Other than Zoo (a good deck, but it's not like 15-20% of the metagame) and janky burn decks, who plays Lightning Bolt?
I realize the "dies to Lightning Bolt" has been a standard in the game forever, but think that test is outdated. And if hardly any deck plays a card, there's no reason to compare against it.
Tempo Thresh plays it too, but I do agree with your overall point.Originally Posted by Bardo
Decks that play Lightning Bolt (in order of likely seeing them at this point):
Zoo, Tempo Threshold, Goyf Sligh, Ugr Dreadstill, Burn, Ultimate Walker. In the northeast Legacy meta that would probably be a solid 20% of your likely opponents.
If your opponent plays Bolts, which you will know when you have 2ready you simply activate +2 first and he is out of Boltrange.
In control decks he's essentially the same as Beleren but he costs one mana more, has no drawback in his abilities has limited protection which has synergy with counterspells/Balance and is nuts when he does his stuff for 2-3 turns.
A cmc 4 spell has to win the game or prevent you from losing it. Thats why Wrath, Elspeth, Humility and such are played. Don't you think a Brainstorm every turn or bounce with counters in hand/Balance in play will win you the game if not answered quickly?
TS Crew
The unsummon isn't the reason to play this card, like alot of people are making it out to be. It's just an added bonus :). It means you can drop him on a table with a single creature and standstill after, because they won't have their creature around, or it means you can send a dreadnought or tombstalker back to where it came from, from time to time.
From where I stand Jace TMS is a brainstorm factory that could double as a killcon after netting you a hand full of cards, with some built-in flexibility.
I'm going to modify my landstill list slightly (add a little more board control) and play two of these suckers instead of my old draw package, which consists of two FoFs and an old Jace.
Hello friend.
You fail to understand the problem. "Lightning Bolt" is just shorthand for "anything that does three damage."
It's not referring exclusively the literal card, Lightning Bolt, which should have been obvious, but I guess it wasn't.
Silvergill Adept pumped by a Lord will get it done (what, will you bounce their Silvergill?). Nimble Mongoose will bash in. Goyf will bash in. Qasali will bash in, or Nacatl (or bolt or chain or Helix all from that deck). Two goblins takes it out. Ichorid takes it out. If it had one more hitpoint, it wouldn't die in one swing.
About half the played sources of damage in the format do 3 damage. Most sources that do less do secondary jobs, like Silvergill Adept, Bob, or Trygon Predator.
But the general cutoff for playability is that, if all the card does is damage, it has to do at least 3.
Yes, "Lightning Bolt" only sees play in about 20-30% of the metagame (actually, I think this is the highest it's ever been -- Zoo, 4c NLU, Tempo Thresh all run it, and are all very popular, so I have no idea what the fuck you're talking about when you say it's on the decline), but certainly the set of "cards that do at least three damage" is higher than ever.
Incidentally, it only has to get about two brainstorms off before it has more absolute power than Fact (depending on what you have drawn, and how many cards you want to/can shuffle away). It might even have more absolute power than Fact off the first activation if you have two crap cards you want to ditch and/or your opponent has to spend cards and time taking it out.
It's worse than fact if your opponent has an answer immediately, and better than fact if your opponent has to scramble to pick up an answer (minus, of course, the fact that you need to tap out during your own mainphase).
I will definetly try this out in a blue stax shell. Between this and Intuition it might actually be able to generate enough card selection to overcome its inherent consistency issues (as well as filling a permanent based creature "removing" role that the archetype desperatly needs).
Oh, and it will be able to run Uba Mask as a sideboard card versus combo and control which is nothing short of awesome.
Realistically, you have to activate new Jace about three times for it to actually be better than Careful Consideration. A card that sees no play because Fact or Fiction is better. I think Forbiddian's picture of the card is actually excessively rosy.
If the card were an even remotely tenable kill condition, I wouldn't be taking this position. But as a kill condition it's absolutely, atrociously bad.
Most Planeswalkers that have seen play in Legacy (and other formats) have been pushed by two factors;
1) As a new card type, there are relatively few cards that deal with Planeswalkers. Burn spells, creatures, and the odd Vindicate or Maelstrom Pulse or whatever.
2) Every viable Planeswalker has been a multifunctional card advantage engine that doubled as a threat.
Is new Jace a card advantage engine? Yes. Does it double as a threat? No. Additionaly, unlike every other viable Planeswalker, it neither comes with enough Loyalty to survive a reasonable hit on it's own, nor is it's loyalty-pumping ability remotely relevant or useful. With other Planeswalkers you could race damage with something to show for it. Garruk and Ajani Venjeant protected themselves. Old Jace was the most vulnerable if you didn't want to go Howling Mine, but it could reasonably double as a kill condition. It also curved into Wrath instead of cockblocking it.
In case I haven't expressed it in strong enough terms;
I would legitimately rather play Arcanis the Omnipotent, to hardcast, than this card. At least then I could have a kill condition and not lose to Lightning Bolts and Nimble Mongeese.
For my confessions, they burned me with fire/
And found I was for endurance made
This Jace reminds me Browse... in a way... It "draws" multiple cards then can empty the library for the softlock with Soldevi Digger. (remember Finkel's counter-post)
I don't know how he sucks or good he is but I was thinking of building (on paper only...) a deck around him in Legacy more than putting him in an already built deck...
Ancestral Vision ?
Foil ?
Thwart ?
Daze ?
Brainstorm ?
Force of Will ?
fetchland(s) ?
Misdirection ?
Time Warp ?
Snow-Covered Island + Scrying sheets ?
Stasis ?
Beacon of Tomorrows ?
Ensnare ?
And that was obvious for me (but maybe not for Legacy) :
Archmage ascension !? (I'm still asking... combo here ?)
I think he works best when he teams up with Tezzeret for a good Mono Blue Stax.
That deck lacks a way to gain CA. Jace solves that. Archmage Ascension does look too cool then, though.
I don't understand why a Brainstorm for
P.S. Please avoid flame, it generally makes the [SCD] threads locked.
0.05.14 [Digital Devil] <Digital Devil> Ach! Hans, run! It's the Tarmogoyf!
0.05.17 [Hans (GER)] <Hans (GER)> ...
0.05.20 [<System>] <System> Player Lost
Sigh. When most people say "dies to Lightning Bolt," I don't think they mean, it "dies to Tarmogoyf" or "dies to a thresh'd Nimble Mongoose." What's just weird. I think most people to make it to mean any direct damage that does three damage.
If you're worried about Chain Lightning, Rift Bolt, w/e, you just activate the +2 ability before passing priority. If Wild Nacatl is on board, either bounce it, +2 Jace or remove it with another fucking card. It's not like the some theoretical deck with new Jace is that card + 56 lands, you know? Besides, these conversations are out of context with actual games. You're probably not going to throw down new Jace when your board is empty and your're staring at 4 opposing Island-walking Merfolk. You're going to lose that game.
Lastly, if the Dec 2009 SCG $5K is any indication of a typical metagame, decks playing Lightning Bolt (and other DD cards) are just around 18% of the top 16. One each of Zoo, Tempo Thresh and Sligh in the Top 16.
The debate is on whether or not this card is good enough to see play, not if it's going to break the metagame. If the card just said "Draw 3 cards, put 2 back" for 4 mana, we would not be discussing it. It's about all of the pieces together.I don't understand why a Brainstorm for
I think you guys are underestimating the new Jace.
First of all, I think he's a pretty good fit as a 1 of (maybe 2 of) in slower Countertop decks. Countertop these days is barely aggro-control, its more like control that can win fast because of Goyf. New Jace is much better than old Jace because he has more ways to protect himself. Sure, he's not THAT great when you're losing, but none of the Planeswalkers really are, including Elspeth. He's fantastic on an even board position though because he can do whatever you want. He should never be dying to Lightning Bolt except in special cases, because if you know your opponent is playing Bolt and is likely to have it you just use the +2 the turn he comes down and they're gonna be pretty hard pressed to Bolt him. Then next turn on you get to Brainstorm each turn for free which should basically put you way ahead after a couple of turns unchecked (something not necessarily true of Elspeth).
If your opponent has a single creature, you can still play Jace and unsummon him. Replay the dork, you say? You're playing blue! Unsummon comboes well with the free/1-mana counterspells if they happened to slip a creature past your counter wall, and you're not spending a card to do it if Jace lives another turn. On top of that Unsummon effect is particularly good against Tombstalker, and more niche cases like Dreadnought and Marit Lage.
Often times you'll have a Rhox War Monk out or whatever, your opponent has a couple of dorks, the game is reasonably even- you land Jace and bam, massive shift in your favor because Planeswalkers in general are very tough to deal with if the board position is anywhere near even.
The worst time to play Jace is when you're losing significantly- sure, I already mentioned that. But even then, he can usually buy you a turn or two between unsummoning a threatening dork and having them deal with him.
Think of it this way- Elspeth sees a decent amount of play. What does Elspeth really do? She can get you a free card each turn, but its a 1/1 dork while Jace can search and get you a good card from your deck each turn, better with shuffling effects. Elspeth's clock is a bit harder to disrupt, but Jace has an unsummon effect. Elspeth can take an existing creature and speed up the clock in some cases. On the whole I think he's nearly as good.
P.S. Why does tapping out during your main phase even matter that much these days, heh. Who runs Counterspell? Only Landstill, and only sometimes, and only as about a 2 of.
Seriously, against decks with Bolts, don't pass priority and gain +2 if you suspect that your opponent has bolt in his hand. But you can easily still activate the Brainstorm option if your opponent is tapped out, or you think that it's very unlikely that they would have bolt, since you Thoughtseized or something (or an educated guess, based on how they've played), or you have CB/Top out, and you don't care, etc. Then, even if they went and bolted it, you still got a Brainstorm activation and took a bolt out of your opponent's hand. That's pretty sweet.
Though the 4 cmc is a bit of a bummer, as it competes with Humility/Wrath. Maybe we can build a deck that plays cheaper sweepers like Firespout/EE/etc, and then slam down Jace for the consistent card advantage/selection to secure the win, so I guess, something like a Supreme Blue variant?
Such a weak semantic argument. Even if you have the belief that everyone was talking about Lightning Bolts and nobody had discussed creatures, yet, it's obvious that Goyfs and Threshed Gooses and just about every creature in the format pose as much or more of a problem than direct damage.Sigh. When most people say "dies to Lightning Bolt," I don't think they mean, it "dies to Tarmogoyf" or "dies to a thresh'd Nimble Mongoose." What's just weird. I think most people to make it to mean any direct damage that does three damage.
But anyway, the point that IBA and I are trying to make is that the three hitpoints makes Jace #2 a huge liability -- one you shouldn't have to worry about if you're forking over FOUR mana for it.
The problem is the fact that Jace needs so much additional backup (as opposed to, say, Elspeth). Elspeth could make a 1/1, take or chump the hit of the goose (or a bolt), and still be a real presence in the game while you draw to answers. Just the presence of Wild Nacatl or Nimble Mongoose (or the threat of a lightning bolt) makes you downshift Jace to running his crappy secondary abilities.If you're worried about Chain Lightning, Rift Bolt, w/e, you just activate the +2 ability before passing priority. If Wild Nacatl is on board, either bounce it, +2 Jace or remove it with another fucking card.
Funny how you bring up "you still lose" in reference to a claim of "four opposing island-walking Merfolk" when you don't talk about the win-more factor. At any rate, it doesn't take four island-walking merfolk to kill Jace, it takes a Silvergill Adept in play and a Lord in hand.You're probably not going to throw down new Jace when your board is empty and your're staring at 4 opposing Island-walking Merfolk. You're going to lose that game.
If I'm paying four mana for it, it should be able to do something on its own, otherwise it's simply win-more. If I can clear the board against Zoo, have enough life that they can't burn me out, spend a turn adding counters, then still have enough time to chain-brainstorm my way to victory... why not just play Elspeth? By that point, Elspeth would have like 8 counters and have 4 1/1 guys running around ready to ultimate.
In fact, if you fulfilled the ridiculous conditions for keeping a Jace alive and using Brainstorm against Zoo, ANY played four casting cost spell would seal the game.
Pretty much what I guessed, but thanks. I will note that direct damage still isn't the real problem facing Jace, it's creatures and the fact that Jace goes into "oh shit" mode when your opponent has a one drop.Lastly, if the Dec 2009 SCG $5K is any indication of a typical metagame, decks playing Lightning Bolt (and other DD cards) are just around 18% of the top 16. One each of Zoo, Tempo Thresh and Sligh in the Top 16.
About "how many turns until Jace has more effect than Fact or Fiction" I still think it's one untap step.
If your opponent bolts immediately, you pay 2UU (3 mana extra over your opponent) for a Brainstorm and a Duress. That's not a great play, but that is when your opponent has the answer immediately (assuming a cleared board).
If your opponent has, say, a Rift Bolt (or for whatever other reason he has to let you untap with Jace), you paid 2UU (3 extra) for two Brainstorms and a Duress. You're drawing 6 cards (even without a shuffle effect, you see 4 extra cards you wouldn't have seen and keep two of the best ones), and you duress your opponent, whereas Fact or Fiction would be look at the tap 5, keep the best two or the three worst (usually).
The real problem is creatures, though. Jace can't be played against two opposing creatures (unlike Elspeth).
I have no idea why this is a SCD, though. Every SCD completely sucks, not because it boils down to a flame war or w/e, but because it quickly becomes obvious that the card is only playable in one archetype (or two archetypes where it fulfills vastly different roles). Everything that has been said should have been said in the Landstill thread or the respective threads as people try this out and then realize it costs too much for their bant aggro deck. There are even people quoting shit out of different threads and re-posting them in different threads, and some people saying you'll have Rhox War Monk to cover Jace anyway, and other people saying that you'll have Firespout or Wrath of God. AHH!!
Bardo summed it up perfectly:
Obviously you feel that way. That's because it's a fucking SCD thread.It's not like the some theoretical deck with new Jace is that card + 56 lands, you know? Besides, these conversations are out of context with actual games.
I think that this card can see some play in MUC along with maindeck Predicts. But I can't think of any other deck that would be able to use her efficiently.
Let's talk about Landstill then.
Essentially, when I hear people advocating this card over another planeswalker, even Old Jace, it's basically like listening to someone advocate the running of, say, Seek the Horizon over Eternal Dragon, or Thirst for Knowledge instead of Decree of Justice.
"But Eternal Dragon just grabs you one crappy plains! You can get [i]three lands with Seek the Horizon!""
"But DoJ just draws you one card for three mana! You're at least getting better selection with TfK, if not outright card advantage!"
The flaw, of course, is that you're not running either card for their drawing capability alone, but because of their double function. While not dead early game, they're there to win late game. You really don't have that much room to maneuver in a control deck; you need to be packing your deck with answers and a way to switch roles to deal with various threats. You want your own kill conditions to be multifunctional. Preferably you're trying to get as much utility and flexibility out of each card as you can.
New Jace, at four mana, is fighting for space with cards like Wrath, Disk, Humility, Ajani Venjeant, Elspeth, Cryptic Command, Fact or Fiction or Gifts Ungiven, all but the latter two of which are very multifunctional, and the latter two of which can immediately turn a game around upon resolution.
New Jace, on the other hand, is basically only good in most situations if you're already winning or maybe against another control deck. And that mirror's rarer than the decks running Lightning Bolt or Tarmogoyf.
For my confessions, they burned me with fire/
And found I was for endurance made
Maybe I'm misunderstanding something, but I don't see where the idea that Old Jace is a kill condition whereas New Jace is not is coming from. With Old Jace, you activate the +2 ability, a more-or-less neutral effect, for four turns, following which your opponent's library is shortened by 20 cards. With New Jace, you activate the +2 ability, a modestly positive effect, for five turns, following which your opponent loses their hand and their library is shortened to, at most, 7 cards. How is the former more of a kill condition than the latter?
SummenSaugen: well, I use Chaos Orb, Animate Artifact, and Dance of Many to make the table we're playing on my chaos orb token
SummenSaugen: then I flip it over and crush my opponent
It's not. The gain Loyalty and Ultimates on both Jaces suck. Sure either could be a fall back if one's out of other options to kill their opponent, but neither are impressive.
The plus to the Old Jace is that it costs 3 mana which is generally an underused CMC in Legacy control, so in multicolor decks - Landstill, Speedstill, Ultimate Walker, etc - you can play out Old Jace, and then follow it up with a good turn 4 bomb the turn after - Wrath of God, Elspeth, Ajani, Humilty, etc.
Honestly, I don't think the New Jace competes with with Elspeth or Ajani in terms of playability. If the deck is UWx I would run Elspeth all day over the New Jace. If the X is Red, I'd include Ajani Vengeant before looking to the New Jace.
I think the decks that will consider running the New Jace are the Blue ones that aren't White splashed decks. Tier 2 decks like MUC, MU Stax, Faerie Stompy, etc; None of these decks have really had a Planeswalker that's fit their deck's CCs before. Being 2UU it lends itself to the the Ancient Tomb/City of Traitors mana bases, and it gives those decks something that's pretty synergistic with Chalice of the Void answering Bolt effects and then having the ability to bounce guys that make it into play or draw/filter versus control. The New Jace might not fit into these types of decks either, but it's probably worth testing.
TPDMC
I still think Jace deserves considerations in decks outside Landstill, like Supreme Blue, so I don't see why he's only limited to one possible archetype or only limited to various T2 mono blue decks like MUC or Fairy Stompy.
But if you're worried about drawing to answers, Elspeth gives you a single turn (against 2 creatures; both 'walkers are OK vs. one creature, each better in certain situations). You can also do that with Jace by simply brainstorming the turn he comes down- in which case he's given you a single turn to find an answer. He's much better at finding answers than Elspeth is.The problem is the fact that Jace needs so much additional backup (as opposed to, say, Elspeth). Elspeth could make a 1/1, take or chump the hit of the goose (or a bolt), and still be a real presence in the game while you draw to answers. Just the presence of Wild Nacatl or Nimble Mongoose (or the threat of a lightning bolt) makes you downshift Jace to running his crappy secondary abilities.
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