Well im clearly wrong anyway, said it was not debateable and smart people are debating me so....
Ill change my stance to debateably stronger =P
FTK is obviously better on defense and hence a better mid-range card. But is at least a full turn of damage slower on offense. Which is pretty huge when you consider he's often forcing in 4+ points of damage.
The only situation that FTK outshines hero on offense is if you don't have more creatures than them (for battlecry to be relevant) and the creatures that they are blocking with are > 1 power.
So they are at a highish life total, and have a board position that is very close to par.
At that point you are probably losing anyway heh.
Then take into consideration times they are blocking with tokens, or are lowish life and trying to stabalize, is why I think hero is that much more powerful.
Personally believe FTK is at a noticeably lower power level than Hero..
In a red agro deck at least.
FTK is just too weak against creature light decks or decks trying to do unfair things. Which id estimate make up about 20-30% of the decks at a table?
(Still think its a solid card and a card I love to have for it's roll in multiple archetypes and it being easily splashable)
Can I swap this guy in for Hero of Oxid Ridge? I am slightly concerned that there will be even more 4 cmc noncreature permanents with Chandra and Koth, but that deck building choice already existed with Hero (kind of)
No. Hero is a premium 4 drop.
The top 3 are hellrider, koth and Hero. There's a pretty big drop in powerlevel after that and don't really think thats debatable.
I prefer purphorous to chandra in cube, but that is debatable.
I wouldnt be surprised if the composition of your red section has a pretty big effect on the power of the god.
If you play say both Boros Reckoner and Boggart ram gang, as well as the good double red 2 drops.. Like Burning-tree emissary and kragon dragon lord.. Then add the hammer in the 3 drop slot, this card gets a lot better.
Seige gang commander probably being the best synergistic card with him..
He seems pretty mediocre as a curve topper. In the the above, example, I feel like if Purphoros were Hellrider or Hero of Oxid Ridge you wouldn't even need the Siege-Gang Commander to win that game.
Totally agreed , but you must admit, it's still very good in that situation no?
Say they play a wall of roots on turn 2 and Qasali pridemage and a goyf on turn 3.
You think hero of oxid ridge or hellrider or going to do THAT much here?
Purphoros -> a deck designed to take advantage of him gives you a chance to go long and draw into the cards to burn them out..
Or have a 6/5 indestructable in play on turn 7 that might actually stand up to their creatures in combat.
Sure agro decks don't generally want to go long, but sometimes they have to.
This card is a card that allows red to go long, and turns all those poor top decks into decent topdecks.
It is also fine as a curve topper, albeit sub-optimal.
Plus, Id obviously rather have hellrider and hero in cube anyway. Those cards are A+ agro 4 drops.
Flametongue Kavu or Avalanche riders aren't anywhere close to as impactful as hellrider/hero in your example too, doesnt mean they arent great.
Fair enough, might be underestimating how often she activates.
But I highly doubt its as much as the red god. Simply because mono U decks rarely exist, whereas mono R decks are everywhere.
Partially a function of U being the best color and hardest to get 23 playables in just that color.
I proxied her in my cube last night.
I played an insane G/U opposition deck yesterday that I built to take advantage of her.
(lots of blue permanants, a deck that goes into attrition wars well as well as edric to take advantage of 1U: unblockable).
Could just be a biased sample size, but she only animated one turn out of 7 games, many of which she was cast in.
That being said, the scry 1 every turn, was f**** amazing.
Cast her on turn 2 in about 3-4 different games and a few of them went 10-15 turns long. Lost none of those games.
thought about my statement some more and I'll take it back =P
It might actually be second to last lol.
Want to rephrase it to:
Likely enough to animate that It's body is relevant and valuable.. Unlike say the blue god.
This we might disagree with, but I should make more accurate statements!
I think it's powerful enough effect to be slightly drafted around too.
Think this is the best god by a decent margin.
The 2R: +1/0 is basically just flavor text.
edit: LOLL thought it was target creature, not each creature. This card is bannanas.
But,
a) most likely to animate out of all the gods (green being a close exception)
b) the 2 damage to player each PER creature provides very insane reach.
c) Synergizes with optimal deck design. Token makers and his hammer work insanely well with him.
If recurrable life gain were more prevalent in cube, he wouldn't be nearly as good, but I think the reach he provides is almost unmatched.
One issue I have with most cards that require other cards to be good, is when you draw the wrong half of the deck, or your opponent is distrupting your game plan, the card is dead. With this one, the wrong half of your deck is like burn spells.. And your opponent can barely disrupt the synergy, short of countering your creatures.
I even speculate this is good enough to be splashable in token decks? But...Maybe not..
I think hes good enough to warrant testing over some tried and true red 4 drops, but he MIGHT not crack the elite status.
Ill change my stance to debateably stronger =P
FTK is obviously better on defense and hence a better mid-range card. But is at least a full turn of damage slower on offense. Which is pretty huge when you consider he's often forcing in 4+ points of damage.
The only situation that FTK outshines hero on offense is if you don't have more creatures than them (for battlecry to be relevant) and the creatures that they are blocking with are > 1 power.
So they are at a highish life total, and have a board position that is very close to par.
At that point you are probably losing anyway heh.
Then take into consideration times they are blocking with tokens, or are lowish life and trying to stabalize, is why I think hero is that much more powerful.
Last Updated 02/07/24
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Personally believe FTK is at a noticeably lower power level than Hero..
In a red agro deck at least.
FTK is just too weak against creature light decks or decks trying to do unfair things. Which id estimate make up about 20-30% of the decks at a table?
(Still think its a solid card and a card I love to have for it's roll in multiple archetypes and it being easily splashable)
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No. Hero is a premium 4 drop.
The top 3 are hellrider, koth and Hero. There's a pretty big drop in powerlevel after that and don't really think thats debatable.
I prefer purphorous to chandra in cube, but that is debatable.
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While I do believe Purphoros is very good , I think he falls short of 360.
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If you play say both Boros Reckoner and Boggart ram gang, as well as the good double red 2 drops.. Like Burning-tree emissary and kragon dragon lord.. Then add the hammer in the 3 drop slot, this card gets a lot better.
Seige gang commander probably being the best synergistic card with him..
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Totally agreed , but you must admit, it's still very good in that situation no?
Now imagine you had a mediocore hand of
Turn 1 Spikeshot elder
Turn 2 Ash Zealot
Turn 3 Burn
Turn 4 - ?
Say they play a wall of roots on turn 2 and Qasali pridemage and a goyf on turn 3.
You think hero of oxid ridge or hellrider or going to do THAT much here?
Purphoros -> a deck designed to take advantage of him gives you a chance to go long and draw into the cards to burn them out..
Or have a 6/5 indestructable in play on turn 7 that might actually stand up to their creatures in combat.
Sure agro decks don't generally want to go long, but sometimes they have to.
This card is a card that allows red to go long, and turns all those poor top decks into decent topdecks.
It is also fine as a curve topper, albeit sub-optimal.
Plus, Id obviously rather have hellrider and hero in cube anyway. Those cards are A+ agro 4 drops.
Flametongue Kavu or Avalanche riders aren't anywhere close to as impactful as hellrider/hero in your example too, doesnt mean they arent great.
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But I highly doubt its as much as the red god. Simply because mono U decks rarely exist, whereas mono R decks are everywhere.
Partially a function of U being the best color and hardest to get 23 playables in just that color.
I proxied her in my cube last night.
I played an insane G/U opposition deck yesterday that I built to take advantage of her.
(lots of blue permanants, a deck that goes into attrition wars well as well as edric to take advantage of 1U: unblockable).
Could just be a biased sample size, but she only animated one turn out of 7 games, many of which she was cast in.
That being said, the scry 1 every turn, was f**** amazing.
Cast her on turn 2 in about 3-4 different games and a few of them went 10-15 turns long. Lost none of those games.
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thought about my statement some more and I'll take it back =P
It might actually be second to last lol.
Want to rephrase it to:
Likely enough to animate that It's body is relevant and valuable.. Unlike say the blue god.
This we might disagree with, but I should make more accurate statements!
I think it's powerful enough effect to be slightly drafted around too.
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The 2R: +1/0 is basically just flavor text.
edit: LOLL thought it was target creature, not each creature. This card is bannanas.
But,
a) most likely to animate out of all the gods (green being a close exception)
b) the 2 damage to player each PER creature provides very insane reach.
c) Synergizes with optimal deck design. Token makers and his hammer work insanely well with him.
If recurrable life gain were more prevalent in cube, he wouldn't be nearly as good, but I think the reach he provides is almost unmatched.
One issue I have with most cards that require other cards to be good, is when you draw the wrong half of the deck, or your opponent is distrupting your game plan, the card is dead. With this one, the wrong half of your deck is like burn spells.. And your opponent can barely disrupt the synergy, short of countering your creatures.
I even speculate this is good enough to be splashable in token decks? But...Maybe not..
I think hes good enough to warrant testing over some tried and true red 4 drops, but he MIGHT not crack the elite status.
Last Updated 02/07/24
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