I really underestimated how much the scrying adds to the card.
I also overestimated how vulnerable a 3-mana artifact is. I had this vision of it getting destroyed frequently, but I think that intuiton was from a past when I supported too much artifact hate. From my recent experiences, that doesn't happen too often.
It’s a good learning lesson for me. Punisher cards can still be strong if the rates of both options are powerful enough.
Braids is fine if you support recursive agro in black, I wouldn't argue against her inclusion in those cubes , but eh...
Cubes I've been playing have been dominated by matchups that Braids would be mediocore in.
Agressive midrange decks are common place with plenty of efficient removal against x/2's and/or fodder to make the effect nearly symmetrical.
She's great in some spots (when ahead against spell heavy decks) and unplayable in others. It's like a monarch/initiative that can die to removal and takes longer to have a big effect on the game (there are exceptions).
I'm in the "not a fan" , "relic of the past" camp.
Buried alive was not a good card many many years ago when I tested it in anything but living death.
The issue with Buried Alive is more justifying its slot in the cube than it is justifying it in a reanimator deck, IMO. And this has much more legs to stand on if you have a Sheoldred back up plan or something.
yes entomb is the best enabler by a lot for reanimator, but tacking on 2 mana and making it sorcery speed is a totally different card in terms of quality.
again, I’m not arguing against the card in general, only the statement about it auto making reanimator decks.
Here's my logic to this being an auto include in any reanimator deck:
- Again, a turn 4 Atraxa / Archon of Cruelty / etc is much better than any other creature / planeswalker / etc that you can play on curve.
- This being a tutor ensures you get the best possible target for any given scenario you're in (unless it's already in your hand).
- Entomb effects >>> discard outlets because it simplifies the combo down to two cards. If this isn't an auto include in a reanimator deck, then what mono black discard outlet is? This advances the gameplan of a reanimator deck much better than Bitter Triumph / Liliana of the Veil / Oona's Prowler / etc.
Honestly the only scenario I can see this not making the main of a reanimator deck is if you're a Reanimator / Oath of Druids hybrid and you already have Entomb / Unmarked Grave / Demonic Tutor / Vampiric Tutor / etc. In that scenario, sure this can probably ride the sideboard.
To be fair, mono black doesn't have that many great self discard effects. After entomb, looting effects are the best to set up reanimation and that is best done by blue and red. Looting doesn't put you at a card disadvantage and it also draws you into your reanimation spells. The raw consistency of entomb effects (A+B vs A+B+C) outweigh the advantages of looting, but not to a degree where you can dismiss the relative mana effeciency and speed of the spells.
The better black discard outlets are cheaper, disrupt the opponents game plan in some way, or protect your reanimation spell. At the cost of consistency.
If this guarnteed you a turn 4 reanimation , then yes, it would be good enough, but that's not what it does. It gives the opponent 4 turns to either disrupt your reanimation spell, find a way to exile a card from the graveyard, prepare for the creature or reanimate the exposed creature themselves. You also have to have a reanimation spell in your hand. Meanwhile, you tapped out on turn 3 and didn't progress the board state in some way.
This won't happen the majority of the time, but it's relevant.
Mostly arguing for the sake of arguing at this point, I do think it's close.
Buried alive was not a good card many many years ago when I tested it in anything but living death.
yes entomb is the best enabler by a lot for reanimator, but tacking on 2 mana and making it sorcery speed is a totally different card in terms of quality.
again, I’m not arguing against the card in general, only the statement about it auto making reanimator decks.
I don't believe a 3 mana sorcery speed entomb is a good card in reanimator, such that this card auto makes any reanimator deck.
I think if I didn't have a few premium cheap creatures and I had 3-5 looting effects already, I'd rather play a card like a sheoldred's edict or an infernal grasp (ok interactive card that doesn't directly contribute to a reanimation game plan).
Could be wrong though, not high confidence. If that statement was true, it definitly increases the value of this card.
Man, I like most of even the mid-tier manlands better than the Surveil lands. I have enough searchable lands and I think activating creatures from amidst my lands will win me more games than a one-off Surveil. And they are just more interesting gameplay wise, subjectively. If I were to go to another land 'cycle' I'd be focusing on a mix of these and Canopylands I think.
the fetchability (and to a lessor extent the land types) is the kicker for me. I think they are close overall.
Something that could be biasing me:
In the MTGO vintage cube I routinely pick fetchlands P1P1-P1P3 (more commonly close to P3). The average play skill isn’t very high, so they are criminally under drafted. I routinely get 2 fetchlands in my decks increasing my perception on the quality of the surveils.
When you start your draft with a fetchland, you have 6 dual lands available for you to fetch for a 2 color deck and in a premium position to play a high quality splash or two.
the cycle of surveil lands has contributed to a noticeable uptick in my assembly of quality mana bases.
My opinion has shifted to : I am over saturated with tap lands at the moment in my cube.
my current plan is play triomes , surveil lands and no man lands. The exception is azorious and dimir as they are penalized the least for tap lands and have the best man lands.
if I want manlands in my cube they’ll be the cycle of “fast” mono-color manlands from AFR.
It sucks to lose raging ravine, restless vents and restless vine stalk but it’s a price I’m willing to pay for the gameplay.
I’m close to indifferent between those manlands and the surveil lands of those color pairs.
Damn, the hits keep coming.
I think this is pretty solid if you have a premium 4 drop or two in your deck.
Cubes I’ve been playing are midrange interactive heavy and creatures die/exchange a lot.
in a midrange battles where creatures are trading off, this is often 5 mana put your best creature in your deck into play and a good 2-3 drop.
even if you accelerate into it, paying 5 mana for an iniative creature is often still a good card.
It’s a bit niche, but not extremely so. Wouldn’t cubes it without support of the 4 drop initiative creatures
The text I (probably) am underestimating is making a clue whenever the opponent discards a card. Lots of effects can make opponents discard, turning this into a semi engine. (Looting effects, Ottawara, trumpeting carnosaur etc).
For what it's worth, it's player, not "opponent", so whenever you discard cards you investigate, which is quite strong.
That being said, I do think it's hard to find room for this card if you support the themes and archetypes in the cube that require other black 4-drops already (stax, initiative, etc.).
I had the correct sense I am underestimating that ability, but didn’t think it was because I misread it hehe. Yeah I missed that it triggers on your self discard too.
card is certainly solid at minimum. Good value with decent board impact. It stood out to me , but ultimately decided against it.
My experience with the text “target player discards a card” is it performs worse than you’d imagine.
Especially in a format with a lot of graveyard value.
A targeted discard or a card at random is much better.
if the opponent is hell bent, this is a 4 mana 4/3 (but that will be uncommon)
The text I (probably) am underestimating is making a clue whenever the opponent discards a card. Lots of effects can make opponents discard, turning this into a semi engine. (Looting effects, Ottawara, trumpeting carnosaur etc).
card is good, but doesn’t quite make it for me to test. Interested in testing results.
Requiring other artifacts to be sacrificed already makes this card pretty narrow. But my bigger gripe is that it typically costs about half a card to generate an artifact, so every activation is setting you back 0.5 CA. You're going to need 3 activations before this Legion Extruder really feels like a good deal, and that's just too slow for my taste.
You're never down a card unless you're sacrificing your Blightsteel Colossus that you Tinker'd for or something. It's also important to point out that this also makes your opponent's artifact removal much less effective whenever you have 2 mana up.
Quote from LucidVision »
What I don’t like about this card is it’s effectively unplayable outside of an artifact deck.
I don't think this is completely true. Urza's Saga is still effective card outside of a dedicated artifact deck since it's not too hard to randomly have a good amount of artifacts lying around (especially in a powered cube). And this card will probably just get better over time as we get more artifacts / things that produce artifact tokens.
Yeah there’s exceptions, but I think it’s pretty rare you’ll get a non artifact focused deck where you get the critical density needed to make this better than say.. shock.
Not only do you need artifacts but you have to encounter situations where you want to sac them for 3/3’s.
Most artifacts you don’t want to sac to make 3/3’s, so if you have few artifacts and uncommon situations to sac, you multiply those two probabilities together to get something of low value.
this needs to on average get enough value to make up for the over costed initial mode. A single marginal upgrade or two every few times you play the card doesn’t cut it.
in a dedicated artifact deck or with artifact synergy cards like saaheeli, your upside potential and increased consistency will make up for the times it underperforms.
im not ultra confident in this prediction, but it’s my read. It’s an intuition on frequency.
What I don’t like about this card is it’s effectively unplayable outside of an artifact deck.
Its power level in an artifact deck is solid, definitly enough to make any artifact heavy main deck, but my gut tells me it’s only marginally better than a replacement level good stuff card.
there’s a lot of great options to support artifact decks, so it kind of comes down to how deeply you want to support them.
I don’t think it crosses the high bar I have for artifact deck cards but I’m curious to see it in action to see if I’m wrong!
I just realized this plays well with epheremate/cloud shift.
One way an opponent can "play around" smirking spelljack is by only playing cheaper/weaker spells into your open 5 mana, advancing their gameplan without over commiting.
With ephemerate you can counter their cheap play, attack and now you are holding up the counter effect again for only 1 mana!
I really underestimated how much the scrying adds to the card.
I also overestimated how vulnerable a 3-mana artifact is. I had this vision of it getting destroyed frequently, but I think that intuiton was from a past when I supported too much artifact hate. From my recent experiences, that doesn't happen too often.
It’s a good learning lesson for me. Punisher cards can still be strong if the rates of both options are powerful enough.
Cubes I've been playing have been dominated by matchups that Braids would be mediocore in.
Agressive midrange decks are common place with plenty of efficient removal against x/2's and/or fodder to make the effect nearly symmetrical.
She's great in some spots (when ahead against spell heavy decks) and unplayable in others. It's like a monarch/initiative that can die to removal and takes longer to have a big effect on the game (there are exceptions).
I'm in the "not a fan" , "relic of the past" camp.
To be fair, mono black doesn't have that many great self discard effects. After entomb, looting effects are the best to set up reanimation and that is best done by blue and red. Looting doesn't put you at a card disadvantage and it also draws you into your reanimation spells. The raw consistency of entomb effects (A+B vs A+B+C) outweigh the advantages of looting, but not to a degree where you can dismiss the relative mana effeciency and speed of the spells.
The better black discard outlets are cheaper, disrupt the opponents game plan in some way, or protect your reanimation spell. At the cost of consistency.
If this guarnteed you a turn 4 reanimation , then yes, it would be good enough, but that's not what it does. It gives the opponent 4 turns to either disrupt your reanimation spell, find a way to exile a card from the graveyard, prepare for the creature or reanimate the exposed creature themselves. You also have to have a reanimation spell in your hand. Meanwhile, you tapped out on turn 3 and didn't progress the board state in some way.
This won't happen the majority of the time, but it's relevant.
Mostly arguing for the sake of arguing at this point, I do think it's close.
yes entomb is the best enabler by a lot for reanimator, but tacking on 2 mana and making it sorcery speed is a totally different card in terms of quality.
again, I’m not arguing against the card in general, only the statement about it auto making reanimator decks.
I think if I didn't have a few premium cheap creatures and I had 3-5 looting effects already, I'd rather play a card like a sheoldred's edict or an infernal grasp (ok interactive card that doesn't directly contribute to a reanimation game plan).
Could be wrong though, not high confidence. If that statement was true, it definitly increases the value of this card.
the fetchability (and to a lessor extent the land types) is the kicker for me. I think they are close overall.
Something that could be biasing me:
In the MTGO vintage cube I routinely pick fetchlands P1P1-P1P3 (more commonly close to P3). The average play skill isn’t very high, so they are criminally under drafted. I routinely get 2 fetchlands in my decks increasing my perception on the quality of the surveils.
When you start your draft with a fetchland, you have 6 dual lands available for you to fetch for a 2 color deck and in a premium position to play a high quality splash or two.
the cycle of surveil lands has contributed to a noticeable uptick in my assembly of quality mana bases.
Thanks wtwlf, I gotta stop skimming cards and then posting 😅
No longer interested (it’s fine)
my current plan is play triomes , surveil lands and no man lands. The exception is azorious and dimir as they are penalized the least for tap lands and have the best man lands.
if I want manlands in my cube they’ll be the cycle of “fast” mono-color manlands from AFR.
It sucks to lose raging ravine, restless vents and restless vine stalk but it’s a price I’m willing to pay for the gameplay.
I’m close to indifferent between those manlands and the surveil lands of those color pairs.
I think this is pretty solid if you have a premium 4 drop or two in your deck.
Cubes I’ve been playing are midrange interactive heavy and creatures die/exchange a lot.
in a midrange battles where creatures are trading off, this is often 5 mana put your best creature in your deck into play and a good 2-3 drop.
even if you accelerate into it, paying 5 mana for an iniative creature is often still a good card.
It’s a bit niche, but not extremely so. Wouldn’t cubes it without support of the 4 drop initiative creatures
I had the correct sense I am underestimating that ability, but didn’t think it was because I misread it hehe. Yeah I missed that it triggers on your self discard too.
Very tempted to test the card now 🤔
My experience with the text “target player discards a card” is it performs worse than you’d imagine.
Especially in a format with a lot of graveyard value.
A targeted discard or a card at random is much better.
if the opponent is hell bent, this is a 4 mana 4/3 (but that will be uncommon)
The text I (probably) am underestimating is making a clue whenever the opponent discards a card. Lots of effects can make opponents discard, turning this into a semi engine. (Looting effects, Ottawara, trumpeting carnosaur etc).
card is good, but doesn’t quite make it for me to test. Interested in testing results.
Yeah there’s exceptions, but I think it’s pretty rare you’ll get a non artifact focused deck where you get the critical density needed to make this better than say.. shock.
Not only do you need artifacts but you have to encounter situations where you want to sac them for 3/3’s.
Most artifacts you don’t want to sac to make 3/3’s, so if you have few artifacts and uncommon situations to sac, you multiply those two probabilities together to get something of low value.
this needs to on average get enough value to make up for the over costed initial mode. A single marginal upgrade or two every few times you play the card doesn’t cut it.
in a dedicated artifact deck or with artifact synergy cards like saaheeli, your upside potential and increased consistency will make up for the times it underperforms.
im not ultra confident in this prediction, but it’s my read. It’s an intuition on frequency.
Its power level in an artifact deck is solid, definitly enough to make any artifact heavy main deck, but my gut tells me it’s only marginally better than a replacement level good stuff card.
there’s a lot of great options to support artifact decks, so it kind of comes down to how deeply you want to support them.
I don’t think it crosses the high bar I have for artifact deck cards but I’m curious to see it in action to see if I’m wrong!
One way an opponent can "play around" smirking spelljack is by only playing cheaper/weaker spells into your open 5 mana, advancing their gameplan without over commiting.
With ephemerate you can counter their cheap play, attack and now you are holding up the counter effect again for only 1 mana!
V powerful