So... it's a Chromatic Lantern, but it costs four mana to activate? Yeah, that seems pretty bad. I guess it gets around Contamination?

Short answer: yes. Longer answer: I have been intending to run more bouncelands for a while.... largely because MDFCs and Troll of Khazad-dûm have chipped away at my actual land slots. I don't want to cut spells, but cutting a normal fixing land for a bounceland is less painful and also helps with h...

The thing I have loved the most about Battles is it gives me a way to not attack anybody when I'm not ready while still accruing value. > attack an opponent for 2 damage: opponent declares war > attack a battle for 200 damage: 'eh, fine, you can have your Serra Angel '. It's pretty rare for me to w...

Dawnbreak Reclaimer is on my shortlist of 'cards that seem sweet but I can never find space for'. It offers a powerful effect with the maybe-upside, maybe-downside bonus of recurring an opponent's thing. You can always bail out of the deal and recur nothing, but it's most exciting if you can use it...

On the theme of cards that are slightly older but are still relatively new to my decks... Faerie Artisans and Aboleth Spawn are both big question marks to me. I've played them a few times in Animar, but they haven't generated much value. I can't tell if it's a meta issue and my specific opponents ar...

I actually added End-Raze Forerunners to my Animar deck recently (and to my cube yesterday), but I haven't had the chance to cast it yet. That deck is capable of playing a ton of creatures, but most of them are small, so I wanted a way to convert that board presence into a win. But yeah, it's defini...

With the release of MH3, I'm starting this thread as a counterpart to the Unreleased and New Card discussion. That thread tends to focus on spoilers and speculation, but I want some cold , hard DATA! ...or, failing that, some entertaining anecdotes (which are pretty much the same thing). What cards ...

I find it interesting that Balefire Dragon sees a fair amount of play, but Incinerator of the Guilty sees almost none despite being cheaper and having an extra keyword. I suppose people are risk-averse and don't want to exile their graveyard, or are worried about not having enough fuel? More broadly...

Swapping around a few cards - mostly testing out some new / reprinted stuff from OTJ. Unlicensed Hearse - historically, I've relied on Thada to steal grave hate from my opponents' decks... but I feel like in my current meta, the play rate of both graveyard strategies and hate has gone down. Or it co...

Nevinyrral's Disk is a strong card, but somewhat high variance - the delay before you can use it means it may be killed before it can be activated. I've also found that it tends to result in opponents attacking me a bunch, both before and after it untaps - it doesn't really work as a rattlesnake. I...

Gaddock Teeg is an interesting card. I'm not a fan of dedicated hatebears / prison decks - hate pieces tend to make for pretty unpleasant games when stacked up because they remove player agency. However, I don't mind cards like Teeg, Rule of Law , and Aven Mindcensor on their own - they turn games ...

Transmutation Font seems okay. It reminds me of Tamiyo's Journal , which is a card I have tested in the past but never quite made the cut. There is a bunch more support for tokens these days though, so I suspect the value of a clue / food / blood token has gone up since Tamiyo's Journal was first p...

Some notes I'll make re: Tasigur, the Golden Fang : Tasigur activations are great for card advantage in the long term, but card quality tends to be poor in the short term - your opponents will generally give you a useless card whenever possible. I'm currently low on two mana ramp spells like Farseek...

Conjurer's Mantle looks like a fine piece of card advantage - cheap to play, cheap to equip, minor additional upside. It obviously only goes in typal decks, but seems fine if you consistently hit with it, and actively good if you actually have some selection. I'm not sure how I feel about it compar...

Urza's Ruinous Blast is a powerful effect. It has upsides and downsides. On one hand, it will never hit opposing commanders (or other legends) and it can only be cast if you control a legendary creature or planeswalker (which means you may not be able to cast it when you're behind). On the flip sid...

I've seen Journey to Eternity // Atzal, Cave of Eternity played by opponents occasionally, but I've never been that impressed by it. It requires a fair amount of setup, plus it's rare to have multiple things in the graveyard worth recurring. If you only recur one thing, then it's an eight mana Rescu...

If I've done my job, not only am I not particularly threatening on board, I'm difficult to target because of a narrow interaction surface, and other players are more pressing concerns because of their board presence. I'll point out the obvious: if you wipe the board repeatedly, your opponents won't...

101.1. Whenever a card's text directly contradicts these rules, the card takes precedence. The card overrides only the rule that applies to that specific situation. The only exception is that a player can concede the game at any time (see rule 104.3a). 101.2 applies, but I believe 101.1 is more rel...

That's not confusing at all XD For reference, I don't believe that this was ever explicitly stated, but it's not difficult to infer. When they added the Phyrexian creature type, they errataed it to every creature with a Phyrexian watermark.... but Consecrated Sphinx had the Secret Lair printing wit...

EDIT: But I forgot to mention one of the last elements of Control: emotional management of your opponents. If you are too oppressive in your Control elements, it creates a negative emotional bias towards yourself that can result in an inordinate amount of targeting against your resources. <...> I w...

MH3 precons brought both some nice reprints and some strong new cards. I'll call out Dark Depths and Yavimaya, Cradle of Growth as two particularly noteworthy reprints in the Omo, Queen of Vesuva deck. Time to analyze! Blaster Hulk and the rest of the energy cards are somewhat interesting, but need ...

The last time I saw a Consecrated Sphinx , it drew two cards and died to a board wipe. I was the person casting the board wipe, and I immediately followed up with an Animate Dead , then proceeded to win the game, so... yeah. I would say C. Sphinx is still a very powerful card, particularly in medium...

I currently have two control decks, Tasigur and Kess. Both are tapout control decks - they do have a little countermagic and instant-speed interaction, but it's not a focus. Tasigur is base green and heavy on both land-based ramp and stuff like Pernicious Deed to blow up all nonlands. Let opponents ...

The MH3 precons have some exciting new options for land and graveyard-based decks. Aggressive Biomancy is a sweet copy effect with upside. I'm not entirely sold on it for this deck - my list only has 12 nonlegendary creatures to copy, and some of them are weak in multiples (like Bane of Progress ). ...

Pfft, you heathens only double and triple sleeve? All my cards are triple-sleeved, laminated, and then encased in steel for maximum protection. I can never alter my decks, but they'll also survive the heat-death of the sun. Anything less for my $20 card is just too risky. I used to do that, but the...