Matt Fichtel - 12 April 2006 01:03 AM

i think this card has playability, the guy with the whole “when it CIP, put target creature on top of its owners library” 2/2 guy would be a great target for this, and he’s controlling enough… but this card is a limited bomb IMO.

I wouldn’t quite say it’s a bomb, but it’s not too bad in the late game.  As a limited game progresses, 90% of the time you want to top-deck a creature to break you out of the stalemate.  Aethermage’s Touch lets you find the best one coming up or gets rid of cards that would have been dead draws anyway.  It would suck if you lost your Hex or something, but if you need a creature for an out this is still not a terrible choice, since you often can’t afford to be that selective in Limited for card-drawing, combat-tricky things.  Incidentally, this would have been so much better if the cards went to your graveyard instead of back into your library.

Today’s preview card is underwhelming, but at least it’s a guildmage that’s not completely broken in Type 4.  But, like the Boros and Izzet Guildmages, it does nothing by itself.  I like the Azorius Guildmage the best so far, though I don’t think the Rakdos one has been spoiled yet.

I really hope Rakdos or unaligned Black in Dissension gets something cheap that lets you use your graveayrd as a resource (c.f. Cryptwailing, only good).  This would be a huge boon to Jin, Avatar of Discord, and the general Rakdos strategy.  I could see Mausoleum Turnkey working its way into a Rakdos deck, especially since he’s an Ogre, but there’s not much else besides Golgari Thug, Gravedigger, and Zombify at less that 4 mana.  Perhaps one or two Death Denied for mid game-recoup of card advantage?  It’s at least a sideboard idea.

And while I’m not particularly sad to see Zvi’s article go, I will still stand up in defense of the article he wrote about noticing your opponent’s play mistakes and exploiting them.  Especially in Limited, there are several times where I have won a game because I realized (or made an educated guess) that my opponent did not know how a card worked.  Yes, this should happen less with good players, but it still happens from time to time, and it helps to be able to notice it when it does happen.

Back to preview/spoiler cards:  has anyone seem the Stomphowler Indrik?  It was one of the first cards spoiled, and one about which I am particularly excited.  It’s like Viridian Shaman and Monk Idealist had a really ugly baby.  4G for a 4/4 Disenchant?  I’ll take four, please.

crystal seer just got a lot better in limited as well.

“Wasn’t our plan just to get to 900 life and f***’em?”

Coldsnap Sealed: who cares
Coldsnap Draft: who cares

I’m pretty happy about the simic guildmage. Yes, it’s by far the most narrow of all the guildmages - You really have to play around it, but remember, this is the G/U guild, THE johnny guild Enchantment alteration on a stick is nice (yeah Kitsune Mystic took too much effort, though I never actually tried the card). The Solifuge on Simic’s Team can be stupid good (with cloak that’s a 7/4 trample haster that can’t be targeted lol).

I hope it’s true that every snowflake is unique, because I never want to see one like this again.

could be stupid good, but probably wont. I just don’t see a deck around the guildmage and a solifuge turning into anything. This guy could be fun with faith’s fetters or pillory, but other than that he’s a little ‘lacking’. lets see what dissension brings to the table.

Love,
Matt

Standard: Ideal 31-7-8

I like guildmage with sinstriker’s will, instead of blocking, I’ll just shoot your whole team.

Kevin

“Wasn’t our plan just to get to 900 life and f***’em?”

Coldsnap Sealed: who cares
Coldsnap Draft: who cares

OMG… that’s quite amazing, Kevin… that along with Grasp/Strands/Fetters/Pillory should make the Simic Guildmage VERY playable in limited… I’d just love being able to move fetters/pillory at instant speed… Think about it… if they have a quasi-pacifism on one of your creatures it’s really easy to pop it onto one of your creatures that’s on its way to the graveyard. Same thing with your opponent’s creatures, if you find a better target just move the fetters over to their Autochthon Wurm if you need to… And that’s not even considering the possibly nuttiness with Bramble Elemental. 2UU: Put 2 Saps into play, sure I’ll take that…

---

Current Decks:
UG Aggro
Mono-Green Turbo-Allosaurus!
Mono-Red BURN

RGD Draft: 25-7-2
RGD Sealed: ***Censored***

Heck - go all the way with Bramble and the guild mage.  With two bramble elementals, a fist of iron wood and the simic guild mage you just bounce the fist between the bramble’s and generate 4 tokens each time you can pay 2 mana....(hm, add in doubling season to make it 8 tokens?  or try and get a coat of arms into play for some really super sized tokens? )

Spoiler card - not a preview
Cost 2WU - Grand Arbiter Augustin IV Legendary Creature - Human Advisor
White spells you play cost 1 less.
Blue spells you play cost 1 less.
Spells your opponents play cost 1 more.
Illus. Zoltan Boros & Gabor Szikszai
2/3

Legendary though - limits how much fun you could have with him (Unless you want to play Mirror Gallery so The ?legend rule? doesn?t apply get two or three of him out and maybe our freind the dust drinker......)

ibrac - 13 April 2006 04:20 AM

Heck - go all the way with Bramble and the guild mage.  With two bramble elementals, a fist of iron wood and the simic guild mage you just bounce the fist between the bramble’s and generate 4 tokens each time you can pay 2 mana....(hm, add in doubling season to make it 8 tokens?  or try and get a coat of arms into play for some really super sized tokens? )

This trick doesn’t work (well, not completely), since the Fists only give the extra saprolings when it actually comes into play.  You don’t get any more from moving it around that moving any other enchantment between two Bramble Elementals.

Augustine looks pretty interesting, but he’s too expensive to matter much.  Ok, so now it costs 2B to Gasp him?  Oh well, you tapped out turn 4 to play a card that did nothing, so now I will kill it and Castigate you while you’re tapped out.  If you play him with counter mana, his ability will hardly matter.  I hope Christian isn’t still holding out for good Azorius cards…

Yeah, Augustin is REALLY disappointing for me.  I thought for sure he’d have some cool control ability.  I don’t want to pay 1 colorless mana less for my spells--I want card advantage!  I’m hoping that maybe there will be an awesome U/W uncommon in the spirit of Lightning Helix, Mortify, and Putrefy.  Maybe it will say this on it:  UW, instant, counter target spell or return target creature to its owner’s hand.  Maybe the Azorious guild champion will be great.  Foresight definitely has potential.  I’m not giving up hope just yet!

Well, actually that kind of counterspell would be nice… except to fix it:

1UW
Instant
Counter target non-creature spell or put target creature on top of it’s owner’s library

Either way, I think Azorious could be interesting, especially when combined with the simic.

RGD Sealed Pariah’s Sheild(s) pulled: 17
RGD Sealed’s Played in: 16
(One was shiny...)

I like big creatures and I cannot lie
You other players can’t deny
That when a beast walks in with an itty bitty cost
And your blockers are all lost
You get removal!

Or the Dimir/Orzhov.  Ghost Council with counter backup seems good.

I’m seriously gonna try a REAL competitive style deck for once once they come out… I’ve been slowly workin’ on it since Guildpact…
It’ll be amazing when I actually come with a “real” deck
I just need a few duals (some dissention ones) and a few painlands, and I’ll be ready for the most part

RGD Sealed Pariah’s Sheild(s) pulled: 17
RGD Sealed’s Played in: 16
(One was shiny...)

I like big creatures and I cannot lie
You other players can’t deny
That when a beast walks in with an itty bitty cost
And your blockers are all lost
You get removal!

Well with Augustine you only need one extra blue open to Mana leak their 2B last gasp… or you can shoal something. W/U can take their time. Yes though, what U/W needs is good spells and maybe a good finisher (we already got that, it’s Windreaver) so yeah good spells, which we haven’t seen any yet of Azorius. Their mechanic looks like junk, however.

Hmm you guys seem disappointed overall quite a bit (Matt H/Christian). Any cards you’re excited for so far? As for best card revealed so far, my vote is probably Voidslime (close 2nd is Crime/Punishment). The card that most excites me is Rakdos. the Johnny it me likes it alot.

I hope it’s true that every snowflake is unique, because I never want to see one like this again.

I’m sort of excited for Infernal Tutor, but not in a good way.  It’s a good card, but I’m not really interested in playing games against it.  I don’t care if it never gets hellbent, it’s still pretty ridiculous.  And Voidslime isn’t very good compared to Hinder.  I’d almost rather play Rewind, too.  Honestly, in Standard, how often are you going to want to counter a trigger or activation and NOT THE ACTUAL SPELL MAKING IT?  I suspect it we be popular, but I don’t think it’s much more than a tough-to-cast hard counter that doesn’t even stop dredge.  I supose it will be the cheapest hard counter once Kami block goes away, at least until Hinder is reprinted in Tenth or (God forbid) Counterspell is in Time Spiral.