9 or 10 is still a hell of a lot of mana. Very few decks get to that, but this guy works to some extent with other strategies. Old Emrakul just failed for that and functioned with very few cards. I never felt it was worth a slot at all, since the cards that OHK with it probably get the job done with more versatile options. This Emrakul is cool since it will get (relatively) pretty cheap indeed deep into most games. If I wanted a second Eldrazi, I'm might think about it over Kozilek 2.0.
I've never been tempted to cube old Emrakul, doesn't work with nearly enough cards. Might as well run Painter's Servant and Grindstone if I want cards that are blank outside of a combo. This is playable in ramp and control and works with reanimator. I am very tempted to test it.
- I think these two are close, with the deciding factor being how castable Koz 2.0 is in your cube. Koz 1.0 is the only Titan without any form of protection and has an anti-reanimation clause, but he's also the most castable tita. with Anhillator.
- Castable, but not as much as others listed. Anti-reanimation clause sucks, but it's better than Kozilek 1.0 in Sneak Attack situations since Ulamog is indestructible.
- The most narrow of the bunch. Uncastable outside of having Channel, Mirari's Wake, or Mana Reflection and anti-reanimation clause restricts Emrakul to Show and Tell / Eureka / Oath of Druids / Sneak Artack strategies.
I'd 100% cube this over any other Eldrazi (though I don't support colorless costs, so Kozilek 2.0 isn't a consideration). I love the unique effect, castability, viability as a reanimator target, and the general feel of the card.
I was unhappy with the "obviously it's Emrakul" feel of SOI, and this Emrakul more than makes up for it.
He almost has the text "Destroy target creature" too since the mindslaver lets you choose how your opponent attacks. Could kill more too if you have other favorable blocks.
He almost has the text "Destroy target creature" too since the mindslaver lets you choose how your opponent attacks. Could kill more too if you have other favorable blocks.
Or if they're holding kills spells. Or etc etc; the mindslaver effect is super powerful in cube.
I didn't go out of my way to support colorless mana in my 450 cube, so this seems like an easy include over New Kozilek. Better evasion, more reliable protection, and not needing colorless mana to hardcast pretty much seals it for me, and that's ignoring the cast trigger.
I think that this makes karakas a better card, not that it really needed to get better. Interesting to say the least, will look forward to the other cards in this set!
I think that this makes karakas a better card, not that it really needed to get better. Interesting to say the least, will look forward to the other cards in this set!
Good point, going both ways too on offense and defense. Really the printing of any cube able legendary card that replaces a non-legendary gives Karakas more credence, but being able to do more than protect your creature or yourself (i.e. infinite Emrakul Slavers) seems like a pretty cool late-game closing play.
It's a very interesting card that's hard to evaluate on the surface... and it's certainly powerful.
My playgroup/cube tends to draft a lot of blue decks and my intuition is that it's the weakest of the major eldrazi against those.
Soft to wraths and some planeswalker heavy decks.
What I have a tough time evaluating is
a) How good is the mind slaver effect? I've seen mind slaver be "win the game" and I've seen it be equivalent to a silence. Have a tough time evaluating it's power level.
It seems like it would be a lot stronger in the mid-late game than the early game. Making the card worse as a busted powered out target.
b) How big is the cast discount going to be? Probably enough to be castable as a control finisher. Especially if you have some cards like dack fayden. Will self mill reanimation decks be happy with this as a potentially hardcastable target in the mid-late game AND a good reanimation target?
What I don't like, is that as a card powered/cheated out very early in the game it falls a bit short of the current eldrazi competition , which is what it's directly competing with.
Mindslaver is an incredibly powerful effect. Even in the early games there are lots of spells you can cast for your opponent that they would normally never consider. And then you have a creature that dies to only a select number of cards. I could be wrong since the extra turn is pretty good for the opponent, but Mindslaver is insane when the cards you get to cast (or not cast) are also insane, and that was a turn they were virtually taking anyways--one that is almost guaranteed to be worse than if you hadn't mindslaved them immediately before.
Mindslaver has always been a powerful card in a vacuum just looking at the abilities, but paying 6 and 4 to do only that is not, i.e. it becomes the silence you refer to too often. When you have that effect from a cast on a creature, you mitigate a lot of the effects since you at least always get the massive creature if the Mindslaver ends up as silence which is good, and if it doesn't then it's absolutely bonkers.
The only scenario where that Midnslaver-effect on Newrakul is explicitly bad for you is if the 2nd-top card of their deck is the card that beats you, which will probably not be common but is why the extra turn they get is not completely irrelevant when evaluating this card. Otherwise it's a minimum gravy and scales up to game-winning.
- I think these two are close, with the deciding factor being how castable Koz 2.0 is in your cube. Koz 1.0 is the only Titan without any form of protection and has an anti-reanimation clause, but he's also the most castable tita. with Anhillator.
- Castable, but not as much as others listed. Anti-reanimation clause sucks, but it's better than Kozilek 1.0 in Sneak Attack situations since Ulamog is indestructible.
- The most narrow of the bunch. Uncastable outside of having Channel, Mirari's Wake, or Mana Reflection and anti-reanimation clause restricts Emrakul to Show and Tell / Eureka / Oath of Druids / Sneak Artack strategies.
I think some people here over-value versatility in their cheaty targets and undervalue upside.
I personally rank old Emrakul 2nd (agree with your #1).
Brief argument:
The ratio of decks that are trying to hardcast eldrazi BUT have 0 or 1 way to cheat them out, is noticeably smaller than the ones based around cheating them out. While emrakul is narrowest, it's not by a large margin; considering the set of strategies that actively want eldrazi.
"Reanimatability" is only a very small concern to me. If you properly support a variety of cheaty strategies, reanimator should have a wealth of targets, many of which are better than the eldrazi. This reduces the need for the eldrazi to be reanimatable.
The higher upside of emrakul, more than makes up for it's increased narrowness IMO.
*Note: Im assuming a cube in the 450-600 range that has all the cheaty options available and doesn't skimp on the critical mass of targets for those decks*
@Lucid I just don't see too many dedicated Sneak/Show decks around here to justify a card that is almost exclusively played there. They exist, but with only 3-4 players a draft the "cheat" deck is also leaning on the graveyard and artifact ramp, so Emrakul becomes a dead card in 2/3 "cheat" archetypes.
a) How good is the mind slaver effect? I've seen mind slaver be "win the game" and I've seen it be equivalent to a silence. Have a tough time evaluating it's power level.
It's probably because Mindslaver doesn't come with a 13/13 Flying, Trample, Pro instants attached to it. A big threat attached to the effect makes it so much better as you can deplete their resources by wasting any answer they have and you can make them crash their best threat onto Emrakul to eliminate it.
True But giving the opponent an extra turn/card after the mindslaver effect mitigates that a bit (adding to my inability to evaluate it).
I think you are right that the huge body and ability to suicide their best creature is a very big deal.
It's really only the card that mitigates it unless they have something that ticks off each turn automatically such as Phyrexian Arena. Otherwise that turn was one they were going to make anyways, and the one you're taking for them is probably going to be really awful for them.
I like the way they link the delirium theme to it. Pretty nice. I was hoping for a planeswalker version of it, but I guess I was dreaming.
About cube, I don't know. It seems just fine. Not sold yet, but certainly a viable finisher in some shells. If you can realibly win with it the turn after you cast it, which seems really doable, I think he's great.
The Mindslaver plus extra turn effect is bad for you when they don't have anything to cast (only permanents, or no legal targets for their spells). Then it's effectivley "draw an extra card" for them. But if that extra card isn't a sorcery answer to Emrakul, you should be in a pretty good place to win with Emrakul on the board.
I think some people here over-value versatility in their cheaty targets and undervalue upside.
I think versatility should never be under-valued, especially with cheaty targets.
Example: Say P1P1 my top 5 picks are all 5 Titans. I value Primeval Titan higher than any other titans because it's the only one I can cheat into play via Natural Order and can also be tutored up with Green Sun's Zenith, not to mention that it's green so it's in the natural ramp color. There's a lot of reasons why I think Primeval Titan is the best titan, but that's a discussion for another day.
In my experience, my Sneak Attack / Show and Tell decks tend to have a reanimator component to them. I dunno about you guys, but I don't exactly stuff my deck to the brim with super fatties, so the anti-reanimation clause can be a huge brick wall when you're forced to go the reanimation route but your only fattie in the first 10 or so cards can't be reanimated.
Super Fatties can be slotted to the following common archetypes:
Ramp
Reanimator
Recurring Nightmare (I consider this its own archetype outside of traditional reanimator)
Cheaty Face (Sneak Attack / Show and Tell / Eureka / Oath of Druids / Through the Breach)
Natural Order
I like to try and get my fatties able to fit into as many as these archetypes as possible.
The cost reduction on this card is what makes this card appealing. Emrakul having flying / protection makes him a great reanimation target and should be the easiest to actually hardcast mid / late game for ramp decks.
I definitely want to test this out. Also, Innistrad is totally going to get blown up, EMN is going to be the Empire Strikes Back to BFZ's somewhat happy ending.
The cost reduction on this card is what makes this card appealing. Emrakul having flying / protection makes him a great reanimation target and should be the easiest to actually hardcast mid / late game for ramp decks.
I definitely want to test this out. Also, Innistrad is totally going to get blown up, EMN is going to be the Empire Strikes Back to BFZ's somewhat happy ending.
Zero chance wotc's most popular plane is destroyed, it's kinda sad knowing the eldrazi will never win anything ever.
Would it have been so broken to just give you the mindslaver effect without giving the opponent and extra turn after? I guess it's pretty backbreaking anyway, but if you successfully case a 9-10 drop you SHOULD win the game.
I don't think anyone discussed this, but that would be roughly equivalent to giving you two extra turns with Time Stretch. You're taking an opponent's turn away (a virtual Time Walk ) plus taking your extra turn (actual Time Walk) plus your regular turn. That seems a bit much on top of the 13/13
EDIT: I misunderstood the question, but still, getting what is almost certainly a better trigger than the original Emrakul without that extra turn clause means it would probably replace original Emmy in cheaty decks in every format all over the world! Mindslaver is a 10 mana effect (eight if you play it in one shot), getting a 13/13 beatstick on top for potentially less seems overly hopeful
Yes, it would've been far, far, FAR too good if it was just a 13/13 flying trample protection from instants with an uncounterable Mindslaver trigger strapped to it for like 8-9 mana. I mean, a Mindslaver activation costs 10 mana on its own.
I think some people here over-value versatility in their cheaty targets and undervalue upside.
I personally rank old Emrakul 2nd (agree with your #1).
Brief argument:
The ratio of decks that are trying to hardcast eldrazi BUT have 0 or 1 way to cheat them out, is noticeably smaller than the ones based around cheating them out. While emrakul is narrowest, it's not by a large margin; considering the set of strategies that actively want eldrazi.
"Reanimatability" is only a very small concern to me. If you properly support a variety of cheaty strategies, reanimator should have a wealth of targets, many of which are better than the eldrazi. This reduces the need for the eldrazi to be reanimatable.
The higher upside of emrakul, more than makes up for it's increased narrowness IMO.
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#1: Ulamog, the Ceaseless Hunger
- Best overall package in terms of castability, reanimation, protection, and clock.
#2 / #3: Tied between both Kozilek, Butcher of Truth and Kozilek, the Great Distortion
- I think these two are close, with the deciding factor being how castable Koz 2.0 is in your cube. Koz 1.0 is the only Titan without any form of protection and has an anti-reanimation clause, but he's also the most castable tita. with Anhillator.
#4: Emrakul, the Promised End
- The most castable one in the mid and late game for ramp / control decks, it has very relevant evasion / protection and is a good reanimation target.
#5: Ulamog, the Infinite Gyre
- Castable, but not as much as others listed. Anti-reanimation clause sucks, but it's better than Kozilek 1.0 in Sneak Attack situations since Ulamog is indestructible.
#6: Emrakul, the Aeons Torn
- The most narrow of the bunch. Uncastable outside of having Channel, Mirari's Wake, or Mana Reflection and anti-reanimation clause restricts Emrakul to Show and Tell / Eureka / Oath of Druids / Sneak Artack strategies.
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I was unhappy with the "obviously it's Emrakul" feel of SOI, and this Emrakul more than makes up for it.
For those who run Kozi 2.0, is the <> mana ever an issue for casting him?
On spoiled card wishlisting and 'should-have-had'-isms:
Or if they're holding kills spells. Or etc etc; the mindslaver effect is super powerful in cube.
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Good point, going both ways too on offense and defense. Really the printing of any cube able legendary card that replaces a non-legendary gives Karakas more credence, but being able to do more than protect your creature or yourself (i.e. infinite Emrakul Slavers) seems like a pretty cool late-game closing play.
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My playgroup/cube tends to draft a lot of blue decks and my intuition is that it's the weakest of the major eldrazi against those.
Soft to wraths and some planeswalker heavy decks.
What I have a tough time evaluating is
a) How good is the mind slaver effect? I've seen mind slaver be "win the game" and I've seen it be equivalent to a silence. Have a tough time evaluating it's power level.
It seems like it would be a lot stronger in the mid-late game than the early game. Making the card worse as a busted powered out target.
b) How big is the cast discount going to be? Probably enough to be castable as a control finisher. Especially if you have some cards like dack fayden. Will self mill reanimation decks be happy with this as a potentially hardcastable target in the mid-late game AND a good reanimation target?
What I don't like, is that as a card powered/cheated out very early in the game it falls a bit short of the current eldrazi competition , which is what it's directly competing with.
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Mindslaver has always been a powerful card in a vacuum just looking at the abilities, but paying 6 and 4 to do only that is not, i.e. it becomes the silence you refer to too often. When you have that effect from a cast on a creature, you mitigate a lot of the effects since you at least always get the massive creature if the Mindslaver ends up as silence which is good, and if it doesn't then it's absolutely bonkers.
The only scenario where that Midnslaver-effect on Newrakul is explicitly bad for you is if the 2nd-top card of their deck is the card that beats you, which will probably not be common but is why the extra turn they get is not completely irrelevant when evaluating this card. Otherwise it's a minimum gravy and scales up to game-winning.
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I think some people here over-value versatility in their cheaty targets and undervalue upside.
I personally rank old Emrakul 2nd (agree with your #1).
Brief argument:
The ratio of decks that are trying to hardcast eldrazi BUT have 0 or 1 way to cheat them out, is noticeably smaller than the ones based around cheating them out. While emrakul is narrowest, it's not by a large margin; considering the set of strategies that actively want eldrazi.
"Reanimatability" is only a very small concern to me. If you properly support a variety of cheaty strategies, reanimator should have a wealth of targets, many of which are better than the eldrazi. This reduces the need for the eldrazi to be reanimatable.
The higher upside of emrakul, more than makes up for it's increased narrowness IMO.
*Note: Im assuming a cube in the 450-600 range that has all the cheaty options available and doesn't skimp on the critical mass of targets for those decks*
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True But giving the opponent an extra turn/card after the mindslaver effect mitigates that a bit (adding to my inability to evaluate it).
I think you are right that the huge body and ability to suicide their best creature is a very big deal.
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About cube, I don't know. It seems just fine. Not sold yet, but certainly a viable finisher in some shells. If you can realibly win with it the turn after you cast it, which seems really doable, I think he's great.
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I think versatility should never be under-valued, especially with cheaty targets.
Example: Say P1P1 my top 5 picks are all 5 Titans. I value Primeval Titan higher than any other titans because it's the only one I can cheat into play via Natural Order and can also be tutored up with Green Sun's Zenith, not to mention that it's green so it's in the natural ramp color. There's a lot of reasons why I think Primeval Titan is the best titan, but that's a discussion for another day.
In my experience, my Sneak Attack / Show and Tell decks tend to have a reanimator component to them. I dunno about you guys, but I don't exactly stuff my deck to the brim with super fatties, so the anti-reanimation clause can be a huge brick wall when you're forced to go the reanimation route but your only fattie in the first 10 or so cards can't be reanimated.
Super Fatties can be slotted to the following common archetypes:
Ramp
Reanimator
Recurring Nightmare (I consider this its own archetype outside of traditional reanimator)
Cheaty Face (Sneak Attack / Show and Tell / Eureka / Oath of Druids / Through the Breach)
Natural Order
I like to try and get my fatties able to fit into as many as these archetypes as possible.
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Zero chance wotc's most popular plane is destroyed, it's kinda sad knowing the eldrazi will never win anything ever.
http://forums.mtgsalvation.com/showthread.php?t=484979
I don't think anyone discussed this, but that would be roughly equivalent to giving you two extra turns with Time Stretch. You're taking an opponent's turn away (a virtual Time Walk ) plus taking your extra turn (actual Time Walk) plus your regular turn. That seems a bit much on top of the 13/13
EDIT: I misunderstood the question, but still, getting what is almost certainly a better trigger than the original Emrakul without that extra turn clause means it would probably replace original Emmy in cheaty decks in every format all over the world! Mindslaver is a 10 mana effect (eight if you play it in one shot), getting a 13/13 beatstick on top for potentially less seems overly hopeful
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