Honestly Mogg Fanatic is a card you have to play with or against to see its power. It looks weak but it's actually not.
One thing about him that many players failed to point out is that being able to sacrifice itself is actually quite powerful. He makes quite a bit of situations awkward for your opponent .(Control Magic, Shackles, Clones... etc) He negates lifegain from Wurmcoil for an attack which is sometimes all you need to win the game.
Would I play a two power one drop over Fanatic? Yes. Is Red spilling with two power one drops? No. Therefore I run Fanatic.
First, every time we look to revise my cube the newest guy points to fanatic and asks, "Is that still good enough?" Every time the old members remind them of the functionality that fanatic provides and the flexibility that it presents.
I'd say I'm surprised this still comes up but it seems like people think that fanatic was great because it was a one that traded with 2s. That is totally wrong. Fanatic was (and is) great because of the flexibility that it allowed. If you need bloodthirst turned on but they dropped a knight, fanatic is your guy. When the other guy leads with birds or hierarch, fanatic is your guy. When you have shot your wad but the other guy is still at 1 and you are facing an exalted angel, fanatic is your guy.
It's true that fanatic is no longer the gold standard of red one drops, but it is still firmly in the top tier. It slows down ramp decks, punishes tempo decks, and sneaks in for little incremental damages. It also is great for blocking. I have probably played a dozen games where I have used fanatic to chump a wurmcoil so they don't get the life. Two power one drops are nice and all but the only red 'one's that I take over fanatic are goblin guide, figure of destiny, and sometimes grim lavamancer (deck dependent). The thing he has going for him that most of the other one drops don't is that one damage is ALWAYS relevant for something. Even late game when most other one drops might as well be land draws, fanatic still has value.
It seems strange to me that people would be unwilling to play Mother of Runes over a two power one drop on turn one, but think that mogg fanatic is very solid turn 1 play. I don't see how both of those things can be true.
This doesn't make any sense. It's pretty simple how it can be true. If you have a 2-power 1-drop, you play that. If you don't, T1 Mom or T1 Fanatic are both great options. I don't see that there's any conflict at all.
Nobody is suggesting not playing Goblin Guide on T1 to play a Fanatic instead. So... I don't see what comparison you're drawing between these two comments at all.
I guess the difference comes because I feel like I have enough one drops in my cube overall without it. It's rare that our aggro decks are looking for one drops, more often 1 or 2 is left in the board. Which I realize runs completely contrary to everyone else's experience when making aggro decks.
Maybe I'll give fanatic a shot since it is getting hugely positive reviews but again we aren't scrounging for one drops so I'm not motivated to give it a shot.
Kind of a slowpoke here, but to add to the Forge Devil vs. Mogg Fanatic discussion: in my peasant cube, I once replaced War Priest of Thune with Ronom Unicorn, with the reasoning that you don't want the card advantage, but the body when it's most relevant. If that applies to a 2/2 (and I do believe in that reasoning), it applies a thousand times more to a 1/1 that loses relevance waay more quickly. I hope that was somewhat understandable..
Specialities about the cube: U tempo, B aggro, R slow-ish are supported. G aggro is not.
Currently trying to support tokens in all colors but blue, in different ways: W pumps them, B sacrifices them, R suicides them, G has decent-sized ones.
cube list outdated
*literal C/U definition according to gatherer
**some cards are banned. Library of Alexandria, Land Tax, Sol Ring.
the difference between mother and fanatic is that a lot of the argument for running fanatic is "red doesn't get enough one drops." that's a theme in this thread and anywhere else i've seen discussions on the card. no one is saying that about mother, it's clearly an amazing card.
if you're running fanatic to increase the number of turn one aggro plays, i just don't get it. he's not a good turn one play for an aggro deck. mother isn't an ideal turn one play but makes up for it by providing reach and countering removal on your guys. it's definitely not a bad turn one play in any deck, in my opinion.
When I see Healing Salve, I'm often like "Oh girl, I wish I could turn every card into this." Thanks they removed the gain life part, otherwise this would have been broken.
I've had Kris Mage in my on deck binder for years waiting to see if we get more cards that interact with discard. At this point, I'd probably add it before I'd add Fanatic. If I'm drafting red and I can't deal with 1-drops with the other 22 cards in my deck, then I have a problem. IMO, Fanatic was marginalized the day it couldn't kill an X/2.
I've had Kris Mage in my on deck binder for years waiting to see if we get more cards that interact with discard. At this point, I'd probably add it before I'd add Fanatic. If I'm drafting red and I can't deal with 1-drops with the other 22 cards in my deck, then I have a problem. IMO, Fanatic was marginalized the day it couldn't kill an X/2.
I didn't say my red deck couldn't deal with a 1-toughness card. But given a choice of options, there's not much better in the 1-mana slot than Fanatic, because it can be both a creature for a while and then a damage-dealer when needed, OR a 1-mana answer to their 1-toughness card. There are no other cards available that give me all of those options rolled up into one card. And especially not ones that only cost me a single mana.
I think Kris Mage is a cool card though, as an aside. If you play with red as a backup color for discard/GY decks, it can be a cool supporter. I've been thinking about bringing it back in for another spin after I got some more red discard cards printed recently.
I think maybe it's not so much a problem that people are overvaluing Fanatic, but that they are undervaluing the other red 1-drops. Most people have been playing Fanatic for years, so they've had time to see all the corner cases flourish and therefore are aware of the full potential of Fanatic. Newer cards almost always take more time to be rated more accurately. I think as people get more playtime with newer 1-drops, those newer cards will rise up relative to the Fanatic. A lot of people will say "I've already tested X and it wasn't as good as Fanatic," but they've not put in nearly the same amount of playtime with these new cards to fully appreciate them, I think.
The second thing is that Fanatic shouldn't be competing with the "brute force" one drops in red. You need a certain threshold of those dumb beaters in the one slot, and clearly red needs a lot (and I would say that most people don't run enough of them). Fanatic comes in more as a utility creature that supplements that core. In white and green, you have to worry more about balancing utility 1-drops with beater 1-drops, but not so in red, at least in the current buildstyles of most MTGS cubes.
I think maybe it's not so much a problem that people are overvaluing Fanatic, but that they are undervaluing the other red 1-drops.
I don't think it's as much this /\ /\ /\...
Quote from PowerConduit »
The second thing is that Fanatic shouldn't be competing with the "brute force" one drops in red.
As it is this /\ /\ /\.
Comparing it to red's aggro beaters gets you nowhere, because it's not the same type of card. I need my suite of 2-power 1-drops, and then I have slots available for cheap utility cards. Fanatic is the latter. He doesn't replace Jackal Pups when you're deckbuilding. It's included as a cheap answer to 1-toughness creatures, in addition to being a creature, which is something the other 1-mana answers to cheap creatures aren't. I can attack, block and carry a Sword with the Fanatic, in addition to shooting Birds and Lions. Which is something you simply can't get with Seal or Shock or something like that.
I don't think the confusion is caused by people over/under-valuing Fanatic. I think it comes from people drawing comparisons to incomparable cards.
They are not comparable. Being able to do the 1 damage at will is far far far far more important than being able to block 2-toughness creatures. You'll just have to take my word for it.
No, they're not comparable. Mogg Fanatic is far better. You have to be able to control when the damage happens.
Are you kidding me? Of course they're comparable! You're comparing them in this very quote!
Now, I agree that Fanatic is much better than Arsonist, I don't think it's as great as the hype sometimes shows in this thread.
First of all, if your opponent has a Mogg Fanatic on the battlefield, who the heck's gonna play a Flickerwisp? If that's why Fanatic is good, find better players, because that seems like a horrible play.
If my opponent plays a Fanatic, I don't play my 1 toughness guy unless it's been dealt with, or if I have 2 of them I play the worse one first to protect my better one. If my opponent waits until I play a 1 toughness guy, then it's basically being used as a burn spell, in which case if it was Shock it would be able to kill more than just my 1-toughness dude.
It is a good killer of mana dorks and Mom, and I think it's an excellent sideboard card against those cards, but most of the time I wouldn't run it main deck.
I currently run 11 red 1-drops in my 630 cube (Goblin Guide, Goblin Patrol, Gorilla Shaman, Grim Lavamancer, Jackal Pup, Magus of the Scroll, Fanatic, Reckless Waif, Spikeshot Elder, Stormkirk Noble, and, ugh, Vexing Devil), and only the Gorilla Shaman has a lower main deck percentage of these cards.
Now, I still place worth on cards being great sideboard cards, and both the Gorilla Shaman and Mogg Fanatic I think are fantastic in this role, and for that reason it's not really on my cut list (even though it might sound like I'm hating on him in this post).
-rexx
EDIT: And I do realize that there may be cases in which case the Flickerwisp may be the correct play depending on what you have available to flicker, but I better be getting some severe value out of that to consider losing a three-drop to an on-board 1-drop.
I don't think the confusion is caused by people over/under-valuing Fanatic. I think it comes from people drawing comparisons to incomparable cards.
What, then, would you consider the comparable cards? It really seems like you've established that you need a card that does exactly what Mogg Fanatic does, and then discounted everything else for not being Mogg Fanatic. I've been designing cube for a long time, and I've rarely needed a slot so specifically to be "1 mana, able to kill Mother of Runes, able to deal damage to my opponent if the board is clear, able to carry a sword, and castable if there is nothing you need to kill yet." Those requirements are so specific you're never going to find anything else that fits them. I personally think that is more of a self-fulfilling prophecy than any actual need for mogg fanatic.
I'll reference this below, but I did a quick span of my cube for toughness of creatures. Here's what I found for my 450 card cube with the RtR update.
I did this quickly, and I'm absolutely positive I made a few errors, excluding creatures I shouldn't have, not excluding something I did, counting a creature in the wrong slot. I'm operating under the assumption that a few minor differences will change the numbers slightly but won't dramatically ruin my point. I apologize if I've missed something feel free to point it out but recognize that one or two miscategorized cards shouldn't invalidate my entire post.
I excluded these for a variety of fairly obvious reasons, mostly about them being variable toughness, untargetable, or creature that dont' usually spend time in play.
Phantasmal Image
Guilded Drake
Pack Rat
Squee, Goblin Nabob
Tarmogoyf
Troll Ascetic
Thrun, the Last Troll
Krosan Tusker
Geist of Saint Traft
Sigarda, Host of Herons
Phyrexian Metamorph
Wall of Omens
Restoration Angel
Hero of Bladehold
Serendib Efreet
Meloku the Clouded Mirror
Hell's Thunder
Wall of Roots
Wall of Blossoms
Yeva, Nature's Herald
Genesis
Wolfir Silverheart
Vorapede
Molten-Tail Masticore
Baneslayer Angel
Exalted Angel
Eternal Dragon
Sphinx of Jwar Isle
Kokusho, the Evening Star
Thundermaw Hellkite
Deadbridge Goliath
Sun Titan
Consecrated Sphinx
Grave Titan
Inferno Titan
Primeval Titan
Woodfall Primus
Simic Sky Swallower
Wurmcoil Engine
Sphinx of the Steel Wind
Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite
Griselbrand
Greater Gargadon
Myr Battlesphere
Terastodon
Sundering Titan
Inkwell Leviathan
Comparison 1
If what you want is "Able to deal with a T1 mother of runes if I'm on the play, castable if I don't have a target so I can use it later", then you have two options; Mogg Fanatic and Seal of Fire
Additional bonuses for Mogg Fanatic: Able to carry a sword, able to attack if there's nothing else on the board, teams up with lightning bolt to kill a 4 toughness creature, able to block and sacrifice to prevent lifelink or jitte counters. Kills 39% of the creatures in the cube
Additional bonuses for Seal of Fire: Able to kill 75% more creatures than Mogg Fanatic. Teams up with lightning bolt to kill a 5 toughness creature. Kills 67% of the creatures in the cube (excluding the list of excluded creatures).
What you're saying then, is that those bonuses for Mogg Fanatic are better than the bonuses for Seal of Fire. I disagree.
Comparison 2
If what you want is a red 1 mana creature that is usually a 1/1, but has some upside and ability to deal more damage if things work out for you and your opponent doesn't have early plays, then you can compare Mogg Fanatic and Reckless Waif
Mogg Fanatic: Able to get in for 2-3 damage if your opponent doesn't have early plays, also able to kill a relevant oppposing creature a lot of the time.
Reckless Waif: Able to get in for 3-9 damage if your opponent doesnt' have early plays. No ability other than dealing damage. Loss of utility at the expense of higher damage output if things go right.
------------
I agree with you that you can't compare fanatic to Jackal Pup, because they fill different roles. I just think that you're comparing Mogg Fanatic to Mogg Fanatic, and he continues to fill that role well. He's always going to. However, if you step back, pretend he doesn't exist, and figure out what you need in red, you may find that other cards fill that exact role better than he does.
I really don't get why they're playing around with things like Goblin Arsonist, if they really want to make a modern day Mogg Fanatic, all they have to do it:
Mogg Arsonist R
When ~ dies, deal 1 damage to target creature or player.
0: Sacrifice Mogg Arsonist
1/1
Have they ever come out and said why they went with Arsonist over Fanatic or the card I just described?
What, then, would you consider the comparable cards?
A card that's a creature that can kill creatures on T1. So basically, a better Fanatic or similar effect that has pros and cons vs him that keeps his most important function.
Stuff like Fume Spitter and Icatian Javelineers are close. They all have pros and cons vs the Fanatic, and are better and worse in one way or another.
They could print a "fixed" Fanatic w/ First Strike that would play like he did pre-M10, but until I get another card that serves the same function, everything else just falls short of doing what I want from a card like it.
A card that's a creature that can kill creatures on T1. So basically, a better Fanatic or similar effect that has pros and cons vs him that keeps his most important function.
I didn't say my red deck couldn't deal with a 1-toughness card. But given a choice of options, there's not much better in the 1-mana slot than Fanatic, because it can be both a creature for a while and then a damage-dealer when needed, OR a 1-mana answer to their 1-toughness card. There are no other cards available that give me all of those options rolled up into one card. And especially not ones that only cost me a single mana.
Forge Devil does all of these things. And he sticks around after he has killed something to THEN provide value, instead of having to choose between attacking/blocking or killing things. And you don't hear anybody saying Forge Devil is much of a cubeworthy card. That's because he isn't.
Forge Devil does all of these things. And he sticks around after he has killed something to THEN provide value, instead of having to choose between attacking/blocking or killing things. And you don't hear anybody saying Forge Devil is much of a cubeworthy card. That's because he isn't.
devil is a worse card than fanatic, so just because it's not cubeable doesn't mean fanatic isn't. it can't be played on an empty board, it can kill you, it can't kill your opponent. it can kill a creature and stick around to deal damage afterward, but i think that's balanced out by fanatic being able to attack first and kill a suitable target later. so the downsides definitely put it at a lower level than fanatic.
When I see Healing Salve, I'm often like "Oh girl, I wish I could turn every card into this." Thanks they removed the gain life part, otherwise this would have been broken.
If you think Fanatic is good enough, that's fine and all, but this is a pretty ridiculous statement. I think a conservative estimate of his play would be your opponent going T1 Land, you go T1 Fanatic, they play T2 Wall of Omens, and you never see a 1 power creature to kill with it until Elspeth makes a 1/1 soldier. That's conservative.
Dealing 2 damage with him because your opponent doesn't play a creature until turn 3 (if you were on the play), and then killing a 3 drop with it isn't exactly "conservative"
In the Wall of Omens example, the Fanatic is doing better than something like a Jackal Pup because it retains the ability to sac for 1.
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less." -Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass
I don't think Fanatic and Forge Devil are even on the same plane of usefulness. Part of what makes Fanatic so good is the fact that I get to decide when the right time to sac him is. I don't have to hold him in my hand because I don't see a useful enough target yet. Not only that, but Fanatic doesn't hit me for one damage as well.
The only card that even comes close to Fanatic IMO is Frostling. And he doesn't make it in because losing the ability to go to the dome is pretty big.
Are you kidding me? Of course they're comparable! You're comparing them in this very quote!
You can compare any two cards to one another. I can compare Goblin Guide to Grave Titan, but that doesn't get us anywhere. So if someone asks do you think Arsonist and Fanatic are comparable power-level wise, my answer is no. I don't think they are.
Quote from JeffDereck »
Forge Devil does all of these things. And he sticks around after he has killed something to THEN provide value, instead of having to choose between attacking/blocking or killing things. And you don't hear anybody saying Forge Devil is much of a cubeworthy card. That's because he isn't.
And neither is Mogg Fanatic.
No, Forge Devil doesn't do all of these things. If I'm on the play, my T1 Forge Devil can't kill their T1 Birds. I can't attack multiple times and then sacrifice it for damage. I can't block with it and then sacrifice it for damage. It's the same reason War Priest is worse than Kami/Unicorn. For all of those reasons, Forge Devil isn't a cubeworthy card.
One thing about him that many players failed to point out is that being able to sacrifice itself is actually quite powerful. He makes quite a bit of situations awkward for your opponent .(Control Magic, Shackles, Clones... etc) He negates lifegain from Wurmcoil for an attack which is sometimes all you need to win the game.
Would I play a two power one drop over Fanatic? Yes. Is Red spilling with two power one drops? No. Therefore I run Fanatic.
I'd say I'm surprised this still comes up but it seems like people think that fanatic was great because it was a one that traded with 2s. That is totally wrong. Fanatic was (and is) great because of the flexibility that it allowed. If you need bloodthirst turned on but they dropped a knight, fanatic is your guy. When the other guy leads with birds or hierarch, fanatic is your guy. When you have shot your wad but the other guy is still at 1 and you are facing an exalted angel, fanatic is your guy.
It's true that fanatic is no longer the gold standard of red one drops, but it is still firmly in the top tier. It slows down ramp decks, punishes tempo decks, and sneaks in for little incremental damages. It also is great for blocking. I have probably played a dozen games where I have used fanatic to chump a wurmcoil so they don't get the life. Two power one drops are nice and all but the only red 'one's that I take over fanatic are goblin guide, figure of destiny, and sometimes grim lavamancer (deck dependent). The thing he has going for him that most of the other one drops don't is that one damage is ALWAYS relevant for something. Even late game when most other one drops might as well be land draws, fanatic still has value.
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This doesn't make any sense. It's pretty simple how it can be true. If you have a 2-power 1-drop, you play that. If you don't, T1 Mom or T1 Fanatic are both great options. I don't see that there's any conflict at all.
Nobody is suggesting not playing Goblin Guide on T1 to play a Fanatic instead. So... I don't see what comparison you're drawing between these two comments at all.
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Maybe I'll give fanatic a shot since it is getting hugely positive reviews but again we aren't scrounging for one drops so I'm not motivated to give it a shot.
And none of the other 1-drops can kill their 1-toughness creatures immediately.
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450, Peasant*, unpowered**
Specialities about the cube:
U tempo, B aggro, R slow-ish are supported. G aggro is not.
Currently trying to support tokens in all colors but blue, in different ways: W pumps them, B sacrifices them, R suicides them, G has decent-sized ones.
cube list outdated
*literal C/U definition according to gatherer
**some cards are banned. Library of Alexandria, Land Tax, Sol Ring.
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if you're running fanatic to increase the number of turn one aggro plays, i just don't get it. he's not a good turn one play for an aggro deck. mother isn't an ideal turn one play but makes up for it by providing reach and countering removal on your guys. it's definitely not a bad turn one play in any deck, in my opinion.
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I didn't say my red deck couldn't deal with a 1-toughness card. But given a choice of options, there's not much better in the 1-mana slot than Fanatic, because it can be both a creature for a while and then a damage-dealer when needed, OR a 1-mana answer to their 1-toughness card. There are no other cards available that give me all of those options rolled up into one card. And especially not ones that only cost me a single mana.
I think Kris Mage is a cool card though, as an aside. If you play with red as a backup color for discard/GY decks, it can be a cool supporter. I've been thinking about bringing it back in for another spin after I got some more red discard cards printed recently.
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The second thing is that Fanatic shouldn't be competing with the "brute force" one drops in red. You need a certain threshold of those dumb beaters in the one slot, and clearly red needs a lot (and I would say that most people don't run enough of them). Fanatic comes in more as a utility creature that supplements that core. In white and green, you have to worry more about balancing utility 1-drops with beater 1-drops, but not so in red, at least in the current buildstyles of most MTGS cubes.
I don't think it's as much this /\ /\ /\...
As it is this /\ /\ /\.
Comparing it to red's aggro beaters gets you nowhere, because it's not the same type of card. I need my suite of 2-power 1-drops, and then I have slots available for cheap utility cards. Fanatic is the latter. He doesn't replace Jackal Pups when you're deckbuilding. It's included as a cheap answer to 1-toughness creatures, in addition to being a creature, which is something the other 1-mana answers to cheap creatures aren't. I can attack, block and carry a Sword with the Fanatic, in addition to shooting Birds and Lions. Which is something you simply can't get with Seal or Shock or something like that.
I don't think the confusion is caused by people over/under-valuing Fanatic. I think it comes from people drawing comparisons to incomparable cards.
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They are not comparable. Being able to do the 1 damage at will is far far far far more important than being able to block 2-toughness creatures. You'll just have to take my word for it.
No, they're not comparable. Mogg Fanatic is far better. You have to be able to control when the damage happens.
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Are you kidding me? Of course they're comparable! You're comparing them in this very quote!
Now, I agree that Fanatic is much better than Arsonist, I don't think it's as great as the hype sometimes shows in this thread.
First of all, if your opponent has a Mogg Fanatic on the battlefield, who the heck's gonna play a Flickerwisp? If that's why Fanatic is good, find better players, because that seems like a horrible play.
If my opponent plays a Fanatic, I don't play my 1 toughness guy unless it's been dealt with, or if I have 2 of them I play the worse one first to protect my better one. If my opponent waits until I play a 1 toughness guy, then it's basically being used as a burn spell, in which case if it was Shock it would be able to kill more than just my 1-toughness dude.
It is a good killer of mana dorks and Mom, and I think it's an excellent sideboard card against those cards, but most of the time I wouldn't run it main deck.
I currently run 11 red 1-drops in my 630 cube (Goblin Guide, Goblin Patrol, Gorilla Shaman, Grim Lavamancer, Jackal Pup, Magus of the Scroll, Fanatic, Reckless Waif, Spikeshot Elder, Stormkirk Noble, and, ugh, Vexing Devil), and only the Gorilla Shaman has a lower main deck percentage of these cards.
Now, I still place worth on cards being great sideboard cards, and both the Gorilla Shaman and Mogg Fanatic I think are fantastic in this role, and for that reason it's not really on my cut list (even though it might sound like I'm hating on him in this post).
-rexx
EDIT: And I do realize that there may be cases in which case the Flickerwisp may be the correct play depending on what you have available to flicker, but I better be getting some severe value out of that to consider losing a three-drop to an on-board 1-drop.
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What, then, would you consider the comparable cards? It really seems like you've established that you need a card that does exactly what Mogg Fanatic does, and then discounted everything else for not being Mogg Fanatic. I've been designing cube for a long time, and I've rarely needed a slot so specifically to be "1 mana, able to kill Mother of Runes, able to deal damage to my opponent if the board is clear, able to carry a sword, and castable if there is nothing you need to kill yet." Those requirements are so specific you're never going to find anything else that fits them. I personally think that is more of a self-fulfilling prophecy than any actual need for mogg fanatic.
I'll reference this below, but I did a quick span of my cube for toughness of creatures. Here's what I found for my 450 card cube with the RtR update.
1 Toughness - 70
2 Toughness - 52
3 Toughness - 22
4 Toughness - 13
5 Toughness - 7
6 Toughness - 9
7 Toughness - 4
9 Toughness - 1
10 Toughness - 1
11 Toughness - 1
I did this quickly, and I'm absolutely positive I made a few errors, excluding creatures I shouldn't have, not excluding something I did, counting a creature in the wrong slot. I'm operating under the assumption that a few minor differences will change the numbers slightly but won't dramatically ruin my point. I apologize if I've missed something feel free to point it out but recognize that one or two miscategorized cards shouldn't invalidate my entire post.
I excluded these for a variety of fairly obvious reasons, mostly about them being variable toughness, untargetable, or creature that dont' usually spend time in play.
Phantasmal Image
Guilded Drake
Pack Rat
Squee, Goblin Nabob
Tarmogoyf
Troll Ascetic
Thrun, the Last Troll
Krosan Tusker
Geist of Saint Traft
Sigarda, Host of Herons
Phyrexian Metamorph
Student of Warfare
Steppe Lynx
Elite Vanguard
Mother of Runes
Savannah Lions
Soltari Monk
Soltari Priest
Accorder Paladin
Soltari Trooper
Stormfront Pegasus
Thalia, Guardian of Thraben
Cloistered Youth
Azorius Arrester
Blade Splicer
Mirror Entity
Flickerwisp
Enclave Cryptologist
Looter il-Kor
Waterfront Bouncer
Snapcaster Mage
Vendilion Clique
Gravecrawler
Oona's Prowler
Nezumi Graverobber
Nantuko Shade
Dauthi Horror
Dark Confidant
Bloodghast
Vampire Hexmage
Bone Shredder
Liliana's Specter
Dauthi Marauder
Disciple of Bolas
Nekrataal
Stromkirk Noble
Jackal Pup
Grim Lavamancer
Goblin Welder
Stonewright
Torch Fiend
Hearth Kami
Hellspark Elemental
Plated Geopede
Lightning Mauler
Mogg War Marshal
Fire Imp
Arbor Elf
Llanowar Elves
Joraga Treespeaker
Birds of Paradise
Noble Hierarch
Avacyn's Pilgrim
Fyndhorn Elves
Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
Strangleroot Geist
Sakura-Tribe Elder
Lotus Cobra
Skinshifter
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Comparison 1
If what you want is "Able to deal with a T1 mother of runes if I'm on the play, castable if I don't have a target so I can use it later", then you have two options; Mogg Fanatic and Seal of Fire
Additional bonuses for Mogg Fanatic: Able to carry a sword, able to attack if there's nothing else on the board, teams up with lightning bolt to kill a 4 toughness creature, able to block and sacrifice to prevent lifelink or jitte counters. Kills 39% of the creatures in the cube
Additional bonuses for Seal of Fire: Able to kill 75% more creatures than Mogg Fanatic. Teams up with lightning bolt to kill a 5 toughness creature. Kills 67% of the creatures in the cube (excluding the list of excluded creatures).
What you're saying then, is that those bonuses for Mogg Fanatic are better than the bonuses for Seal of Fire. I disagree.
Comparison 2
If what you want is a red 1 mana creature that is usually a 1/1, but has some upside and ability to deal more damage if things work out for you and your opponent doesn't have early plays, then you can compare Mogg Fanatic and Reckless Waif
Mogg Fanatic: Able to get in for 2-3 damage if your opponent doesn't have early plays, also able to kill a relevant oppposing creature a lot of the time.
Reckless Waif: Able to get in for 3-9 damage if your opponent doesnt' have early plays. No ability other than dealing damage. Loss of utility at the expense of higher damage output if things go right.
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I agree with you that you can't compare fanatic to Jackal Pup, because they fill different roles. I just think that you're comparing Mogg Fanatic to Mogg Fanatic, and he continues to fill that role well. He's always going to. However, if you step back, pretend he doesn't exist, and figure out what you need in red, you may find that other cards fill that exact role better than he does.
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Have they ever come out and said why they went with Arsonist over Fanatic or the card I just described?
A card that's a creature that can kill creatures on T1. So basically, a better Fanatic or similar effect that has pros and cons vs him that keeps his most important function.
Stuff like Fume Spitter and Icatian Javelineers are close. They all have pros and cons vs the Fanatic, and are better and worse in one way or another.
They could print a "fixed" Fanatic w/ First Strike that would play like he did pre-M10, but until I get another card that serves the same function, everything else just falls short of doing what I want from a card like it.
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Forge Devil does all of these things. And he sticks around after he has killed something to THEN provide value, instead of having to choose between attacking/blocking or killing things. And you don't hear anybody saying Forge Devil is much of a cubeworthy card. That's because he isn't.
And neither is Mogg Fanatic.
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devil is a worse card than fanatic, so just because it's not cubeable doesn't mean fanatic isn't. it can't be played on an empty board, it can kill you, it can't kill your opponent. it can kill a creature and stick around to deal damage afterward, but i think that's balanced out by fanatic being able to attack first and kill a suitable target later. so the downsides definitely put it at a lower level than fanatic.
In the Wall of Omens example, the Fanatic is doing better than something like a Jackal Pup because it retains the ability to sac for 1.
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The only card that even comes close to Fanatic IMO is Frostling. And he doesn't make it in because losing the ability to go to the dome is pretty big.
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You can compare any two cards to one another. I can compare Goblin Guide to Grave Titan, but that doesn't get us anywhere. So if someone asks do you think Arsonist and Fanatic are comparable power-level wise, my answer is no. I don't think they are.
No, Forge Devil doesn't do all of these things. If I'm on the play, my T1 Forge Devil can't kill their T1 Birds. I can't attack multiple times and then sacrifice it for damage. I can't block with it and then sacrifice it for damage. It's the same reason War Priest is worse than Kami/Unicorn. For all of those reasons, Forge Devil isn't a cubeworthy card.
But Mogg Fanatic is.
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