Jalira could possibly see play as a 1 of in a polymorph deck I suppose.
But not really, because she commits the cardinal sin of being a creature in a Polymorph deck that's a bad card to flip to Polymorph.
Now, that artifact twist on Polymorph snuck in during Scars of Mirrodin? Guess who else is in that block? Something that just so happens to not be legendary?
Blightsteel Colossus.
It's up to you to figure out how to get artifact tokens out in a sane manner, though.
Jalira could possibly see play as a 1 of in a polymorph deck I suppose.
But not really, because she commits the cardinal sin of being a creature in a Polymorph deck that's a bad card to flip to Polymorph.
Now, that artifact twist on Polymorph snuck in during Scars of Mirrodin? Guess who else is in that block? Something that just so happens to not be legendary?
Blightsteel Colossus.
It's up to you to figure out how to get artifact tokens out in a sane manner, though.
Jalira could possibly see play as a 1 of in a polymorph deck I suppose.
But not really, because she commits the cardinal sin of being a creature in a Polymorph deck that's a bad card to flip to Polymorph.
Now, that artifact twist on Polymorph snuck in during Scars of Mirrodin? Guess who else is in that block? Something that just so happens to not be legendary?
Blightsteel Colossus.
It's up to you to figure out how to get artifact tokens out in a sane manner, though.
(As a reminder, there are no RCD updates on the weekend)
So far, the best Jalira use I have seen is as DotMatrix observed; with Shape Anew. At least there she is real redundancy for the Shape Anew. She couldn't hit Darksteel Relic, fetched off a Trinket Mage, but she could hit a bunch of tokens created be spells. For those suggesting stuff like Origin Spellbomb, that doesn't work unless it's just a singleton copy. Otherwise, your Shape might hit leftover copies in your deck.
Master's Call gets the job done. So does Blade Splicer. Between those two and Inkmoth, you would have enough cards to reliably Shape or activate Jalira. Would the deck be good? Probably not. But hey, we tried!
(As a reminder, there are no RCD updates on the weekend)
So far, the best Jalira use I have seen is as DotMatrix observed; with Shape Anew. At least there she is real redundancy for the Shape Anew. She couldn't hit Darksteel Relic, fetched off a Trinket Mage, but she could hit a bunch of tokens created be spells. For those suggesting stuff like Origin Spellbomb, that doesn't work unless it's just a singleton copy. Otherwise, your Shape might hit leftover copies in your deck.
Master's Call gets the job done. So does Blade Splicer. Between those two and Inkmoth, you would have enough cards to reliably Shape or activate Jalira. Would the deck be good? Probably not. But hey, we tried!
The problem with Blade Splicer is that it could get hit off of Jalira.
(As a reminder, there are no RCD updates on the weekend)
So far, the best Jalira use I have seen is as DotMatrix observed; with Shape Anew. At least there she is real redundancy for the Shape Anew. She couldn't hit Darksteel Relic, fetched off a Trinket Mage, but she could hit a bunch of tokens created be spells. For those suggesting stuff like Origin Spellbomb, that doesn't work unless it's just a singleton copy. Otherwise, your Shape might hit leftover copies in your deck.
Master's Call gets the job done. So does Blade Splicer. Between those two and Inkmoth, you would have enough cards to reliably Shape or activate Jalira. Would the deck be good? Probably not. But hey, we tried!
The problem with Blade Splicer is that it could get hit off of Jalira.
Yep, that's true. Guess we are stuck with Inkmoth and Blinkmoth!
(As a reminder, there are no RCD updates on the weekend)
So far, the best Jalira use I have seen is as DotMatrix observed; with Shape Anew. At least there she is real redundancy for the Shape Anew. She couldn't hit Darksteel Relic, fetched off a Trinket Mage, but she could hit a bunch of tokens created be spells. For those suggesting stuff like Origin Spellbomb, that doesn't work unless it's just a singleton copy. Otherwise, your Shape might hit leftover copies in your deck.
Master's Call gets the job done. So does Blade Splicer. Between those two and Inkmoth, you would have enough cards to reliably Shape or activate Jalira. Would the deck be good? Probably not. But hey, we tried!
The problem with Blade Splicer is that it could get hit off of Jalira.
Yep, that's true. Guess we are stuck with Inkmoth and Blinkmoth!
And Master's Call.
Which is still 12 cards.
Oh I guess nonsense like Stalking Stones or Dread Statuary could also represent, if you don't mind them being a tad durdly.
Not seeing a lot of applications for this card. You can't realistically resolve this before turn 6 and, as an added issue, any mana dorks you use to cast this card are going to get blown up by Angel herself. She can't reliably clear the board of everything, which is a big issue against decks like Pod that tend to have creatures they might not attack with. At least she's resilient enough to withstand most removal, although 6 toughness would have been better than 5 to keep her out of Dismember range. The best I can do with her is to flash her in during a turn 6 combat via Leyline of Anticipation or something similar, but even there, that isn't much better than flashing in any number of more useful sorcery-speed sweepers.
Not seeing a lot of applications for this card. You can't realistically resolve this before turn 6 and, as an added issue, any mana dorks you use to cast this card are going to get blown up by Angel herself. She can't reliably clear the board of everything, which is a big issue against decks like Pod that tend to have creatures they might not attack with. At least she's resilient enough to withstand most removal, although 6 toughness would have been better than 5 to keep her out of Dismember range. The best I can do with her is to flash her in during a turn 6 combat via Leyline of Anticipation or something similar, but even there, that isn't much better than flashing in any number of more useful sorcery-speed sweepers.
Hey man, it's the bees knees. Fog Twin's attack after combo then land this baby
Joking aside, this is another cool angel/demon/dragon card that is likely a little overcosted and simply not impactful enough.
Sunblast Angel definitely seems bomb-diggity in Control after you've tapped their entire board with a Cryptic Command, yet that combo is too wonky and expensive to be all that playable I feel.
Private Mod Note
():
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Modern Decks: UBG Lantern Control GBU BRG Bridge-Vine GRB
Commander Decks UBG Muldrotha, Value Elemental GBU BRG Windgrace Real-Estate Ltd. GRB
#PayThePros
Dollar rare and rightfully so. As a control wincon, it's worse than Baneslayer/Sun Titan. As a board wipe, it's more expensive AND requires more setup than just playing Wrath/Day (or even Hallowed Burial). Yeah, you might get to keep your creatures, but it's easier to build a deck with almost no creatures and 2-4 Wraths, than to build a deck with enough creatures to justify playing Sunblast over Wrath, AND the support required to perform a Plague Wind.
Sunblast was more of a Standard-minded fatty, back when you had Gideon Jura to force everyone into oops-I-wrath.
And even then, no one played her, because, and I remember this vividly (it was a fun time) UB CONTROL STANDARD, BEST STANDARD EVER.
Like, we're talking an era where UW could just suck it, and everyone was slinging IoKs and resolving JTMS, and Caw-Blade had yet to reach its apex...
...oh yeah, we're talking about Sunblast.
Ok, well, for a ETB fatty I like her, but she's too much a work-for-it card. She has amazing synergy with Gideon Jura, and I suspect that was an intentional part of her design since again she came around in a Standard with Gideon Jura legal.
This is a cool card. It's one of those awesome rares from Time Spiral block that have zany, unique abilities that everyone forgets about. Apart from Godhead of Awe, Ixidron is one of the few ways to artificially set the power/toughness of all creatures in play. But unlike Godhead, it also has the Humility effect bundled in. No, it's definitely no Humility in its own right, but that ability to turn off all creatures in play is one that doesn't otherwise exist in Modern. As two important mechanical pieces, Ixidron doesn't flip them back when it leaves play, and Ixidron flips them down AS it enters, not WHEN it enters.
I'm not sure how playable all of this is. But unlike that sad Angel of yesterday, this might actually be an interesting sleeper card. Would probably have to run it with blink effects, likely of the noncreature variety. Really cool card though!
My problem with this card is that the decks that most likely have enough creatures out on the field for this sort of effect to be useful would gladly take 2/2 creatures over a board wipe if their enemy is spending 5 mana.
My problem with this card is that the decks that most likely have enough creatures out on the field for this sort of effect to be useful would gladly take 2/2 creatures over a board wipe if their enemy is spending 5 mana.
This is also my issue with the card. Where does a 5 mana Ixidron become better than a 4 mana Supreme Verdict? I like the cutesy idea of turn 4 Reverence into turn 5 Ixidron, but that's just about as cutesy as it sounds. Turn 4 Night of Soul's Betrayal into Ixy is a little better but still not a lot better than just wiping out the board period.
What ifffffff..... you play him with tokens? Like young pyro? you make a crap ton of dudes agaisnt a deck like midrange. Flip em all. Suddenly their 3 dudes are 2/2, and you have something closer to 6 2/2s.
Ixidron doesn't flip the 1/1 tokens. Instead you'd have to have something like Call of the Herd, but that would probably be too slow. Maybe something with 1/1 mana dorks to buff them to 2/2s after they get you an early Ixidron play.
Ace, Boros Swiftblade, Viashano Slaughtermaster, and Warren Instigator are the cheapest creatures in the game that also have double strike. There are some other double strikers in that mana range, but they all have conditional double strike instead of an unconditional ability. I've always been a big fan of this ability, especially on these undercosted guys, but I don't really see a deck coming out of them. These cards lend themselves to a Bogles style deck, but they lack the innate protection of Bogles and company. Or they lend themselves to an Infect style blitz deck, but they aren't quite as bursty as Infect creatures; indeed, the Infect mechanic effectively gives the Infect creatures double strike, at least when hitting life totals. So I have difficult seeing Ace and friends in a serious Modern deck.
Why it's worse than Infect:
1) no good manland
2) Hoplite is not actually a double striker
3) you need either G or W on turn 1 for your 1-drop. With Bogle or Infect it's very simple, you just need G.
4) protection spells are a non-bo with Hyena Umbra if your opponent Paths the creature (you choose white, then Umbra falls off). That's why I swapped them for Ranger's Guile, which isn't as good, because it doesn't grant evasion like protection does.
But not really, because she commits the cardinal sin of being a creature in a Polymorph deck that's a bad card to flip to Polymorph.
Now, that artifact twist on Polymorph snuck in during Scars of Mirrodin? Guess who else is in that block? Something that just so happens to not be legendary?
Blightsteel Colossus.
It's up to you to figure out how to get artifact tokens out in a sane manner, though.
Master's Call?
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Derp. I was thinking that her being a creature wouldnt matter if she was a 1 of, but yeah, other polymorphs would hit her.
Unplayable.
Origin Spellbomb is cheaper AND cantrips!
So far, the best Jalira use I have seen is as DotMatrix observed; with Shape Anew. At least there she is real redundancy for the Shape Anew. She couldn't hit Darksteel Relic, fetched off a Trinket Mage, but she could hit a bunch of tokens created be spells. For those suggesting stuff like Origin Spellbomb, that doesn't work unless it's just a singleton copy. Otherwise, your Shape might hit leftover copies in your deck.
Master's Call gets the job done. So does Blade Splicer. Between those two and Inkmoth, you would have enough cards to reliably Shape or activate Jalira. Would the deck be good? Probably not. But hey, we tried!
The problem with Blade Splicer is that it could get hit off of Jalira.
Storm Crow is strictly worse than Seacoast Drake.
Yep, that's true. Guess we are stuck with Inkmoth and Blinkmoth!
And Master's Call.
Which is still 12 cards.
Oh I guess nonsense like Stalking Stones or Dread Statuary could also represent, if you don't mind them being a tad durdly.
Or.
Or.
If you want to be really silly, Gild.
Sunblast Angel!
-------------------------------------------------------------
Not seeing a lot of applications for this card. You can't realistically resolve this before turn 6 and, as an added issue, any mana dorks you use to cast this card are going to get blown up by Angel herself. She can't reliably clear the board of everything, which is a big issue against decks like Pod that tend to have creatures they might not attack with. At least she's resilient enough to withstand most removal, although 6 toughness would have been better than 5 to keep her out of Dismember range. The best I can do with her is to flash her in during a turn 6 combat via Leyline of Anticipation or something similar, but even there, that isn't much better than flashing in any number of more useful sorcery-speed sweepers.
Hey man, it's the bees knees. Fog Twin's attack after combo then land this baby
Joking aside, this is another cool angel/demon/dragon card that is likely a little overcosted and simply not impactful enough.
Standard: lol no
Modern: BG/x, UR/x, Burn, Merfolk, Zoo, Storm
Legacy: Shardless BUG, Delver (BUG, RUG, Grixis), Landstill, Depths Combo, Merfolk
Vintage: Dark Times, BUG Fish, Merfolk
EDH: Teysa, Orzhov Scion / Krenko, Mob Boss / Stonebrow, Krosan Hero
Modern Decks:
UBG Lantern Control GBU
BRG Bridge-Vine GRB
Commander Decks
UBG Muldrotha, Value Elemental GBU
BRG Windgrace Real-Estate Ltd. GRB
#PayThePros
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.
And even then, no one played her, because, and I remember this vividly (it was a fun time) UB CONTROL STANDARD, BEST STANDARD EVER.
Like, we're talking an era where UW could just suck it, and everyone was slinging IoKs and resolving JTMS, and Caw-Blade had yet to reach its apex...
...oh yeah, we're talking about Sunblast.
Ok, well, for a ETB fatty I like her, but she's too much a work-for-it card. She has amazing synergy with Gideon Jura, and I suspect that was an intentional part of her design since again she came around in a Standard with Gideon Jura legal.
She could be podded into as a 1-of, but it's too unreliable and can easily hurt you as well.
Ixidron!
-------------------------------------------------------------
This is a cool card. It's one of those awesome rares from Time Spiral block that have zany, unique abilities that everyone forgets about. Apart from Godhead of Awe, Ixidron is one of the few ways to artificially set the power/toughness of all creatures in play. But unlike Godhead, it also has the Humility effect bundled in. No, it's definitely no Humility in its own right, but that ability to turn off all creatures in play is one that doesn't otherwise exist in Modern. As two important mechanical pieces, Ixidron doesn't flip them back when it leaves play, and Ixidron flips them down AS it enters, not WHEN it enters.
I'm not sure how playable all of this is. But unlike that sad Angel of yesterday, this might actually be an interesting sleeper card. Would probably have to run it with blink effects, likely of the noncreature variety. Really cool card though!
This is also my issue with the card. Where does a 5 mana Ixidron become better than a 4 mana Supreme Verdict? I like the cutesy idea of turn 4 Reverence into turn 5 Ixidron, but that's just about as cutesy as it sounds. Turn 4 Night of Soul's Betrayal into Ixy is a little better but still not a lot better than just wiping out the board period.
Cheeri0sXWU
Reid Duke's Level One
Who's the Beatdown
Alt+0198=Æ
I think he's a bit too weird and silly for Modern. Though, depending on the Morph selection in Khans that could change, since Ixidron resets Morphs.
Fencing Ace!
-------------------------------------------------------------
Ace, Boros Swiftblade, Viashano Slaughtermaster, and Warren Instigator are the cheapest creatures in the game that also have double strike. There are some other double strikers in that mana range, but they all have conditional double strike instead of an unconditional ability. I've always been a big fan of this ability, especially on these undercosted guys, but I don't really see a deck coming out of them. These cards lend themselves to a Bogles style deck, but they lack the innate protection of Bogles and company. Or they lend themselves to an Infect style blitz deck, but they aren't quite as bursty as Infect creatures; indeed, the Infect mechanic effectively gives the Infect creatures double strike, at least when hitting life totals. So I have difficult seeing Ace and friends in a serious Modern deck.
4 Noble Hierarch
4 Favored Hoplite
4 Fencing Ace
4 Viashino Slaughtermaster
4 Groundswell
4 Rancor
4 Mutagenic Growth
4 Ranger's Guile
4 Hyena Umbra
Why it's worse than Infect:
1) no good manland
2) Hoplite is not actually a double striker
3) you need either G or W on turn 1 for your 1-drop. With Bogle or Infect it's very simple, you just need G.
4) protection spells are a non-bo with Hyena Umbra if your opponent Paths the creature (you choose white, then Umbra falls off). That's why I swapped them for Ranger's Guile, which isn't as good, because it doesn't grant evasion like protection does.
| Ad Nauseam
| Infect
Big Johnny.