Remember, this isn't an opening hand trigger, this is a "first spell you cast in the game" trigger. Which means that on the draw (or without a 1-drop, or with an ETB tapped land on T1 or whatever) you can still cast this for free. That will give you an extra card or two on average and make it quite a bit more consistent than the "opening hand" trigger cards. It's already come up a couple times in testing, so don't forget to factor that in. It adds noticeable consistency to the effect.
Well, it's more than just Oath decks that struggle with effects like this. There are a ton of decks (that play green) that are centered around critical non-creature cards. But there are just as many decks that are focussed around creatures, or they're just generic goodstuff decks with enough targets to make this effective. So I'm willing to give it a shot. There will be times where it'll function as a green Anticipate, but there's also timew where it'll be a 0-mana Impulse. Card has a super high ceiling.
I'm slightly less interested in the card after crunching my own hypergeometric calculation numbers. I still think it has the potential to be good in decks that can afford to run it, but I'm not sure it's as good in cube as some folks seem to think it will be. Based on the calculations, it looks like it'll be more consistently an Anticipate than an Impulse (particularly when it's cast). That being said, a free Anticipate is still fantastic, so depending on how often you get to cast this for 0 mana, it can be very good. I'm going to test it, though I'm quite skeptical. It will run into issues with decks that can't afford to play it and decks that are too inconsistent with it. It may pan out to be another card that's significantly better in constructed than in our format.
I'm less excited for this card than most are. It's good, but there's so many decks that need to grab something besides creatures and lands. I was higher on Oath of Nissa than anybody, but as green's role evolved beyond just creature-based midrange decks, whiffing on grabbing critical cards became too much of a problem for it. I expect this to have similar issues. Great in some decks, unplayable in others. A 5-card Impulse is a bad card if it can't grab your best/most important cards. Had that issue with Oath, and expect to have the same problem here.
However, in a creature-heavy green midrange deck, this is a great card to have in your opening hand.
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I'm cautiously optimistic.
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My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!
However, in a creature-heavy green midrange deck, this is a great card to have in your opening hand.
My 630 Card Powered Cube
My Article - "Cube Design Philosophy"
My Article - "Mana Short: A study in limited resource management."
My 50th Set (P)review - Discusses my top 20 Cube cards from OTJ!