[mtgnexus] Random Card of the Day - Transmutation Font

[Guardman]

Seedborn Muse - Nothing more really needs to be said about it.

Graveborn Muse - Great zombie payoff. Though I've seen it win games. I've also seen it kill its owner thanks to how easy it is for zombies to go wide nowadays.

Dreamborn Muse - Alright. Okay mill card depending on your meta.

Windborn Muse - Once upon a time I could see this being run in pillowfort decks, but there are so many other attack taxing options nowadays.

Lavaborn Muse - This one never made sense to me. It was like they were thinking of adding discard into red at one point, but then pivoted before they did it and forgot to update Lavaborn Muse. It's a real shame as if it was the other way (i.e. deal 3 damage if opponent has six or more cards in hand), it would've at least been an interesting payoff in decks that like to play wheel effects.

[TheGildedGoose]

There's a big difference between "relevant" and "ends the game". No, you don't want to oblation some random Oracle of Mul Daya on turn 4, but if you're using it to disrupt a combo, remove a lethal attacker, or blow up something giga-dangerous, giving them 2 possibly-relevant cards is a pretty reasonable trade.

You gonna Oblate that Rhystic Study the skilled blue player is running in a pod with two idiots? Would you spend other removal on it? Outta here with that false dichotomy.

It does depend a bit on how lopsided the game is. If it's full archenemy against the target, then giving them 2 cards could be fairly bad since those 2 cards are actually worth 2 full-ish cards against you. If it's a reasonably balanced game, then it's a pretty minor downside, and they're worth less than a card (2 cards divided by 3 opponents = 2/3 of a card worth of downside - better than you get from a FoW).

This is a pretty bizarre comparison. Spending your worst blue card on FoW to stop a game ending play is a completely different situation than Oblating a game ending play and giving them two random cards.

rcane denial is extremely good. Probably second best counterspell in regular commander behind mana drain. Goes down a bit in rank in high-powered metas as tempo rules and FoW and friends become more valuable, but still very good.

Okay.

[Sinis]

I really like the Muse cycle. I've played all of them, but it comes as no surprise that I've played Green the most.

[Mookie]

Seedborn Muse is nuts. Yes, I would like to run a mana quadrupler (even if you only get the extra mana on your opponents' turns), plus it does other stuff.
I'm much lower on the others.
Windborn Muse is fine as a tax effect, but I don't value pillowfort effects that highly.
Graveborn Muse is cool in zombie decks, but black has simpler draw elsewhere.
Dreamborn Muse is (like Mesmeric Orb from a few days ago) often a group hug effect.
Lavaborn Muse is a slow clock for a 4-drop, assuming you can even make it trigger consistently.

I can see Windborn and Graveborn being played in some decks, and maybe Dreamborn in mill, but I'm not sure what decks would ever want Lavaborn. The only format I've seen it played is in 3CB, since it beats Mishra's Workshop + Ensnaring Bridge.

...it sort of bugs me how loosely these cards are linked. Four(ish) trigger on upkeeps, and one(ish) is a static effect (Seedborn Muse is a static effect that feels like an upkeep trigger). Three care about cards in hand. Three have two mana pips, two have just one pip. One of them costs five mana, the rest are four. One of them has a keyword. One of them has a second creature type.

[TheAmericanSpirit]

@Oblation I think it's great. Most people I know are pretty greedy about card advantage, so throwing two more on the pile is inconsequential in exchange for their scariest threat.

On the muses: I think they're all dated except Seedborn. Haven't seen one besides Seedborn played in ages either.

[DirkGently]

Green is obvious A-tier.

Black is interesting because it can potentially be a liability in a very heavy-zombie deck. The ideal situation might not be 20 zombies, but more like 5 zombies. And it's honestly not awful as a standalone card, phyrexian arena on a body for +1 mana (not that many people would actually want to play that in 2023, but I liked it in that role in 2009). Probably doesn't go into every zombie deck, but it's overall a pretty solid card. B.

White is paying an extra mana for a Ghostly Prison to get a body. Ghostly prison is still okay, but I'd much rather have it on an enchantment so I can play wipes without weakening my defenses. Not awful if you really want redundancy but it's a bit outclassed these days. C.

Blue is pretty strong, it's just very niche. If you're playing a mill deck with a lot of forced draw, you can shred libraries fairly quickly with her. The main problem is that "mill deck with a lot of force draw" sounds really really bad as a way to win across turns. C- I guess?

Red just doesn't really do anything. Commander life totals, commander penchant for draw, both these things work strongly against it in this format. Plus it just hasn't aged well and it doesn't fit well into red. Pretty F-tier.

You gonna Oblate that Rhystic Study the skilled blue player is running in a pod with two idiots? Would you spend other removal on it? Outta here with that false dichotomy.

I'm not really sure what you're saying. As I said already, in very lopsided games it can become worse, for essentially the same reason it's not very good in 1v1. If you're playing a game with 2 non-players and one dangerous opponent, giving that opponent 2 cards would be a significant downside compared to a game where all your opponents are on roughly the same playing field.

Rhystic study kinda falls into a similar space as my oracle example - oblation isn't great as a way to destroy early value-generation, it's more of a wincon-killer. Personally I think it's rarely worth using removal on early value generation...ofc a rhystic study in a game where the controller is a threat and the other two players are morons is kind of a worst-case-scenario where it's probably worth it, but I'd usually try to avoid that sort of game in the first place.

This is a pretty bizarre comparison. Spending your worst blue card on FoW to stop a game ending play is a completely different situation than Oblating a game ending play and giving them two random cards.

In 1v1, sure, I'd probably rather lose one card than give them two. Although it's certainly worth noting that you can't typically discard a land to FoW, whereas the odds are good that they'll draw at least one likely-irrelevant land when you cast oblation on their wincon, so it's often more of a 1:1 ratio of "real" cards. But ofc the bigger difference is that we're not usually playing 1v1, so giving a single opponent a card or two is a much smaller penalty. That's why I'd say FoW has a worse overall CA penalty than oblation (ofc oblation costs mana whereas FoW is free, though removal does have a lot of last-mover advantages that counterspells don't so it's not quite a fair comparison).

[onering]

Graveborn can be pretty great in certain decks. Yeah, zombie decks are going to draw a ton of cards from it, and only maybe kill themselves (there's plenty of sac effects to just get rid of it when it becomes a liability, so its not really much of a worry). It's also good in decks where you are likely to have one or two other zombies that aren't necessarily zombie tribal. Primarily I'm thinking commanders that just happen to be zombies, like Daxos the Returned, so when you have it out with your commander it draws you two every turn, which is still pretty good and losing 2 life is still negligible. Then, if you randomly have another zombie, and there are a decent number of zombies that are just generically good or which fit with non tribal strategies, its three per turn for just a bolt to the face. Venser, Corpse Puppet has made good use of it for me. I drew it a couple of times so far, and it was drawing me 2-4 cards per turn, and Venser isn't a zombie tribal deck but a poison/proliferate deck, its just that Venser is a zombie and cheap, and a number of phyrexians with poison or proliferate happen to be zombies.

[3drinks]

Tuesday, March 21st, 2023; Merciless Eviction

This is largely but not completely outclassed by Farewell these days, yeah? But I remember how big of a deal this was when it first came out.

[Sinis]

This is largely but not completely outclassed by Farewell these days, yeah? But I remember how big of a deal this was when it first came out.

I think you're right; it is outclassed by Farewell... but, I think it's possible a deck wants to play Farewell and Merciless Eviction. Also, Walkers tend to be overwhelming when numerous... Eviction still has a very steady place, I think.

[Mookie]

Merciless Eviction is one of my favorite board wipes in the format. It's flexible enough to hit any nonland card type, plus it exiles. There are very few problematic board states that it isn't able to solve. It is generally outclassed by Farewell, but not strictly - planeswalkers can be a challenging card type to deal with, particularly in multiples, so it definitely has its uses. Plus it's significantly more budget-friendly, since Farewell is sort of expensive (I'm hoping for a reprint soon).

....would I run both if given the option? Eh, maybe. Six mana is a bit expensive for a board wipe, and I'm not sure how many games will need more than one nuclear option. Could be worth consideration in more controlling decks though.

[TheGildedGoose]

Is there a merciful eviction?

[folding_music]

"skilled blue player with two idiots" the way commander players discuss commander just keeps getting more appealing, wow =P

[PrimevalCommander]

I don't think I have ever cast Merciless Eviction, mainly because my only regular deck with BW is Karador, Ghost Chieftain and I found False Prophet to be better overall. I didn't want too much mass exile in my graveyard deck.

Otherwise it looks really good. I have started seeing more and more decks leaning heavily into artifacts and/or enchantments, and having a wipe that can hit those really helps with flexibility. Solid wipe that I would play more if I had another deck in it's colors.

[TheGildedGoose]

"skilled blue player with two idiots" the way commander players discuss commander just keeps getting more appealing, wow =P

You're telling me you've never played in a pod with a Rhystic Study the other two players never paid for? You're put in the impossible situation of either paying the 1 and being set further behind, or not paying the 1 and propelling the Studyer even farther ahead. Pretty frustrating.

[Dunadain]

"skilled blue player with two idiots" the way commander players discuss commander just keeps getting more appealing, wow =P

You're telling me you've never played in a pod with a Rhystic Study the other two players never paid for? You're put in the impossible situation of either paying the 1 and being set further behind, or not paying the 1 and propelling the Studyer even farther ahead. Pretty frustrating.

I firmly believe both Expropriate and Rhystic Study aren't actually that good in a perfect game. Just always pay the one and always vote for money. Unfortunately, we don't play perfect games.

Don't get me wrong, a one sided Thorn of Amethyst and Time Walk + 3 Dominate's stapled together are both strong, but not nearly as strong as Rhystic Study and Expropriate play out to be because my opponents are all smooth brained.

(Though I hard disagree with Gilded Goose's evaluation on Oblation, I'm actually kind of confused how this is relevant to that conversation at all).

[folding_music]

not as frustrating as having to play a game with people who think yr an idiot for not playing like them!

[TheGildedGoose]

not as frustrating as having to play a game with people who think yr an idiot for not playing like them!

Fair enough. I just want to note that I'm polite and jovial during games, but internally I am screaming. This extends to all of the time.

[pokken]

Mostly superseded by Farewell but still pretty solid. I've seen the planeswalkers mode used a time or two, but definitely the exception. And I've seen not being able to get multiple categories be a real issue. That said, it's very nice because you can be fairly targeted too.

6 mana wipe-everythings are pretty niche these days, but man exiling everything can be *really* good when it's good.

[3drinks]

Wednesday, March 22nd, 2023; Stoic Angel

Exalted plant. I miss the days of exalted being a cool ability. Nowadays we got cyberpunk-esque monkies generating mana and CA for almost no mana.

I like that she kinda looks like Elspeth.

[Hawk]

Love the design of this card as a great payoff for Angel tribal and for Exalted tribal. Being 4MV in three colors makes her naturally very niche - a long long time ago when Rafiq of the Many was THE Bant Commander, she was seen often but I haven't seen her on a table in ages now since every Bant deck I run into is Arcades, the Strategist, Chulane, Teller of Tales, or Tuvasa the Sunlit and she isn't nearly as great in those shells.

[TheAmericanSpirit]

I have always liked this card. Way back, I tried to make a 60 card deck around this and Lightning Angel.

[Mookie]

Stoic Angel looks fine - 3/4 flying vigilance for four mana are good baseline stats. The secondary ability is a bit niche, but can be good against go-wide strategies or decks dependent on mana dorks. The obvious synergy is in exalted decks (so... Rafiq of the Many), but could also be interesting if you're running Derevi, Empyrial Tactician or other ways to tap down your opponents, or if you have Seedborn Muse / Quest for Renewal to untap your stuff.

That said, Bant decks have a lot of competition for creature slots, so it seems somewhat difficult to find a card slot for a weak stax effect like this. The base body does make it a lot easier to justify including though - I wouldn't run this if it were just an enchantment, but if you're already in the market for an angel with upside, this looks reasonable.

[Sinis]

I like how Stoic Angel is just Smoke with wings.

[TheAmericanSpirit]

I like how Stoic Angel is just Smoke with wings.

This almost reads like some crazy shortform poem if you remove the context.

[3drinks]

Thursday, March 23rd, 2023; Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon