Feels a bit like Grafted Wargear, except you don't get hosed by artifact removal, can swap it around freely, and get a sort of an Evolutionary Leap trigger upon death.
This should pull out a random critter from your deck more often than not unless attached to a very random creature like Scooze or Goyf. That's pretty cool. The stat boost is ok for the cost too. Yeah, I can see this being tested.
Seems like another slam dunk for Peasant cubes of any size, and definitely worth testing in cubes that don't run swords. I'll be slamming both into both of my cubes regardless.
Wargear costs less, which is a major boon in aggressive decks, and gives me more toughness. I anticipate the death trigger of this card not to matter much in a typical cube.
So on Mirror Entity does this just tutor for any creature?! =P Sweeeet. (Okay assuming you don't have multiple creatures that share the type you are searching for).
Black tends to have a lot of tribal zombies/vampires so this should be solid there as well. Human decks get a boost from this as well. I'm a fan. Just when Stoneforge Mystic was starting to look a little meh in my cube we get a couple great equipment.
I really happy to be getting some more cubable equipment. The last few I have tried haven't panned out very well but this set seems to have 2 viable inclusions so far plus the Un-sword, 1 or 2 more and all of us not running swords will have a set of decent replacements.
On this sword specifically: It has a good cast/equip ratio, it is more than Grafted Wargear to equip but at the upside of being able to move it about so you have have it offence and defense. It allows for a lot more smart plays than Grafted Wargear and rewards you for knowing what creatures can get upon there death and moving the sword when appropriate.
This one I'm less high on than the blood axe but it definitely has its strong matchups. In grindy matchups I like it a fair bit... but it's clock for it's cost is a bit underwhelming.
I've found from wargear that the extra point of toughness was surprisingly relevant.
Really not sure on the math for the hit rate but I know it's perportional to the number of creatures in your deck.. and the competition for powerful non-creature spells in creature heavy decks is high.
Overall my prediction is a bust for tighter cubes, but might be the next best equipment after the staples.
This one I'm less high on than the blood axe but it definitely has its strong matchups. In grindy matchups I like it a fair bit... but it's clock for it's cost is a bit underwhelming.
I've found from wargear that the extra point of toughness was surprisingly relevant.
Really not sure on the math for the hit rate but I know it's perportional to the number of creatures in your deck.. and the competition for powerful non-creature spells in creature heavy decks is high.
Overall my prediction is a bust for tighter cubes, but might be the next best equipment after the staples.
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I think I like this more than the axe. 1 mana equip is a lot more attractive and I'd rather have more creatures to equip a sword to than many axes to equip a creature to.
I also like this more than the Axe, but still not enough to cube it. Grafted Wargear this is not. Equip 0 is THE reason why that card is good. And I don't need a 6th piece of equipment that costs 3.
I anticipate the death trigger of this card not to matter much in a typical cube.
Why? There are almost no creatures that don't share a creature type with multiple other creatures in the same and other colors. Creatures also often have mutliple types, like Goblin Warrior or Human Soldier. To give you an example - ~27% of the creatures in your cube are humans and many of these have additional creature types on top of it. In a creature heavy deck it should be pretty easy to draw cards off of Heirloom Blade.
I do not think it will be worth making a subpar equip just so you will have a higher chance to hit with the trigger, unless for some reason you know you are going to get hit by a sorcery speed creature removal or mass removal. I want to equip my Gisela, but I am unlikely to have another angel in my aggro deck. So is my first striking Plated Geopede (that I cannot even equip on turn three) or the disposable in combat Young Pyromancer token. Plus, many games do not end in the result of the equipped creature dying, but rather in a race, chump blocking, or removal that does not send to the graveyard (from exile effects through Control Magic to Maze of Ith).
I also do not think the trigger is particularly powerful. Chances are I'll draw a weak to middling body (if we go with human) that I'll have to equip again for it to matter. Wouldn't a single point of toughness just be better a significant amount of the time?
I guess what I should say is, in an aggressive equipment I'd rather have the more efficient card than a less efficient one with an unreliable and slow plan B.
I anticipate the death trigger of this card not to matter much in a typical cube.
Why? There are almost no creatures that don't share a creature type with multiple other creatures in the same and other colors. Creatures also often have mutliple types, like Goblin Warrior or Human Soldier. To give you an example - ~27% of the creatures in your cube are humans and many of these have additional creature types on top of it. In a creature heavy deck it should be pretty easy to draw cards off of Heirloom Blade.
I do not think it will be worth making a subpar equip just so you will have a higher chance to hit with the trigger, unless for some reason you know you are going to get hit by a sorcery speed creature removal or mass removal. I want to equip my Gisela, but I am unlikely to have another angel in my aggro deck. So is my first striking Plated Geopede (that I cannot even equip on turn three) or the disposable in combat Young Pyromancer token. Plus, many games do not end in the result of the equipped creature dying, but rather in a race, chump blocking, or removal that does not send to the graveyard (from exile effects through Control Magic to Maze of Ith).
I also do not think the trigger is particularly powerful. Chances are I'll draw a weak to middling body (if we go with human) that I'll have to equip again for it to matter. Wouldn't a single point of toughness just be better a significant amount of the time?
I guess what I should say is, in an aggressive equipment I'd rather have the more efficient card than a less efficient one with an unreliable and slow plan B.
I don't really follow this thread of logic. You can know 100% whether or not you have an available target in your deck whenever you equip this to a creature. How does that make it unreliable? If you don't have another angel in your deck, what the heck ever. Just bash with your 7-power lifelinking flier and be happy with your life. And I don't get the idea of worrying about drawing a subpar creature. Not only are you drawing an action spell no matter what, equipment makes those subpar creatures relevant! I get that cube has a lot of non-destroy answers and ways to play around this, but with a dirt-cheap equip cost of 1, you can easily position this to tax those answers on both offense and defense. There are only so many to go around.
I mean, if you want to compare this unfavorably to Wargear, sure. This is a less streamlined card, and every mana and point of stat boost counts, especially in aggro. But these cards do different things, and I think your arguments that the trigger doesn't matter are silly.
Perhaps it is more reliable than I think, math needs to be done. But I think a significant portion of your creatures will not yield card advantage if they die equipped.
Perhaps it is more reliable than I think, math needs to be done. But I think a significant portion of your creatures will not yield card advantage if they die equipped.
Unless this is the very last card you draft you should be able to construct your deck to get value from the blade. Even netting 1-2 cards off this seems like great value. And it's a +3+1 buff for 1 equip! That strengthens your 2/2's into 5/3's. I have a small human theme in white and I'm excited to play this card.
It's not quite Grafted Wargear, as 0 equip is huge. Wargear generally comes down on turn three, equips a dude who can swing, and adds 3 damage to the board immediately. This can't play + equip in one action until turn four, which is quite a bit slower. However, 1 equip cost is still pretty darn good, especially as WotC has recently overbalanced towards higher equip costs to make equipment less overpowered. Even if this card didn't have the second ability, 3 mana + 1 to equip for +3/+1 is solid on its own and would make this a contender for Peasant Cubes as well as Cubes that eschew Swords and Jitte. And then it tacks on the second ability for effectively free. And this is definitely more powerful than many of you guys think. Rough guess is that this will draw a card in an aggressive/midrange list about 80% of the time, as there are a LOT of common creature types out there. And that card is guaranteed to be gas. This practically staples a free Evolutionary Leap activation onto the equipped creature. Or it's half of a Skullclamp with an extra +2/+2.
Card is definitely good and definitely worth testing. I'd probably rank it 10th or 11th in equipment after the 5 Swords, Jitte, Skullclamp, Wargear, and maybe Loxodon Warhammer.
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While this seems cool in theory, I'm already running 12 equipment and considering the Axe, so I think this is going to be a pass for me. It's definitely weaker than the 5 Swords, Jitte, Skullclamp, and Wargear. Beyond that, there's Bonesplitter, which is also better imo, honorary equipment Batterskull, and then Lightning Greaves which serves a different function.
The only way I could see adding this in is if I decided to cut Smuggler's Copter and/or Fleetwheel Cruiser from the cube, but I'm not ready for that yet.
I still like the axe more than this. I agree that I'd rather have more creatures to equip to than more axes to equip, but the cheaper cost on the axe puts it ahead of this sword by at least a small margin. This seems likely to be left out of decks based on the 3cc alone while axe being priced at only a single mana makes it easier to justify in most decks that want equipment.
This really needed to be a 2cc equipment or put the creature on the battlefield instead of your hand or something. Feels like it's just barely short of making it.
This really needed to be a 2cc equipment or put the creature on the battlefield instead of your hand or something. Feels like it's just barely short of making it.
I think either of those scenarios are too good. Especially the second. Card is already really solid as is. Free card advantage on death is great, especially when it's better (usually) than a random drawn card. I don't think this makes the cut for us but it's honestly very close.
I still like the axe more than this. I agree that I'd rather have more creatures to equip to than more axes to equip, but the cheaper cost on the axe puts it ahead of this sword by at least a small margin. This seems likely to be left out of decks based on the 3cc alone while axe being priced at only a single mana makes it easier to justify in most decks that want equipment.
This really needed to be a 2cc equipment or put the creature on the battlefield instead of your hand or something. Feels like it's just barely short of making it.
I think the cheaper equip cost and better stats is worth more than cheaper initial cmc. Equip 2 is a huge tempo killer and greatly diminishes the value of the copy effect.
That's fair too. Neither card is super impressive, to be honest. Captain's Claws is better in that tier of equipment. WotC is super scared of printing powerful equipment.
Reasonable casting / equip cost with a cool tribal effect. Seems great for those that don't play swords / Jitte / clamp.
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Black tends to have a lot of tribal zombies/vampires so this should be solid there as well. Human decks get a boost from this as well. I'm a fan. Just when Stoneforge Mystic was starting to look a little meh in my cube we get a couple great equipment.
No, just means you'd get the first creature you find, since they all share Mirror Entity's subtypes. You don't get to name what you're after.
Similarly, any other creature in your deck will hit Mirror Entity, at a minimum.
Except, I guess, if you're that rare cube designer who included Nameless Race on your list...
On this sword specifically: It has a good cast/equip ratio, it is more than Grafted Wargear to equip but at the upside of being able to move it about so you have have it offence and defense. It allows for a lot more smart plays than Grafted Wargear and rewards you for knowing what creatures can get upon there death and moving the sword when appropriate.
This one I'm less high on than the blood axe but it definitely has its strong matchups. In grindy matchups I like it a fair bit... but it's clock for it's cost is a bit underwhelming.
I've found from wargear that the extra point of toughness was surprisingly relevant.
Really not sure on the math for the hit rate but I know it's perportional to the number of creatures in your deck.. and the competition for powerful non-creature spells in creature heavy decks is high.
Overall my prediction is a bust for tighter cubes, but might be the next best equipment after the staples.
Sword of the animist/captains claw tier
Back and forth on whether to test it...
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I think I like this more than the axe. 1 mana equip is a lot more attractive and I'd rather have more creatures to equip a sword to than many axes to equip a creature to.
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Agreed that this is in the tier with Sword of the Animist and Captain's Claws (which is also where I place the new Axe, FWIW).
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I do not think it will be worth making a subpar equip just so you will have a higher chance to hit with the trigger, unless for some reason you know you are going to get hit by a sorcery speed creature removal or mass removal. I want to equip my Gisela, but I am unlikely to have another angel in my aggro deck. So is my first striking Plated Geopede (that I cannot even equip on turn three) or the disposable in combat Young Pyromancer token. Plus, many games do not end in the result of the equipped creature dying, but rather in a race, chump blocking, or removal that does not send to the graveyard (from exile effects through Control Magic to Maze of Ith).
I also do not think the trigger is particularly powerful. Chances are I'll draw a weak to middling body (if we go with human) that I'll have to equip again for it to matter. Wouldn't a single point of toughness just be better a significant amount of the time?
I guess what I should say is, in an aggressive equipment I'd rather have the more efficient card than a less efficient one with an unreliable and slow plan B.
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I don't really follow this thread of logic. You can know 100% whether or not you have an available target in your deck whenever you equip this to a creature. How does that make it unreliable? If you don't have another angel in your deck, what the heck ever. Just bash with your 7-power lifelinking flier and be happy with your life. And I don't get the idea of worrying about drawing a subpar creature. Not only are you drawing an action spell no matter what, equipment makes those subpar creatures relevant! I get that cube has a lot of non-destroy answers and ways to play around this, but with a dirt-cheap equip cost of 1, you can easily position this to tax those answers on both offense and defense. There are only so many to go around.
I mean, if you want to compare this unfavorably to Wargear, sure. This is a less streamlined card, and every mana and point of stat boost counts, especially in aggro. But these cards do different things, and I think your arguments that the trigger doesn't matter are silly.
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Card is definitely good and definitely worth testing. I'd probably rank it 10th or 11th in equipment after the 5 Swords, Jitte, Skullclamp, Wargear, and maybe Loxodon Warhammer.
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The only way I could see adding this in is if I decided to cut Smuggler's Copter and/or Fleetwheel Cruiser from the cube, but I'm not ready for that yet.
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This really needed to be a 2cc equipment or put the creature on the battlefield instead of your hand or something. Feels like it's just barely short of making it.
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I think either of those scenarios are too good. Especially the second. Card is already really solid as is. Free card advantage on death is great, especially when it's better (usually) than a random drawn card. I don't think this makes the cut for us but it's honestly very close.
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I think the cheaper equip cost and better stats is worth more than cheaper initial cmc. Equip 2 is a huge tempo killer and greatly diminishes the value of the copy effect.
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