Exodus - Signed, Sealed and Broken - Blue

Exodus - Signed, Sealed and Broken

Part 1 - Blue

Here goes. My first post on Exodus was based on a card that turned out not to be in Exodus. That's a very very good thing. But Exodus still has many cards in it that are overpowered, and it still encourages several bad trends in Magic play, especially in Type II but also in Extended. So, like in the 'Weatherlight (or Tempest, etc) Revealed' books, I'm going to take a tour of Exodus, card by card, and focus on the cards I think may be a threat to the Type II enviornment. This is going to be long. First, I'll spell out a few principles for evaluating new cards:

1. If it's good now, would you play a worse version of this card? If the answer is yes, the card is too good. For example, the new black creature that costs B for a 2/2. If the cost was "lose 1 life" each upkeep instead of "pay 1 life or tap him" he would still see play; therefore, he is a problem. 2. If it's bad now, especailly if it's a bad rare now, would it be used if it cost less? If it seems too powerfull when it costs slightly less, it may be a good card now. If you still wouldn't touch it, for example The Best Card In Magic (Duplicity, see the Humor section) at UU2, then don't bother. Note, however, that I think Duplicity isn't as bad as people think they are, and it may be part of "The Joy of Bad Rares II." 3. Does this card make you want to use Lotus Petal? If yes, the card is a problem. Lotus Petal is generally a horrible card, and only shows up in decks that shouldn't be able to exist: TurboZvi, Fruity Pebbles, etc. If the good players want petals, watch out. 4. Is WotC pushing the envelope? In general, WotC will introduce a concept, for example Life Gaining in Legends, and then begin strengthening it until it sees play: Fountain of Youth in The Dark, reprinting of Spirit Link, Mangara's Blessing, then finally Gerrard's Wisdom. If this card has existed in much weaker form in the past, and has an interesting ability, take a close look. So onward. Since I'd like to start before the prerelease, I'll start with Blue, since it's confirmed on the Spoiler. Refer to the spoiler for the exact text of these cards; I don't list exactly to save space. Power Ratings refer to constructed, not to sealed deck or draft. 'Watch List' means it looks broken. The two cards for which I have deck lists are Curiosity and Mind Over Matter (with another card); I encourage you to at least think about those two before reading, lest I spoil your fun.

BLUE Aether Tide - Sorcery, XU and discard X creatures to unsummon X creatures Power Rating - Specialized Commentary - This card has a place with and against reanimation decks, particuarly Godzilla. If you want to discard, this is a good effect, although not as effective as Abandon Hope. The other possible uses of this card are if you can force the creatures to be discarded, in which case the card still isn't efficent unless the discards are basically free (just use Man-'o-War and Tradewind Rider instead), or to gain a speed advantage (which requires you to have creatures on table and extras in hand), or to use with Armageddon, in which case the X cost makes things difficult. Not an easy one to use well.

Cunning - Creature Enchantment, U1, +3/+3 and sac Cunning if creature attacks or blocks Power Rating - Weak Commentary - Compare this card to Giant Growth, which cost one less and has more surprise value. The ability to keep a blocker on table with this card in place is dubious. This card won't see constructed play, except for people who are pumping their creatures a little too much.

Curiosity - Creature Enchantment, U, draw a card when creature damages opponent Power Rating - Watch List Commentary - Ophidian is one of the easiest ways for a control deck to win a game, because once it starts it protects itself with the new cards. Curiosity makes this happen much faster. It also works on pinging creatures, and will see a place on Suq'Ata Firewalker, Fireslinger, guildmages, Urborg Stalker, and all the rest. Also a funny card in older formats; put it on your opponent's Serendeb Efreet. Or your Triskelion. One place it might fit well is in a 5CG-like structure, where the situation could turn ugly really fast:

If you get Curiosity in your opening draw, you have many nasty things to do. For example, suppose the game starts like this: Turn 1: Forest, Querion Ranger Turn 2: Kalpulsian Forest, Firelslinger Turn 3: Gemstone Mine, Curiosity, Draw 2 Cards Turn 4: Draw 2 Cards…. Of course, there's also the simple: Turn 1: City of Brass, Querion Ranger Turn 2: Curiosity, Draw….. If your opponent is playing a deck without quick, targeted removal in his draw, he's already lost. If he's got it, all you have to do is use Curiosity once to break even. Ironically, the one creature it doesn't work on is Ophidian.

Dominating Licid: UU1, 1/1 Licid, UU1T to morph into Control Magic Power Rating: Strong Commentary: This Licid can keep three creatures in check! If you have it on one, and he attacks with the other two, end the effect, block #2, move onto #3, repeat. Going somewhere? Then attack with #3 on your turn. It's also a Control Magic, however fragile.

Ephemeron: 4UU, 4/4 Flying, discard a card to unsummon it Power Rating: Average Commentary: Another solid damage source for blue decks, but six mana is a lot. Playing one or two in a deck to kill with could often be a good idea, though.

Equlibrium, 1UU, Enchantment, you can pay 1 whenever you cast a creature to unsummon a creature. Power Rating: Watch List Commentary: This one gets ugly quickly once you start thinking about it. There are many cards that have come into play effects, and by paying an extra 1 you can now effectively use them as buyback spells. This includes Uktabi Orangatang, Wall of Blossoms, Nekrataal, Venerable Monk, Staunch Defenders, Cloudchaser Eagle, Man-'o-War (double your fun), Spikes (in pairs!), and some new ones in Exodus. Wall of Blossoms is probably the worst: 2G to draw a card, as many times as you like. This card gets even worse in pairs. One deck might be five colors, with a 5CU mana base, and use creatures with come-into-play effects instead of Disenchant and Gerrard's Wisdom. They already have Wall of Blossoms and Uktabi Orangatang, and can play these instead of Whispers of the Muse (since these effects are more mana-efficient). There are a lot of other things you can do with this, including many silly ones. You could abuse Earthcraft with a 2 0-cost creatures for a mana filter, or infinite mana with a Wild Growth. You could use Winding Canyons, and protect your creatures by casting others in response to removal. In fact, Winding Canyons allows the buyback to be done in your opponent's discard phase. Three lands to initiate, then three per card, or four per artifact, or five per enchantment….

Ertai, Wizard Adept, 2U, 1/1 Creature (Legend), 2UUT: Counter target spell. Power Rating: Strong Commentary: Wow! Everyone I've talked to thought this card would cost a lot more to cast, and probably more to use. An excellent card, unless this set has given you better things to do (and that's not such a crazy notion, either).

Fade Away, Sorcery, 2U, For each creature, its controller pays 1 or sacs a permanent. Power Rating: Strong Commentary: A companion card to Armageddon, and something blue shouldn't have: Decent, global removal. Sink them out, then Fade them Away. Twice, if you need to. A good way to finish the game after a Tradewind lock, if you can pay for your own cards. Just casting this spell on turn 3 can devestate a lot of decks that just tapped out to play their third creature.

Forbid, UU1, Counter target spell, Buyback: Discard 2 Cards Power Rating: Strong In general, the Buyback versions of most cards are light years better than the non-buyback versions. Compare Capsize to Boomerang, or Constant Mists to Fog, or Disturbed Burial to Raise Dead. The problem is that one extra mana in the CC isn't enough of a deterent. Already, Dissipate is played as an extra counterspell, even though very few decks use Hammers or Pheonixes right now. Forbid will be a dangerous card, because a good blue player will have plenty of cards to discard, either from Whispers, or his kill cards (more copies will show up later), or extra land (if no Whispers), or from Equilibrium with a cantrip creature, or from Wrath of God or Gerrard's vs. Burn. This greately strengthens blue's counterspell capability, and I would suggest playing this as the first counter for long-term decks, over Counterspell.

Keeper of the Mind, UU, 1/2 Creature, UT: Draw a card if you have 2 or more less than opponent. Average If this came out in Tempest I'd have said it was Strong, in Mirage I'd have said Broken. But with so many reasons for players to empty their hands, and so many ways to draw cards, this isn't going to happen that often. A good SB card for counter wars, though.

Killer Whale, UU3 3/5, U:Gains Flying. Weak A sealed deck card, no more.

Mana Breach, 2U, Enchantment, Whenever any player plays a spell, that player reutrns a land he or she controls to owner's hand. Watch List Does anyone else realize how easy this card makes locks? This prevents anyone from ever reducing their hand size, because every time they play a non-land card a card comes back to their hand, and they draw a card for every land they play. Put a Miser's Cage on them. Drop this and an Ank of Mishra. Make a Tradewind lock even more solid. (On the lighter side, can you cast a Mox Diamond, then discard the land you returned to your hand?) Or just play in a deck where you don't need land in play. Play it in ProsperBloom: slow down your opponent, and return your lands to feed Cadaverous Bloom! This card can be used to good effect in combination with Equilibrium: every card you bounce is also a land you bounce. Also good in combination with effects that let you play more land, like Burgening. Depending on the situation, it can be good with LD, by removing lands, or against LD, by unsummoning lands in response. It must be crucial, because it changes the nature of the game.

Merfolk Looter, 1U, 1/1, T: Draw, then discard. Strong A good ability at a fair price. Remember also that discarding is a three-edged sword.

Mind over Matter, 2UUUU, Enchantment, Discard: Tap or Untap a permanent. Watch List There are many cards in Exodus that tap for effects that will often be worth a card. You can untap to block. You can overuse a Tradewind Rider, or get more mana. This card could be the first one to be abused with Lotus Veil or Shattered Ruins. It also has uses tapping Winter Orb (and lands under Winter Orb), especially with Howling Mine (or how about with Necro on your discard phase? I know, too color intensive). Stasis gets ugly quickly. You can shut down your opponent's blue when you need to most. You could use Equilibrium, Lotus Veil, Wall of Blossoms and Mind over Matter to choose your hand from your whole library, dropping an Emerald Medallion at some point to get infinite mana, too. Something like:

This deck can just sit there, acting like a counter deck with a weird mana base, until it gets or assembles the combo of Mind Over Matter, Lotus Veil, Equilibrium, Wall of Blossoms, the last 2 of which can be replaced by Intuition (if you have an extra card to discard each), in its hand, casting them if it can. It needs 5 lands in play, or 4 and a Temple/Vein in play, to begin. Then: 1. Play Lotus Veil. Sac lands. 2. Cast Mind Over Matter 3. Discard to Untap Veil, Cast Equilibrium 4. Discard to Untap Veil 5. Cast Wall, return, draw, discard. 6. At some point, dicard one more for Medallion. 7. If you need more mana when you have no library, cast Paradigm Shift. So you need 3 dead cards, too. That means a 7-card hand, although if you have two extra mana you can have a 6-card hand. That makes it slower than TurboZvi, but it has much more defense and an excellent way to go off piecemail, by drawing cards with Wall/Equilibrium. It can also use Mind over Matter to shut down its opponents land before starting if you have the cards to burn because you already cast some of the cards. There is no card in the deck you can just let through, unless it duplicates an already cast card.

Mirozel, 3U, 2/3 Flying, Returns to hand if targeted Weak 2/3 just isn't that big. And a lot of abilities will get annoying: Querion Ranger, for example.

Oath of Scholars, 3U, Enchantment Strong Works extreamly well with effects like "2T,Discard your hand: Counter target spell." Once this hits the table, any deck with a decent amount of land should just go on cruise control if its opponent holds any cards at all. The name is deceptive: This card is actually an Oath to destroy the Scholars, those who believe that Magic was meant to be played with a hand. Silly rabbits!

Robe of Mirrors, U, "Enchanted creature cannot be the target of spells or abilities" Weak Mystic Veil is better, because it can counter spells. Also, the new 'spells or abilites' ruling means that this creature is going to get Man-'o-War and Nekrataal trouble.

Rootwater Mystic, U, 1/1, 1U: Look at the top card of target player's library. Average Blue doesn't have good one mana creatures, basically Spindrift Drake. This could be a decent way to look for such cards as Hermit Druid, Wood Sage, Impulse, etc.

School of Piranha, 1U, Upkeep:U1, 3/3 Average Not bad for the cost, especially considering the color, but there are too many ways to disrupt mana now.

Scrivener, 4U, 2/2, When it comes into play, you may regrow an instant or interrupt. Average Really good effect, but at a high cost. May see Type I play, actually. But 5 mana spells are in win-the-game range, and this won't win the game immedietly.

Thalakos Drifters, 2UU, 3/3, Discard: Gains Shadow Weak In a rush deck, this is a decent card if you're going monoblue, but 4 mana is too much for a 3/3.

Thalakos Scout, 2U, 2/1 Shadow. Discard: Returns to hand Average A good card, especially against decks which don't have that many ways to kill it. Certainly better than putting it on top of your library (Thalakos Mistfolk).

Theft of Dreams, 2U, Sorcery. For every tapped creature target opponent controls, draw a card. Average Can be devestating, especially on Elves and Birds, but shouldn't be more than 2 cards most of the time, and 2 cards for 2U is nice but without certainty not wonderful.

Treasure Trove, 2UU, Enchantment. 2UU: Draw a card. Average Not as good as Browse, but not bad. But Whispers of the Muse is going to be seen as better, with some justification.

Whiptongue Frog, 2U, 1/3, U: Gains Flying Weak Just costs too much.

Summary of Blue: Blue seems to be split in two. In one corner is a mixed bag of creatures, most of them bad but some of them decent. In the other is a Treasure Trove of lock cards and ways to gain massive card economy. The creatures won't see much play. Some of the utility and lock cards will see massive play. Forbid, Curiosity and Equilibrium will be staple cards. There are several new combination decks in Exodus, and while some of them won't be tournament viable, I'd be surprised if none of them are. And that's knowing only one color.