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

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Guardman
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Post by Guardman » 2 years ago

It's an effect I really like and would like to see more of, in different cards, and to a lesser extent, in different colors. Especially with so many ways to cheat creatures onto the battlefield nowadays. I will also point out that it hits tokens as well, unlike Containment Priest, which is a neat twist. A criminally underplayed card in my opinion.

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pokken
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Post by pokken » 2 years ago

I would definitely like it if they hit critical mass for this effect. It's a fun hatebear effect.

I'm seeing a lot more cheat into play stuff lately so that has me thinking on this as well :)

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Post by ironic gesture » 2 years ago

3drinks wrote:
2 years ago
Monday, November 29th, 2021; Hallowed Moonlight

As a Sneak Attack|usg player, this scares me. It's not on the board, you've no idea if they have it…
This card isn't amazing against sneak attack as sneak is a may ability. If they play this in response you simply don't put anything into play and you either wait a turn or respond by activating sneak again (manas permitting).

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BeneTleilax
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Post by BeneTleilax » 2 years ago

I don't really like running niche answers in this format that don't synergize with your deck. At best, this prevents a specific type of deck from winning the game, but leaves you otherwise where you were. Even stuff like Containment Priest is a creature, giving it some level of baseline synergy with most Wx decks. It's too niche to reliably save you from losing. at the same time, it doesn't really do anything to help you win. At least Fogs tend to leave the would-be winner with a tapped-out board you or others can rush through to take them out.

If you don't want people mass-reanimating to build overwhelming board presence/synergies, you're in the color of wraths. If you don't want people cheating a bunch of guys out with haste, propaganda effects will serve you better. I guess if you're in some Xw spellslinger that could make use of it being a cheapish cantrip, I could see it,

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pokken
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Post by pokken » 2 years ago

yeah, I think sneak attack's ability to just react by doing it again is pretty much a crushing blowout. :) That card is really good.
BeneTleilax wrote:
2 years ago
Even stuff like Containment Priest is a creature, giving it some level of baseline synergy with most Wx decks. It's too niche to reliably save you from losing. at the same time, it doesn't really do anything to help you win. At least Fogs tend to leave the would-be winner with a tapped-out board you or others can rush through to take them out.
Containment priest's ability to turn flexible blinks into a machine gun is also very fun, that doesn't really work super well with this because you can only do it for a turn.

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ISBPathfinder
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Post by ISBPathfinder » 2 years ago

The fact that it cantrips is a big deal making it reasonable even when you don't need the effect. I really like it when you know your meta and you know the tricks of the meta. Its very good against mass reanimation, tokens, and tutor to play effects.

Its hard in that its responsive and can feel somewhat narrow in use. I still like the effect quite a bit though and run it in some of my white decks.
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Post by BeneTleilax » 2 years ago

I guess my metas don't really have a lot of big cheat effects that aren't better answered with a Strict Proctor or good wraths.

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Hawk
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Post by Hawk » 2 years ago

This is really niche. Like yeah, it can stop a big reanimator or sneak turn...but only if you have it right then. You know what else stops reanimator? Playing graveyard hate. And often in this format, just having removal stops a lot of the worst of this stuff too. Like, looking at the top commanders...

- This stops Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow...once. Or, it stops a single ninjutsued out creature. Then, they just don't do any more ninja tricks for the turn once you've shown them the moonlight. Maybe that ends up making this a fog of sorts, helping you just take a bunch of 1/1 dork damage rather than big ninja swings, but it's pretty niche. Having a kill spell once the ninja comes in also stops the ninjas.

- This punks a single activation of Kenrith, the Returned King, Sisay, Weatherlight Captain, Meren of Clan Nel Toth, and others. Bleh.

- This will stymie a single turn of "go off" nonsense from Edgar Markov or Alela, Artful Provocateur or Kykar, Wind's Fury ...but, again, they'll just stop after you cast this (or keep going off and building their board and just suck up the lack of tokens for a round). It's a losing battle.

There are corner cases (casting this in response to Living Death when that player just sacced their whole board to the Death to supercharge it), but for every one in a hundred games where this breaks your opponents back theres going to be ninety-nine where you cycle it (or hold it praying its good way longer than you ought to).

I could see it for a deck like Phelddagrif or some sorta Mardu Aikkido deck but even then its facing a ton of competition. Maybe a Boros Aikkido deck as a Sunforger target? Even then, its really hard to justify space in the '99 for a narrow hate piece like this.

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Post by Mookie » 2 years ago

I had an opponent cast Hallowed Moonlight once in response to my Brago, King Eternal trigger. It was... not pleasant, to say the least.

More broadly, I think Hallowed Moonlight is a pretty niche effect. It can blow out reanimation / flicker / Birthing Pod / token effects, and the cantrip lowers the opportunity cost.... but I think the most common lines for it are to either cycle it aggressively (in which case it is an overcosted cantrip) or to hold on to it until you can get value (in which case you may be waiting a long time). It looks better if you have Flickerwisp effects to blink out your opponents' stuff, or if you can fetch it up on demand with Sunforger... but for most other decks, I'd prefer more targeted hate, such as Relic of Progenitus against graveyard recursion, Torpor Orb against flicker strategies, or Aven Mindcensor against tutor-to-play strategies.

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Post by hyalopterouslemur » 2 years ago

It's hate for reanimator, blink, and tokens, and a few oddball things like Sneak Attack and Rebels. It's pretty ridiculous when it matters, and it really should matter in this format.
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Post by toctheyounger » 2 years ago

I like Moonlight myself. It is very niche, but it allows you to be asymmetrical in this scope of hate where something like Containment Priest does not, and where I run it in Bruna that's pretty great. Replacing itself in hand is good too.
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Post by onering » 2 years ago

The advantage this has over other options is that it isn't telegraphed. Things that sit around can be played around. Containment Priest does both, the surprise hoser and the preventative measure, with the tradeoff being that it doesn't hit tokens. Its a good backup for Containment Priest if you really need two copies of the effect for some reason, or a good alternative if you're just as worried about something like Kiki Conscripts as you are about T&N.

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Post by 3drinks » 2 years ago

Tuesday, November 30th, 2021; Peace Talks



When you really want to combo off but you need to buy a turn. Side note: wtf is "multiverse gift box" and why haven't I heard of it until now? How large was this "set" and how wide was it's distribution?

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Mookie
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Post by Mookie » 2 years ago

Huh, weird. Peace Talks is... not a card that works quite as well in multiplayer - if you cast it on your turn, you can't attack, and neither can the player after you, but any other players will be unaffected. As a result, I value that clause pretty low - unless the person you're afraid of attacking is very specifically the next player, it won't do much. I'd prefer Holy Day or Dawn Charm as combat protection in that case.

The other place I could see it being used is to protect a combo turn from spot removal - it stops spells and activated abilities from targeting, but there are plenty of ways to combo off with just triggered abilities (ex: Karmic Guide + Reveillark). However, in this case, I think it is outclassed by Silence and similar effects.

....so yeah, I can't think of any use cases for the card. Orim's Chant seems like a strict upgrade.

Also:
The Multiverse Gift Box was released in November 1996. Featuring a mix of boosters from different sets in different languages, it was the first box to emphasize the international aspect of Magic. Additionally it offered a unique possibility to have a look at a future Magic set three months before it was released.

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Post by RowanKeltizar » 2 years ago

I agree with Mookie, Peace Talks needs to be an instant to be useful.
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Hawk
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Post by Hawk » 2 years ago

@Mookie is right on - if you are worried about combat, you should be running a more versatile/powerful/cheap/recurrable Fog like Holy Day, Dawn Charm, or Kami of False Hope. If you are looking for a way to disrupt combo, that's a lot harder in white - you likely want some preemptive hatebears and rule-setting from something like a Thalia, Guardian of Thraben or Containment Priest , but might also look at stuff like Abeyance or Silence. If you are trying to protect your own combo, the last two spells there are better at that too and there's also Grand Abolisher. Finally, we've got Orim's Chant and Teferi's Protection as spells that sorta "do it all" in terms of protecting you and your boardstate from attacks and combos.

At instant speed this would be spicy, so I might consider it in a UW deck playing all the "you may cast spells as instants" trickery? But even then, now we're competing with real counterspells.

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Post by 3drinks » 2 years ago

Worth noting, there's nothing stopping you from casting this in 2nd main phase...

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Post by BeneTleilax » 2 years ago

It's still too dependent on turn order to be particularly valuable as a fog or a silence, unless you're already trying to leverage seating arrangement/turn order with Pramikon, Sky Rampart.

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Post by hyalopterouslemur » 2 years ago

The problem isn't that this is bad per se, just that there are a dozen other options that do it better. Especially in multiplayer.
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Post by Jemolk » 2 years ago

Yeah, if this had been errataed to affect everyone's turns, I'd think about playing it. As is? Nah. It's a cool idea, but it just doesn't work very well in multiplayer, as everyone else pointed out. Pity about that, but hey. If you're ever doing more casual 1v1 and have some sort of pillowfort setup, it could be cool there.
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Post by TheAmericanSpirit » 2 years ago

Magic is a zero sum game. There can be no peace, therefore I cannot see the point of paying two to hold a convention about it. Also inb4 someone says Divine Intervention exists, %$#% %$#% %$#% that %$#% can go lick a %$#% %$#% %$#% covered in %$#%$#% and horseradish.
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Post by 3drinks » 2 years ago

Wednesday, December 1st, 2021; Crush of Wurms



Man. What a Blast from the Past. The OG Timmy (or Tammy, I don't judge!) card.

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Post by Sinis » 2 years ago

Wednesday, December 1st, 2021; Crush of Wurms
A fine finisher at casual tables. I never get bored of seeing this one.

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Post by Hawk » 2 years ago

This was THE original Timmy/Tammy card, and to this day the P/T to Mana Value ratio is unmatched:

- Terastodon CAN be 18/18 of stats for one less mana, but only if you stone rain yourself. Don't get me wrong, Terastodon's ability to naturalize enemy threats makes it a better card overall, but in terms of raw stats Crush wins.
- Craterhoof Behemoth and End-Raze Forerunners have more abilities and SHOULD shake out to 18/18 worth of stats the turn they are cast by overrunning your board, but that's a one shot compared to a stabilizing army in a crash of wurms.
- Apex Chimera and Artisan of Kozilek should also be way more than 18/18 worth of stats on board unless your deck is truly bizarre, but there's an element of chance to it and also Apex does cost one more to initially cast. Kozilek, Butcher of Truth should be more overall value, but again is 10 mana up front.
- Impervious Greatwurm and Ghalta, Primal Hunger are similar but lesser stats. They do have abilities and ways to be cheated out that make them overall better cards, but still behind in raw stats.

And that's before we factor in the flashback! Practically speaking this card is never going to be great, but it's a ton of fun and a blast from the past and I wouldn't fault anyone for slamming it. Probably at its best in Ruxa, Patient Professor or Wurm Tribal (and a bit of a bombo for Mayael the Anima and Atla Palani, Nest Tender so I'm surprised to see them as the top commanders for it)

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Post by Mookie » 2 years ago

Crush of Wurms is an enormous pile of stats, but it doesn't quite make the cut these days compared to options like Apex Devastator and Worldspine Wurm - if you're investing that much mana into a single card, you generally want some immediate value, and a pile of vanilla beef isn't necessarily going to get there - I'd be much more enthusiastic if they had trample or something. Still, quantity does trump quality in some situations, and 18/18 points of stats are going to have a significant board impact (assuming your opponents don't have a board wipe). If you can generate value from the flashback, even better - although I'd probably lean towards the significantly cheaper Roar of the Wurm or Honored Hydra.

Certainly worth consideration for style points though.

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