And oh my god, way to spoil the surprise about the question before the second set is released, WotC! You could have at least pulled a New Phyrexia and tried to hide it.
The name of the third set is always revealed before the second set is revealed. New Phrexia was very unusual and Wizards went to a lot of trouble to protect the secret, including paying to register two trademarks where they normally only register one.
That all said, it should ne noted that other large last sets are not considered standalone. You guys are either new players, or have really short memories, but they have pushed for increased space in final sets before (Dissension, Alara Reborn) simply to develop a few more cards, many of them drawn from the card file as rejects from previous sets that didn't quite fit (Dissension ended up getting the wedge split cards and the Nephilim as a result, where the latter were intended for earlier release). You also seem to think this will be a RoE repeat, and that's just feeding into your recent experiences. There has been no announcement that this is a "two-block" Block, like Zendikar/Rise and Lorwyn/Shadowmoor, and that was raised when those blocks' second sets were released. You should have no worries about this, and consider the effect of a large end-block pool, just as TSP had to deal with it in the beginning.
There was, however, a statement that this large set Avacyn Reloaded is intended for stand-alone draft and sealed, which pushes it much further towards the Rise of the Eldrazi end and away from the Dissension end. (Incidentally, the Nephilim were in Guildpact, not Dissension.)
That all said, it should ne noted that other large last sets are not considered standalone. You guys are either new players, or have really short memories, but they have pushed for increased space in final sets before (Dissension, Alara Reborn) simply to develop a few more cards, many of them drawn from the card file as rejects from previous sets that didn't quite fit (Dissension ended up getting the wedge split cards and the Nephilim as a result, where the latter were intended for earlier release). You also seem to think this will be a RoE repeat, and that's just feeding into your recent experiences. There has been no announcement that this is a "two-block" Block, like Zendikar/Rise and Lorwyn/Shadowmoor, and that was raised when those blocks' second sets were released. You should have no worries about this, and consider the effect of a large end-block pool, just as TSP had to deal with it in the beginning.
Nope, I've been playing since '95; but when the article itself says "Avacyn Restored will be drafted by itself.", I tend to believe them
I must be missing something, but I don't see how Heroic Defiance fit this week's Card of the Day theme. Unless the trick is that it's "Defying" the theme?
EDIT: I figured it out just after posting this... That theme is brilliant!
I must be missing something, but I don't see how Heroic Defiance fit this week's Card of the Day theme. Unless the trick is that it's "Defying" the theme?
EDIT: I figured it out just after posting this... That theme is brilliant!
@ Friday's Daily Deckliist: Take a really good deck, replace 3 good cards with bad cards, and surprise, it's still a pretty good deck. Parallel Lives is jank, even in a deck full of token making.
@ Friday's Daily Deckliist: Take a really good deck, replace 3 good cards with bad cards, and surprise, it's still a pretty good deck. Parallel Lives is jank, even in a deck full of token making.
The daily deck is actually rather different from the usual version of township tokens in that he replaced more than just "3 good cards" with Parallel Lives . His version is a lot slower than the normal version, but it has a ramp element giving it a potentially stronger midgame, and probably a better endgame. It's still fast enough to stall a typical aggro deck, and you're right that the core is the same core as the normal GW Tokens, meaning that it is still pretty strong for the most part.
It's the ramp part though that makes Parallel lives not quite as "jank," although I still don't know if it's really a good card yet. Because he is able to amass a stronger mana base that much quicker, he is that much more likely to be able to spend the 4 mana, even knowing it won't have an impact yet, because, guess what! It might still have an impact after all that turn, given that he could have gotten hero of bladehold out turn 3, so parallel lives will give him the extra two tokens, and more in the future. Also, he could theoretically have the Mimic Vat /Parallel Lives combo out pretty early, and then Day of Judgement to clear the board, mimic vat to create twoHero of Bladehold (or Geist-Honored Monk ), and there's 8 1/1 tokens, which with the two Hero of Bladehold tokens, that's 34 damage straight at your opponent's face.
**Note** I don't actually know if the deck would be quite as viable in a tournament, but it is different enough that it could be considered. Also, as they said in the blip at the top, "bring it to your Friday Night magic" where it would probably do very well if you understand the deck
Clearly Hesiod predated the Rule of Five (or whatever it's supposed to be called officially). The last time Wizards broke that rule I think was in Shards of Alara, with Sedraxis Specter , Broodmate Dragon , Realm Razer , some Bant creature I forget, and.... Punish Ignorance . Aaron Forsythe hit this card during his short-lived Card Comment of the Day, and that in turn caused it to lodge in my mind as being annoying - he thought there was nothing wrong about breaking the cycle of rare creatures for the shards, but I'm annoyed and wonder what awesome Esper creature could have gone here instead.
As far as the benefit of the rest of Magic is concerned, gold cards in Legends were executed perfectly. They got all the excitement a designer could hope out of a splashy new mechanic without using up any of the valuable design space. Truly amazing. --Aaron Forsythe's Random Card Comment on Kei Takahashi
Clearly Hesiod predated the Rule of Five (or whatever it's supposed to be called officially). The last time Wizards broke that rule I think was in Shards of Alara, with Sedraxis Specter , Broodmate Dragon , Realm Razer , some Bant creature I forget, and.... Punish Ignorance . Aaron Forsythe hit this card during his short-lived Card Comment of the Day, and that in turn caused it to lodge in my mind as being annoying - he thought there was nothing wrong about breaking the cycle of rare creatures for the shards, but I'm annoyed and wonder what awesome Esper creature could have gone here instead.
I think you got your cycles mixed up. Punish Ignorance isn't part of that cycle, the others are just power rares without any effective cycling aside from being rare and doing something. The actual "cycles" involved was, if I recall correctly, the uncommon Charm cycle, the CDDE mythic cycle (Hellkite Overlord and kin), Tower Gargoyle , Kederekt Creeper [a common, 'cause otherwise it would be Fire-Field Ogre which, I suppose, is just as effective], Sprouting Thrinax , Woolly Thoctar and Rhox War Monk . Rares worked in a large range, such as Sedraxis Specter and Stoic Angel , but Punish Ignorance isn't even a creature, in a break with the other Shard creatures, simply because there is a dearth in SoA for rare creatures. This implies that either there is no real cycle here (if there is, it's extremely loose), or that the structure was less on the feeling "obvious" cycles than filling in slots with effective cards, and making sure the CDE costs were followed. Note that CDDE appears on six cards, not five, while CDE appears on a majority of them. What you seem to have done is merely grabbed all the rare CDE cards together, and forced them into a "cycle," which seems odd.
"Possibilities abound, too numerous to count."
"Innocent, unbiased observation is a myth." --- P.B. Medawar (1969)
"Ever since man first left his cave and met a stranger with a different language and a new way of looking at things, the human race has had a dream: to kill him, so we don't have to learn his language or his new way of looking at things." --- Zapp Brannigan (Beast With a Billion Backs)
Clearly Hesiod predated the Rule of Five (or whatever it's supposed to be called officially). The last time Wizards broke that rule I think was in Shards of Alara, with Sedraxis Specter , Broodmate Dragon , Realm Razer , some Bant creature I forget, and.... Punish Ignorance . Aaron Forsythe hit this card during his short-lived Card Comment of the Day, and that in turn caused it to lodge in my mind as being annoying - he thought there was nothing wrong about breaking the cycle of rare creatures for the shards, but I'm annoyed and wonder what awesome Esper creature could have gone here instead.
Aaron never said it was supposed to be a cycle of creatures. He only commented on it not fitting with the shard's mechanical themes:
The other consists of Broodmate Dragon, Sedraxis Specter, Realm Razer, Stoic Angel, and this card--essentially just a bunch of cool cards with varying levels of connectivity to the rest of the set. Sedraxis Specter actually has its shard’s mechanic, Stoic Angel was designed to play well with exalted cards, and Broodmate Dragon is, well, a dragon, which is a big part of Jund’s identity. Realm Razer kind of fits with Naya’s plan of get out a bunch of huge creatures (and then make the lands go away). Punish Ignorance, on the other hand, really has nothing to do with Esper's colored artifacts theme.
Also, I think Mikaeus broke the rule too, he should've been WG.
