[mtgnexus] Random Card of the Day - Jetfire, Ingenious Scientist

[BeneTleilax]

Huh, good on you for finding an actual purpose for this weird, weird card outside of mindless Reserved List spec.

[Igzex]

It's one thing to play a commander that happens to match up poorly with one of your friend's decks.

It's a whole 'nother thing to actually run a commander with the actual intent to literally counter-pick your friend's deck...

[3drinks]

Huh, good on you for finding an actual purpose for this weird, weird card outside of mindless Reserved List spec.

I've watched while this five mana 3/4 held my Balefire Dragon at bay for many-a turns....

[3drinks]

Saturday, July 10th, 2021; Arahbo, Roar of the World

[pokken]

This guy is probably the most innocuous of the eminence generals but let me tell ya...

Free giant growth every turn can get a crapload of pressure. I've seen a pretty decent deck that just flooded the board with mid-sized cats and was constantly swinging with a 10/10 while blowing up all your stuff with Qasali Slingers and Qasali Pridemage.

Eminence is such a dangerous ability from a philosophical standpoint and really should not have been printed. I would not be sad if these cards did not exist and they took Yuriko, the Tiger's Shadow and Derevi, Empyrial Tactician with them just because of the way they warp games around the pressure from being impossible to deal with long term.

[DirkGently]

I have never seen a cat deck not suck.

[BeneTleilax]

It's a solid tribal aggro deck, but it's limited to the power tiers where tribal aggro is viable. It can't just combo off like Elves and some Goblins. That said, I have only seen Arabho twice, once as basically a precon where it held its own against the other basically precon decks and the other time by this creepy dude who had a bunch of catgirl alters, and I think got hated out just for that.

[Igzex]

and the other time by this creepy dude who had a bunch of catgirl alters, and I think got hated out just for that.

PFFFFT HAHAHAHA!

Arahbo got the short end of the stick when it came to eminence especially when you consider how few and far in between cat tribal support is. Honestly I'm halfway ok with eminence when it comes to Arahbo and The Ur-Dragon because they're just mildly helpful abilities for garbage tier tribes. But then you give the really busted eminence abilities to the already viable Wizard tribe and then push Vampires to the friggin' moon to make Edgar Markov's already dumb eminence ability even more obnoxious so yeah. Fine with that ability just being a one time thing.

[Mookie]

Eminence is a fundamentally broken ability, similar to companions - you get something without needing any in-game investment, with the opportunity cost coming in the form of a deckbuilding restriction. Edgar Markov, The Ur-Dragon, and Inalla, Archmage Ritualist are all extremely powerful commanders, and some of the strongest options to command some very well-supported tribes. Arahbo, Roar of the World, on the other hand, provides a much more situational eminence ability (+3/+3 to a creature) to a significantly less-supported tribe.

If the format ever changes to make aggro more well-supported (such as reducing starting life totals), or if we get a lot more tribal support for cats, I could see Arahbo being a very potent aggro commander. Until then, cats are going to be classified as a meme tribe, and I don't mind them getting a bit of extra support.

[ilovesaprolings]

This guy is probably the most innocuous of the eminence generals but let me tell ya...

And yet he can still potentially one-shot someone with lost leonin

[hyalopterouslemur]

This guy looks ridic, but, well, he's a cat. Cat tribal doesn't have the history of say, soldiers or elves. So not as many weapons yet.

But as said, a 10/9 trampling infectious Lost Leonin is a real threat. Maybe not on the same level as Blighted Agent or Spinebiter in Rafiq, or Blightsteel Colossues in Animar, or infect in general in Saskia or Viral Drake anywhere, but still KOS.

[3drinks]

Sunday, July 11th, 2021; Platinum Emperion

[folding_music]

how's this guy interact with Volcano Hellion? have never understood which layer supercedes which. Kinda want to do one million damage to a Mogg Maniac with an Emperion in play

[pokken]

Pretty high on the list of "I slam this permanent and think I am safe and then die to an edge case."

1. commander damage
2. infect
3. infinite combo that can kill the creature (draw deck, walking ballista, etc.)

This card is functionally useless, just play better winconditions, but I can see some jank decks that might like it (e.g. that red polymorph that damages you) but usually a non-evasive 8/8 isn't enough to make those things work.

[The_Hittite]

how's this guy interact with Volcano Hellion? have never understood which layer supercedes which. Kinda want to do one million damage to a Mogg Maniac with an Emperion in play

"Platinum Emperion's ability doesn't prevent damage. Rather, it changes the results of that damage. For example, if a creature with lifelink deals damage to you, you won't lose any life, but its controller will still gain that much life. Similarly, if a creature you control with lifelink deals damage to another player, that player will lose life but you won't gain any life."

[TheGildedGoose]

I play it in Daretti, Scrap Savant Robots because it's a giant robot, but not once has it ever actually won me a game.

[EonAon]

This always felt like a good bad card. 8cc for a 8/8 body fine, the ability and the distance you have to go for mana means the ability kinda says your deck isnt tuned enough to have a better effect/threat.

[Wallycaine]

Pretty high on the list of "I slam this permanent and think I am safe and then die to an edge case."

1. commander damage
2. infect
3. infinite combo that can kill the creature (draw deck, walking ballista, etc.)

This card is functionally useless, just play better winconditions, but I can see some jank decks that might like it (e.g. that red polymorph that damages you) but usually a non-evasive 8/8 isn't enough to make those things work.

I do think that the one big upside this has over stuff like Platinum Angel is that it doesn't suffer from the "well we'll just keep killing you until we draw our removal", because it locks your life total in place until they do something about it. But that's probably still not worth 8 mana.

[pokken]

Pretty high on the list of "I slam this permanent and think I am safe and then die to an edge case."

1. commander damage
2. infect
3. infinite combo that can kill the creature (draw deck, walking ballista, etc.)

This card is functionally useless, just play better winconditions, but I can see some jank decks that might like it (e.g. that red polymorph that damages you) but usually a non-evasive 8/8 isn't enough to make those things work.

I do think that the one big upside this has over stuff like Platinum Angel is that it doesn't suffer from the "well we'll just keep killing you until we draw our removal", because it locks your life total in place until they do something about it. But that's probably still not worth 8 mana.

It varies a lot by power level I think since angel beats lab man effects and other win the game lose the game things, and infect and commander damage. But both are super risky in four player games. I think protect the queen is a safer strategy with angel but it sure sucks losing to krosan grip lol

[Ruiner]

I like Platinum Emperion in decks where I am unconcerned about the mana cost, whether that's a quick reanimate or a high amount of mana acceleration. It rarely is something you can rely on sticking around but it presents a roadblock people have to find a way around, which can buy some time in a slower gameplan kind of deck.

[Wallycaine]

Pretty high on the list of "I slam this permanent and think I am safe and then die to an edge case."

1. commander damage
2. infect
3. infinite combo that can kill the creature (draw deck, walking ballista, etc.)

This card is functionally useless, just play better winconditions, but I can see some jank decks that might like it (e.g. that red polymorph that damages you) but usually a non-evasive 8/8 isn't enough to make those things work.

I do think that the one big upside this has over stuff like Platinum Angel is that it doesn't suffer from the "well we'll just keep killing you until we draw our removal", because it locks your life total in place until they do something about it. But that's probably still not worth 8 mana.

It varies a lot by power level I think since angel beats lab man effects and other win the game lose the game things, and infect and commander damage. But both are super risky in four player games. I think protect the queen is a safer strategy with angel but it sure sucks losing to krosan grip lol

Yeah, I think Angel is the stronger effect if you can protect it, but there's at least an argument that this is a stronger "value" effect? Like, if you assume that someone is *going* to remove them at some point, then the Angel only really protects you from Lab Man and similar "win/lose the game" effects, since anything else that could kill you will make you instantly dead when the angel gets removed. On the other hand, while the Emperion is out, it shuts off life drain and combat damage against you for as long as you keep it alive, and once it dies, you're still at the same life total you were when you played it. So if you treat it less like Platinum Angel and more like a narrower Serra's Emissary, I can see some extra value in it. Still probably ended up overcosted, though.

[Igzex]

You gotta wonder how the Mirrans thought this would help them against the Phyrexians at all when the majority of Phyrexians killed through infect.

Even back in the day where the majority of Commander players were innocent and just played with really cool looking bomb cards this kinda didn't do anything.

[BeneTleilax]

A decent reanimation target I guess. It's not bad, it's just not good.

[hyalopterouslemur]

This can be used with Ad Nauseam, for what it's worth. But a lot of cards I want to use it with, I can't. (See Necropotence, Murderous Betrayal, Book of Rass.) It can essentially say Wound Reflection doesn't apply to me.

It is useful with Pestilence tho. Just remember to give it a sword or something.

[Mookie]

Platinum Emperion is a cool card, but I feel like it's not really worth running unless you have shenanigans planned. It functions somewhat similarly to Blazing Archon by making you mostly immune to damage, but that isn't really worth it by itself - there are a lot of ways to kill someone without dealing damage, and it's also somewhat vulnerable to removal. If you're cheating it out with reanimation or Madcap Experiment, it's a bit more exciting, but it's usually not going to be worth the eight mana to hardcast it.

....I've seen it used alongside Goblin Game more times than is probably healthy, so I suppose that's another use case.