divisionbyzorro
Member
I wouldn't say it was terrible, but it just didn't click with me. I never went home after work and thought "man, I really want to draft Gatecrash right now," whereas I actively wanted to draft RTR.
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Magic: the GAFering |OT2|
- Thread starter The Technomancer
- Start date
I wouldn't say it was terrible, but it just didn't click with me. I never went home after work and thought "man, I really want to draft Gatecrash right now," whereas I actively wanted to draft RTR.
divisionbyzorro
Member
divisionbyzorro
Member
divisionbyzorro
Member
This POS is your buy-a-box promo:
No kidding. Ajani 2.0 makes Ral look like trash by comparison.
No kidding. Ajani 2.0 makes Ral look like trash by comparison.
Hm. $40 preorder price incoming.
He's not very good.
narcosis219
Member
Split cards with a twist? Seems sweet.
Too bad paying for both sides is always gonna be way too much mana.
Too bad paying for both sides is always gonna be way too much mana.
Hasn't stopped people yet. He's more useful than bad Gideon and even that reached $25 - $30 before it came out. His first ability looks exploitable, his second is Lightning Bolt, and his third says "HEY! YOU COULD GET 5 EXTRA TURNS!!! OMGZ!" People are going to eat this up.
Ral is good only if he has support from the deck. You cannot drop him into a deck on his own and expect him to do work. That's why I say "he's not very good" - contextually, he's just not as individually powerful as many of the other PWs we've seen recently. And given he's a 4-mana U walker, probably a good thing.
narcosis219
Member
We just need Simic and Selesnya colored planeswalkers and we'll have at least one for every guild color!
Honestly really surprised we haven't seen a GW one yet. Guess we need to save those for The Ravnica Strikes Back in 5 years.
divisionbyzorro
Member
Missed this split card before:
We know the Simic one (it's Kiora, probably will see her soon-ish.) Selesnya's the ??? one now.
narcosis219
Member
When the cycle is complete, I don't know how I'll hold myself back from putting all of them into my cube. It would make for a really PW heavy cube and is probably a bad idea, but the OCD in me wants to make cycles. UGH
Missed this split card before:
You know, as much as I like these, it really bothers me that the borders and bars cross over the middle.
This smells like some crazy shennanigans in EDH. Time warp with free copies? lolololol
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
Fuse is pretty cool. Like a more versatile (from a design standpoint) version of Entwine
Ral may not nessecarily end up being very good but he's goddamn hilarious
Ral may not nessecarily end up being very good but he's goddamn hilarious
narcosis219
Member
Ral has an untap ability so he has the potential to do some broken things. In cube at least, untap a basalt monolith/grim monolith/other mana rock every turn is ridiculous.
divisionbyzorro
Member
Time to start brewing!
I think it's because they're willing to just straight up ban this card too. (Call isn't very good.)
The Technomancer
card-carrying scientician
Ah, I hoped for wacky green resource manipulation, but black was my second choice. We can get some really interesting effects in black.
Damn, I have no idea how to vote for the first time though. Aura or non-aura...
Yeah, I don't think he's powerful and completely game changing as soon as he hits the board, but very few PWs these days are. At any rate, I like him better than Liliana of the Dark Realms, Tibalt and Gideon, Champion of Justice.
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
I ain't sayin' nuthin
I don't see any zombies.
Beck is likely to get banned in modern. It's nuts -- the one mana difference between it and glimpse is significant, but so is the ability to draw cards by chaining through token generators. I can't fucking believe they printed a Glimpse of Nature that works with tokens.
'Loser Affinity' will be a deck for a few weeks. I already took my ravagers out of the trade binder.
Ral Zarek will see some standard play for his -2; RUG control might become a thing. The +1 is hard to rate, but I'm guessing the tap ability is pretty much useless. His ult is fucking hilarious, and will cause him to see WAY more play at FNM than he should. Not a great planeswalker -- he's worse than every other PW he tries to emulate (mostly ajani vengeant) -- but he's still playable. 4cmc lightning bolt + a planeswalker for later, on turn three, off farseek, is good enough.
Compare to how most people used Ajani Vengeant during his time in the sun. Lightning helix a dude, leave the board empty, now you have a planeswalker capable of tapping down lands for a while.
....unfortunately, Ral Zarek ramps and removes blockers instead of keeping lands and attackers tapped. I don't think his abilities are synergistic with each other, and it seems like he's trying to cater to three playstyles at once.
Melek is a pretty nifty 'fair' izzet Commander. Obviously you can do insane things with him, but he won't draw hate like Jhoria or Niv. You could also probably do something ridiculous with him and top in a (casual) legacy pet deck. Entomb, reanimate, dark ritual, seething song, pyretic ritual, rite of flame, animate dead, griselbrand, sensei's divining top to spin to the next mana ritual, scroll rack as a backup top, etc etc etc. You'd need to load the deck to the fucking brim with rituals, but it'd still be fun as a motherfucker to pull off. Just not competitive.
fuckit, decklist:
(19 duals/fetches/whatev)
combo hell:
1 Melek
1 grapeshot
1 past in flames
rits:
4 Dark Ritual
4 Rite of Flame
4 Seething Song
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Manamorphose
reanimator:
4 Entomb
4 Reanimate
consistency:
4 brainstorm
spin:
4 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Scroll Rack
terrible? yes.
fun as a motherfucker? YOU BETCHYA.
the other cards....
Wear/Tear is pretty nice. Hull breach at instant speed for one more mana, in boros. EDH loves it.
Toil/Trouble is playable. Three mana for a Sudden Impact is below the curve for this standard environment, as is a three mana sign in blood. Give both options and the new mechanic, and you've got a card that breaks open the jund midrange v control matchup pretty hardcore. A three way split card between divination, sudden impact, and "target player loses 5+ life" is absurd.
Jund doesn't really have that sort of reach outside of thundermaw hellkite, and attaching a lategame burn spell to early card advantage is very good card design. The only issue is, Jund doesn't need any more help beating control. It has Liliana. The card is solid, but I'm not sure it does enough or has a home in standard. I still wanna play with it.
VALUE PREDICTIONS:
Ral will not be an expensive planeswalker, but will stay over $15 for most of his standard run due to newb appeal. Expect preorders to begin at $30-40, and slowly fall to 15 once redemptions are up.
If he finds a home that can take advantage of his odd abilities, he might be able to keep a $25 pricetag. I wouldn't feel too bad jumping in at around that price now, as he'll likely be trading for 40 at release.
Beck will peak at a few bucks (under ten), then likely get banned in modern. Expect many combo elves and affinity pieces to make a 10-50% jump in the next few hours/days.
Everything else spoiled is bulk. Render silence might be two bucks longterm, as it's pretty nifty.
'Loser Affinity' will be a deck for a few weeks. I already took my ravagers out of the trade binder.
Ral Zarek will see some standard play for his -2; RUG control might become a thing. The +1 is hard to rate, but I'm guessing the tap ability is pretty much useless. His ult is fucking hilarious, and will cause him to see WAY more play at FNM than he should. Not a great planeswalker -- he's worse than every other PW he tries to emulate (mostly ajani vengeant) -- but he's still playable. 4cmc lightning bolt + a planeswalker for later, on turn three, off farseek, is good enough.
Compare to how most people used Ajani Vengeant during his time in the sun. Lightning helix a dude, leave the board empty, now you have a planeswalker capable of tapping down lands for a while.
....unfortunately, Ral Zarek ramps and removes blockers instead of keeping lands and attackers tapped. I don't think his abilities are synergistic with each other, and it seems like he's trying to cater to three playstyles at once.
Melek is a pretty nifty 'fair' izzet Commander. Obviously you can do insane things with him, but he won't draw hate like Jhoria or Niv. You could also probably do something ridiculous with him and top in a (casual) legacy pet deck. Entomb, reanimate, dark ritual, seething song, pyretic ritual, rite of flame, animate dead, griselbrand, sensei's divining top to spin to the next mana ritual, scroll rack as a backup top, etc etc etc. You'd need to load the deck to the fucking brim with rituals, but it'd still be fun as a motherfucker to pull off. Just not competitive.
fuckit, decklist:
(19 duals/fetches/whatev)
combo hell:
1 Melek
1 grapeshot
1 past in flames
rits:
4 Dark Ritual
4 Rite of Flame
4 Seething Song
4 Cabal Ritual
4 Manamorphose
reanimator:
4 Entomb
4 Reanimate
consistency:
4 brainstorm
spin:
4 Sensei's Divining Top
2 Scroll Rack
terrible? yes.
fun as a motherfucker? YOU BETCHYA.
the other cards....
Wear/Tear is pretty nice. Hull breach at instant speed for one more mana, in boros. EDH loves it.
Toil/Trouble is playable. Three mana for a Sudden Impact is below the curve for this standard environment, as is a three mana sign in blood. Give both options and the new mechanic, and you've got a card that breaks open the jund midrange v control matchup pretty hardcore. A three way split card between divination, sudden impact, and "target player loses 5+ life" is absurd.
Jund doesn't really have that sort of reach outside of thundermaw hellkite, and attaching a lategame burn spell to early card advantage is very good card design. The only issue is, Jund doesn't need any more help beating control. It has Liliana. The card is solid, but I'm not sure it does enough or has a home in standard. I still wanna play with it.
VALUE PREDICTIONS:
Ral will not be an expensive planeswalker, but will stay over $15 for most of his standard run due to newb appeal. Expect preorders to begin at $30-40, and slowly fall to 15 once redemptions are up.
If he finds a home that can take advantage of his odd abilities, he might be able to keep a $25 pricetag. I wouldn't feel too bad jumping in at around that price now, as he'll likely be trading for 40 at release.
Beck will peak at a few bucks (under ten), then likely get banned in modern. Expect many combo elves and affinity pieces to make a 10-50% jump in the next few hours/days.
Everything else spoiled is bulk. Render silence might be two bucks longterm, as it's pretty nifty.
Yup. I don't think it's as good as Tezz v1 in Vintage but I'm sure there is something juicy do do with him. He's definitely solid, though not amazing, though I love the flavor of his ultimate.
divisionbyzorro
Member
I'm so excited to play UG elves you don't even know. I just bought all the pieces for it before they shoot up in price.
Keep in mind, it works with tokens. Zombie Infestation is in modern, which could be cute.
EDIT: Summoner's Pact is too. Ohboy.
divisionbyzorro
Member
I'm well aware
I'm just trying to think of a strategy that'll win a little faster. If I can goldfish a turn 3 win pretty consistently, I'm happy. Right now I'm at one copy of Lys Alana, since I'm not convinced I want it in my opening hand, and too many 4cmc spells might make it difficult to chain through the deck.The main 'engine' should focus on loading up with one drops. We don't have gaea's cradle, so multiple 4cmc spells, especially in the opening hand, could completely fuck us over.
I think the four-ofs (at 1cc) should be Nettle Sentinel, Llanowar Elves, Heritage Druid, and Deathrite Shaman. Could be wrong, though.
divisionbyzorro
Member
I'm well aware
The card is clearly powerful. I really hope it doesn't end up busted, because I think this could actually be really good for Modern. Eggs is almost certainly getting hit with the banhammer, but if combo elves can come behind it and play nice, the format will still have a "sweet" combo deck.
It's busted, and is almost certainly going to be banned. Combo elves is very capable of winning on turn three.
divisionbyzorro
Member
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
Standard Bant decks are going to have a field day with that card too.
GOOD FUCKING CHRIST HOW DID I NOT NOTICE THAT. This is going to be a fucked up couple of months.
edit: Nettle Sentinel is almost $4 on MTGO right now
divisionbyzorro
Member
EDIT: below
divisionbyzorro
Member
Yep, just bought four of 'em at $3.50. They're not tracked on MTGGoldfish, so I have no idea how much they were yesterday, but I can't imagine they're getting cheaper. I was hoping to find FTV:Realms Orchards, but they're all sold out everywhere (yet the price is listed as cheaper, go figure).
WanderingWind
Mecklemore Is My Favorite Wrapper
Craterhoof's new BFF, in that version too.
Keru_Shiri
Member
Ral Zarek is extremely solid. He's good for tempo based strategies. It's a shame his +1 doesn't keep the permanent tapped during the opponent's turn, but that might be too good. More importantly, he's got enough loyalty to stick around, and I like that he can Bolt in a pinch.
I actually have a casual R/U coin flip deck, so the idea of pulling of Ral Zarek's ult with a Krark's Thumb out is hilarious.
I actually have a casual R/U coin flip deck, so the idea of pulling of Ral Zarek's ult with a Krark's Thumb out is hilarious.
Having Ral keep stuff tapped on opponent's turn would be crazy broken. He'd be better cheaper Tamiyo at that point.
As it is the untap part of his ability is probably way more useful, since Sorcery speed tapping isn't particularly great. I do like the choice it sets up with creatures where you can either give one of your guys pseudo-vigilance or make it so an enemy creature can't block, but not both.
As it is the untap part of his ability is probably way more useful, since Sorcery speed tapping isn't particularly great. I do like the choice it sets up with creatures where you can either give one of your guys pseudo-vigilance or make it so an enemy creature can't block, but not both.
Keru_Shiri
Member
True, I normally evaluate a 'walker based on how well their plus ability can protect themselves, but I guess Ral's beefy loyalty plus his ability to come down and Bolt will go a long way to keeping him on the table.
Personally, if this means the return of UR Tempo in Standard, I wouldn't mind one bit. (*dusts off Snapcasters, Delvers, and Steam Vents).
Personally, if this means the return of UR Tempo in Standard, I wouldn't mind one bit. (*dusts off Snapcasters, Delvers, and Steam Vents).
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