Alrighty, I just made my first full pass through the Zendikar Rising previews, and here are my initial thoughts as they concern
Kykar, Wind's Fury (even though I haven't gotten around to making the changes I've been discussing over the past month or so!):
First there are the plain old noncreature spells which caught my eye.
Chilling Trap is a cheap instant which cantrips as long as Kykar or
Talrand, Sky Summoner are in play, and cantripping is a staple effect for the deck. In commander I don't see the -4/-0 effect being amazing though. Sure, it will occasionally blank a nasty attack with infect, double strike, or a combat damage trigger, or it will enable a block that otherwise would suck, but I'd rather just roll with stuff that makes the cantrip itself better, like the scry on
Opt.
Concerted Defense will sometimes be a better
Spell Pierce for the deck since the commander and a couple other cards are wizards, but I'm happy just sticking with counters that are bonkers a la
Fierce Guardianship or sunforger friendly a la
Counterflux.
Confounding Conundrum is spicy. It's a cheapish cantrip that triggers Kykar and some other mentors and really puts a damper on the green decks at the table. I like the effect enough that I think I would often play it on turn two over a rock just to keep the land ramp decks at bay. This one seems likely to get a test run!
I already shared some thoughts about
Jace, Mirror Mage in my last post. Seems good for digging to a combo piece, draw engine, or token pump, and the deck spits out protection for Jace and the mirror. I like it.
Maddening Cacophony could chop opponent's libraries in half to ensure they are smaller than my own before starting a
Burning Inquiry/
Underworld Breach loop for a mill victory, but Inquiry Breach stumbles into enough other win conditions as it is that this seems unnecessary. That, and having a kicked version of this gets countered seems like a bad time.
Shell Shield is a cheap cast trigger that can save Kykar or a mentor from targeted removal, but there are already better options out there for something like that, such as
Apostle's Blessing. If it was indestructible + hexproof we'd be in business.
Cleansing Wildfire is a sorcery unfortunately, yet it destroys the god-tier lands like
Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx ,
Cabal Coffers,
Emeria, the Sky Ruin, and
Gaea's Cradle/
Itlimoc, Cradle of the Sun while also triggering mentors and cantripping. I certainly don't hate it, but sorcery speed makes me cringe. In a pinch this fixes our mana though, and that's worth something. It also can hook us up with an island to turn on
Mystic Sanctuary.
Lithoform Engine looks like a pile of fun. Copy a token creation trigger, especially fun if
Anointed Procession is in play, or copy a huge
Electrodominance, or copy a
Monastery Mentor. Good times all. The problem I have is the cost. Basically I'm asking myself, would I pay Kicker
for a second mentor, or Kicker
to fork
Generous Gift? I think the answer is a clear no since I already have ways to copy/recur these effects for less. I suspect the Engine just isn't good enough unless you get 2 activations, so there's a bunch of setup involved and crossing your fingers and hoping it makes it around the table. If your meta is really casual though, absolutely go for this.
Relic Amulet has lots of words on it that I like in this deck, but conditional damage-based spot removal that can only be repeated once per turn cycle might not get there. Then again, in this deck the card may as well say "
tap: remove one target annoying utility creature from the board" and that is by no means awful. It can be cast and activated with just spirit mana, it triggers Kykar and some mentors, and it could be a lightning rod for a
Disenchant effect before I cast a
Whirlwind of Thought or
Jeskai Ascendancy. I wish you didn't have to remove ALL charge counters from it so you could just keep zapping derpy X/2's and piling up counters to remove something big later. Hmm... I dunno. My gut says no though. Am I undervaluing repeatable on board removal here?
Well they went and made
Darksteel Ingot good with
Skyclave Relic, the madlads. Indestructible fixing for all colors is certainly good, and kicking it is better than 1.5
Explosive Vegetations. I just don't see a kicked version of this not drawing out a counter if one is available. Also, the deck is probably humming along just fine once it hits 6 mana, and I can't turn a fistful of spirits in exchange for the three rocks at instant speed unfortunately. I feel like it wants to be in a
Raff Capashen, Ship's Mage deck with ways to bounce it back to hand and/or
Unwinding Clock effects rather than here.
Next there's the flippy cards, several of which have my attention.
Jwari Disruption // Jwari Ruins is a pretty crappy counter, but it can potentially ruin someones day if they tap out for an entwined
Tooth and Nail or overloaded
Cyclonic Rift or whatever. The only reason it tickles my fancy is because I can just count it as a land slot. I don't think it's quite good enough though because of the ETBT, but if slots in the deck are just excruciatingly tight at some point in the future I might include it as a way of keeping land and spell slots both at reasonable levels.
7 mana sorceries aren't really where the deck wants to be headed, but
Sea Gate Restoration // Sea Gate, Reborn comes with card draw and allows me to count it as a land slot, albeit a
bolt land that only taps for one color. The crappy part is the text "equal to the number of cards in your hand plus one", which means you need a grip already to justify playing a 7 mana spell, and even then what are you doing besides just digging for a combo piece or desperate for some interaction? I think I'd rather just invest in a
Mystical Tutor for such a situation. I really think that for 7(!) mana the designers could have made this thing draw your hand size plus 3. I get that a card playing double duty as both a land and a spell is dangerously close to broken, but that rider text probably ruins this card for me.
Silundi Vision // Silundi Isle on the other hand puts a big smile on my face. I am likely cutting my land count by one and tossing this in the deck. Instant speed, moderately costed, with a good percentage of hits especially on a 6 card dig. Even if you whiff completely it clears the top 6 pieces of land/chaff off your library so you have a shot at action on your following draws. Of course if you have plenty of action just play it as your land for the turn. Oh yeah, good stuff.
Valakut Awakening // Valakut Stoneforge isn't quite as good in my opinion. The ceiling is that, if I've already got a draw engine online then, sure, I can bury a bunch of lands and draw action, but I'd rather just go with
Winds of Change in that situation and potentially foil my opponent's plans while I'm at it. The floor is an ETBT mountain or a 3 mana cantrip, and I don't love either of those. So the questions become, does that wash out since I will count the card as a land slot, and how much do I value the middle case scenario of "bury 3, draw 4" at instant speed? I will think about it some more, but being able to use it as a land slot probably just makes it worth a test run.
Sejiri Shelter // Sejiri Glacier is a worse
Gods Willing with an ETBT land option stapled on. I like saving Kykar for
, but I've got better ways to do it already. I don't think the flexibility is worth it here.
Glasspool Mimic // Glasspool Shore will probably go in SO many of my blue decks, but I don't think it goes here. 3 mana is an aggressively costed clone, especially considering it can be counted as a land slot for the deck. The downsides of only copying your own creatures and the legend rule make it a stinker in this deck though. Best case scenario, it copies a
Monastery Mentor or the really weird corner case of copying a
Sakashima the Impostor that has copied Kykar then bouncing the original in response. Worst case it's stranded in hand while Kykar and some tokens are on board or it's an ETBT island. Meh.
Lastly there are the creatures that aren't flippy bois. I didn't look at them all, I just searched up any that said "whenever you cast a" or "landfall". I'll look at the rest later.
Windrider Wizard is trying to be
Jeskai Ascendancy on legs/wings. It's not bad by any means, but isn't worth taking a slot away from a land or noncreature spell IMO.
Canyon Jerboa is a token pump enabler in conjunction with the
Ghostly Flicker/
Mystic Sanctuary loops, but it isn't really necessary in order to turn that into a win and doesn't do enough apart from that.
Same deal with
Ruin Crab. I'd rather run
Hedron Crab to mill myself until I hit
Sevinne's Reclamation and
Underworld Breach, but I haven't included that since it seems unnecessary. Still, the crab is at least on my radar.
Moraug, Fury of Akoum is spicy since he pumps and enables extra combats. I'm not sure about the rules, but I *think* with Moraug in play you could stack up infinite combats with the
Ghostly Flicker/
Mystic Sanctuary loop and your army would be +1/+0 bigger each successive combat. He costs 6 mana and seems win-more with the loop though. He could enable a game winning alpha strike(s) without the loop though, but I don't think it's worth the slot since
Cathars' Crusade and
Jeskai Ascendancy already do it better.
Spitfire Lagac is fun with the land loop combo, but a pile of nothing everywhere else.
I'll go over the set again with a fine tooth comb and see what other folks are doing with the cards. The big stand outs to me are as follows:
Am I missing anything? Or, perhaps phrased more accurately, what am I missing?