We Pay The Teller Off In Gold

Hey folks, had a couple of follow up thoughts from the previous post, plus some observations from the first couple of days of this set.

Invasion of Azgol is awesome. My first experience with it is casting it on turn three and my opponent immediately conceding. It's not going to be that good all the time, but for a two mana card, the amount of power it has is pretty incredible. High ceiling, high floor, doesn't take a ton of work to pull it off. I think that you should play four if you have an aggressive slanted Jund or Rakdos deck.

I'm not 100% sure how to build around it yet. I haven't been that impressed with Grim Flayer in Explorer, at least not as much as I have been in Pioneer. The short answer is that there are more Bonecrusher Giants in Explorer, the long answer is that Pioneer is a format where games are less about value battles and more about setting up engines, and in that case, Grim Flayer is great at finding the tool you need to break up an opposing engine, but not great at actually giving you value, and not great at not getting beat up value-wise by Bonecrusher. The idea was that a four-power creature is perfect for attacking the Invasion, and that's true. However, while the perfect four-power 2 drop may not exist, things like Bonecrusher itself has been excellent at flipping battles, as has Evolved Sleeper alongside any other creature on turn 2. I've been playing about 10 or 11 copies total of Scavenging Ooze, Canterbloom, and Bloodtithe Harvester. I am also wondering if there's a way to make Chevill work alongside Invasion, but that's a post for another time. Also, maybe Reckoner Bankbuster? Or Heart of Kiran?

Invasion of Ikoria has been sweet in Modern. It's not changing the world or anything, but having a big gigantic creature for four mana that completely dominates a board and closes the game quickly is a great ability to have, especially because the Invasion itself is a flexible card you can do other stuff with. I think the hatebear toolbox aspect of Invasion of Ikoria isn't really what I'd hoped it would be, because the best stuff in Modern doesn't usually get absolutely hosed by a single creature. That said, a couple singleton Dauthi Voidwalker and stuff like that in the board isn't the worst idea ever. What has been as good as I'd hoped, or maybe better, is Zilortha just dominating the game when it comes down. Plus, there's other flexibility outside of the hate bear aspect, like finding a Dryad Arbor, or a Ragavan, or just going after a Tarmogoyf if it looks like you can flip the battle.

Outside of that, nothing too much to report, other than that Deeproot Wayfinder has potential and is not a bust. I haven't had a chance to try it myself, but I have seen some lists online that have done well with it in Modern and Legacy. Now, there are also a couple of cards that I didn't mention in the previous post that I'd like to go over.

Sheoldred is likely to find a place as a sideboard slot in decks where you're looking for a good five mana card as a midrange hammer, but are trying to cover a wider range of decks. Glorybringer has its applications, as does Elder Gargaroth, Angrath, Lolth the Spider Queen, etc. I also like The Eldest Reborn, especially when I'm playing Jegantha. In non-Jegantha decks, I wouldn't be surprised if Sheoldred was just the best thing going in that slot. It has a certain amount of immediacy that we're looking for, like a Planeswalker or Glorybringer does, but also has the ability to take over a game if you untap with it like Gargaroth does. Eight cards in the graveyard isn't a gimme, but in the late game it should be fairly likely to happen, and 4/5 menace is a great stat line.

One of the problems I run into every time I try and tune this deck is that I have a hard time figuring out which three-drop cards I want to play. Liliana, Riveteers Charm, Fable of the Mirror Breaker, Kolaghan's Command, those are some of the best, but I also really miss playing stuff like Inscription of Ruin, Murderous Rider, Courser of Kruphix, and Briarbridge Tracker. Tons of options at that slot, and they all have their merits. What interests me about Nahiri's Warcrafting is that you can cast it on curve as a removal spell just fine, but it scales up nicely later in the game. So, in reality it's a four drop, in the same way that Courser is, except you can cast it early if you want to. Shoot your creature, find a land, make my land drop for free, that's a fine turn four. However, you also have the ability to wait until even later and start digging for action. On six mana, Warcrafting a creature and finding something like a Fable or even just some two-drop creature, now we are cooking. So you get all this flexibility baked into a card that's just sorcery-speed Hero's Downfall, plus you can pop off your own battle if you have nothing else going on. I think there's potential here, a low-risk/high-reward card that can smooth out the top end of the curve. I'm currently playing a Jegantha build, but if that changes, then I think this is worth a slot or two. Also, it was like 30 cents, so I spec bought 58 copies. I hope they're good!

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That's it for today. I think the thing I'm most excited about actually is the Invasion of Ikoria in Modern, that seems sweet. This point in the baby's life is not ideal for Magic content creation, but she'll be more independent soon. Thanks for reading.

Just Might Be Your Kind Of Zoo

March of the Machine spoilers are up, and there are a few cards to go over. Admittedly, since the baby was born I haven't had a ton of time to play. It feels like Brother's War just came out, and that was two sets ago now. But, this set has a lot of stuff that if not powerful, or that good, is at least intriguing. And wordy.

In Explorer, this excites me a lot as far as the battles go. The reason is that the front side is a solid enough card by itself. I don't think we would play Cruel Edict if given the chance, or Cruel Edict plus Planeswalkers. Jund in Explorer, though, is in the market for everything going on here. We want a removal spell, we want it to be versatile, we are okay with trading damage for a little card advantage, and we're into having a cheap creature that's small enough that you don't have to put a lot of resources into it but big enough that you can't exactly ignore it. Ashen Reaper is a real enough threat if it stays on the board long enough. The reason that this battle in particular seems good to me, in Explorer Jund, is that we might be on board for a free creature if we gift our opponent four life, we also might not be depending on the context of the game, and Invasion of Azgol lets you decide that for yourself. You've got the removal spell part of the card done, which is a perfectly fine outcome, you can try to get the full value if you want, or you might choose not to.

Battles seem like they are going to be hit or miss, since what the card does has a lot to do with how it's going to play out. I remember when Lorwyn came out and the debate about whether Planeswalkers were good or not, and it turns out that they are all contextual. Similarly to Planeswalkers, what makes them hard to evaluate is the amount of options they give you, not just the abilities written on the card, but the plays you make in-game to protect a planeswalker or to flip a battle.

You also want to have flipping battles in mind when you construct your deck, both for yourself and your opponent. In order to maximize Invasion of Azgol, or maybe to give ourselves the most options, creatures that can flip it by themselves turn into a priority. New Explorer addition Grim Flayer comes to mind, as does Voltaic Brawler, Bonecrusher Giant, Migloz, Sheoldred, stuff like that. Also stuff like Kolaghan's Command and Stomp can finish off an Invasion of Azgol that a Kiki Jiki token or an early Evolved Sleeper got a hit on. A huge Package Theory situation. Also, we want to keep the board clear to avoid our opponents being able to cast a battle and flip it on us, so cheap removal and being up-tempo might be critical in the coming format, if more battles become popular.

Finally, what's nice about Invasion of Azgol, and why not only do I like it but I like it as a four-of, is that it works so well with itself. Invasion's trigger can remove a blocker, allowing you to get in and flip the battle. Ashen Reaper is a creature that itself can quickly get up to four power and has evasion, so it's excellent at flipping future drawn copies of Invasion of Azgol. I think initially I'm going to play four copies of this to try it out.

Similarly to that last thought on Invasion of Azgol, Kyren Flamewright looks like it's really good at flipping battles as well, if we're going to go down that road. It also is a nice synergy piece with Grim Flayer, in that it helps get delirium both by being another card type and by filling the yard, so there might be something there. If you want to just be The Battle Deck, this card is probably in there.

Out of the battles, this is the only other one that looks appealing to me in Explorer Jund. It's definitely more of a setup-payoff kind of card than Invasion of Azgol, becuase four mana Murder is just not good enough. Also, the difference between needing five damage and four is huge, especially if you're planning on having four-power creatures to flip your other battles. The flipped card is just a monster, though. It's like Esika's Chariot plus a mana sink plus a removal spell and incidental graveyard hate. I'm not sure how consistently this can go off, but if it's consistent at all, it seems like a powerful top end for Explorer.

I don't have super duper high hopes for Deeproot Wayfiner, and a lot of that is because it probably doesn't go in the Invasion of Azgol deck, but this thing is solid, especially in a deck that incidentally puts lands into the bin. And by solid, like, I mean, one hit with this on turn three is going to be winning games fairly often, not immediately but down the road. And while it's not especially good at flipping battles, it does trigger even if you're attacking one, and is a cheap creature that wants to be played alongside cheap removal, just like battles would like you to do. Not sure it will make any decklist in Explorer, but I'm eager to try it, if only because I think it's been criticized quite a bit by some notable people. Or maybe those people are right and I just can't get over my disbelief that a card this pushed isn't good. Either way, worth a shot.

I don't think this is good enough for Explorer, but what's worth focusing on isn't the abilities, necessarily, it's the numbers. This card has (pretty much) the same play pattern as Jace, Architect of Thought. Four loyalty, +1 to play some defense, -2 to gain some value. You start by using the -2, if it survives until your next turn, you +1 and spend your turn setting up to defend it, then you -2 again the next turn for more value, rinse and repeat one time and you've drawn three cards and played some defense and fixed your mana. A planeswalker that has +1 defend itself and -2 gain a semi-large piece of value turns out to work nicely. I'm just not sure that a card like this that doesn't put anything tangible on the board the turn it enters play is good enough to see play. Three mana, four loyalty, +1, -2, those are the things I like about this card, the actual ability effects are just probably not going to be useful enough.

A pretty good removal spell. Compare to something like Vraska's Contempt and Eat to Extinction, and it's a little bit worse at face value because of "destroy" vs "exile", but okay. This will probably work nicely if you're expecting to be blocking, where you can use the convoke after blockers and before damage on their biggest unblocked creature. Surveil 2 is no joke. It looks great if you can depend on having creatures in play to convoke it, Explorer Jund kind of can't.

Every once in a while I try and go way up the mana curve for a sideboard midrange hammer card. Usually that means something like Casualties of War or Chandra, Awakened Inferno. In Jegantha decks it's usually Garruk, Cursed Huntsman. Kogla and Yidaro could take that spot in a non-Jegantha deck. 7/7 Nekrataal is pretty nice, as is just trample and haste to either go face or hit a planeswalker (or battle). But the backup ability of being an uncounterable Slice in Twain is really nice too. Lots of the decks you'll want to bring this in for will have incidental stuff it can hit, like Fable of course, but also Portable Hole, Leyline Binding, stuff like that, not to mention the Enigmatic Incarnation deck. I've actually like Jegantha lately, and six mana hammers aren't always the thing to be doing, but it could be worth a shot in specific instances. I don't think it's the most powerful card for that slot, but it might be the one that gives you the most options while still being very powerful.

So you've probably heard that the trick with Invasion of Ikoria is that in Modern (or Legacy I guess), you can cast it for 2 and go fetch Vampire Hexmage and get a Thorn Elemental. Seems cool, but is four mana Thorn Elemental really that good? Well, yeah it kind of is. Murktide Regent isn't that powerful of a card compared to Ulamog and Primeval Titan and Ad Nauseam and whatever, but the reason it's good is that it goes in a deck that is just playing a normal game until you cast it. This combo is the same way, you can just cast Thoughtseizes and Fatal Pushes and Tarmogoyfs and then when you hit four mana, you get Thorn Elemental. Also, note how it makes all your creatures Thorn Elemental too, so it busts through a board stall if you have a couple of Goyfs in play holding down the fort.

What makes it most exciting to me is that plan A of flipping the battle is solid enough, but you've got a ton of cool plays you can make with the Invasion to fetch up silver bullets, and in Modern that's a big deal. Finale of Devastation doesn't make your Jund deck in Modern just to fetch Collector Ouphe, but if you could just cast it for X=2 and get 8/8 reach unblockable, it probably would. Even just fetching a Tarmogoyf and having the battle later to flip can work out. A singleton Dryad Arbor can turn a double Invasion hand into a turn three Zilortha fairly easily, and there are plenty of awesome hate piece creatures you can put singles of in your board and have five copies when the time is right. Maybe play one Godless Shrine and then stuff like Gaddock Teeg, Leonin Arbiter, whatever else you might want. Plus if you draw the Hexmage, it's not like it's that bad of a card. I think it's the closest thing Jund is going to get to Natural Order in Modern, which is to say, the ability to do something a little beyond fair Magic, something that's maybe not on-theme but isn't specifically off-theme and adds an extra element to the deck.

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So there's that. My two cards I'm most excited about are Invasion of Azgol in Explorer and Invasion of Ikoria in Modern. I'm finding that it's not that feasible to climb the ladder with a two month old in the house, since it's hard to have a win rate that can overcome having to close the program and go put out a fire or whatever every few games. But I'll get some games in and come back with a list at some point for Explorer, and maybe the same in Modern. Thanks for reading.