[mtgnexus] Random Card of the Day - Samwise the Stouthearted

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Rumpy5897
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Post by Rumpy5897 » 4 years ago

It's a card I'm quite hesitant to use, perhaps irrationally. I figure that if I pop this, people will draw a fresh set of seven, and seeing how all the pieces will go away at the end of turn then any instant speed interaction will just get pointed straight at me, messing with whatever my seven is enabling.

Change my mind :P
 
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Post by JoeyB11223 » 4 years ago

Nath of the Gilt-leaf is a fan. Not really thought to use it in anything else, but It's obviously got a place in certain decks, decks which punish for opponents drawing cards are also interested I imagine.

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Post by 3drinks » 4 years ago

I jam this in any deck that plays goblin welder, honestly.......

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Post by RedCheese » 4 years ago

Its in my Daretti deck to "refill" my hand

Uts also in m y Nicol Bolas Wheen deck so Waste Not and company apreciate it

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Post by Mookie » 4 years ago

I'd play it in Sharuum if it weren't out of budget. Effectively a one-sided draw-7, unless your opponents have lots of instants to play. And the cards you don't play get put into your graveyard anyway. At its best the lower your curve is, since you'll be able to play more things. Also good if you have the ability to loop / recur it, at which point it's occasionally possible to use it to mill your opponents out too.

I've also been on the receiving end of Jar → Cyclonic Rift → crack Jar in response before, which is.... not a pleasant experience.

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Post by onering » 4 years ago

It's still a total bomb that generates absurd value for the price. Not great in decks loaded with reactive responses, great everywhere else. It's a better Wheel because breaking symmetry is trivial (just crack it on your turn and your opponents can only cast instants with it) and you don't have to weigh what's in your hand when deciding when to crack it since you'll get those cards back.

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Post by toctheyounger » 4 years ago

It's an eventual purchase for my Glissa build. Maybe soon. I can only see plenty of ways it becomes super useful there in filling my yard with rocks, letting me see more of my deck, getting me the answers I want when I want them and being supremely reusable.
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Post by 3drinks » 4 years ago

Sunday, December 8th, 2019; Profane Command



The often forgot about command...but should it be forgotten?

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Post by Mookie » 4 years ago

Profane Command is a card where you're paying a pretty steep premium for flexibility, when that flexibility isn't really necessary. I suspect the vast majority of the time it will be cast for the reanimation and removal modes, in which case it loses out to any spell dedicated to those purposes - Animate Dead and Doom Blade do pretty much the same thing. There is something to be said for card advantage, but in this case I don't really think it's worth the cost.

The other two modes are occasionally useful, but a bit more niche - they're both ways to close out a game when life totals get low, or if you have a ton of mana available from Cabal Coffers and a few other mana doublers. I'd say Profane Command is at its best in big mana decks as a result, where you expect to be draining people out with it a significant percentage of the time.

I'd place it above Incendiary Command, but definitely loses to Austere Command and Cryptic Command. Primal Command is also better, but it's a bit closer.

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Post by MeowZeDung » 4 years ago

I only think it's good in a list that can put all the modes to good use. My wife's Drana, Liberator of Malakir deck runs it since every mode is good for it:

- The loss of life goes great alongside Cabal Coffers and Nykthos and adds some redundancy alongside Exsanguinate and Blood Tribute.
- Reanimation is good, and buying back Ascendant Evincar, Guul Draz Overseer, or Necropolis Regent before combat can be big game for aggresive vampire tribal beats.
- Removal is also good, and getting around indestructible with -x/-x is a nice bonus.
- Giving most or all of your attackers fear in a deck like hers can make getting to lethal trivially easy sometimes.

I don't think it's a bomb by any means. It is situational, and I think it's too narrow unless you can be happy with any of the modes in your deck. If you're only ever going to use it to get the 2 for 1 with the removal/reanimate modes, there are better options.
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Post by DirkGently » 4 years ago

I think you're usually going to either go the value route (reanimate + removal) or the kill route (fear + life loss).

Neither mode is very efficient, but the flexibility is actually quite good since they do very different things. I could only imagine it going into a really big-mana deck, though, to offset how overpriced it is.
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Post by pokken » 4 years ago

This is another card that I always wind up cutting due to being pretty expensive mana wise, but it's very decent. If it could reanimate anything (other people's yards too) I would probably play it more, as its flexibility is constrained by needing to be in a graveyardy deck mostly.

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Post by hyalopterouslemur » 4 years ago

The problem is what you get for that mana.

First mode: X life loss for one player. This is good, but better exists. (Exsanguinate hits everyone but you, and gains you life too. Torment of Hailfire also exists.) The problem is, in this case "better" wins games.
Reanimator I kinda like, but of course old-timey reanimator cards are busted to hell and back, and usually cost three mana or less.
-X/-X: You can get Murder for 1bb, so why?

Basically, the only one that's really worth anything on its own is giving your army fear. The other modes are basically gravy. I mean, you get the versatility of a command, but it's not worth the mana cost.
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Post by onering » 4 years ago

It's worth the mana cost, but your deck needs to be able to afford lots of Mana. Yeah, murder exists, but it also doesn't get you back a creature to the field, and it can't drain out the pillow fort player if need be or give your army fear.

The key to this card isn't just that it's flexible, but that you are always going to be able to tack on another mode to whatever you need at the moment. Yeah, your going to overpay to get back that 5 mana creature, but you get to take out something 5 toughness or less at the same time. You can give your army fear and remove a black or artifact creature to help them get through. You can kill a problem creature while finishing off the archenemy. It's a card that lends itself to big swingy plays. It used to better in the early days when commander was all about good stuff, but it's still good now. It's great in casual metas, and otherwise shines most in decks with plenty of mana. It doesn't compete with exsanguinate, because your only going to cast exsanguinate when its lethal or you desperately need life, while your going to cast profane command well before that.

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Post by 3drinks » 4 years ago

Monday, December 9th, 2019; Word of Command



Oracle text: Look at target opponent's hand and choose a card from it. You control that player until Word of Command finishes resolving. The player plays that card if able. While doing so, the player can activate mana abilities only if they're from lands that player controls and only if mana they produce is spent to activate other mana abilities of lands the player controls and/or to play that card. If the chosen card is cast as a spell, you control the player while that spell is resolving.

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Post by Mookie » 4 years ago

Word of Command is a weird card. I've never actually seen it in action. I guess it's sort of a one-shot Mindslaver effect, except instead of their whole turn you instead get to control a single spell. Mindclaw Shaman is the closest comparison I've played with, and it can definitely whiff at times, which feels bad. I guess that Word of Command can hit any spell type, but realistically, targeted instants and sorceries are usually the best hits. Some non-targeted spells are reasonable to cast (like board wipes), but the overall value is going to be pretty high-variance unless you have some way to know / control what is an your opponents' hands.

I imagine there are some interesting stories about casting Toxic Deluge with Word of Command though.

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Post by DirkGently » 4 years ago

This has to be one of the most confusing cards ever printed, in terms of the details of how it works. The sorts of cards you can and can't see, mana abilities you can and can't activate, when exactly you control the player...what a mess.

I'm struggling to think of a good way to set this up. Obviously telepathy makes it a lot more reliable (both in terms of knowing what you can cast from their hand, and knowing whether they can prevent you from doing so by using up all their mana first). But I think it's worded such that there's no straightforward way to wreck someone using your own cards - you have to get lucky and catch them with a good target. Only being able to use lands is a real killer, as I can't think of many lands you could donate to make them use. Like, have an urborg and donate sorrow's path? Seems a little overcomplicated when a twiddle would have sufficed.

This is the rare card I don't have in my collection but kinda wish I did, if only for the lulz. Price tag is way too steep for lulz, though. Although the unlimited version isn't too bad on cardmarket, if only I still lived in Europe.
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Post by Dunharrow » 4 years ago

Has anyone played this since mana burn was a thing? I feel like this is how it would play out:
Player 1: Casts Word of Command
Player 2: Looks at hand, in response floats the wrong colours of mana
Player 1: Word of Command resolves....


I would like a new version of this card
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Post by Sharpened » 4 years ago

Dunharrow wrote:
4 years ago
Has anyone played this since mana burn was a thing? I feel like this is how it would play out:
Player 1: Casts Word of Command
Player 2: Looks at hand, in response floats the wrong colours of mana
Player 1: Word of Command resolves....
Mana pool doesn't empty before the spell resolves, so this is not a problem.

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Post by Sinis » 4 years ago

3drinks wrote:
4 years ago
Monday, December 9th, 2019; Word of Command
I spent quite a bit of time trying to find one of these for my Toshiro Umezawa deck. I eventually got it, and it was... not spectacular. It wasn't bad either, there were definitely fun applications with the smallest Worst Fears.

I think one of the big problems is priority; players generally tap and cast, and then let a spell resolve, and then tap and cast... when they finally pass priority, they may not have any mana for the spell you want to leverage. It's only if you're playing against 'good' magic players that generally wait until the second main to play anything that WoC becomes kind of exciting.

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Post by ISBPathfinder » 4 years ago

Sinis wrote:
4 years ago
3drinks wrote:
4 years ago
Monday, December 9th, 2019; Word of Command
I spent quite a bit of time trying to find one of these for my Toshiro Umezawa deck. I eventually got it, and it was... not spectacular. It wasn't bad either, there were definitely fun applications with the smallest Worst Fears.

I think one of the big problems is priority; players generally tap and cast, and then let a spell resolve, and then tap and cast... when they finally pass priority, they may not have any mana for the spell you want to leverage. It's only if you're playing against 'good' magic players that generally wait until the second main to play anything that WoC becomes kind of exciting.
Yea, I often would cast it at someone's draw step because you can force them to cast any sorcery speed card at that point still and unless they have mana dumps or a bunch of instants its hard to get out of it that way. It is fun to catch someone in combat with all their mana up though too as occasionally you can get them to wrath themselves as they are attacking which is hilarious.

Its a very fun card and when it works sometimes its amazing. Often times its just ok but it is a fun card for Toshiro.
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Post by hyalopterouslemur » 4 years ago

Sharpened wrote:
4 years ago
Dunharrow wrote:
4 years ago
Has anyone played this since mana burn was a thing? I feel like this is how it would play out:
Player 1: Casts Word of Command
Player 2: Looks at hand, in response floats the wrong colours of mana
Player 1: Word of Command resolves....
Mana pool doesn't empty before the spell resolves, so this is not a problem.
Yeah, the biggest issue is if you have a mana sink (in the old days, Carrion Ants or Mishra's Factory) or something like, well, either a hard counter or something like Negate for Word of Command, or something like Remand or Memory Lapse for the spell being countered. You can even use Arcane Denial on your own the spell being cast by Word of Command just to really humiliate them.
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Post by Sinis » 4 years ago

ISBPathfinder wrote:
4 years ago
Sinis wrote:
4 years ago
3drinks wrote:
4 years ago
Monday, December 9th, 2019; Word of Command
I spent quite a bit of time trying to find one of these for my Toshiro Umezawa deck. I eventually got it, and it was... not spectacular. It wasn't bad either, there were definitely fun applications with the smallest Worst Fears.

I think one of the big problems is priority; players generally tap and cast, and then let a spell resolve, and then tap and cast... when they finally pass priority, they may not have any mana for the spell you want to leverage. It's only if you're playing against 'good' magic players that generally wait until the second main to play anything that WoC becomes kind of exciting.
Yea, I often would cast it at someone's draw step because you can force them to cast any sorcery speed card at that point still and unless they have mana dumps or a bunch of instants its hard to get out of it that way. It is fun to catch someone in combat with all their mana up though too as occasionally you can get them to wrath themselves as they are attacking which is hilarious.

Its a very fun card and when it works sometimes its amazing. Often times its just ok but it is a fun card for Toshiro.
I did not know this; I thought you had to obey timing restrictions with Word of Command, but, I see now that it *isn't* the case...

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Post by Dunharrow » 4 years ago

Sharpened wrote:
4 years ago
Dunharrow wrote:
4 years ago
Has anyone played this since mana burn was a thing? I feel like this is how it would play out:
Player 1: Casts Word of Command
Player 2: Looks at hand, in response floats the wrong colours of mana
Player 1: Word of Command resolves....
Mana pool doesn't empty before the spell resolves, so this is not a problem.
That's why I said 'float the wrong colours of mana'. Like... if I am holding swords to plowshares and someone casts word of command, I can tap all my mana for other colors, then wish you luck using my black and green mana on the white spell... shouldn't be hard to do something like this with all the dual lands, pain lands and Urborgs people play....
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 4 years ago

Sinis wrote:
4 years ago
ISBPathfinder wrote:
4 years ago
Sinis wrote:
4 years ago
I spent quite a bit of time trying to find one of these for my Toshiro Umezawa deck. I eventually got it, and it was... not spectacular. It wasn't bad either, there were definitely fun applications with the smallest Worst Fears.

I think one of the big problems is priority; players generally tap and cast, and then let a spell resolve, and then tap and cast... when they finally pass priority, they may not have any mana for the spell you want to leverage. It's only if you're playing against 'good' magic players that generally wait until the second main to play anything that WoC becomes kind of exciting.
Yea, I often would cast it at someone's draw step because you can force them to cast any sorcery speed card at that point still and unless they have mana dumps or a bunch of instants its hard to get out of it that way. It is fun to catch someone in combat with all their mana up though too as occasionally you can get them to wrath themselves as they are attacking which is hilarious.

Its a very fun card and when it works sometimes its amazing. Often times its just ok but it is a fun card for Toshiro.
I did not know this; I thought you had to obey timing restrictions with Word of Command, but, I see now that it *isn't* the case...
Yea, proactively catching the person who is doing the best and just seeing what you can make them do to themselves is fun. You really want to look into the nitty gritty details on what you can and can't do with it because its actually quite the spell. Its intricacies are very high. Sometimes you will poke at someone's hand and its just all draw and ramp spells which will suck but the more responsive their deck is the more you tend to have for options to screw with them.

If anyone ever has a Phyrexian Tower and doesn't tap it in response they are in for a rude awakening lol.
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