MTG Salvation

Art is great. I believe Howard Lyon is with the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

On the story/lore, I was expecting Gideon to become one of the Ravnica spirits, just like how Elspeth became a resident of the Therosian underworld. Perhaps someone planeswalked with him as he was dying to Theros? Maybe the Therosian gods call their true heroes home, like Disney's Hercules?

As for the card itself, I can't imagine how this would be useful in standard, except for possibly flushing a hand that's land-swamped or that's been revealed to an opponent? Not very many white/red graveyard strategies I think.

Quote from Silver_Spellthief »

Damn. The art for Unlikely Aid, Gideon Blackblade and (card]Desperate Lunge[/card] paint such a metal picture of Gideon in this fight and I'm into it.

Quote from Goryo »

Wait.

Wait, wait, wait, ****ing wait.

So a Zombie God shoots the hero out of a stormy sky while he's riding a freaking pegasus, only for the hero's fall is broken by an ancient, evil demon lord who swoops in to deliver him to his tragic final showdown with a multiverse-conquering dragon-god.

Magic lore has officially peaked. Nothing will ever top this. This is so amazing and over-the top, it's borderline pornographic.

It paints such a metal picture of Gideon in this fight that I'm into him. Wait, wait....

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Vampire Opportunist and Tithebearer Giant are obvious plants for the commander format, but I like all of them.

How so? All of these cards seem vastly underwhelming in Commander.

The opportunist is for Orzhov taxing decks, as a potential finisher. The Giant is overcosted for most formats, but has a decent body for its cost, and works as a bigger Phyrexian Rager, a card that is played a lot in Commander. Casting Cost and activated abilities with high costs are not really an issue in the format.

Pretty sure they're limited chaff not commander plants. A seven mana sink isn't useful except in infinite mana situations where most effects will make you win. I'm not sure who is playing Phyrexian Rager but Tithebearer is not enough for 6 mana. Not even Phyrexian Gargantua sees play at 6 mana.

Obviously the Giant is a plant for commander Najeela with its Warrior typing.

Kidding aside, these look like limited or Brawl options. If power 4 or greater is a thing in limited, the Rogue might be a way to slip around that. Otherwise these cards don't seem to have too much application elsewhere.

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Rules question: So for multi-player, I cast/resolve this spell, then attack 3 players, A, B, and C. My creatures connect with players A and B. But C blocks all incoming damage. Can I use the delayed trigger here to blow up 2 of player C's artifacts/enchantments, since it says "defending player controls" instead of "that player controls".

It implies only the player dealt damage is applicable.
Otherwise, it would say "a defending player"

Ah, but player C is also defending, they just didn't take damage.

I looked up on Gatherer for other examples of "defending player", and it appears that "defending player" refers to each specific defending player and the creature attacking said player. Especially with Storm the Citadel, because the creature gains that ability; the player that creature is attacking becomes that creature's defending player.

So my creatures A, B, and C under a resolved Storm the Citadel attack their respective players A, B, and C. Player C blocks all damage, and Players A and B are hit by their respective creatures. I get a trigger from creature A to destroy one artifact/enchantment player A controls, and another trigger from creature B to destroy one artifact/enchantment player B controls. Nothing further happens to player C.

Rules question: So for multi-player, I cast/resolve this spell, then attack 3 players, A, B, and C. My creatures connect with players A and B. But C blocks all incoming damage. Can I use the delayed trigger here to blow up 2 of player C's artifacts/enchantments, since it says "defending player controls" instead of "that player controls".

I guess something on Ravnica had to respond to all these Planeswalker sparks and powers being chucked everywhere. Betcha Bolas didn't expect anyone else to be interested in harvesting sparks.

As long as you have a couple PWs out, this outgrow most burn spells in standard.

I'm surprised her trigger isn't upon ETB, upon attacking, or upon connecting to a player or planeswalker. Each has its pros and cons, but upon casting a creature is much easier to abuse.

Barring shenanigans, Green and Black have a one-time use ability on ETB, meaning you'll pull it off once every 3 turns in a vanilla game? Red is upon attack, so once per turn barring extra combat steps. Blue counts the first card you draw each turn, so instant speed card draw enables near "once on each player's turn" but it has a pretty high mana requirement.

Oketra on the other hand comes down when you have a lot of mana for white and then you can get multiple value per turn if you're able to play only creatures. Cards able to abuse Oketra include the aforementioned Whitemane Lion, Kor Skyfisher, Emancipation Angel, Stonecloaker, or in other colors, Shrieking Drake, Dream Stalker, Fleetfoot Panther, Silver Drake, Sawtooth Loon.

Sarkhan's been in all colors except white (colorless not being a color, of course). It's nice to see his mini-story conclude as he being his own master. All dragons should be free.

Given that it's Kaya who's saying this...I think it's kind of funny flavor text. Because she's one of them. Except maybe she's not rude about it.

The card itself is decent enough; 2B for 2/3 with an upside of cashing in a worn out uncommon walker or a creature/walker that's about to die to combat/spell. Like your Tibalt who's made 2 tokens against a non-life gaining deck.

I kinda wish the ability cost was 2 instead of 3 for easier accessibility, but it's probably common-rarity balanced better this way.

Edit: Also super secret anti-Elderspell tech, right here.

This version of Nicol:

+1: Destroy a card in hand or on the battlefield.
-3: Destroy a creature or planeswalker.
-8: Destroy one (or more) opponents.

In standard, can grief-more with Nicol Bolas, the Ravager turn 4, Nicol Bolas, Dragon-God turn 5, flip Ravager to be Nicol Bolas, the Arisen turn 7. Or earlier with ramp. Could make for a brutal mid-range Grixis deck?

Edit: I'd like to see a deck that runs a bunch of planeswalkers so they can Elderspell their own PWs and ult one of their remaining PWs. If the opponent plays any of their own PWs then they'll just become lunch for your ult target as an added bonus.

Also prevents graveyard-into-library shuffling triggers a la Kozilek, Butcher of Truth or Gaea's Blessing and kin from working properly. If Ashiok mills one of those cards, it exiles all opponents' libraries first, then the triggered (shuffling) ability goes off. That opponent will shuffle their empty graveyard into their library. (Effectively, they just shuffle their library.)

Plot twist: Gideon ults and has 1 loyalty left. Jace cracks Emergence Zone. Rescuer Sphinx dives in and saves Gideon from an untimely exiling. Go Gatewatch.

Between throwbacks to old uber lands Cabal Coffers/Cabal Stronghold, Gaea's Cradle/Itlimoc, Cradle of the Sun, Lotus Vale/Lost Vale, Maze of Ith/Spires of Orazca, and so forth, and now Sneak Attack god and Reprocess god...I can't tell if WotC is aiming for nostalgia, or for fixing older cards, or if this is a formula for a better standard/modern card pool?

The UU may be relevant for future sets too. Like for devotion if that's around the corner.

Turn 2 Submarine into turn 3 Tempest Djinn could be a thing.

The flavor though. Windstorm picks up a land and smacks something with it. 10/10