Ixalan [XLN]

[ReAnimator]

So someone at Wotc is probably getting fired for this. Ixalan leak, way ahead of schedule. The Hour of Devestation one was more reasonable as we would have known that stuff in a week or two but this is something else, a whole foil sheet.

http://www.mtgsalvation.com/forums/magic-fundamentals/the-rumor-mill/778184-possible-leak-from-reddit

http://i.imgur.com/xaxvVFQ.jpg

[Undomian]

I'm pretty excited about Sorcerous Spyglass, a playable Needle in Chalice decks seems great.

[Gheizen64]

Ancient tomb, spyglass, name your only fetch is probably gonna be a play in the fall season :P

The fact that cost 2 also make it way more playable along with chalice, and the power to peek for a sure hit on an empty board is probably well worth the :1: extra mana in a lot of decks.

[Dice_Box]

I like it, but spyglass is unlikely to replace Revoker in the decks I run that have Tomb.

[Undomian]

I also can't wait to have more than one Jace at the same time at some point.

EDIT: Minus Jace, VP interactions

[Barook]

Ancient tomb, spyglass, name your only fetch is probably be a play in the fall season :P
Pretty much.

You can either jam Wastelands to protect your Sol lands or catch some of their fetches before they can play them. Or shut down one of their key cards. I like it.

Edit: The Banner kinda screams "ELVES", although I doubt it would have place in Legacy Elves.

Somebody also pointed out the card in the top corner is yet another fucking Jace variant, "Castaway". :mad: With Ajani showing up in Explorers, they still can't tone down the Gatewatch involvement. Goddamn it.

Edit #2: I do wonder if there are any practical applications for Arcane Adaption. Making everything uncounterable with Cavern of Souls would be a good start.

[Claymore]

That's the thing about the announcements earlier this week. It's all far out projections; the next set was already printed before they made the pledge to reduce the Jacetice league. No telling when the decision was made internally. Hence I think we can still see some more bans in Standard before the new-management dust settles.

The think I like about the Spyglass is with a deck like TurboDepths. Against a deck like DnT, do you name Wasteland, Vial, Karakas? Well if you have a turn 3 Lage kill, you can more accurately name exactly what will stop you. The card is pretty savage turn 1 against fetches too, so I wouldn't dismiss it from Stax lists.

[filln]

My jank brew senses are tingling...

4x Sorcerous Spyglass
4x Pithing Needle
4x Phyrexian Revoker
4x Nevermore
4x Gideon's Intervention
4x Meddling Mage
4x Gitaxian Probe
4x Gideon of the Trials
4x Swords to Plowshares
2x Approach of the Second Sun
22x Land

[Barook]

http://i.imgur.com/MMhlWMt.jpg

Second sheet, for those who want to decipher it.

[Kanti]

Pay 7 to draw 7 at instant speed? Meh. That Spyglass looks SICK though. And Pirates look cool too.

edit: What does that green merfolk mean for the set? You dudes see it? 1G Merfolk Shaman. Are we gonna see some tribes meshed, and just go on the other color? Only other green merfolk I can think of is that UG Elf Merfolk flying thing. Also Spell Swindle, whatever that is, sounds sweeeeeeet.

[Barook]

Reddit's thread has some translations of the cards they could decipher (https://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/comments/6hg2dr/xln_possible_leaks_they_seem_real_2/)

The green Merfolk has Megaprowness, aka Prowness with +1/+1 counters.

[rufus]

I'm guessing there isn't much in the way of viable things to do with it, but that cost-reduced Conspiracy is has my jank senses tingling.

[Scott]

So if the wording on Hostage Taker is correct, it can target itself, for some infinite ETBs/draw action? :really:

Hostage Taker 2UB
Creature — Human Pirate (Rare)
When Hostage Taker enters the battlefield, exile target artifact or creature until Hostage Taker leaves the battlefield. You may cast that card for as long as it remains exiled and you may spend mana as though it were mana of any type to cast that spell.
2/1

[Gheizen64]

Reddit's thread has some translations of the cards they could decipher (https://www.reddit.com/r/magicTCG/comments/6hg2dr/xln_possible_leaks_they_seem_real_2/)

The green Merfolk has Megaprowness, aka Prowness with +1/+1 counters.

Is this what the world has come to? Now gro is called "megaprowess"?

[Barook]

Is this what the world has come to? Now gro is called "megaprowess"?
It doesn't have a name, but that's what it for all intents and purposes is.

@Scott: Sounds like it if this is the actual wording. I wouldn't be suprised if this was another oversight of our dim R&D overlords.

Edit: Somebody on Reddit made this janky (https://i.redd.it/lche9y8uju3z.png) Modern combo.

Legacy has alot more :0: creatures in form of Kobolds. There are also non-janky X creatures like Hangarback Walker or Walking Ballista.

[Claymore]

So if the wording on Hostage Taker is correct, it can target itself, for some infinite ETBs/draw action? :really:

Hostage Taker 2UB
Creature — Human Pirate (Rare)
When Hostage Taker enters the battlefield, exile target artifact or creature until Hostage Taker leaves the battlefield. You may cast that card for as long as it remains exiled and you may spend mana as though it were mana of any type to cast that spell.
2/1

Yeah...if this is legit, Wizards printed a card that will always end the game in a draw if it is played on an empty board. Gonna be an errata out the gate on this one. This card is one of the few that is very in focus in the leak too, so the wording is very clear.

GG guys.

[rufus]

...

@Scott: Sounds like it if this is the actual wording. I wouldn't be suprised if this was another oversight of our dim R&D overlords.

They could reverse course on the ruling from Aligned Hedron Network to fix that problem and make the "self-exile until" a zero- or one-way trip.

[Barook]

Hostage Taker is pretty scary with Impact Tremors.

[Zombie]

Edit: The Banner kinda screams "ELVES", although I doubt it would have place in Legacy Elves.

Somebody also pointed out the card in the top corner is yet another fucking Jace variant, "Castaway". :mad: With Ajani showing up in Explorers, they still can't tone down the Gatewatch involvement. Goddamn it.

Edit #2: I do wonder if there are any practical applications for Arcane Adaption. Making everything uncounterable with Cavern of Souls would be a good start.

I'm also interested in Arcane Adaptation in Elves. Ever stop to think about how much of a pain Wirewood Symbiote being an Elf is (Mirror Entity says hi)? Or how trivial it is to go infinite with.

[LOLWut]

I wouldn't be suprised if this was another oversight of our dim R&D overlords.

Which area of WotC isn't dim now? R&D? Design? Art? Storyline? Quality control? Marketing? Online product? Secondary market? Broadcasting and e-sports? Stopping leaks?

[Barook]

Which area of WotC isn't dim now? R&D? Design? Art? Storyline? Quality control? Marketing? Online product? Secondary market? Broadcasting and e-sports? Stopping leaks?
They're still experts in fucking up at every chance they get. They're a terrible company and now that they can't dickride their growth numbers anymore, they're into deep shit. That makes it so satisfying to watch their blunders.

As for combos with the Pirate, it's a human, so it could go infinite with Champion of the Parish/Thalia's Lieutenant in some kind of Human Esper build with Cavern of Souls and some quality humans, including the white Recruiter to assemble the combo.

[Zombie]

They're still experts in fucking up at every chance they get. They're a terrible company and now that they can't dickride their growth numbers anymore, they're into deep shit. That makes it so satisfying to watch their blunders.

Watching Sony/MSoft console business decisions mid-2000s was similarily hilarious. The Wii Fit Balance board had a larger installed base than PS3 itself at some point :'D

[LegacyIsAnEternalFormat]

They're still experts in fucking up at every chance they get. They're a terrible company and now that they can't dickride their growth numbers anymore, they're into deep shit. That makes it so satisfying to watch their blunders.



but you won't be satisfied when the game dies.
besides if you hate WotC so much why don't you play another game? there are so many good card games out there it isn't even funny...

Use capitalization. -zilla

[filln]

They're still experts in fucking up at every chance they get. They're a terrible company and now that they can't dickride their growth numbers anymore, they're into deep shit. That makes it so satisfying to watch their blunders.

As for combos with the Pirate, it's a human, so it could go infinite with Champion of the Parish/Thalia's Lieutenant in some kind of Human Esper build with Cavern of Souls and some quality humans, including the white Recruiter to assemble the combo.

Nice. Let's throw in a Soul Warden too. I'm really hoping the language doesn't get fixed...

[Barook]

but you won't be satisfied when the game dies.
besides if you hate WotC so much why don't you play another game? there are so many good card games out there it isn't even funny...
The game won't die that easily.

Besides, I haven't found a good alternative yet.

Edit: Back on topic:
The new Jace has definitely a supertype. People are suspecting that it's Legendary - which makes sense, considering his ult creates two copies of him that aren't legendary.

If we dive deeper in the rabbit hole, then we might see an errata of Planeswalkers with an rules update that makes them all legendary, so they can be used as commanders for EDH. Doesn't sound too outlandish.

[MaximumC]

So if the wording on Hostage Taker is correct, it can target itself, for some infinite ETBs/draw action? :really:

Hostage Taker 2UB
Creature — Human Pirate (Rare)
When Hostage Taker enters the battlefield, exile target artifact or creature until Hostage Taker leaves the battlefield. You may cast that card for as long as it remains exiled and you may spend mana as though it were mana of any type to cast that spell.
2/1

Oh man. Please. Please, Wizards. Please don't screw this up by claiming you forgot to add a word or clause like you did with Marath, Will of the Wild.

LET JOHNNY RIDE THIS WAVE YOU STARTED WITH KALADESH JUST A LITTLE BIT LONGER! Pretty please?


I'm pretty excited about Sorcerous Spyglass, a playable Needle in Chalice decks seems great.

Spyglass is super good. You're playing Pithing Needle, except you're never going to be naming it blind. We've seen how powerful free information is with Git Probe, and now we have a Probe stapled to a Needle. This card is going places, and that place is my deck.

[Barook]

Spyglass is super good. You're playing Pithing Needle, except you're never going to be naming it blind. We've seen how powerful free information is with Git Probe, and now we have a Probe stapled to a Needle. This card is going places, and that place is my deck.
Except it isn't free. You pay premium for a Pithing Needle. Don't get me wrong, I like the card alot and getting around Chalice is fantasic, but it isn't going to see play just for the information alone at double the price.

There's a reason why Gitaxian Probe is heavily played/banned in multiple formats while it's instant speed counterpart Peek sees fuck all play.

[MaximumC]

Except it isn't free. You pay premium for a Pithing Needle. Don't get me wrong, I like the card alot and getting around Chalice is fantasic, but it isn't going to see play just for the information alone at double the price.

There's a reason why Gitaxian Probe is heavily played/banned in multiple formats while it's instant speed counterpart Peek sees fuck all play.

Fair enough, but I think Peek is actually a ton more playable than people give it credit for.

[ThomasDowd]

Pay 7 to draw 7 at instant speed? Meh.




I'm pretty sure Dream Halls wants a draw 7 once its in play, and doesn't care how much it costs.

I also think its a sorcery? Couldn't read it.

[rufus]

I'm pretty sure Dream Halls wants a draw 7 once its in play, and doesn't care how much it costs.

I also think its a sorcery? Couldn't read it.

Wouldn't Conflux or Enter the Infinite just be better for that?

[Claymore1]

Edit #2: I do wonder if there are any practical applications for Arcane Adaption. Making everything uncounterable with Cavern of Souls would be a good start.

Cheap casting cost rebel cards that tutors for rebel cards? :)

[bruizar]

Oh man. Please. Please, Wizards. Please don't screw this up by claiming you forgot to add a word or clause like you did with Marath, Will of the Wild.

LET JOHNNY RIDE THIS WAVE YOU STARTED WITH KALADESH JUST A LITTLE BIT LONGER! Pretty please?



Spyglass is super good. You're playing Pithing Needle, except you're never going to be naming it blind. We've seen how powerful free information is with Git Probe, and now we have a Probe stapled to a Needle. This card is going places, and that place is my deck.

I suggest we call this new probe-needle card Preeble from now on

[Darkenslight]

Except it isn't free. You pay premium for a Pithing Needle. Don't get me wrong, I like the card alot and getting around Chalice is fantasic, but it isn't going to see play just for the information alone at double the price.

There's a reason why Gitaxian Probe is heavily played/banned in multiple formats while it's instant speed counterpart Peek sees fuck all play.

It's interesting because it hits lands. That's a huge upside over Revoker. What you lose in beatdown you gain in shutting off outs. I see this as being eaily a feasible item in Lands or D&T.

EDIT: Timmiest Combo piece ever with Stuffy Doll:

Star of Extinction :5: :r: :r:
Sorcery (M)
Destroy target land. ~ deals 20 damage to each creatuyre and each planeswalker.

[Barook]

It's interesting because it hits lands.
So does Pithing Needle. I didn't compare it to Revoker since they do different things (blocking lands vs mana abilities).

Identified cards so far (http://imgur.com/a/L4YrQ)
Explore seems like a decent mechanic - it's kinda like a pseudo-scry or can even draw cards as long as it's a land.

Tucati Honor Guard 1W
Creature - Human Soldier
Creatures entering the battlefield don't cause abilities to trigger.
1/3

Torpor Orb with legs. Looks like Dreadnought got a new best friend.

[mistercakes]

So does Pithing Needle. I didn't compare it to Revoker since they do different things (blocking lands vs mana abilities).

Identified cards so far (http://imgur.com/a/L4YrQ)
Explore seems like a decent mechanic - it's kinda like a pseudo-scry or can even draw cards as long as it's a land.

Tucati Honor Guard 1W
Creature - Human Soldier
Creatures entering the battlefield don't cause abilities to trigger.
1/3

Torpor Orb with legs. Looks like Dreadnought got a new best friend.

so hushwing gryff for 2 mana. maybe there is a fun dreadnought deck with that.

[Cire]

Sunbird's Invocation
3R
Enchantment (R)
Whenever you cast a spell from your hand, reveal the top X cards of your library, where X is the spell's converted mana cost. You may cast a card revealed this way with converted mana cost X or less without paying its mana cost. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.

There must be some card - make fireblast - that this can be abused with?

[bruizar]

Sunbird's Invocation
3R
Enchantment (R)
Whenever you cast a spell from your hand, reveal the top X cards of your library, where X is the spell's converted mana cost. You may cast a card revealed this way with converted mana cost X or less without paying its mana cost. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.

There must be some card - make fireblast - that this can be abused with?

Sounds like something for Dream Halls

[filln]

Sunbird's Invocation
3R
Enchantment (R)
Whenever you cast a spell from your hand, reveal the top X cards of your library, where X is the spell's converted mana cost. You may cast a card revealed this way with converted mana cost X or less without paying its mana cost. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.

There must be some card - make fireblast - that this can be abused with?

Nice! Maybe a new toy for Vial Smasher the Fierce decks.

[rufus]

Sunbird's Invocation
3R
Enchantment (R)
Whenever you cast a spell from your hand, reveal the top X cards of your library, where X is the spell's converted mana cost. You may cast a card revealed this way with converted mana cost X or less without paying its mana cost. Put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order.

There must be some card - make fireblast - that this can be abused with?

That's a strong effect. Anything with cost reduction (Delve or Affinity) or alternative costs (Fireblast, FoW, Evoke) can do stuff with it. Good thing Gush is banned.

[(nameless one)]

So if the wording on Hostage Taker is correct, it can target itself, for some infinite ETBs/draw action? :really:

Hostage Taker 2UB
Creature — Human Pirate (Rare)
When Hostage Taker enters the battlefield, exile target artifact or creature until Hostage Taker leaves the battlefield. That card gains Stockholm Sydrome

2/1

Fixed it.

[ThomasDowd]

Wouldn't Conflux or Enter the Infinite just be better for that?

True. I don't play Show and Tell enough to know the payoff for big free blue spells.

[Lord Seth]

Yeah...if this is legit, Wizards printed a card that will always end the game in a draw if it is played on an empty board. Gonna be an errata out the gate on this one. This card is one of the few that is very in focus in the leak too, so the wording is very clear.

GG guys.This actually makes me question how accurate this leak is to begin with. They've so consistently worded such cards as saying "another creature" or "another permanent" or something else that disqualifies it from exiling itself (e.g. Restoration Angel's non-Angel clause, Banishing Light's statement of it being a permanent an opponent controls) that it makes it really unlikely they'd overlook it for this card. If it's real, it makes me wonder if there might have been some planned rules adjustment that changes the way the effect works that just hasn't been announced yet.

[LegacyIsAnEternalFormat]

This actually makes me question how accurate this leak is to begin with. They've so consistently worded such cards as saying "another creature" or "another permanent" or something else that disqualifies it from exiling itself (e.g. Restoration Angel's non-Angel clause, Banishing Light's statement of it being a permanent an opponent controls) that it makes it really unlikely they'd overlook it for this card. If it's real, it makes me wonder if there might have been some planned rules adjustment that changes the way the effect works that just hasn't been announced yet.

who would go through the immense amount of work required to fake these cards. i mean what is the reward, the possibility of being sued by WotC?

[Barook]

This actually makes me question how accurate this leak is to begin with. They've so consistently worded such cards as saying "another creature" or "another permanent" or something else that disqualifies it from exiling itself (e.g. Restoration Angel's non-Angel clause, Banishing Light's statement of it being a permanent an opponent controls) that it makes it really unlikely they'd overlook it for this card. If it's real, it makes me wonder if there might have been some planned rules adjustment that changes the way the effect works that just hasn't been announced yet.
Well, whoever made the picture stole (https://i.redd.it/pursgvgbnx3z.jpg) an entire foil uncut sheet.

Why is it so hard to believe that the current R&D just sucks so much that they fucked up again? Especially after missing Felidar Guardian, then dismiss banning it, just to ban emergency ban it two days later?

[tescrin]

I'm not sure the combo works. With ORing it works, but it enters and leaves. This could easily be a rules redefinition that this ability can't target the source of it to any effect because it's a logical contradiction. If it's only exiled while it's on the battlefield, it can't enter exile itself and then trigger a leave because it's not a trigger. It's a while condition that specifically cannot be (mathematically or logically) satisfied if it targets itself.

Remember, the second half *isn't* a trigger it's a duration, specifically a duration of '0' because the card can never both be exiled and on the battlefield at the same time. You're probably just seeing the results of Tabek debugging the game and finally putting that work into play.

EDIT: Which is to say, the new template has been around for awhile and he probably realized that the new "duration" template takes the abuse case away because it's a logical contradiction; meaning they can stop wording it as "another."

EDIT2: While somewhat uninteresting; this means that when you look at Banisher Priest the "leave" condition happens *when* a thing kills it; not after. So it's the same motion to have the next thing ETB as the priest dies. You can't stifle it or respond until the creature is in play; which actually could have some really interesting use cases with "As Enters" permanents like revoker

[Barook]

EDIT: Timmiest Combo piece ever with Stuffy Doll:

Star of Extinction :5: :r: :r:
Sorcery (M)
Destroy target land. ~ deals 20 damage to each creatuyre and each planeswalker.
Or Mogg Maniac to make it a bit cheaper.

[Lord Seth]

Well, whoever made the picture stole (https://i.redd.it/pursgvgbnx3z.jpg) an entire foil uncut sheet.

Why is it so hard to believe that the current R&D just sucks so much that they fucked up again? Especially after missing Felidar Guardian, then dismiss banning it, just to ban emergency ban it two days later?Because this is dramatically different than the Felidar Guardian stuff, as it requires them to ignore their own templating they've been doing for a long time and ignore a card's interaction with itself (rather than an interaction between two different cards, one of which was probably disregarded as nothing more than Limited fodder). All the cards with this effect make a point to not allow you to exile themselves with it. It'd be like if they suddenly had a "draw a card at the beginning of the next turn's upkeep" on a card after years and years and years of having cantrips occur immediately. They've had some screwups, but I don't think they'd goof something like this up; this isn't a case of missing an interaction, this is willfully going against your own rules. If it's a real card, I fully expect that they were planning to have some rules change of some kind and it was pre-empted by this leak.

[Bobmans]

Are those sheets for real or what?

Verstuurd vanaf mijn SM-G935F met Tapatalk

[Kage]

There's absolutely nothing that would indicate that they are fake.

[Dice_Box]

Well fuck. Someone is going to get actually fucking arrested over this. I am all for knowing about something ahead of time, it's fun to know what's coming, but this feels wrong. Not even God book in New Phyrexian wrong, Wizards themselves played a part in that, as in fucking should never have happened, criminal liability levels of wrong.


For the record, the process for leaks here is: If you have something you shouldn't and you desperately want to post it, take it elsewhere.
If you have found something on a separate site and it's now in the wild your in the clear. I want this site to have nothing to do with Wizards looking for information on a cracked seal.

[TsumiBand]

I'm not sure the combo works. With ORing it works, but it enters and leaves. This could easily be a rules redefinition that this ability can't target the source of it to any effect because it's a logical contradiction. If it's only exiled while it's on the battlefield, it can't enter exile itself and then trigger a leave because it's not a trigger. It's a while condition that specifically cannot be (mathematically or logically) satisfied if it targets itself.

Remember, the second half *isn't* a trigger it's a duration, specifically a duration of '0' because the card can never both be exiled and on the battlefield at the same time. You're probably just seeing the results of Tabek debugging the game and finally putting that work into play.

EDIT: Which is to say, the new template has been around for awhile and he probably realized that the new "duration" template takes the abuse case away because it's a logical contradiction; meaning they can stop wording it as "another."

EDIT2: While somewhat uninteresting; this means that when you look at Banisher Priest the "leave" condition happens *when* a thing kills it; not after. So it's the same motion to have the next thing ETB as the priest dies. You can't stifle it or respond until the creature is in play; which actually could have some really interesting use cases with "As Enters" permanents like revoker

This was what I started to think a little while after seeing the card and honestly I think this is the more likely answer. This is either a natural expression of the current rules, or a slight modification that makes it so they don't need to continually say "another target creature" on effects that would 99% of the time as written be directly to anything but itself anyway.

[Ronald Deuce]

Pirates, PIIIIIIIRATES! Fuck this game.

[mistercakes]

Pirates, PIIIIIIIRATES! Fuck this game.


rishadan cutpurse

[rufus]

I'm not sure the combo works. With ORing it works, but it enters and leaves. This could easily be a rules redefinition that this ability can't target the source of it to any effect because it's a logical contradiction. If it's only exiled while it's on the battlefield, it can't enter exile itself and then trigger a leave because it's not a trigger. It's a while condition that specifically cannot be (mathematically or logically) satisfied if it targets itself. ...

Check out the gatherer rulings on Aligned Hedron Network.

[TsumiBand]

Check out the gatherer rulings on Aligned Hedron Network.

I'm kind of hoping that it's more of a signal that they're closing this particular kind of loop because in the case of a single card printing it feels fucking weird to always have to put "exile another target thing" just so you're not printing creatures that aren't able to be played on an empty board, or something?

Like.. it's not exactly the same, but like with counterspells, it's just a rule of the game that it can't target itself when you're declaring targets even though it's technically already on the stack, right -- so maybe there's some weird shift in the rules coming that makes creatures work in a similar kind of way? Like maybe they aren't actually "all the way in play" until all their abilities resolve? But maybe that just breaks Gating, I mean I don't know. It just seems like a really weird syntactic error if it really is some kind of durdly one-card combo with itself that just happens to draw the game. Then again I guess they went ahead and printed Marath not very long ago, so maybe anything's possible and I have no idea.

[MaximumC]

I'm kind of hoping that it's more of a signal that they're closing this particular kind of loop because in the case of a single card printing it feels fucking weird to always have to put "exile another target thing" just so you're not printing creatures that aren't able to be played on an empty board, or something?

Like.. it's not exactly the same, but like with counterspells, it's just a rule of the game that it can't target itself when you're declaring targets even though it's technically already on the stack, right -- so maybe there's some weird shift in the rules coming that makes creatures work in a similar kind of way? Like maybe they aren't actually "all the way in play" until all their abilities resolve? But maybe that just breaks Gating, I mean I don't know. It just seems like a really weird syntactic error if it really is some kind of durdly one-card combo with itself that just happens to draw the game. Then again I guess they went ahead and printed Marath not very long ago, so maybe anything's possible and I have no idea.

That sounds hard to do. What, are we going to rule that permenants cannot be the target of their own effect? Just imagine how many cards get absolutely wrecked by that kind of rule. I can't imagine they would do this.

I think we've got precedent for this just being a mistake.

[Ronald Deuce]

rishadan cutpurse

There's a big difference between pirates as a feature and "Pirates, PIIIIRATES!"

Still no goddamned Return to Sarpadian Empires.

[Lord Seth]

Well fuck. Someone is going to get actually fucking arrested over this. I am all for knowing about something ahead of time, it's fun to know what's coming, but this feels wrong. Not even God book in New Phyrexian wrong, Wizards themselves played a part in that, as in fucking should never have happened, criminal liability levels of wrong. They've caught and arrested who did it? Who? Where?

[Kanti]

This was what I started to think a little while after seeing the card and honestly I think this is the more likely answer. This is either a natural expression of the current rules, or a slight modification that makes it so they don't need to continually say "another target creature" on effects that would 99% of the time as written be directly to anything but itself anyway.

Doesn't the card just exile itself, come into play, exile itself, come into play, and the caster needs to choose when to end the loop? Also, doesn't this just give you infinite life with Essence Warden?

New 2-card combo with any CiP effect? Infi damage on Pandemonium, etc? Is this the worse case scenario for the card, a 2UB creature that gives infinite life with Essence Warden? If so, please sign me up.

edit: Can someone please confirm this shit please? If it's infinite ETB triggers but I can't draw the game. This creature is an entire new archetype in itself if so, and a potentially powerful one at that as it's a fairly simple A+B combo.

[TsumiBand]

That sounds hard to do. What, are we going to rule that permenants cannot be the target of their own effect? Just imagine how many cards get absolutely wrecked by that kind of rule. I can't imagine they would do this.

I think we've got precedent for this just being a mistake.

I'll be honest I'm just spitballing. It may even be the case that I need to believe that they wouldn't screw up THIS bad, because this kind of wording on this effect is almost in the ballpark of printing a creature without power and toughness

[Barook]

Doesn't the card just exile itself, come into play, exile itself, come into play, and the caster needs to choose when to end the loop? Also, doesn't this just give you infinite life with Essence Warden?

New 2-card combo with any CiP effect? Infi damage on Pandemonium, etc? Is this the worse case scenario for the card, a 2UB creature that gives infinite life with Essence Warden? If so, please sign me up.

edit: Can someone please confirm this shit please? If it's infinite ETB triggers but I can't draw the game. This creature is an entire new archetype in itself if so, and a potentially powerful one at that as it's a fairly simple A+B combo.
What is there to confirm? You know as much as we do.

Even when you don't go infinite right on the spot, stealing an efficient creature or equipment sounds pretty good. As soon as you cast it, it doesn't matter if Hostage Taker gets removed, you will still keep the stolen permanent.

Instead of arguing how Wizards can fuck up this bad again, we should at least think about what shell could get the most milage out of it.

It's UB, so U means Brainstorm/FoW and possibly other cantrips, B means DRS. Welp, that looks familiar - oh, the joys of Legacy deckbuilding. :rolleyes:

Edit: I just realized that Esper Soul Sisters with this is going to be the shit in Modern. I'd keep my eyes on the prices.

[Kanti]

What's the ruling if I am milling someone and hit Emrakuls with this thing? How many times can I mill them? When does 4 Horseman ruling come into effect and stop me from milling my opponents deck until he has the remaining Emrakuls on top of his library with every other card in his library milled?

Also, isn't all the talk about drawing the game irrelevant because attempting that loop would constitue "slow play" and you need to add a finite number to the whole thing?

edit: bless my soul, I just ordered x10 foil Altar of the Brood. Hopefully they at most errata this shit to make it so it can't draw on an empty board. Godspeed.

[Lord Seth]

Doesn't the card just exile itself, come into play, exile itself, come into play, and the caster needs to choose when to end the loop?If it said you "may" exile, that would be the case, but it doesn't (it says "may" but that refers to casting the exiled card), so you're required to choose a target when it comes into play. So if that wording is correct, and there's no rules change, then on an empty board it creates an infinite loop that ends the game.

Or so is my understanding of the rules.

[Noctalor]

Old-Growth Dryads
G
Creature - Dryad (R)
When ~ enters the battlefield, each opponent may search his or her library for a basic land card, put it onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle his or her library.
3/3

I feel like this card has the potential to be relevant

[Gheizen64]

Old-Growth Dryads
G
Creature - Dryad (R)
When ~ enters the battlefield, each opponent may search his or her library for a basic land card, put it onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle his or her library.
3/3

I feel like this card has the potential to be relevant

Not really, Nacatl isn't playable, and this is arguably almost always worse.

Needed forest-walk or an ability of any kind, or to be a 4/4. It's a really neat design though. They could go for more spells with this "drawback" on it as well. More Vet. Explorer effects could make nic-fit an actually relevant effect. If this is a theme of the expansion i'd LOVE it. Need more basic-promoting cards in the game. Fetches need to be toned down a bit.

[rufus]

Not really, Nacatl isn't playable, and this is arguably almost always worse. ...

At some point you can start playing 'exhaust the basics.' Either with Veteran Explorer or with Path to Exile and Ghost Quarter.

Even so, this seems more like an EDH hug card than anything else.

[tescrin]

@ New nacatl card
It seems alright. A backwards Rogue Elephant that punishes people if they don't play any basics, or only play one, etc. Works well with Weathered Wayfarer effects too; though the tempo loss will hurt. Not sure what to think. It's nice that it's not in Naya which is why I think it has potential.

@ People arguing about rules
I hadn't seen Aligned Hedron Network/rulings but I also feel like that ruling is just wrong. It's logically/mathematically is not consistent with itself. If it exiles itself, it can't possibly be in exile because it's duration is already used up. They literally have their own rules wrong there based on old templating. There is no trigger to allow the permanents to come back and retrigger, nor is there the ability for it to exile itself and come back in, it's a contradiction. Given that Tabek is a Logic Nerd like myself (computer science) my guess is that he's fixing this somehow; likely by stating that if the effect would exile itself, nothing happens because the duration of '0' cancels itself out. Please remember that there is no trigger upon leaving; it happens without even checking state based effects, *without the stack.* It just occurs at the exact same time, so if it exiles itself at the same time it's putting itself back into play nothing should happen. This is what logical contradictions do. Again, please note how if you kill a banisher priest that is holding a Phyrexian Revoker; there is no point in time where you can stop the revoker from coming into play, nor can you stop it from naming things. [EDIT: Compare this to an O-Ring; where you can stifle the leave-trigger play a containment priest, or some other effect that uses the stack.]

Just like TNN or Revoker name things *at the same time* they come in, the banishing rules (why didn't they keyword this?) happen concurrently. I get that a I'd be ruled against currently by AHN's ruling and that my interpretation of current rules is not how it works despite it meaning they have a built in divide-by-zero clause.

We'll find out in a short bit whether it's:
* Fake
* Indicative of a minor rules change about '0' duration effects
* Actually a mistake
* something else

[Kanti]

The big red light on it is that it draws on an empty board. Like land, Dark Ritual, Lotus Petal, Pirate, onto g2? Makes no sense. I am hoping they don't change it too much though, as there are just so many ridiculous interactions with this thing. I want Woldgorger Pirate to be real. It enables x100 combos.

edit: the more I look at this, the more I think it's a misprint or something. They are just gonna add the word "another" to it, and it's gonna be a great card in Vintage, as 2UB to take control of an artifact is schweeeeet. It's basically Nekrataal+Control Magic rolled into one. Very blue/black effect, great design if they remember to add "another" on it. Though I really wish they add "you may" so I can live in combo winterland.

edit2: am i right to think I can cast this, target a creature, then once it resolves cast that creature before passing priority? So even if they exile my Hostage Taker, I can still use mana of any color? Schweeeeeeeet, if so.

[Dice_Box]

Here's the thing, if it is real and they plan to change the rules, all is good. If it's real and they missed it, it's likely to get fixed now. If it's fake it's not a problem anyway. No matter the situation, I don't see this becoming an issue.

[Lava Snacks]

Here's the thing, if it is real and they plan to change the rules, all is good. If it's real and they missed it, it's likely to get fixed now. If it's fake it's not a problem anyway. No matter the situation, I don't see this becoming an issue.

What would be the actual rules change though? Anything I can think of seems sloppay.

[MorphBerlin]

I don't think you will be able to go infinite with this. I guess if you target itself it will never leave the Battlefield. Same if you kill Dragonlord Silumgar in response to his trigger

[Gheizen64]

What would be the actual rules change though? Anything I can think of seems sloppay.

Either it stay exiled because it's the last step before it loops, you lose the game because a draw caused by an infinite loop = loss for the player causing it, or they simply add a go-like rule where you can't choose an option that regress the game to a previous state, aka targeting itself is illegal and it stay into play.

[tescrin]

What would be the actual rules change though? Anything I can think of seems sloppay.

I realize you may have read my other two posts; but what is sloppy about something like:

* "If an effect has a duration and would cancel that duration as a result of the effect, that effect is countered."

or
* "Duration effects can never choose a target that would cause the duration to be canceled" or even

or the best so far I think
* "if an effect would cause the same non-token permanent to both leave and enter the battlefield or the same spell card to both leave and enter the stack, the actions cancel and the permanent or spell instead doesn't leave or enter the battlefield as a result of that effect."

This is how they deal with -1/-1 counters and +1/+1 counters effectively and how they deal with counters not targeting themselves (which you can't do even with a Misdirection and thus has nothing to do with the order you declare targets/etc and place things on the stack.)


P.S.
An aside; I do realize why they ruled it that way, and I now believe it's correct despite making no sense. Basically the permanent leaves and enters the battlefield at the exact same time*, causing it to count as entering the battlefield and the full effect from the previous trigger having resolved.

*[Note: this is not the same as Flickering, which leaves and then enters but happens to be contained within the same clause and thus has no space to play with the stack. This is actually the same permanent both leaving and entering at the same time.]

[Lemnear]

What's the ruling if I am milling someone and hit Emrakuls with this thing? How many times can I mill them? When does 4 Horseman ruling come into effect and stop me from milling my opponents deck until he has the remaining Emrakuls on top of his library with every other card in his library milled?

The moment you try to shortcut and can't name the number of required iterations for the loop and a definitive outcome.

[TsumiBand]

Given that Tabek is a Logic Nerd like myself (computer science) my guess is that he's fixing this somehow; likely by stating that if the effect would exile itself, nothing happens because the duration of '0' cancels itself out. Please remember that there is no trigger upon leaving; it happens without even checking state based effects, *without the stack.* It just occurs at the exact same time, so if it exiles itself at the same time it's putting itself back into play nothing should happen.

This makes sense. The object changes zones for exactly 0 time per its own ability and so its ability resolves having done nothing. And since it technically never left play its ETB doesn't re-trigger so there is no infinite loop.

[Claymore]

One reason we may even be seeing this leak is they realized the broken card after it went to the printers, so they had to scrap the whole run instead of having another PR fuck up out the gates.

Past that, whatever story you want. Disgruntled operator who got told to scrap production and go home cause the customer fucked up, foil sheet heading to the trash so someone scooped it up, etc.

I don't think they'd come up with some convoluted computer programming logic puzzle to explain to a 11 year old who drafts this, plays it on an empty table, and is told it doesn't do anything. Not that creating an infinite loop is any better of course...but wizards wants cards that you can walk through by reading the text and following the instructions.

[MaximumC]

The moment you try to shortcut and can't name the number of required iterations for the loop and a definitive outcome.

That's partially right. Here's an exerpt from my article about Loops, perpetually a work in progress:

This section explains why you can't shortcut the Four Horseman loop:



A. The Problem of Indeterminate Loops.

The best example of such a loop occurs (and comes up frequently on Magic forums) in the context of the much-maligned “Four Horseman” deck. You can see a copy of this deck performing well in Legacy recently if you look up Jeff Liu’s deck, which came in 17th place at the September 16, 2012 Star City Games Legacy Open. The deck functions by resolving Basalt Monolith and Mesmeric Orb. Since you can tap the Monolith for 3 mana, and spend that mana to untap the Monolith again, you can trigger the Orb as many times as you like.

The deck’s goal is to mill a Blasting Station, at least three Narcomeboas, Sharuum the Hegemon, and a Dread Return. Once it does that, it puts the Narcomebias into play, sacrifices them to Dread Return to return Sharuum, who brings back the Blasting Station. This leaves you with a bunch of Narcomebias in the yard. No problem; just keep tapping your Monolith and keep milling yourself until you hit an Emrakul, the Aeons Torn. When she hits the yard, you will shuffle those lovely Narcobmebias back into your library, where you can mill them back into play and start feeding them to the Blasting Station to ping your opponent to death.

There’s a random element to all of these moving parts, however: the order of cards in your shuffled library. Consider what happens if the Four Horseman player mills an Emrakul before the other half-dozen cards it needs to be in the yard. Emrakul’s shuffle trigger will go on the stack next time the player has priority. The player can keep milling in response, certainly, but the stack will never be empty until Emrakul’s trigger finally resolves. That’s a problem, because Dread Return in a Sorcery, and you cannot cast Sorceries until the stack is empty. The upshot is that player shuffles the yard back into the library and try again from scratch if Emrakul arrives early.

In theory, the player could keep doing this as much as they like, just as someone could keep rolling a twenty-sided dice until they hit a 1. But, since the outcome of each roll or shuffle is based on chance, there’s no way to pick a specific number of iterations around the loop that will be required in order to accomplish the desired graveyard order. Worse still, there’s no way to know, in advance, exactly what will be in the graveyard or in the library when the win condition finally comes up.

B. Winning Eventually Is Not Enough For a Shortcut.

Fans of the Four Horseman will be quick to point out that, if the deck was given infinite time, then it eventually would reach the necessary conditions to win. Put more precisely: for any arbitrarily small probability X, you could calculate a number of iterations around the Four Horseman loop that would bring the probability of failure after that many iterations below X. Since the deck will eventually win, given enough time, the player should be allowed to propose a shortcut without specifying the particular finite number of iterations or the particular board states passed through to get there, or so the argument often goes.

This suggestion fails for two reasons. First, the shortcut rules do not allow you to shortcut where you can prove there is a vanishingly small chance of getting the result you want. The mathematical concept of a “limit” is not contained in the Rules. Since you cannot specify a number of iterations that will precisely get you to a specific board state, you cannot use the shortcut Rules.

The second flaw with this argument is that it ignores the second part of the shortcut rule: the opponent’s option to shorten it. Perhaps, by way of illustration, the opponent wishes to stop the combo when the last two cards in the pilot’s library are the two Emrakuls and then attempt to exile them to deck the opponent. It is impossible for the players to know how many iterations will occur before this state is reached. It is also impossible to know whether this state will happen before or after the Four Horseman pilot hits his win condition.

This is why it is so critical that a shortcut involve both a finite, specified number of iterations and a definite, predictable board state during and after the loop. Without both, you cannot use the shortcut rules. Instead, you just have to go through the actions that would make up your loop, action after action, just like you were playing on Magic: The Gathering Online. Except that, if you do this in a tournament setting, you might get warned by a judge for Slow Play and told to stop trying to win with your combo. We will discuss that in more detail below.


..and this section explains why you can't just do it without a shortcut, either:



Slow Play

To understand Slow Play, we must leave the realm of the Comprehensive Rules and enter the domain of the Infraction Procedure Guide, or IPG. The IPG does not apply to all Magic tournaments, only those “held at a Competitive or Professional Rules Enforcement Level.” I.P.G. at Introduction (July 22, 2016). At your kitchen table, or at Regular R.E.L., you may very well be allowed to execute your Indeterminate Loop to your heart’s content. Remember, check with your local judge beforehand!

Slow Play is a tournament error that results in a Warning. I.P.G. § 3 and 3.3. When players think of Slow Play, the usual thing that springs to mind is someone taking longer than normal to move the game along. Slow Play does indeed occur when “[a] player takes longer than is reasonably necessary to complete game actions.” I.P.G. § 3.3. Tucked away behind this definition, however, is a subsidiary definition that appears to be included here mostly because it does not really fit anywhere else. The Guide says: “It is also slow play if a player continues to execute a loop without being able to provide an exact number of iterations and the expected resulting game state.” Id.

This short statement is packed with meaning. It applies when someone is trying to “execute” a loop. The term “execute” is not defined by either the Comprehensive Rules or the I.P.G., but it appears to be intended to include both shortcutting a loop or carrying out the actions involved in a loop. The Slow Play definition also specifically calls out the type of loop we have defined as an Indeterminate Loop above; one for which the player cannot provide both a specific number of iterations and a specific resulting game state.

This all means that, in practice, you cannot execute - carry out - the actions of your Indeterminate Loop. But, as we already explored above, you cannot propose a shortcut of such a loop, either. The result is that you simply cannot win with an Indeterminate Loop! As it applies to the Four Horseman in particular, Head Judge Josh Stansfield had this to say about Mr. Liu’s deck at the Star City Open:

"During Round 3 of the tournament, I was made aware of a Four Horsemen player on the feature match table. I went over to watch the match, knowing that I was likely to see a problematic line of play according to the IPG. When the player started to flip cards from the Basalt Monolith/Mesmeric Orb combination, he quickly ran into Emrakul, and was forced to shuffle his library. After doing this again, he was left in an identical game state: An empty graveyard and no other change to the game state. By performing the same loop of actions without changing the game, he was violating the shortcut policy outlined in the Magic Tournament Rules and the Slow Play policy in the Infraction Procedure Guide.

Put another way: Mr. Liu would violate the shortcut rule if he proposed a shortcut, but he would violate the Slow Play rule if he did not, and as a result, he is barred from trying to win.

This is little unusual. It is not often in Magic that a player is told they may not take an otherwise legal game action, even though the action is clearly designed to win. This strange rules interaction makes the option of bringing Four Horseman to a tournament impossible or at least wildly unwise. That strikes many people as unfair. People also rankle, understandably, at the suggestion that fast-paced play with the goal of winning can be defined as Slow Play, the same tournament error that applies to someone who is simply wasting time.

There is a logic behind this rule, however. The shortcut rules are already complicated, and it is not at all clear whether any change to accommodate Indeterminate Loops would be good for the game, or even possible. Once shortcuts are off the table, infinite loops present a massive challenge the Magic Tournament Rules. Sure, your deck may be able to win given an infinite amount of time. Magic Tournaments do not occur over an infinite amount of time (even if it seems like they do on some occasions).

Under the Tournament Rules, tournament matches are given a time limit, which must be at least forty minutes. Magic Tournament Rules at Appendix B (July 22, 2016). Once the time for a match has expired, “the player whose turn it is finishes his or her turn and five additional turns are played in total” at which point the game ends in a draw. Id. § 2.5. There is nothing in the Tournament Rules allowing a judge to stop a player from continuing to act but not actually ending his or her turn. A player executing an infinite loop could simply keep doing so and the tournament would grind to a halt. That situation is not good for anyone involved.

The Slow Play rules give judges a way to avoid this scenario, to the benefit of all players.

[rufus]

... Given that Tabek is a Logic Nerd like myself (computer science) my guess is that he's fixing this somehow; likely by stating that if the effect would exile itself, nothing happens because the duration of '0' cancels itself out. ....

Even if Tabek could magically produce bug-free rulings, he's not the only one who makes rulings. "Self-exile until" is legitimately ambiguous or singular. I would have sworn that the ruling actually went the other way when I originally asked about Aligned Hedron Network. (In other words that the ruling was that it was 'one blink for everything else.')

[tescrin]

On a different note, have they responded to this leak yet? I can't find one. They're under new management IIRC and it could be that they've started playing 4D-chess by beta-testing the player base. Our confusion on the way the wording works could be a move to see how we respond to the cards or if they make sense. [Not us specifically, but the community in general.]

After all, dedicated forum nerds are probably just a small sample size of the wider community.


Again, this is total speculation and whatnot, but I feel they responded faster last time with immediate damage control and process debugging, begging and blaming the community for stuff. The total silence on this could indicate it's time to delve into conspiracy territory :P

[morgan_coke]

It's more likely they just actually have adults in charge now, instead of the garbage in, garbage out crew that somehow avoided running the game into the ground - solely due to patenting the very concept of a TCG and thus crippling any potential competition - for so long.

[Barook]

https://i.redd.it/2cny8lyx08hz.png

Basically an uncommon Cavern of Souls - without the uncounterability. I guess Slivers will like it. As for Legacy relevance, it's an upgrade over painlands in colored Eldrazi lists.

There's also this (https://i.redd.it/43sqaawft7hz.jpg) removal. Probably too expensive and slow in Legacy, though.

[Fjaulnir]

Victim of Night doesn't really see play, and it's an instant while the creature types it doesn't hit (Vampires/Werewolves/Zombies) see even less play than this one (Merfolk), so I'd think it's strictly worse on both fronts in Legacy. But of course Go for the Throat is yet even more superior to Victim of Night.

[filln]

The art and flavor of Walk the Plank are pretty outstanding though.

[rufus]

...
Basically an uncommon Cavern of Souls - without the uncounterability. I guess Slivers will like it. As for Legacy relevance, it's an upgrade over painlands in colored Eldrazi lists....


It helps with 4-5 color tribal in general. It's just that most of the strong tribes are color-linked.

[Cire]

The art and flavor of Walk the Plank are pretty outstanding though.

Up to a point - fish and octopuses still drown

[Dice_Box]

Plank will replace Go for the Throat in my EDH decks. It might find a place in Modern too.

[maharis]

Victim of Night doesn't really see play, and it's an instant while the creature types it doesn't hit (Vampires/Werewolves/Zombies) see even less play than this one (Merfolk), so I'd think it's strictly worse on both fronts in Legacy. But of course Go for the Throat is yet even more superior to Victim of Night.

Gurmag Angler is a Zombie, which really hurts Victim of Night, and the most played Merfolk right now is TNN which can't be targeted anyway.

It would be cool if Walk the Plank was played enough to make Merfolk into tech but Terminate/Dismember also exist anyway.

[Claymore]

Gurmag Angler is also a fish, so walking the plank shouldn't affect it.

[Michael Keller]

Am I seeing this correctly with Didgeridoo and shit like Eldrazi:

http://i.imgur.com/5ZOJYaD.jpg

So if an Eldrazi is in your hand and you name "Minotaur," Eldrazi cards in your hand will basically be Eldrazi-Minotaur? That's dope.

[MaximumC]

Gurmag Angler is a Zombie, which really hurts Victim of Night, and the most played Merfolk right now is TNN which can't be targeted anyway.

It would be cool if Walk the Plank was played enough to make Merfolk into tech but Terminate/Dismember also exist anyway.

Yeah, but Merfolk is already a regular threat in the metagame. It's not "tech," it's just there, and at any sizeable event you can't afford to turn off all your removal just because you bumped into it. Plank is basically not playable for this reason. When it's dead - it's REALLY dead.

Also, agree on flavor fail of not including fish ;)

[MaximumC]

Am I seeing this correctly with Didgeridoo and shit like Eldrazi:

http://i.imgur.com/5ZOJYaD.jpg

So if an Eldrazi is in your hand and you name "Minotaur," Eldrazi cards in your hand will basically be Eldrazi-Minotaur? That's dope.

https://i.imgur.com/rsmlDmF.png

[Cire]

So if an Eldrazi is in your hand and you name "Minotaur," Eldrazi cards in your hand will basically be Eldrazi-Minotaur? That's dope.

Didgeridoo & Artificial Evolution naming Eldrazi probably works cheaper?

[MaximumC]

Didgeridoo & Artificial Evolution naming Eldrazi probably works cheaper?

https://i.imgur.com/UQ6abTh.png

[PirateKing]

Wow way to shaft it to Conspiracy.

Step 1: find old nonblue card
Step 2: reprint it in blue
Step 3: oh, also make it like 50% cheaper
Step 4: ???
Step 5: profit

Looking forward to Furnace of Rath for :1::u: :rolleyes:

[Michael Keller]

https://i.imgur.com/UQ6abTh.png

https://media.giphy.com/media/wu9qzTVOkK9va/giphy.gif

[16km]

http://i.imgur.com/5ZOJYaD.jpg


Infinite Glimpse Runs in Elves :D

[Barook]

Am I seeing this correctly with Didgeridoo and shit like Eldrazi:

http://i.imgur.com/5ZOJYaD.jpg

So if an Eldrazi is in your hand and you name "Minotaur," Eldrazi cards in your hand will basically be Eldrazi-Minotaur? That's dope.
Or you can just cast S&T for the same cost. :rolleyes:

[TsumiBand]

Up to a point - fish and octopuses still drown

Maybe they roll out the extra-long plank for the fish and octopi and just force them to walk it over and over until they dry out.

If a Suntail Hawk can equip Argentum Armor, Dandan can Walk the Plank.

[rufus]

Infinite Glimpse Runs in Elves :D

You could also combine it with Griffin Canyon and Fatestitcher/Voyaging Satyr.

It's still bad.

[Cire]

octopi

Unrelated - what is the correct plural? I looked online and for every source that says one, there is another source that says another.

[rufus]

Unrelated - what is the correct plural? I looked online and for every source that says one, there is another source that says another.

Standard English is "octopuses." The word origin is greek, so the plural could be "octopodes" if you were feeling silly. "Octopi" is formally incorrect, but common.

[PirateKing]

Unrelated - what is the correct plural? I looked online and for every source that says one, there is another source that says another.

Octopoxen. Then fight anybody who says otherwise.

[DarthVicious]

So if the wording on Hostage Taker is correct, it can target itself, for some infinite ETBs/draw action? :really:

Hostage Taker 2UB
Creature — Human Pirate (Rare)
When Hostage Taker enters the battlefield, exile target artifact or creature until Hostage Taker leaves the battlefield. You may cast that card for as long as it remains exiled and you may spend mana as though it were mana of any type to cast that spell.
2/1

If this wording is correct, you have to pay four mana every time to get him into play again. Nothing on it says the removed card could be cast for free, simply that you can ignore color requirements. It still needs to be cast.

[UseLess]

Octopoxen. Then fight anybody who says otherwise.

You're all wrong. It's Octopussies, obviously. And they're going to be the new support tribal of the cats EDH deck!

[H]

If this wording is correct, you have to pay four mana every time to get him into play again. Nothing on it says the removed card could be cast for free, simply that you can ignore color requirements. It still needs to be cast.

The issue isn't that you would cast it over and over, it's that by removing itself it returns itself, infinitely.

"When Hostage Taker enters the battlefield, exile target artifact or creature until Hostage Taker leaves the battlefield."

[Claymore]

If this wording is correct, you have to pay four mana every time to get him into play again. Nothing on it says the removed card could be cast for free, simply that you can ignore color requirements. It still needs to be cast.

The text is Oblivion Ring/Fiend Hunter but with "you may also cast that card yourself" tacked on. When it leaves the field, the exiled card returns to play.

[DarthVicious]

The issue isn't that you would cast it over and over, it's that by removing itself it returns itself, infinitely.

"When Hostage Taker enters the battlefield, exile target artifact or creature until Hostage Taker leaves the battlefield."

Dumbfounded how I missed that ... they may errata it to 'another target' then.

[EpicLevelCommoner]

This may not be best for Legacy, but Shaper's Sanctuary looks like it'd be hilarious paired with two Spellskite. Granted it requires an opponent to be the one casting a spell that can be redirected to Spellskite, but if they do, you can save the original target and draw X+1 cards in exchange for 2*X life and one of the Spellskites.

[Barook]

This may not be best for Legacy, but Shaper's Sanctuary looks like it'd be hilarious paired with two Spellskite. Granted it requires an opponent to be the one casting a spell that can be redirected to Spellskite, but if they do, you can save the original target and draw X+1 cards in exchange for 2*X life and one of the Spellskites.
Wouldn't Leovold do the same thing on a card that is actually good? :eyebrow: Actually, Leovold + Spellskite sounds like a fun combo - they play removal for Leovold, you get +2 CA and they still have accomplished jackshit.

[Ronald Deuce]

Standard English is "octopuses." The word origin is greek, so the plural could be "octopodes" if you were feeling silly. "Octopi" is formally incorrect, but common.

I sense a fellow classicist/antiquity enthusiast.

[rufus]

I sense a fellow classicist/antiquity enthusiast.

Nah, just a pedantic jerk.

[kirkusjones]

Octopi is not the preferred nomenclature. Octopedes, gentlemen, please.

[Barook]

As for combos with the Pirate, it's a human, so it could go infinite with Champion of the Parish/Thalia's Lieutenant in some kind of Human Esper build with Cavern of Souls and some quality humans, including the white Recruiter to assemble the combo.
Addendum:
Correct me if I'm wrong, but can't Hostage Taker be used with Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit to get infinite Bolster triggers? Put Bolster trigger on the bottom, stack Pirate on top, Pirate resolves and returns, another round of triggers, rinse, repeat, end it with an army of Bazillion/Bazillion beaters. Bonus points for having Walking Ballista in play (which is also recruitable).

The actual scary thing is that all those cards are Modern-legal (well, except Recruiter of the Guard).

[Claymore]

It's a little irrelevant, but you would need a third creature to kill with Anafenze + Pirate. If you have the choice to end an infinite loop you must, so eventually you'd have to exile Anafenza instead of the pirate.

There are tons of two card infinite combos that the Pirate enables if it's printed as leaked.

[Cire]

There are tons of two card infinite combos that the Pirate enables if it's printed as leaked.

Certainly a lot of cheap infinite life combos

1 CC

Essence Warden - Infinite Life
Soul Warden - Infinite Life
Soul's Attendant - Infinite Life

2 CC

Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit - Infinite Power (but require at least 1 more creature in play)
Ninth Bridge Patrol - Infinite Power (but require at least 1 more creature in play)
Auriok Champion - Infinite Life
Beck (Beck/Call) - Infinite Draw
Genesis Chamber - Infinite Tokens
Impact Tremors - Infinite Damage
Suture Priest - Infinite Life

[rufus]

...
Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit - Infinite Power (but require at least 1 more creature in play)
...

This came up twice, but can't you just remove Anafenza and then let the bolster triggers pump up Hostage Taker?

[Dice_Box]

I think Hostage Taker is meant to only be able to target opponents creatures. The way it is written as well as the title leaves me with the flavour of someone taking an hostage and flipping it to your side.

There was a creature, I don't remember what it is, that was printed without "Artifact" in its type line despite being an artifact boarder. It was errataed to be an artifact. Perhaps, if they have made an actual mistake here, that might happen.

[Claymore]

I guess that's true, I thought bolster targeted. A third creature would let you combo and swing that turn.

[ReAnimator]

Alter of the Brood, is infinite mill, only 1 cost and on colour.

[Ace/Homebrew]

There was a creature, I don't remember what it is, that was printed without "Artifact" in its type line despite being an artifact boarder. It was errataed to be an artifact. Perhaps, if they have made an actual mistake here, that might happen.
Walking Atlas

[morgan_coke]

Spell Swindle
3UU
Instant
Counter target spell, then make treasure tokens equal to it's converted mana cost.

It's an improved Mana Drain effect for more than twice the price. I don't really see it doing anything in Legacy, but is a non-free 5cmc counterspell playable anywhere, even when it's effect is that good?

[Dice_Box]

EDH. Its going to do work in EDH. That effect reads: counter your big fatty, on my turn cast my Tooth and Nail.

[Ace/Homebrew]

DFCs are back. Did we already know that?

http://i.imgur.com/2tHDokj.png http://i.imgur.com/QAPbgQi.png

[BenBleiweiss]

Starting with this set, all planeswalkers past, present, and future will have the supertype legendary. They will also be subject to the "legend rule." The "planeswalker uniqueness rule" is going away. What does this mean? In short, everything that's true about legendary creatures will now be true about legendary planeswalkers.

Under the new rules, if a player controls more than one legendary planeswalker with the same name, that player chooses one and puts the other into their owner's graveyard. This means that if you control Jace, Unraveler of Secrets and cast Jace, Cunning Castaway, both Jaces can exist under your control.

Official rules change. Liliana.dec and Jace.dec and Gideon.dec now? No longer constrained by worrying about dead Jace Beleren if you're playing Jace, TMS.

[CptHaddock]

Sorry if something posted this already but it looks like they spoiled all the rares in this set today (http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/news/behind-scenes-alleged-ixalan-card-theft-2017-08-28).

[Dice_Box]

I think this helps Jace. 4 mana Jace and Flip Jace are sometimes found together. In Modern this will help Lili more. In all this likely is better for new players but feels like a flavour fail. But hell, you can already have two copies of the same (Woman) Thalia on the table so flavor be dammed.

[bruizar]

Starting with this set, all planeswalkers past, present, and future will have the supertype legendary. They will also be subject to the "legend rule." The "planeswalker uniqueness rule" is going away. What does this mean? In short, everything that's true about legendary creatures will now be true about legendary planeswalkers.

Under the new rules, if a player controls more than one legendary planeswalker with the same name, that player chooses one and puts the other into their owner's graveyard. This means that if you control Jace, Unraveler of Secrets and cast Jace, Cunning Castaway, both Jaces can exist under your control.

Official rules change. Liliana.dec and Jace.dec and Gideon.dec now? No longer constrained by worrying about dead Jace Beleren if you're playing Jace, TMS.

Noteworthy for gideon of the trials

[morgan_coke]

Holy WOW is that a huge buff to 8 Gideon.dec Might also be seeing 8 Lilian.dec in Modern.

[Dice_Box]

http://media.wizards.com/2017/xln/en_PxlYqa3ZQJ.png

[H]

I think this helps Jace. 4 mana Jace and Flip Jace are sometimes found together. In Modern this will help Lili more. In all this likely is better for new players but feels like a flavour fail. But hell, you can already have two copies of the same Thalia on the table so flavor be dammed.

Old rule: No one gets a Jace!™

New rule: Everyone get a Jace!™

New New-Rule: Everyone get's all the Jaces!™

[kombatkiwi]

The PW rule change is also marginally relevant for Legacy Pox where before you might have wanted to play more planeswalker threats but you couldn't consider any of the other Lilianas.

[morgan_coke]

So the most relevant PW combos:

Gideon of the Trials + Gideon, Ally of Zendikar (Now you have even more ways to not lose, seems likely there's some kind of deck there)

Liliana of the Veil + Liliana, the Last Hope (both castable off of Dark Ritual. Welcome to Tier 2.5 Pox!)

Jace, Vryn's Prodigy + Jace, the Mind Sculptor (or Architect of Thought/Beleren if you're in Modern) [all the Jace's, all the time]

Honorable Mention:

Nissa, Voice of Zendikar + Nissa, Vital Force

Chandra, Torch of Defiance + well, they'll print another good Chandra eventually, right?

[kombatkiwi]

Theres an official announcement from Eli Shiffrin on twitter that Hostage Taker is being erratad to be unable to target itself.

[Ace/Homebrew]

Remember when Chandra, Pyromaster was the good Chandra? :tongue:

[procobrito]

Spell Swindle
3UU
Instant
Counter target spell, then make treasure tokens equal to it's converted mana cost.

It's an improved Mana Drain effect for more than twice the price. I don't really see it doing anything in Legacy, but is a non-free 5cmc counterspell playable anywhere, even when it's effect is that good?This will see play in EDCH, eith afinitty, sack Artifact, decks with hellkite tyrant and so. And maybe even in standard, with e*Hellkite Tyrant*and*Kuldotha Forgemaster, Afinity and even in standard with*Torrential Gearhulk, Improvise, or even with*Mechanized Production or the new Revel in Riches.

Enviado de meu SM-G900MD usando Tapatalk

[Dice_Box]

Theres an official announcement from Eli Shiffrin on twitter that Hostage Taker is being erratad to be unable to target itself.
Good to know. Thanks for that for those of us who do not use Twitter.

[morgan_coke]

Theres an official announcement from Eli Shiffrin on twitter that Hostage Taker is being erratad to be unable to target itself.

That has got to be the MOST WotC thing ever.

EDIT: I mean, from the leak, to players instantly realizing the card doesn't work as printed, to the announcement of it's insta-errata only being made on twitter. WotC has apparently not managed to solve its Garbage In, Garbage Out problems yet.

[H]

The PW rule change is also marginally relevant for Legacy Pox where before you might have wanted to play more planeswalker threats but you couldn't consider any of the other Lilianas.

They better not bullshit me and cancel my order for Last Hopes. (Calm down, I only ordered 3 for my personal use.)

[TsumiBand]

They better not bullshit me and cancel my order for Last Hopes. (Calm down, I only ordered 3 for my personal use.)

For a second I thought you were talking about Dash Hopes and I was about to freak out because someone finally found a way to make that card good

[H]

For a second I thought you were talking about Dash Hopes and I was about to freak out because someone finally found a way to make that card good

(Bad) Tech versus Death's Shadow decks?

[TsumiBand]

(Bad) Tech versus Death's Shadow decks?

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CAJXkzwUkAA8lJa.jpg

[H]

.

http://i.imgur.com/IERgYMp.gif

Also, new Jace plus Doubling Season is extra stupid and double-plus dumb funny.

[Ace/Homebrew]

new Jace plus Doubling Season is extra stupid and double-plus dumb funny.
... :eek:

It makes infinite Jaces, right? He can ultimate right away, and makes 4 copies of himself. Then each copy can ultimate right away, each making an additional 4 copies... Until you decide you have enough Jaces... right?

[morgan_coke]

... :eek:

It makes infinite Jaces, right? He can ultimate right away, and makes 4 copies of himself. Then each copy can ultimate right away, each making an additional 4 copies... Until you decide you have enough Jaces... right?

Then you make infinite illusions with your infinite jaces and then... needs a third card to end the immediately, otherwise it's a win the next turn thing. Still, I've seen worse combos.

[Ace/Homebrew]

Altar of the Brood is typically the go to win-con for infinite creature loops.

[Claymore]

Hostage taker will day 1 errata to say "another creature". What a joke of a company.

[rufus]

These treasure token makers may make Inspiring Statuary more attractive as an engine.

[rufus]

Hostage taker will day 1 errata to say "another creature". What a joke of a company.

It's better than leaving errata off Felidar Guardian so there's a little progress.

[bruizar]

These treasure token makers may make Inspiring Statuary more attractive as an engine.

That's exactly what I'm brewing up. I've got a legacy list and working on a standard list around artifact tokens. Inspiring statuary is nice with artifacts tokens because with too many artifacts in the deck the card becomes useless and eith too little the card becomes a crappy manarock. You need free artifacts to ramp your colored spells.


Also, treasure cove into nicol bolas will become an ixilan standard play

They should errata smuggler's copter to an artifact creature - pirate, but they banned it anyway :/

[rufus]

That's exactly what I'm brewing up. I've got a legacy list and working on a standard list around artifact tokens. Inspiring statuary is nice with artifacts tokens because with too many artifacts in the deck the card becomes useless and eith too little the card becomes a crappy manarock. You need free artifacts to ramp your colored spells....

Yeah, treasure tokens also help with colored mana costs that you can't pay using statuary. I wonder how strong the treasure token cards will end up being.

[Barook]

Mechanized Production would be a hilarious wincon with treasure tokens. That's what they might actually be going for Standard. Other formats can blow up CMC 0 tokens too easily.

[rufus]

Mechanized Production would be a hilarious wincon with treasure tokens. That's what they might actually be going for Standard. Other formats can blow up CMC 0 tokens too easily.

They're printing Revel in Ritches too.

A random thought: Treasure Cove is a land with CMC 2, which is quite strange.

[Barook]

http://mythicspoiler.com/ixa/cards/ripjawraptor.jpg

Most likely no Legacy material due to its price, but I wonder what the best ways are to abuse its ability. Aside from self-pinging, repeatable fighting like Ulvenwald Tracker seems pretty profitable.

[rufus]

...
Most likely no Legacy material due to its price, but I wonder what the best ways are to abuse its ability.
...

It seems like a bad Swans of Bryn Argoll.

[bruizar]

4 Cavern of Souls
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Mountain
4 Wooded Foothills
1 Taiga
1 Badlands

1 Tireless Tracker
2 Quicksmith Genius
4 Captain Lannery Storm
4 Goblin Rabblemaster
2 Pia Nalaar
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar

4 Shrapnel Blast
4 Galvanic Blast
4 Curse of Opulensce

4 Magus of the Moon
4 Blood Moon
4 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
2 Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast
2 Ghirapur Aethergrid
1 Bloodforged Battle Axe


A bit too much still, but this was my attempt at making a legacy list or at least the direction i wanted to take. It needs something against storm reanimator sneaknshow and dnt (dnt can be addressed with fiery confluence) and a clean answer to TNN (hence black splash)

[Barook]

4 Cavern of Souls
4 Ancient Tomb
4 City of Traitors
4 Mountain
4 Wooded Foothills
1 Taiga
1 Badlands

1 Tireless Tracker
2 Quicksmith Genius
4 Captain Lannery Storm
4 Goblin Rabblemaster
2 Pia Nalaar
1 Pia and Kiran Nalaar

4 Shrapnel Blast
4 Galvanic Blast
4 Curse of Opulensce

4 Magus of the Moon
4 Blood Moon
4 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
2 Daretti, Ingenious Iconoclast
2 Ghirapur Aethergrid
1 Bloodforged Battle Axe


A bit too much still, but this was my attempt at making a legacy list or at least the direction i wanted to take. It needs something against storm reanimator sneaknshow and dnt (dnt can be addressed with fiery confluence) and a clean answer to TNN (hence black splash)
The Tireless Tracker seems kinda random as a 1-of. Maybe there should be more focus on pinging everything into oblivion with Ghirapur Aethergrid and company. Add Ravager and Walking Ballista to the mix to convert your artifacts into damage. Maybe you should drop the one-drops for Chalice and throw in some Ensnaring Bridges. I'm also missing the Chrome Moxen here.

[bruizar]

The Tireless Tracker seems kinda random as a 1-of. Maybe there should be more focus on pinging everything into oblivion with Ghirapur Aethergrid and company. Add Ravager and Walking Ballista to the mix to convert your artifacts into damage. Maybe you should drop the one-drops for Chalice and throw in some Ensnaring Bridges. I'm also missing the Chrome Moxen here.

In the first version I actually had 2x ravager 2x walking ballista. Perhaps they should return, I have no idea :-).

The thought behind tireless tracker was that I don't want to draw dead, and red doesn't have many ways of card advantage. You can cash in the clues for draws, plus they make it so that land drops provide a loot effect with quicksmith genius. The gold and treasure should provide you with some green mana in the case where you can't find the singleton taiga. That said, I've no idea whether it is any good. I own 3 foil tireless trackers but haven't gotten around to playing with them yet but I imagine that they would be great in a deck with more fetch in it since it provides 2 artifacts which is enough for ghirapur aethergrid to ping something.

Captain Lannery Storm and Curse of Opulensce both require aggressive strategies, or they don't give you any value. That's why Ensnaring Bridge is not so hot here (unless against sneak & show). With Chalice, curse of opulensce would be gone and I doubt there would be enough artifact token producers to fuel the deck. Besides, no galvanic blast either . First I also had Goblin Guides in the deck for extra aggression. I've established a difficult relationship with chalice. The card just forces you to not play with 1drops which leaves you wide open against tempo decks and wastelands. I would sooner play with both 1 drops AND chalice, and loot the dead draws away, then play without any one drops.

Galvanic blast and shrapnel blast were chosen to give the deck a lot of reach so you just hit with a few hasty aggressive creatures and then just bolt + ghirapur them out. I'm not sure if galvanic blast can get metalcraft quick enough, but having 4 damage and 5 damage burn spells is highly efficient. In addition there's chandra's +1, thopters, kiran & pia-ping and ghirapur aethergrid for pushing through extra damage. Fiery Confluence has a reach of 6 damage, so perhaps galvanic blast needs to be replaced with fiery confluence because it also improves the DNT matchup enormously.

I have even considered Ovalchase Daredevil as a draw engine with Quicksmith Genius, and Kazuul's Toll Collector with Bloodforged Battle-Axe as additional token creators. Bloodforged Battle-Axe is kind of a shakey card. If you can equip it to a thopter, it's great, because you can get in for damage and still tap the equipment down for ghirapur aethergrid, but it's probably going to be hard to do combat damage to a player with it. Just needs to be tested. If not bloodforged battle-axe, I'd say Sword of War and Peace (gives you some life gain and a very fast clock, as well as shoring up the burn + dnt matchups with relevant protection) or Sword of Light and Shadow (Also life gain, but insulates even more against DNT with protection from Germ Token).

[rufus]

...
A bit too much still, but this was my attempt at making a legacy list or at least the direction i wanted to take. It needs something against storm reanimator sneaknshow and dnt (dnt can be addressed with fiery confluence) and a clean answer to TNN (hence black splash)

I think you have to chose between an aggro/sligh plan where you can run curse of opulence, and a chalice/3sphere plan where the 3-drops can shine.

[morgan_coke]

One thing that might be worth thinking about with the new 'Walker rules is that Garruk Wildspeaker now leads to a Garruk, Apex Predator the very next turn. Apex Predator isn't a bad card, it just never found a home because Karn is easier to cast in Tron and also costs 7 mana.

[Echelon]

http://mythicspoiler.com/ixa/cards/ripjawraptor.jpg

Most likely no Legacy material due to its price, but I wonder what the best ways are to abuse its ability. Aside from self-pinging, repeatable fighting like Ulvenwald Tracker seems pretty profitable.

Pestilence :smile:

B: Draw a card.

As for the Swans of Bryn Argoll thing - it's a Swan where the effect only gives you cards and this time around the Swan is GSZ-able.

[JackaBo]

I used to play this deck in oldschool. Hope they erata Fungusaur to Enrage, as an honorable mention.

[bruizar]

I think you have to chose between an aggro/sligh plan where you can run curse of opulence, and a chalice/3sphere plan where the 3-drops can shine.

A good insight. I think you are correct.

[Gheizen64]

DFCs are back. Did we already know that?

http://i.imgur.com/2tHDokj.png http://i.imgur.com/QAPbgQi.png

Does this seems playable to anyone? Between this and sorcerous spyglass i'm liking the new 2 drops options for tomb decks. Hoping for something to make Opal better as well by making early treasure tokens.

[bruizar]

Does this seems playable to anyone? Between this and sorcerous spyglass i'm liking the new 2 drops options for tomb decks. Hoping for something to make Opal better as well by making early treasure tokens.

probably too slow but gets around city of traitors

[Gheizen64]

I think such a land seems likely:

Treasure cave
Land
ETB tapped.
Create a treasure token when it ETB.
T: add :C:

Simple, elegant design and deceptively good. Maybe too much. But god this + opal could make for some sick good early openings for tomb decks.

[Barook]

Does this seems playable to anyone? Between this and sorcerous spyglass i'm liking the new 2 drops options for tomb decks. Hoping for something to make Opal better as well by making early treasure tokens.
Spyglass seems great.

Treasure Map, not so much. 3 turns setup and then wait another turn due to being tapped (if it isn't getting wastelanded) before you can even think about drawing cards? Weak sauce.

[Mr. Safety]

DFCs are back. Did we already know that?

http://i.imgur.com/2tHDokj.png http://i.imgur.com/QAPbgQi.png

Is it just me, or does anyone else LOVE this card? Maybe not for Legacy, but I think the modern UWx control decks would love to play 1-2 of these, and maybe even tron. Paying 3 for a scry 1 isn't great, but the payoff for it is huge after just three turns in play. Maybe a better play than the embarrassing Think Twice copies we sometimes see in modern blue-based control.

[morgan_coke]

It's not just you. That card is incredible. I LOVES IT TEH PRECIOUS!!!

Oh, also, with the way Treasure tokens work, combined with Spire of Industry and the Energy 5c land, I think we're going to see a lot of 5c goodstuff decks in Standard.

[rufus]

Does this seems playable to anyone? ...

In competitive play? I doubt it.

The increase in card quality from scrying probably offsets the card you spent in the first place, but it's still paying 5 mana and spending 3 turns doing something that doesn't affect the board much.



Treasure cave
Land
ETB tapped.
Create a treasure token when it ETB.
T: add :C:

Simple, elegant design and deceptively good.

That card is super strong. It would probably see play in every modern combo deck, affinity, and maybe some others.

[kirkusjones]

Is it just me, or does anyone else LOVE this card? Maybe not for Legacy, but I think the modern UWx control decks would love to play 1-2 of these, and maybe even tron. Paying 3 for a scry 1 isn't great, but the payoff for it is huge after just three turns in play. Maybe a better play than the embarrassing Think Twice copies we sometimes see in modern blue-based control.

This is going to be fun in my EDH lands deck. Quick question, does this sit land face up or artifact face up in the graveyard? (i.e. can I replay Treasure Cove with Crucible?)

[Dice_Box]

This is going to be fun in my EDH lands deck. Quick question, does this sit land face up or artifact face up in the graveyard? (i.e. can I replay Treasure Cove with Crucible?)
Always the first side face up. It's an artifact.

[Barook]

This is going to be fun in my EDH lands deck. Quick question, does this sit land face up or artifact face up in the graveyard? (i.e. can I replay Treasure Cove with Crucible?)
It's an artifact.

[kirkusjones]

Always the first side face up. It's an artifact.

Thanks to Barook, too. That's what I figured, but not what I hoped.

[Dice_Box]

Thanks to Barook, too. That's what I figured, but not what I hoped.
Sad I know. Who's the Commander?

[kirkusjones]

Sad I know. Who's the Commander?

Mina and Denn, Wildborn. I've been tinkering with the list a lot recently and would love suggestions if you don't mind me pm-ing you a list.

[BenBleiweiss]

https://d33ypg4xwx0n86.cloudfront.net/direct?url=http%3A%2F%2Fsm.ign.com%2Fign_de%2Fscreenshot%2Fdefault%2Fdeeproot-waters-de1_fwzz.png&resize=w704

2U - Enchantment
Whenever you cast a Merfolk creature spell, create a 1/1 blue Merfolk creature token with hexproof.

[BenBleiweiss]

Old-Growth Dryads are officially 3/3.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DIWCubNUEAAueLf.png

[Cire]

Old-Growth Dryads + Ghost Quarter . . . . how many basic lands do legacy decks run usually for both of these cards to be draw back free after a certain point.

[Barook]

Old-Growth Dryads + Ghost Quarter . . . . how many basic lands do legacy decks run usually for both of these cards to be draw back free after a certain point.
Ramunap Excavator is Ghost Quarter's best friend.

New card that isn't uninteresting garbage:
https://i.redd.it/iiyif4p0noiz.png

It strikes me as pretty odd flavor that it's a monogreen Merfolk that animates lands. Everything about this card screames Elf. That said, despite being a merfolk, I could see shenanigans with GSZ, untap effects and Gaea's Cradle, especially in Elves.

[Richard Cheese]

Ramunap Excavator is Ghost Quarter's best friend.

New card that isn't uninteresting garbage:
https://i.redd.it/iiyif4p0noiz.png

It strikes me as pretty odd flavor that it's a monogreen Merfolk that animates lands. Everything about this card screames Elf. That said, despite being a merfolk, I could see shenanigans with GSZ, untap effects and Gaea's Cradle, especially in Elves.

Forget Elves, it's got that sweet Shaman synergy going on!

http://magiccards.info/scans/en/mt/128.jpg

Also fuck new Jace right in the goddamn ear. "Defeated" by Bolas to show up on a boat like 2 weeks later, with Planeswalker spark intact? At least have the stones to have some kind of consequences for the characters in your world. This is death of Superman all over again, except worse because they never left any doubt that there would be zero repercussions for their main characters.

[morgan_coke]

Ramunap Excavator is Ghost Quarter's best friend.

New card that isn't uninteresting garbage:
https://i.redd.it/iiyif4p0noiz.png

It strikes me as pretty odd flavor that it's a monogreen Merfolk that animates lands. Everything about this card screames Elf. That said, despite being a merfolk, I could see shenanigans with GSZ, untap effects and Gaea's Cradle, especially in Elves.

Why wasn't that card in Zendikar? It's literally just casting "Awaken X"

[Ronald Deuce]

If this isn't the right place for this question, I'll gladly move on and ask it elsewhere.

I might be the only person who cares, but is it me, or is the tone of this set really jarring? We went from a plane that was a giant gladiator school with a searing sun, seas of blood, and apocalyptic plagues to rainbow-feathered dinosaurs and *jingle* "Pirates, PIIIIIRATES!"

And vampires for some reason.

I always liked the fact that there was a dark quality to a lot of the MtG lore, even if the writing's been mostly on a downhill for the last ten (or more) years; maybe I'm just nostalgic for the days when I was a kid and the macabre tone made me feel like more of an adult for noticing it. There's certainly a lot of fodder for that in what we know about pre-Columbian Meso-American cultures and historical pirates. But this set's starting to make me feel like a kid again—and not in a good-old-timey-fun way, but in an "UNDAAH DA' SEEEEEA" way.

[Barook]

Why wasn't that card in Zendikar? It's literally just casting "Awaken X"
Same reason why Tireless Tracker wasn't in the Landfall block despite literally having Landfall. :rolleyes:


Forget Elves, it's got that sweet Shaman synergy going on!

http://magiccards.info/scans/en/mt/128.jpg
There's also Descendants' Path - either you get some sweet Shaman tribal action going, or you use Arcane Adaptation to get the Eldrazi Titans rolling.

[BenBleiweiss]

https://images.stopgame.ru/news/2017/08/30/normal_PnI7GOT.png
G, Merfolk
1/1
It gets +1/+1 if you control either an Island or another Merfolk.

[Barook]

G, Merfolk
1/1
It gets +1/+1 if you control either an Island or another Merfolk.
That's pretty uneventful.

[H]

That's pretty uneventful.

Poor Jungle Lion, not even close any more.

[BenBleiweiss]

Poor Jungle Lion, not even close any more.

At least it's a Cat! (Not relevant for competitive, potentially relevant for Casual)

You know, if you don't feel like playing Wild Nacatl, Loam Lion, Steppe Lynx, or Sacred Cat :(

[Barook]

Poor Jungle Lion, not even close any more.
As long as Delvers terrorize the skies, almost every other aggro 1-drop is garbage (for Legacy). This one is no exception.

[Dice_Box]

Yea, that guy needed to be printed in 5th Ed, not 2017.

[Richard Cheese]

If this isn't the right place for this question, I'll gladly move on and ask it elsewhere.

I might be the only person who cares, but is it me, or is the tone of this set really jarring? We went from a plane that was a giant gladiator school with a searing sun, seas of blood, and apocalyptic plagues to rainbow-feathered dinosaurs and *jingle* "Pirates, PIIIIIRATES!"

And vampires for some reason.

I always liked the fact that there was a dark quality to a lot of the MtG lore, even if the writing's been mostly on a downhill for the last ten (or more) years; maybe I'm just nostalgic for the days when I was a kid and the macabre tone made me feel like more of an adult for noticing it. There's certainly a lot of fodder for that in what we know about pre-Columbian Meso-American cultures and historical pirates. But this set's starting to make me feel like a kid again—and not in a good-old-timey-fun way, but in an "UNDAAH DA' SEEEEEA" way.

Mostly it just feels like they pulled tribes out of a hat. It stinks of design-by-committee, and apparently the committee plays EDH. Like Pirates and Dinosaurs were honorable mentions for the last commander set or something.

[Dice_Box]

http://68.media.tumblr.com/acec15f0d280c8a9e386e4ca7583beed/tumblr_orm2abxDcv1s9rpajo1_r1_500.png

[H]

http://cardboard-crack.com/post/161868485171/ixalan

...

Fixed that link for you, :smile:

EDIT: You got me...

[bruizar]

Mostly it just feels like they pulled tribes out of a hat. It stinks of design-by-committee, and apparently the committee plays EDH. Like Pirates and Dinosaurs were honorable mentions for the last commander set or something.

feels more like they are attempting to make pirates and dinosaurs a thing the way plants and zombies were a thing, except plants and zombies had a mechanical synergy (plants don't move + endless stream of zombies = the actual game concept)

[rufus]

As long as Delvers terrorize the skies, almost every other aggro 1-drop is garbage (for Legacy). This one is no exception.

It's probably better than delver in a merfolk deck where the creature type is relevant and it's not so easy to flip delver. Though they'd have to print something else to make a green splash worthwhile.

It's also outclassed by goblin guide.

[Ace/Homebrew]

I'm not usually one to defend the WotC attempt at storylines, but it is really early to declare the new set comparable to The Little Mermaid in tone.

Regarding the 'picked from a hat' tribes... I'm pretty sure Pirate and Dinosaur have been highly demanded by the playerbase for a long time. I don't see the connection between the two and question why they'd be in the same plane. But Merfolk makes a ton of sense in a plane about Pirates. And this also gives them a valid excuse to explore vehicles again (pirate ships!!)

White-aligned Vampires is pretty out there, but it does give anyone who bought the Vampire Commander deck a reason to buy packs of Ixalan. :rolleyes:

[Cire]

Idk - the concept of white vampires as blood abstaining paladins is pretty cool.

[bruizar]

I'm not usually one to defend the WotC attempt at storylines, but it is really early to declare the new set comparable to The Little Mermaid in tone.

Regarding the 'picked from a hat' tribes... I'm pretty sure Pirate and Dinosaur have been highly demanded by the playerbase for a long time. I don't see the connection between the two and question why they'd be in the same plane. But Merfolk makes a ton of sense in a plane about Pirates. And this also gives them a valid excuse to explore vehicles again (pirate ships!!)

White-aligned Vampires is pretty out there, but it does give anyone who bought the Vampire Commander deck a reason to buy packs of Ixalan. :rolleyes:

Well.. dinosaurs are referenced as dragons in one of the ixalan flavor text. I can imagine nicol bolas will get destroyed by a dinosaur(dragon) that's so ancient he even dwarfs nicol bolas in strength. (Nicol bolas won against the guildpact right?)

[Barook]

I'm not usually one to defend the WotC attempt at storylines, but it is really early to declare the new set comparable to The Little Mermaid in tone.

Regarding the 'picked from a hat' tribes... I'm pretty sure Pirate and Dinosaur have been highly demanded by the playerbase for a long time. I don't see the connection between the two and question why they'd be in the same plane. But Merfolk makes a ton of sense in a plane about Pirates. And this also gives them a valid excuse to explore vehicles again (pirate ships!!)

White-aligned Vampires is pretty out there, but it does give anyone who bought the Vampire Commander deck a reason to buy packs of Ixalan. :rolleyes:
They could have stepped up their meme game and throw in ninjas for some sweet Pirates vs Ninjas action.

[rufus]

They could have stepped up their meme game and throw in ninjas for some sweet Pirates vs Ninjas action.

Pirate ninja zombie robot monkey wars, like the battle of five armies from The Hobbit?

[toletole]

Can we please have a set that completely ignore combate phase? pleeeeeeease! And and it would be nice less digital art too, and and less dino-pirate-vampire-emo shit and more wizards and stuff. Im old I want old shit and dont like change.

[dte]

Can we please have a set that completely ignore combate phase? pleeeeeeease! And and it would be nice less digital art too, and and less dino-pirate-vampire-emo shit and more wizards and stuff. Im old I want old shit and dont like change.

Easy: buy old sets :)

[JackaBo]

Easy: buy old sets :)

Just play 93/94. I run a underworld dreams, howling mine, winds of change combo deck. With 3 redblasts main, no creatures and abyss x2. It's a pleasure to play and to behold.

[Claymore]

It's more likely to have the reserved list abolished and have Wizards print a Power 9 Arsenal box set than have any set printed that ignores the combat step.

[PirateKing]

It's more likely to have the reserved list abolished and have Wizards print a Power 9 Arsenal box set than have any set printed that ignores the combat step.

...so Reserved List abolished then?
#CONFIRMED

[morgan_coke]

So, do we just not get any cards today? This spoiler season sucks. At least give us a rare or mythic once a week. Or something. Still plenty left.

[Claymore]

They suck at spoilers recently anyway.

Didn't they reveal all the rares because of the leak?

[morgan_coke]

From what I understand they just showed everything that was on the sheet that got leaked, which wasn't all the rares, just a fair number of them. Don't think it had any Mythics on it.

We're at 81/249 now. There's a lot left.

[Ace/Homebrew]

Planeswalkers are all mythic rarity. And Jace/Vraska/red-white-walker were all on the sheet.

[bruizar]

Pillars of Genesis - 2 (Uncommon)
Artifact
When Pillars of Genesis enters the battlefield, choose a creature type.
T: Add one mana of any color to your mana pool. Use this only to play creature spells of the chosen type.

[rufus]

Pillars of Genesis - 2 (Uncommon)...

Wasn't that spoiled a while ago?

Seems like everything new is templated "... creature spell of the chosen type ..." They must really hate or fear those tribal cards.

[morgan_coke]

Two days heading into a holiday weekend and we get ZERO previews on both? Wow. Solid failure rate wizards.

[Cire]

They gave us the walker deck cards today : https://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/archive/card-preview/ixalan-promos-planeswalker-decks-packaging-and-fnm-tokens-2017-09-01 (know it's a PW deck card but Huatli, Dinosaur Knight may be the narrowest planeswalker ever)

[Claymore]

Here he is making his way through the forest.


Here he is struggling on the shore of an island.


Here he is wondering how the heck he's going to get through these mountains.


Here he is peering over the plains.


And, finally (really finally, this time), here he is wading through a swamp.

You know what?

Fuck it. I'm done.

I'm not buying another product directly from Wizards ever again.

[Cire]

Jacelands!

[morgan_coke]

It's like they heard all the criticism of "the Jacetice League" and decided to say "hold my beer"

[rufus]

Jacelands!

In the new "Beleren" expansion.

[Claymore]

I imagine the next 4 sets are going to be similar find yourself stories for the rest of the Jacetice league too.

[Dice_Box]

And, finally (really finally, this time)Fingers crossed.

[PirateKing]

They gave us the walker deck cards today

Are these the pack Planeswalkers?
Are they still doing the special precon only Planeswalker?

[Richard Cheese]

Jacelands. FML.

Also this:
http://media.wizards.com/2017/xln/en_bPbcVvKEYp.png

Can destory Homarids. I hate this game.

[Barook]

Here he is making his way through the forest.


Here he is struggling on the shore of an island.


Here he is wondering how the heck he's going to get through these mountains.


Here he is peering over the plains.


And, finally (really finally, this time), here he is wading through a swamp.
Quality writing right there.

It doesn't suprise me that their Magic storylines aren't going to have bylines anymore starting with Ixalan when your writing is so shitty that you have to hide it:

https://twitter.com/MTGAlison/status/902935084088492032

Edit: Maybe it's just the pack planeswalker, but I'm kinda worried that the new RW walker is going to have a heavy focus on dinosaurs, too. If that's the case, they have learned nothing from the second worst planeswalker of all time: Nissa, Elf Hitler

[Phoenix Ignition]

Did they really make a new Jace and call it "Jace, Ingenious Mind-Mage"?

Why not "Really Smart Brain-Wizard"?

Did they actually just embrace the idiocy of their storyline to the point of completely phoning it in like they have with MTGO's software or is it one of those memes that becomes self-aware and doubles down on its shittyness?

[MaximumC]

Jacelands. FML.

Also this:
http://media.wizards.com/2017/xln/en_bPbcVvKEYp.png

Can destory Homarids. I hate this game.

I mean, it can also destroy fish. Putting fish in the ocean kills them. But, not man-fish.

Homarids are the least of the flavor fails here.

[Di]

I mean, it can also destroy fish. Putting fish in the ocean kills them. But, not man-fish.

Homarids are the least of the flavor fails here.

It also kills birds. And dragons. And, you know, any creature with flying. Because that's just too damn much to ask for a creature walking off a board on a boat, tied up or not.

[PirateKing]

Let us not get too deep with the flavor here...

https://i.warosu.org/data/tg/img/0360/52/1415522318259.jpg

[UseLess]

I can't remember exactly where I read it, though I believe it was some post made on the mothership (too lazy to dig it up), but I'm pretty sure Wizards said that they heard the feedback from the community about too much Gatewatch and would tome it down. Something tells me they didn't quite succeed with that for this set...

[Barook]

I can't remember exactly where I read it, though I believe it was some post made on the mothership (too lazy to dig it up), but I'm pretty sure Wizards said that they heard the feedback from the community about too much Gatewatch and would tome it down. Something tells me they didn't quite succeed with that for this set...
That was wishful thinking. People interpreted it wrong. What people want is less Gatewatch. Wizards interpretation is that they don't put the entire league of chucklefucks into one plane each time, but split them up. We'll still follow Jace, Liliana, etc., but it isn't the entire Scooby Doo gang each time.

You can bet your ass that Dominaria is going to be Dominaria-centric.

[Lemnear]

So Jace isn't just a cornerstone in every goddamn set and on near every counter-/drawspell, but now also on BASIC LANDS?!?!

[Barook]

So Jace isn't just a cornerstone in every goddamn set and on near every counter-/drawspell, but now also on BASIC LANDS?!?!
I haven't even noticed that before. Holy shit, what the hell is wrong with Wizards? :eyebrow:

[Darkenslight]

So Jace isn't just a cornerstone in every goddamn set and on near every counter-/drawspell, but now also on BASIC LANDS?!?!

Well, at least you can't have the new 'walkers as your Commanders....yet.

[Barook]

Well, at least you can't have the new 'walkers as your Commanders....yet.
I was actually suprised that they didn't go that route with the rules change, considering they even had Walker Commanders before. Maybe negative feedback?

[Claymore]

The foil sheet was already, or very shortly after, leaked when Wizards said they'd cut back the Jacewatch. I'm guessing they'll actually do that after all 5 walkers have their own tribal sets, commander arsenals, standalone games, and Hearthstone's Next Digital Clone sets released.

[Richard Cheese]

I mean, it can also destroy fish. Putting fish in the ocean kills them. But, not man-fish.

Homarids are the least of the flavor fails here.

They could be freshwater fish!

http://68.media.tumblr.com/5331495cdd4b2c89978fdef5f5473957/tumblr_inline_ndg22xnNZi1r9lhsj.png
Forget about the Homarids?!?!?!? RABBLERABBLERABBLERABBLERABBLE!!!!!!

[thecrav]

So Jace isn't just a cornerstone in every goddamn set and on near every counter-/drawspell, but now also on BASIC LANDS?!?!

Jaceic lands

[Richard Cheese]

Jaceic lands

Jace-covered.

Ultimate Jacestice
Instant
:u::u::u::u::u::u:
If you and target opponent each control a Jace-covered land, jerk each other off while talking about how cool and smart and handsome Jace is. The match ends in a draw.

[Aggro_zombies]

So Jace isn't just a cornerstone in every goddamn set and on near every counter-/drawspell, but now also on BASIC LANDS?!?!
We're now at a point, with the change to the planeswalker uniqueness rule and the introduction of these Islands, where we can build an all-Jace deck.

4 Jace's Phantasm
4 Jace's Sentinel
3 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy

4 Jace's Erasure
1 Oath of Jace

4 Counterspell
2 Negate

2 Fact or Fiction

2 Castaway's Despair
2 Grasping Current

4 Jace, Architect of Thought
3 Jace, Memory Adept
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Jace, Ingenious Mind-Mage

21 Island

[Ace/Homebrew]

I was actually suprised that they didn't go that route with the rules change, considering they even had Walker Commanders before. Maybe negative feedback?
They aren't balanced for that, unlike the Planeswalker Commanders. Such a change would likely require banning some cards...

[Barook]

We're now at a point, with the change to the planeswalker uniqueness rule and the introduction of these Islands, where we can build an all-Jace deck.

4 Jace's Phantasm
4 Jace's Sentinel
3 Jace, Vryn's Prodigy

4 Jace's Erasure
1 Oath of Jace

4 Counterspell
2 Negate

2 Fact or Fiction

2 Castaway's Despair
2 Grasping Current

4 Jace, Architect of Thought
3 Jace, Memory Adept
3 Jace, the Mind Sculptor
1 Jace, Ingenious Mind-Mage

21 Island

This is a thing of beauty. Now we only need one spiteful mofo to dress up like Jace and play that deck at some event for mamimum trolling.

[bruizar]

This is a thing of beauty. Now we only need one spiteful mofo to dress up like Jace and play that deck at some event for mamimum trolling.

Speaking of cosplay, I'm wearing an eyepatch at the Ixalan prerelease. HAR!

I'm gonna say "Shiver your timbers!" every time I deal combat damage to my opponent


ps: no O.G. Jace aka Beleren?

[Barook]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DIu0HGdWAAACVpJ.jpg

More quality GY hate. While it can't single-target attack GYs, it's one mana cheaper. And it still turns Tarmogoyfs into garbage. I like it.

[Aggro_zombies]

It's probably worse than Nihil Spellbomb, unless the scry matters somehow.

EDIT: It also doesn't target, which may be slightly more relevant.

[Dice_Box]

Also entirely colourless. You get the manipulation up front without a need for a coloured mana to access it. Even it if is a weaker effect, Scrying over drawing.

[Aggro_zombies]

I guess my big complaint about it is that it tags both graveyards, which limits the number of decks that want it. Most blue decks have DRS, delve, and/or Snapcaster and so want to preserve at least a little bit of their own graveyards. Non-blue decks either want to use their graveyards as a resource (Lands, dredge), have more powerful options (white decks with RiP), or aren't really in the market for graveyard hate (some combo decks).

I think the card is fine, but it's trying to break into a crowded market.

[rufus]

It's probably worse than Nihil Spellbomb, unless the scry matters somehow.

EDIT: It also doesn't target, which may be slightly more relevant.

In a world where cards like 'goyf, scavenging ooze, and DRS are ubiquitous, 'all graveyards' is significantly different from 'target player's graveyard.'

[bruizar]

http://media-dominaria.cursecdn.com/avatars/133/371/636399669207800654.png

Interesting ult!

[Barook]

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DIv4CZVW0AAlTFl.jpg

Meh, 5 mana is alot.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DIv4-6TW4AEDL-s.jpg

4 mana is alot, but blocking certain permanents does seem pretty interesting. Although it doesn't stop cheating stuff into play. :rolleyes:

[procobrito]

http://media-dominaria.cursecdn.com/avatars/133/410/636401187279049993.png

http://media-dominaria.cursecdn.com/avatars/133/409/636401184205869891.png

I really want to test this in High Tide with Turnabout and Time Spiral, lol.

[Darkenslight]

Relevant card?

https://twitter.com/ElaineChase/status/904774132994260997

Siren Stormtamer :u:
Creature - Siren Pirate Wizard (U)
:u: , sacrifice ~: Counter target spell or ability that targets you or a creature you control.
1/1

The relevant part is that it hits spells and abilities that target your stuff. It seems like efficient protection from things going Farming, as well as Bolts.

[Barook]

It's interesting for sure and cheap enough for Legacy, but what deck would play it?

[bruizar]

http://media-dominaria.cursecdn.com/avatars/thumbnails/133/417/200/283/636401326125824297.png
I like this card for Standard. Very curious how Mardu vehicles will adopt the blue-centric vehicle cards in the coming set. It's not quite stoneforge mystic, but it has the potential to be busted provided they print a broken vehicle

for those who do not follow standard:
Mardu Vehicles

25 LANDS
4 Aether Hub
2 Canyon Slough
4 Concealed Courtyard
4 Inspiring Vantage
2 Mountain
3 Plains
2 Shambling Vent
4 Spire of Industry
20 CREATURES
3 Archangel Avacyn
2 Pia Nalaar
4 Scrapheap Scrounger
4 Thraben Inspector
4 Toolcraft Exemplar
3 Walking Ballista
7 INSTANTS and SORC.
3 Fatal Push
4 Unlicensed Disintegration
8 OTHER SPELLS
3 Aethersphere Harvester
2 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
3 Heart of Kiran
SIDEBOARD
2 Abrade
2 Chandra, Torch of Defiance
1 Declaration in Stone
1 Dispossess
3 Doomfall
2 Gideon, Ally of Zendikar
1 Heart of Kiran
1 Painful Truths
2 Skysovereign, Consul Flagship