The big difference is that there are planeswalkers now, and attacking into them is the most reliable way to deal with them. I have a hard time imagining how the pendulum could swing back to a viable creatureless deck for that reason.
The creature-less deck is assuredly jammed full of planeswalkers itself. See superfriends from a few years back. Only creatures it ran were walls to block, and killed with any number of Elspeth/Gideon activations or a Jace ultimate. Planeswalkers have become much less pushed and less numerous in the last few years, though.
how is it more fragile than oracle of mul daya? it's exactly the same size but dodges a small amount of removal by being black.
If Oracle flips a land or two, if it dies before you untap with it, you still got some value. With Ghast, if you drop it on 4 and it dies immediately, you got no lasting value. That's all I meant.
If we get one or two more good green aggro cards from this set I'm definitely going to think hard about revamping my green section to support aggro. This guy seems totally absurd.
If this were a death trigger I'd auto include him.
Agreed. Even in standard a death trigger would make him very powerful. Imagine Havengul Lich with this guy. They made the hoop difficult to jump through for a reason.
Why? As he suggested, this Gideon is the first planeswalker that cannot give you any kind of advantage when it enters the battlefield. Even Nissa Revane managed to do better things
In theory land you are correct. In practice a ton of walkers can and do brick when they hit the field without support, and this Gideon is always at least a beater. At any rate, Gideon is more of a creature than a walker. Some creatures are best when you are behind (eg Sunblast Angel), some are best when you are ahead (Hellrider), and some are best when the board is stalled (Gideon).
Well that's basically the reason why I think Gideon 2 is bad. He's the first Planeswalker that needs support to be good. All the other Planeswalkers are self sufficient. I want my 4-drops to do relevant stuff on their own.
Uh... I don't agree with your second sentence at all.
I don't think sphinx's revelation is good for the cube either.
I agree, but mostly because u/w is loaded with good options, and I try to limit cards that make games go long. Neither of those are points against Clan Defiance. If people run cards such as Devils Play, that cube should at least test Clan Defiance.
There are way too many potential board states and decision trees to judge how this one performs off the bat. Definitely worth testing though, maybe over Goldmane.
It's not even strictly better than Branching Bolt. To kill two creatures you need to spend two more mana, and it's Sorcery speed iirc.
Judging x spells on "strictly better" isn't going to get you very far. Ajani Vengeant is not strictly better than Lightning Helix either but I would argue its the better card. I think Clan Defiance is at least worth testing. X spells can be hard to judge on sight alone, a lot of people dismissed Sphinxs Revelation at first too.
Don't buy boxes unless you're splitting them with friends to play draft, sealed, packwars, etc. If you want commons/uncommons, just buy a 4-of C/UC playset on ebay. Just remember that 80-90% of the cards you are opening are unfit for constructed play, and the ones you do open may not be what you are looking for.
Behemoth Sledge, Loxodon Warhammer, Basilisk Collar and Umezawa's Jitte are all pretty powerful equipements that saw Constructed play and cost 2 to equip...
He means for the effect. All of those equipment do much more than +2/+0.
The indestructibility on this thing is almost totally irrelevant. Could've easily costed it differently and made it less of a strict downgrade from Bonesplitter.
People comparing Elspeth to Conqueror's Pledge don't get the point of planeswalkers. It's like calling Jace2 "just an overpriced Brainstorm" or Ajani "just an overpriced Lightning Helix".
(Note that sometimes this IS true, but that's what we call "game balance". Planeswalkers would be unbeatable if they weren't vulnerable to creatures.)
The power in this card is not only that its effects are repeatable, but also that it gives you options. Ahead on board? Make a bunch of dudes and cement your board presence. Behind? All is Dust suspend 1 (with a little life gain), and you get to keep your incremental advantage engine.
3WW is expensive, and what keeps it from being Jace2-level IMO, but this should see a good amount of play, and is certainly not going to be a $5 planeswalker.
I know, they discontinued landfall too! It was so good on my Steppe Lynxes and Plated Geopedes. With allies and landfall guys, it made for a fast aggressive format, which was lots of fun. I don't know why they would discontinue these aggressive themes in a set about giant 12 drop creatures though. It's almost as if the block is completely separate mechanically! What nonsense.
The creature-less deck is assuredly jammed full of planeswalkers itself. See superfriends from a few years back. Only creatures it ran were walls to block, and killed with any number of Elspeth/Gideon activations or a Jace ultimate. Planeswalkers have become much less pushed and less numerous in the last few years, though.
If Oracle flips a land or two, if it dies before you untap with it, you still got some value. With Ghast, if you drop it on 4 and it dies immediately, you got no lasting value. That's all I meant.
Agreed. Even in standard a death trigger would make him very powerful. Imagine Havengul Lich with this guy. They made the hoop difficult to jump through for a reason.
In theory land you are correct. In practice a ton of walkers can and do brick when they hit the field without support, and this Gideon is always at least a beater. At any rate, Gideon is more of a creature than a walker. Some creatures are best when you are behind (eg Sunblast Angel), some are best when you are ahead (Hellrider), and some are best when the board is stalled (Gideon).
Uh... I don't agree with your second sentence at all.
I agree, but mostly because u/w is loaded with good options, and I try to limit cards that make games go long. Neither of those are points against Clan Defiance. If people run cards such as Devils Play, that cube should at least test Clan Defiance.
Judging x spells on "strictly better" isn't going to get you very far. Ajani Vengeant is not strictly better than Lightning Helix either but I would argue its the better card. I think Clan Defiance is at least worth testing. X spells can be hard to judge on sight alone, a lot of people dismissed Sphinxs Revelation at first too.
It's so much better than br bolt that I dont even think a comparison is worthy. It's much closer to Comet Storm that you don't have to multikick.
He means for the effect. All of those equipment do much more than +2/+0.
The indestructibility on this thing is almost totally irrelevant. Could've easily costed it differently and made it less of a strict downgrade from Bonesplitter.
(Note that sometimes this IS true, but that's what we call "game balance". Planeswalkers would be unbeatable if they weren't vulnerable to creatures.)
The power in this card is not only that its effects are repeatable, but also that it gives you options. Ahead on board? Make a bunch of dudes and cement your board presence. Behind? All is Dust suspend 1 (with a little life gain), and you get to keep your incremental advantage engine.
3WW is expensive, and what keeps it from being Jace2-level IMO, but this should see a good amount of play, and is certainly not going to be a $5 planeswalker.