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

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Lifeless
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Post by Lifeless » 2 years ago

A really nicely designed card. The abilities work together and also interact well with some other themes that RB will often use. Maybe not the most exciting card but A+ design.

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Post by Mookie » 2 years ago

Chainer, Nightmare Adept is a sweet commander, and one I've been meaning to build for a while. At a base case, he gives your creatures (including himself) haste, which enables all sorts of shenanigans alongside Flameblast Dragon effects. I've definitely enjoyed using Samut, Voice of Dissent in the command zone to enable attack / combat damage triggers and tap abilities, and Chainer can do something similar. Chainer also acts as a discard outlet for madness cards and actual reanimation effects, and can also act as a strong recursion / value engine if you have Squee, Goblin Nabob or another recursive card to discard. Lots of possible directions. Not necessarily as strong as Chainer, Dementia Master, who lets you cheat on mana costs, but Chainer 2.0 has a ton of depth - certainly more than most of the other commanders from that set of precons.

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Dunharrow
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Post by Dunharrow » 2 years ago

built it on arena and it is pretty fun
I think I will throw it into Marchesa, the Black Rose when I pick one up. The haste makes it really strong.
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Post by hyalopterouslemur » 2 years ago

An aside: I wouldn't even know how to build Tariel. (And some day soon I want to discuss the OG precon commanders and how they've evolved.)

Anyway, I would point out Chainer 2 also enables madness.
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Post by toctheyounger » 2 years ago

I really like both Chainers, and this one jn particular has a lot of scope for variety of build, which is something I really like. If a commander has a predetermined build path I'm out. This guy is strong and flexible and thats pretty cool.

I've played against him once or twice before and he can play for sure. It looks fun and plays strong.
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onering
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Post by onering » 2 years ago

Mookie wrote:
2 years ago
Chainer, Nightmare Adept is a sweet commander, and one I've been meaning to build for a while. At a base case, he gives your creatures (including himself) haste, which enables all sorts of shenanigans alongside Flameblast Dragon effects. I've definitely enjoyed using Samut, Voice of Dissent in the command zone to enable attack / combat damage triggers and tap abilities, and Chainer can do something similar. Chainer also acts as a discard outlet for madness cards and actual reanimation effects, and can also act as a strong recursion / value engine if you have Squee, Goblin Nabob or another recursive card to discard. Lots of possible directions. Not necessarily as strong as Chainer, Dementia Master, who lets you cheat on mana costs, but Chainer 2.0 has a ton of depth - certainly more than most of the other commanders from that set of precons.
He only gives nontoken creatures not cast from your hand haste. So he does give himself haste (unless he was bounced and you cast him from your hand), but otherwise he's got a somewhat significant restriction. Thankfully, both things he really wants to do (casting madness spells and casting creatures from your graveyard) get haste from his ability, but you won't be able to rely on casting something you topdecked and it getting haste, you have to jump through his hoops. Normally that won't matter, but it means you can't benefit from him granting haste if there's gy hate about, or Drannith Magistrate. It does also mean that you're limited to one hasty dude a turn if you're relying entirely on the yard since you can only use his ability once each turn, though anything cast from exile will also get haste.

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Post by 3drinks » 2 years ago

Tuesday, October 19th, 2021; Call for Unity


Modern
R{R/W} 87guide Burn
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RTorbran, Thane of Red Fell (Red Deck Wins)
WBRAlesha, Who Smiles at Death (Slivers)
WBRKaalia HQ

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TheAmericanSpirit
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Post by TheAmericanSpirit » 2 years ago

Works about as effectively as any politician's call for unity. Powers up too slowly and conditionally and confers no permanent stats. At the same price (cmc wise) Cathar's Crusade exists, which is everything CFU isn't and more.

But for my tastes, Crescendo of War is the real deal white pump enchantment. One or two turn cycles of that thing will either end the game or create a mexican standoff of cosmic proportions.
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Post by Hawk » 2 years ago

Even after the banhammering of Crusade, White still has plenty of great options for 2 and 3 CMC Anthems in the form of Honor of the Pure, Spear of Heliod, Glorious Anthem, Shared Triumph, and Divine Sacrament depending on your tastes. A 4-5 CMC Anthem needs to come with more bang for your buck to compete with the mana efficiency of these. And we have those too:

- Ajani Goldmane is a 'walker who can instead gain life and who has a time limit if you just want an anthem but who leaves around counters and who generates Vigilance while he's doing his thing.
- Dictate of Heliod has flash for trickery and starts at a +2/+2.
- The gold standard is Cathars' Crusade which, like today's CotD, is a 5-mana do nothing that builds steam over time...but Crusade scales much better, generating explosive growth with very little investment in blinks or tokens.

If this triggered on Each end Step (like Crescendo of War triggers on each upkeep) it might be a bit more interesting but as printed it seems pretty jank sadly.

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Post by RxPhantom » 2 years ago

I could see Call for Unity in a certain kind of deck, but there are still plenty of better options.
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Post by 3drinks » 2 years ago

Whoops I read it as triggering revolt for each permanent and thought about aristocrat strats. How silly and underwhelming this is by comparison.

Modern
R{R/W} 87guide Burn
Commander
WRKellan, the Fae-Blooded // Birthright Boon (local secret santa gift)
RTorbran, Thane of Red Fell (Red Deck Wins)
WBRAlesha, Who Smiles at Death (Slivers)
WBRKaalia HQ

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Post by Dunharrow » 2 years ago

They were too cautious with this card. It was bad in limited, bad in standard and has always been bad in Commander. It either needed to trigger at each end-step and cost 4 mana, or cost 3 mana as is.
At 5 mana it would maybe work if it gave lifelink or first strike or made tokens.


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Post by toctheyounger » 2 years ago

2/10 Cathars would use this card. 10/10 Felidars retreat from it.

Its just slow and clunky and very outclassed, even in mono white. Theres a lot of better full board pumps that trigger just as easily, more regularly, and give as good as this if not better.
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Post by hyalopterouslemur » 2 years ago

short rant
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Glad this was mentioned. Personally I find the whole banning cards thing humorous. Look, police need to go out and investigate real crimes instead of what Karen thinks is a crime. Real estate agents need to show me all available properties. WotC? Not on the agenda. Not even on the same steno pad as the agenda.

Not sure what Turkish or Arab nationalism has to do with any of that.

But it is funny to watch grognards squirm.
Anyway, this card is bad. The fact that it only triggers on your turn, and only once per turn makes riot inherently bad. Mazirek, Kraul Death Priest does this much better. The only place where this is somewhat better is phantoms
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Post by 3drinks » 2 years ago

Wednesday, October 20th, 2021; Praetor's Counsel


Modern
R{R/W} 87guide Burn
Commander
WRKellan, the Fae-Blooded // Birthright Boon (local secret santa gift)
RTorbran, Thane of Red Fell (Red Deck Wins)
WBRAlesha, Who Smiles at Death (Slivers)
WBRKaalia HQ

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Dunharrow
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Post by Dunharrow » 2 years ago

I have never found a home for this card. I want my recursion to be cheap, and I want my card draw to be less than 8 mana.
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Post by tstorm823 » 2 years ago

This card was good to me in my Mina and Denn, Wildborn ramp into mass land destruction deck. But a lot of cards are good in that situation that people frown on you making good.
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Lifeless
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Post by Lifeless » 2 years ago

There's a ramping Muldrotha, the Gravetide self-mill that uses this in our group and while it's pretty slick it's far from the most powerful thing the deck can do. One of those cards that was clearly designed for EDH and more or less hits the mark.

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Post by Sinis » 2 years ago

Wednesday, October 20th, 2021; Praetor's Counsel
It's not bad. At 8 mana, though, you better have ramped a ton.

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Post by pokken » 2 years ago

It's always nostalgic for me when cards like this that used to be windmill bombs in my playgroup (back in 2012 or so) crop up on the random card of the day. So many games where someone has like 40 cards in their hand on turn 22 and we go outside and shoot the %$#% while they figure out how they win type shenanigans :P

I honestly don't think it's playable anymore.

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Post by Serenade » 2 years ago

Played this once after we were stuck in Lethe Lake for a while (maybe it was Nephalia). Tons of fun. It probably does not have a home for me anymore.
Last edited by Serenade 2 years ago, edited 1 time in total.
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3drinks
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Post by 3drinks » 2 years ago

pokken wrote:
2 years ago
It's always nostalgic for me when cards like this that used to be windmill bombs in my playgroup (back in 2012 or so) crop up on the random card of the day. So many games where someone has like 40 cards in their hand on turn 22 and we go outside and shoot the %$#% while they figure out how they win type shenanigans :P

I honestly don't think it's playable anymore.
This is some zoomer logic lmao. Games don't have to end every time by t5. Or, I'm just becoming increasingly more of a magic boomer and I can't cope with that.

Modern
R{R/W} 87guide Burn
Commander
WRKellan, the Fae-Blooded // Birthright Boon (local secret santa gift)
RTorbran, Thane of Red Fell (Red Deck Wins)
WBRAlesha, Who Smiles at Death (Slivers)
WBRKaalia HQ

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Sinis
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Post by Sinis » 2 years ago

3drinks wrote:
2 years ago
pokken wrote:
2 years ago
It's always nostalgic for me when cards like this that used to be windmill bombs in my playgroup (back in 2012 or so) crop up on the random card of the day. So many games where someone has like 40 cards in their hand on turn 22 and we go outside and shoot the %$#% while they figure out how they win type shenanigans :P

I honestly don't think it's playable anymore.
This is some zoomer logic lmao. Games don't have to end every time by t5. Or, I'm just becoming increasingly more of a magic boomer and I can't cope with that.
Same. Boomer magic 4 lyfe

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3drinks
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Post by 3drinks » 2 years ago

Sinis wrote:
2 years ago
3drinks wrote:
2 years ago
pokken wrote:
2 years ago
It's always nostalgic for me when cards like this that used to be windmill bombs in my playgroup (back in 2012 or so) crop up on the random card of the day. So many games where someone has like 40 cards in their hand on turn 22 and we go outside and shoot the %$#% while they figure out how they win type shenanigans :P

I honestly don't think it's playable anymore.
This is some zoomer logic lmao. Games don't have to end every time by t5. Or, I'm just becoming increasingly more of a magic boomer and I can't cope with that.
Same. Boomer magic 4 lyfe
At least I know I'm not alone in my struggles.

Modern
R{R/W} 87guide Burn
Commander
WRKellan, the Fae-Blooded // Birthright Boon (local secret santa gift)
RTorbran, Thane of Red Fell (Red Deck Wins)
WBRAlesha, Who Smiles at Death (Slivers)
WBRKaalia HQ

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Mookie
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Post by Mookie » 2 years ago

Praetor's Counsel is the Enter the Infinite of recursion spells - it simply isn't possible to recur more cards than your entire graveyard. As a result, it will always have at least a niche place in the format for decks that have a bunch of mana and a massive graveyard. I've definitely played games where someone plays it in the lategame, recurs 20+ cards, and overwhelms the rest of the table in raw value. ....of course, eight mana is a lot, and it is vulnerable to grave hate. Interestingly, that makes it somewhat more interesting in decks that aren't very graveyard-focused, since they are less likely to be randomly targeted by Bojuka Bog effects.

These days, I would say that Seasons Past is probably the best recursion spell in the format - six mana to recur 6+ cards is a very strong rate, and it tends to function much better than Wildest Dreams. It's pretty unlikely for you to be able to play all of the cards recurred by Praetor's Counsel, so just getting the best six or so is more than enough. However, it does suffer a bit in a combo context, where you may be looking to recur specific combinations of cards (it couldn't grab Kiki-Jiki, Mirror Breaker + Zealous Conscripts, for example). Praetor's Counsel is probably still overkill in that situation, but it is technically better.

....ultimately, I think Praetor's Counsel suffers a bit from the fact that green has better win conditions - at the point in the game where you can win off its raw card advantage, you could probably also win immediately off Craterhoof Behemoth, Genesis Wave, or Finale of Devastation.

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