batterskull is for sure very dependent on having a SFM in play. If SFM is not in play, then you get a 2WW Vigilance lifelink that came in 2 turns late, and maybe being able to tap out 5 mana to equip a dude when your pseudo-warmonk gets removed. If you have SFM, sure it will eventually generate advantage to win you the game, but it is still fundamentally slow, and in those slow situations where it works, I can only imagine a Sword with relevant pro-colors going in and racing faster (since they can't remove/block it). The only situation where Batterskull is relevant is if you need a relevant extra body and you had a SFM in hand. Those situations are fairly narrow for most cases (if they're not then you're building a creature-light SFM deck like Cawblade and you shouldn't attribute the +++ to Batterskull because that's an analysis on deck design, not the inherent power of the card).

[CorpT]

Here's the thing people seem to be misunderstanding about Batterskull, and believe me, I was extremely skeptical at first.

Batterskull without SFM (7 mana - requiring 5 in one turn) is slower than SFM + Jitte (6 mana - requiring 2 mana increments) but, SFM + Jitte is slower than SFM + Batterskull (4 mana - requiring 2 mana increments).

There are games, specifically against Merfolk where you don't have time to set up a SFM, maybe another creature and a Jitte. In that situation, Batterskull absolutely shines. In those games where you do have time to set up with Jitte, Jitte is obviously better.

Here's the great part: you're running SFM, so you get to pick which you get. In a bind and way behind? Get Batterskull. Got time to set up with a Jitte? Get Jitte.

In a 3-4 SFM deck, I would whole-heartedly endorse Batterskull as one of the 3 equipments to run (with Jitte and SoFaI).

[Koby]

There are too many factors to categorically assert or deny that Batterskull is good. It depends on your colors (perhaps Islands?), the opponent's deck, which point in the match you're in, do you have access to enough mana, do you need a creature (Germ), etc.

Batterskull is certainly strong by its own merits. However, I don't think it is auto-include in every SFM deck, nor does every SFM deck need it.

[brianw712]

Here's the thing people seem to be misunderstanding about Batterskull, and believe me, I was extremely skeptical at first.

Batterskull without SFM (7 mana - requiring 5 in one turn) is slower than SFM + Jitte (6 mana - requiring 2 mana increments) but, SFM + Jitte is slower than SFM + Batterskull (4 mana - requiring 2 mana increments).

There are games, specifically against Merfolk where you don't have time to set up a SFM, maybe another creature and a Jitte. In that situation, Batterskull absolutely shines. In those games where you do have time to set up with Jitte, Jitte is obviously better.

Here's the great part: you're running SFM, so you get to pick which you get. In a bind and way behind? Get Batterskull. Got time to set up with a Jitte? Get Jitte.

In a 3-4 SFM deck, I would whole-heartedly endorse Batterskull as one of the 3 equipments to run (with Jitte and SoFaI).

This. SFM into Jitte is extremely slow. Using up six mana to equip Jitte, only to have it nullified for one mana, can lose the game for you. Add that to the fact that Jitte usually takes two combats to really get going, and you can see why Batterskull can be better in a lot of tempo-oriented matches: it instantly pushes the race in your favor. I think Merfolk is probably the best example of this; against two lords or Kira, SoFI doesn't do anything, and Jitte needs three counters to do anything, and by then you're probably dead.

If you cast SFM into Batterskull, and the opponent STPs your SFM, it's only a one-mana tempo loss, and you still have the Batterskull to cast later on if it gets to that (not common, but not too unlikely either, especially if you run guys like Noble and Knight). If they STP the Germ token, it's a three-mana tempo less, still much better than the five-mana tempo loss of fetching Jitte.

[Grollub]

Easy, chief, you're a bit quick on the draw there. Try to relax and think of baseball.

You might be right, my post was intended as a friendly tongue in cheek stab at the people only evaluating cards in the extrenum cases. Apologies around if I came off aggressive/as a mister know-it-all.

Oh, I'm from Europe - we only think about football. ;-)