Galazeth Prismari, what's your take?

[BounceBurnBuff]

Galazeth Prismari

Well, its time to meet the Elder Dragon that ate up all the power equity in that cycle, unless Witherbloom comes along and proves otherwise.

Galazeth is nuts, beyond the initial take of "Izzet Urza", the mana generation, storm opportunities and even stax potential is far beyond the power Lorehold, Quandrix and Silverquill have offered. Trail of Evidence, Metallurgic Summonings and Saheeli, Sublime Artificer are absolute musts, and I've been surprised in brewing where just going Izzet big spells has shown Prismari to be ahead of poor ol' Mizzix.

The more competitive amongst you will probably be eyeing up the usual Urza suspects with Winter Orb and chums, thoughts?

[Mookie]

Hmmmm.... I do think Galazeth is sweet, but I wouldn't classify it as broken. Comparable to Urza, Lord High Artificer.... but you don't have a card-advantage-generating mana sink, and the you can only spend the mana generated on instants and sorceries. As a result, I'd say how strong Galazeth is will depend largely on how much an additional color brings to the table. Gaining artifact synergy cards like Goblin Welder and Scrap Mastery is certainly strong, but if you want to run UR artifacts, there's already Saheeli, the Gifted and Tawnos, Urza's Apprentice. I'll also call out that Galazeth has some inherent tension built in - you want lots of artifacts to generate mana, but you also need a bunch of instants / sorceries to spend that mana on.

That said, powering out a massive Saheeli's Directive seems sweet.

[PrimevalCommander]

Withe the magecraft treasure creator and several other artifact generating cards, It shouldn't be very difficult to fill in some slots with single cards that churn out artifacts every turn. This leaves most of the deck free for instant and sorceries. So the balance may not cause all that much tension. I guess it depends on how competitive you want to be. Spell slinger decks tend to lean on artifacts to a point anyway. Usually for ramp, which this doesn't exactly help, but some treasure makers, and artifact creature makers starts to look like a rather powerful engine.

[BounceBurnBuff]

Yeah, I wouldn't be looking at including many stand-alone artifacts here. Tamiyo's Journal, Inspiring Statuary and Howling Mine being the main ones. Can even make use of a Nevinyrral's Disk when you don't want to wipe. It is also worth noting it makes rocks like Thought Vessel tap for coloured mana with no downside too.

[Sinis]

I think there's a fundamental detail where Urza pulls ahead of Galazeth; Urza can use his mana to power out more artifacts, which you can tap for more mana. Galazeth lacks this feedback loop; you can 'only' buy instants and sorceries.

I think there's a big difference there; Urza can spend artifacts to cast or activate anything, while Galazeth cannot.

While Galazeth seems undeniably powerful, I think that Urza might still edge them out with his ability as well.

[PrimevalCommander]

That is why Galazeth is more interesting and less obnoxious... to me. More thought required than just spam artifacts to spam more artifacts. Glad he isn't a mana sink as well because that's how you get overpowered commanders.

Also pretty solid in the 99 if you plan on making artifact tokens with anything. Even with random equipment and other artifacts he can easily come down and repay his entire cost for that Fact or Fiction in your hand

[illakunsaa]

I'm thinking orbs effects like Winter Orb, Torpor Orb, Cursed Totem combined with Twiddle and Exhaustion effects.

[ISBPathfinder]

I did a little brewing on it, in the end I just hate the mechanics that I feel like I was incentivized to play. And by that I mean extra turns. The commander is sort of like playing an alternative ramp style of deck but the payoff is mostly in casting spells. I kept feeling like the wincon was some sort of "screw with lands", "take all the turns", or "Deal tons of direct damage to players" and I just kind of hated everything that it could do.

Decks that contain more than 2 extra turn effects are extremely tedious to play against and I got the impression it as a deck that wanted to just take all of them and jam them hard.

Decks that are composed of tons of ramp, extra turns, and impossible to interact with direct damage doesn't exactly sound like a fun mix of things to play against. Its a goldfish deck through and through is what I was seeing and I think I am just going to walk away.

[Dragoon]

I did a little brewing on it, in the end I just hate the mechanics that I feel like I was incentivized to play. And by that I mean extra turns. The commander is sort of like playing an alternative ramp style of deck but the payoff is mostly in casting spells. I kept feeling like the wincon was some sort of "screw with lands", "take all the turns", or "Deal tons of direct damage to players" and I just kind of hated everything that it could do.

Decks that contain more than 2 extra turn effects are extremely tedious to play against and I got the impression it as a deck that wanted to just take all of them and jam them hard.

Decks that are composed of tons of ramp, extra turns, and impossible to interact with direct damage doesn't exactly sound like a fun mix of things to play against. Its a goldfish deck through and through is what I was seeing and I think I am just going to walk away.

Can't you just play stuff like Insurrection, Aminatou's Augury or Clone Legion? I don't think there is any shortage of big CMC spells that don't involve extra turns.

[ISBPathfinder]

Can't you just play stuff like Insurrection, Aminatou's Augury or Clone Legion? I don't think there is any shortage of big CMC spells that don't involve extra turns.

I am just....... tired of seeing all of these new legends and having to go through the process of: 1) removing all the land disruption that it naturally has synergy with 2) removing all of the infinite combos that it clearly hits 3) powering down the miserable cards that are left.

This commander isn't even the peak of this but man, it has all this synergy with LD, stasis, and turns. Its really annoying when all of the new commanders have to be neutered to have something that isn't a complete pile of annoying cards that leaves your opponents wanting to commit acts of violence on you in the parking lot after the game is done.

[Dragoon]

I am just....... tired of seeing all of these new legends and having to go through the process of: 1) removing all the land disruption that it naturally has synergy with 2) removing all of the infinite combos that it clearly hits 3) powering down the miserable cards that are left.

This commander isn't even the peak of this but man, it has all this synergy with LD, stasis, and turns. Its really annoying when all of the new commanders have to be neutered to have something that isn't a complete pile of annoying cards that leaves your opponents wanting to commit acts of violence on you in the parking lot after the game is done.

I can understand. I guess your best plan is to just straight-up ignore them then, if it feels too bad to not exploit them to their full potential? Outside of Galazeth Prismari and Velomachus Lorehold, the other legends don't strike me as good candidates for extra turns/MLD/combos, but I might just not see them.

[Ertai Planeswalker]

Well i think this is the legend i'm going for from this set. Making treasure, clues, thopter and/or myr tokens and some copy enablers and just counterburn my way to victory.. Wincons can be direct damage, Mechanized Production or Hellkite Tyrant..

Question: What do you all feel should be the minimum amount of instants and/or sorceries the deck should run to make sure it does not run out of gas with sll it's earmarked ramp? My gut says about 40 but i"m not sure.