Lorwyn Eclipsed - Cube Set Review P1

We're back in a Magic set!!!! This is part 1 of our cube set review for Lorwyn Eclipsed. In this episode we cover White, Blue and Black.

Timecodes:
2:21 - Mechanics
9:19 - White
33:44 - Blue
57:38 - Black

Video Version: https://youtu.be/3WcYIIijOqM

Card Gallery: https://moxfield.com/decks/OY90G_xjZE2tLvkhk9L-5Q

My Cube: https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/sweet
The Treat Yourself Cube: https://cubecobra.com/cube/overview/treatyourself
James Cube: https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/ba642a54-a6c7-4587-b97e-1d95429c59b5
MTGO Vintage Cube: https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/modovintage

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Chapters

• 2:21 Mechanics
• 9:19 White
• 33:44 Blue
• 57:38 Black

Transcript

0:03

Hello everyone. Welcome back to Powerful Nothing and Magic The Gathering Cube podcast. I'm your host, Dan, and as always, I'm joined by James James. We're back with an actual magic set. It feels good. How are you doing today? Oh, we are so back. New year, new set is real magic cards. A really cool plane. I'm hyped for it, man. Yeah, this is going to be a fun one. There's a lot of cool cards for us to get through today. So yeah. So we're back in Lauren, 19 years after we were first there seems longer than I thought it was, but it's nice to be back in a recognizable environment. We have a ton of cool cards to get through today, and in our next episode. The goal for today is we're going to be going through white, blue and black cards. And then next week we're going be going through red, green, multicolored and some lands. There will be time codes below if you want to jump around. Also, if you listen to the audio version of this episode, there will be a card gallery down in the show notes below. If you want to see the cards that we're talking about from the set, and also any cards that we mentioned in reference, we'll try and read them out where relevant, but if there's some shorthand, there'll be images in the show notes below if you want to have a nice look at them as well. James, I know that Lauren was before you started playing magic, but you played commander, you played Gabe. There's a ton of cool cards from the original seconds. Like, what's your memories of Lauren or your impressions of the original set? Yeah, if you have a ritual. Lauren always looks super cool to me at seventh. I think I've done one Lauren draft lifetime. So thanks for that drop for that. It's not big, but the cards. Oh, I think that's a lot of really cool cards I really like about original low and pop that has a very distinctive art style, which I think is, which I think is really cool. And it there's not many planes where like, you can look at a card and be like, oh, that's a low wing card. Even if it if even if it's not a picture of a very distinct like character or whatever, it sort of has quite a distinctive art sign. I think that's really cool. And that comes across in a bunch of new cards as well. So yeah. I'm, I'm hyped to go back to Lo, and I think this looks very cool. No. Exactly. Yeah. The original set had a ton of cool cars and cool mechanics that kind of still see a lot of Q play, and there's a lot of images to some of those cards in this set, but we're going to be chatting, art, chatting about in our episodes. And one thing we should mention before we jump in is that in terms of sets, Lauren Eclipsed is sort of a parasitic set. There's a ton of cool Q cards. We had to have more than normal to talk about over the next episodes. There's a ton of cool cards that we like, but when I say parasitic, I mean that similar to avatar, there's a bunch of cards that work well within the set, but won't transition well to generic cubes. Like specifically, I'm talking about things like creature type matters and minus one minus one counters when you're running creature type matters cards, it's normally that the cube itself is doing a bunch of creature dark matter stuff. Like. Like you might have goblins in red. You might have elves in green, you might have merfolk in, in blue, that kind of thing. There's a bunch of cool cards for those specific decks, which only really go in those homes. Like there's a bunch of goblin cards, and elf guys only really work if you have those specific decks, so we might not touch on all of those. We'll try and keep it on ones that kind of can go in any cube that is running a specific creature that matters, like archetype across the whole thing. Basically, because in larger cubes, in more generically powerful cubes, we tend to not see specifically, your type matters appear that much. And would you go along with that? James. Yeah, for sure. I think the thing is for for type payoff stuff is that it's, it can't really be a light touch, you know, if, if you're doing it in your cube, you kind of have to commit to it because you need that critical mass of the, of the appropriate type for it to barely stop functioning. That being said, if if you are supporting that in your cube, it can be cool. And there's, there's a lot of stuff for you in a set for sure. Specifically, I like to play with changelings. So changelings obviously cards that have all feature types. I think those are very, very important. If you're doing feature type massive cubes because, you need pivot cards in the draft, right? You need enough cards that go in multiple different archetypes. The, the drafts can get really, really boring if you just end up with a scenario where you have to pick your lane very, very early and just commit to it because none of you know all your cards 70 work in one deck. They anyone who drafted like excellent is is familiar with this experience. Right. And and change things gives you that ability to pivot between decks which is really important and there and like there's quite a small pool of preexisting changelings. If you're doing it in your cube, you'll probably have sort of been scraping that barrel a little bit, you know? So, so getting a few more on this set, I think will be very welcome. But ice cubes? No, exactly. I think the other limited environment I wanted to just like mentioned along with Zan is Bloom. Burrow. That was a real like on the rails, like draft environment and like for me, yeah, the changelings really help smooth over all the cracks and help you get enough bits without having to get specific. And three, that kind of stuff like that. I think changelings work really well for this limited ride, and there's a bunch of changelings in this set that we're probably not gonna touch on in too much detail, because you'll know if you want them. The, finally, the main creature type matters archetype I've seen work in kind of generic cubes is humans, but there's famously no humans on Morrowind, so we don't get too much of that archetype here. The other one that the other mechanic in the set that that is a little bit parasitic, as it were, is minus one minus one counters outside of Amon Cat and original Lauren Block, there haven't been too many archetypes and decks that have kind of come out from minus one minus one times. So we have a bunch of cool black gods talk about. They're going to be more self-contained than the minus one minus one strategy, as it were. Yeah, for sure. For sure. There's, I guess there's a little bit of crossover with, if you're doing sort of persist stuff in your cube valve contracts with minus one minus one counters, that's maybe something that you, get to listen to our episode from a couple of weeks ago. But yeah, in general, that's a mechanic that is pretty confined to this set. And, there are definitely cards which are asking you to commit to that as a theme. And that's probably not happening in ice cubes. No, exactly. And yeah, one reason we wanted to flag the creature type matters cards in the minus one minus one count as matters card specifically is because when we do these set reviews, we try and talk about cards that go in a wider range of cubes as possible. And it's always important to remember that we are comparing every card in this set to every card that has ever come before it. So if we don't mention the card, that doesn't mean that is bad and you're bad for running it. It means that we don't think it's going to find place in a wide variety of cubes. Also, when we talk about cards will generally talk about them in terms of what cube they might go into. And when we do that, that's normally with things like power level restrictions and size. So for power level, we're basically trying to describe the pool of cards that the rest of the cube is picked from. So like an entry level cube or like a beginner cube or like someone's first cube, we might described as low powered or budget. There's a lot of cool cards that you might run, but generally these cubes are looking for fun games rather than doing broken things really quickly. Think of these as somewhere between a regular set draft and like a master set, you then tend to have your mid powered cubes. In these, the games are getting a little faster, there's better fixing, and you'll start seeing more staples from lots of formats. So cause like lightning bolt and counter spells and maybe fetch lands previously these might be known as standard modern or legacy cubes. These cubes are still a little slower. You have time to do more of an engine and build more of a mid-range game plan. And then you have the real high powered cubes. They're generally environments that are optimized to run the best cards possible. In these, the games are powerful and the decks need to be more focused, and you have to be doing a thing. The best example of high powered cubes are the mid go Vintage Cube or the arena powered cube. Me and James also have cubes like James has a full powered vintage cube. I have two cubes like I keep up to date. I have a unpowered vintage cube, slightly less powerful than that, and I have a slower treat yourself cube, which is more midrange. You do fun things, so if you mention cards for those cubes, that's kind of what we're talking about. In terms of restrictions, the most common you find are proper, which is a cube using only commons, and peasant, which is a cube using only uncommon. So if we say this card is good in pauper, it means it's good in an environment where all the cards in the cube are commons. And then if we mention size, the general idea here is that the smaller the cube is the average, the card quality is higher. Like in a 360 cube, for example. For a card to get in there, it has to be super focused and super efficient. Whereas in larger cubes, like a 540 or a 720, there is room for less optimal bits and you're often looking for duplicates of effects. So if we say a card could see play in a 720 cube, it probably means there's a card that exists that does that affect may be better, but if we want a second version of that effect, that's where we could consider running this card. All right. So with all that preamble out of the way, let's talk about some awesome magic cards. James, don't take it away with our first white card of the day. Yeah for sure. So first up we have a deck to water shaper. This is two in a white for a three for creature. Merfolk cleric. And there it says of attacked creatures you control have indestructible. So first thing to say about this really good stats like free mana freefall, very, very solid. Especially in white by bats. And that's the sort of stat line we're more used to seeing out of a green free drop. So really good body. The ability is solid. It's, if you're on the front foot and they can't remove fish, this is going to be very annoying for them. It means they they're not gonna be able to kill your creatures in combat. If I do find removal spell upkeep. The first removal spell is going this, the majority of the time. But they can also kill you other creatures with removal and that untapped. So not a huge deal for that. Can be annoying in combat. Free on the front foot. Having said that doesn't do that much when you're behind as an ability, but I guess at least the, the body as well suited for blocked. And it we're fine, though it is possible to get to use that ability a little more on blocks if you have some vehicles because like you obviously tap your creatures outside of combat. Right? You can line up some blocks. The way crew works, you can crew a vehicle that is already crewed if you want to. You can also over crew a play call. It does just let you tap your creatures whenever you want to. So you could line up a bunch of blocks and tap all your features. They become indestructible. That's something. I guess the reason I think fish probably won't see play in tons of cubes is just it's a bit hard to see where it fits. Because obviously it needs to go in a creature heavy attack. If you're just looking for a free drop for a generic wipe down deck, this is very decent. But there are better ones, right? It's not. I think this is sort of absolutely tier one because, a lot of there's a lot of good ones that do something on the way in but leave you a bit of value. And the ones that don't add things like Adaline. Right. Which is just some more snowball D cards. And this is, and that's fine. Right? Not every cube is just looking to play for most powerful cards, but for ones that aren't generally looking for cards that have this specific synergy in a specific off type side, which this kind of doesn't, it's kind of just a generic like, good to have creature sort of card. So I think the lack of a solid, natural synergistic home might, might limit how often bases play. But if it's a card that appeals to you, like put it in your cube and it will be very solid I think. Yeah, I agree. Yeah, I think it's a very fine, fine magic card. Yeah. The vehicles part is very nice. I think that the other ones I had with were in theory, you could like tap a man, a dork after blocks, or like a merfolk lute or something like that. Like there is a bit of play there on defense. And like, I, I think the fact that it can be offensive and defensive to an extent, I think is quite nice. Like the way I was looking at this is I felt like this this is like a dolphin gate style of card, like I called the Gibbs, attack, which is indestructible so we can swing through forever for free. But this is actually playable in cube because Dolans gate is a great command card, but it doesn't attack or block. It does nothing by itself. Like there's a, I think a God from. Was this like a two color guard that kind of eventually will get turned on, but not really in limited. That is also more of a command card. So it's like so this is more if you want a dolphin gate style of effect. This is one you can actually running cube. Again I agree with you. I think it's interesting. I think it's yeah. Not one for the most efficient cubes because you're correct, it doesn't have an ATB and it doesn't snowball. And when you the game which a lot of the white three drops that are good do but follow it up. But about cubes I think this is a fine card. Yeah for sure. I guess you could theoretically like find a way to tap all your creatures and then barf. And that's something, that as well. Yeah. But the the issue is going to be like the that and this card wanted to go in generally very different decks. Right. This wants to go into all like 17 creature attack. And that decks is not what that have got. So yeah it might be a little bit tough to get that working. I guess it is a of like like as you mentioned, I'm not going too deep on the merfolk specific cards in this set, but merfolk like in this. Anyway, merfolk is like a white blue. I know in next land it was, green blue. But if you're pushing merfolk then it is a decent merfolk at three, so that is possibly more of a flex it. Yeah, true. All right. We have our planeswalker for the set. I love that we only get one now. A Johnny Outland chaperon. It is one white wait for a three, starting loyalty legendary planeswalker a Johnny. And as a plus one, I've create A11 green and white kitchen creature token as a minus two of a Johnny deals for damage to target tapped creature and a minus eight of. Look at the top cards of your library, where X is your life total. You may put any number of non land permanent cards with mana value three or less from among them onto the battlefield, then shuffle. So I. I quite like this a Johnny, and partly because I don't think it's super strong like this feels like a planeswalker from a decade ago. Like before they all had static abilities or made a token and then flipped and then won the game really easily. Like it comes in, it protects itself. On the uptick. The removal is the downtick removes something pesky. The ultimate wins you the game. Like I quite like that. There aren't also that many three mana white plains walkers. Like, this is the best, I thought. Like, oh, there's a few guardians that are fine, but I think this is probably generically the best white three drop planeswalker now. Yeah, this one is a game breaking. I don't think it belongs in the vintage power group, but in budget cubes and in silver cubes, this will feel strong because it is a three mana planeswalker, but I like the fact that this feels that this feels nice and cool and fair and will be a solid, and yet it will be solid because it is a three mana planeswalker. That will be fine enough, I think. Yeah, no, I not this great king card. I don't know what back breaking a Johnny, but still a cool card. I'm kind of. I would be fine running this in, like, a lot about Gabe. Yeah, I mean, a Johnny in a Castle fire is the best card magic. I mean, it's, It's hard to be the best. Johnny. Yeah. No, I think this is. I think this is cool. I think for a free mana planeswalker plus to make A11 minus to conditionally kill something is about where these cards should end up, right? I quite like this. In one specific home. I think there's a lot of cubes, you see. Have some sort of white base token scheme. Right. And, one of the issues I think those decks can fall into is that because a lot of the token makers are quite aggressive, often people try and put in a white base token synergy deck, but it actually ends up just being a like beat down deck, right. And people tend to end up leaning into that token synergy stuff that, that, well, this is a repeatable way to make a token which isn't super aggressive but is like pretty competitively casted and, can help keep you alive. And that, I think, is good. If you want people to do a bit more of be slower, go white, generate a bunch of tokens, generate a bunch of value stuff. So I think, I think this does have quite a nice home in that way. Without. Yeah, without being like a super busted card. I think it is fine. I don't think you're getting for minus eight very often. If you. But I guess it could come up. But yeah, I think the, the plus one, the minus two if I, if this is ultimate in it's more because like something else is happening as well, like you're proliferating or you're getting counters on it in some other way is my god like five turns. Let me turn eight, maybe like again in a slower cube. If this comes out on three, there is a world, but I feel, you know you're going to be wanting to like you're going to want to be answering their creatures at some point. And that minus two is actually quite good. So yeah, for sure. I guess maybe that's just a massive board stole that and nothing attacks ever. No tapped creatures. And it's just pluses forever. Right. But yeah, it doesn't feel like a huge part of card. Nice. All right. We have a flip card now, James, what do you think of Brigid Clayton's heart? Yeah. So this has a lot of words on it. So Bridget, I think is pretty good fate. So it's, a two in a white for A32 legendary creature in warrior. That's one. Save it. Tribe making a comeback. It says when this creature enters or transforms into Brigid Clayton's heart, create A11 final white kicking creature token. And at the beginning of your first main phase, you may pay green. If you do transform, touch it. So if we get, that's going to be the turn after you've played. It will be the first time you can transform it. So it comes in A32 makes A11 next turn you get the option to transform it. The other side is Brigid Doom's mind. This is a free to let you do creature consulta, but it has tap to add x screen or x bytes mana where x is the number of other creatures you control, and a beginning of your first main phase may pay white and turn it back to the front side, which will again make make another token. I think again, this is pretty solid in the token stat. The money is really on the back side, right? That sort of pseudo chi is cradle ability is is obviously very powerful. But the front side does set it up fairly nicely. And if late in the game you're sort of short of bodies, so you're just short of things to do with that extra mana, you can pay the white and flip it back. I think really the sort of default pattern is going to be play it, make a one more next turn, flip it over, get a bunch of mana. And to be clear, this is a sort of transform where it doesn't leave the battlefield. So we can tap it for Manu as soon as we transform. And I think, yeah, most game is just going to leave it on that pseudo guys cradle mode. Nice of game. Yeah, I think this is really cool. It's good with all the stuff the cradle is good with, you can untap it. If you have great mana sinks, then it's going to do a lot for you. Obviously it's slow. Even cradle, it's easier to remove from cradle. It's a lower power level card for that reason, but it gives you access to the same sort of powerful synergies. And I think that's cool. And it's cool to get access to those synergies, in cubes where guys cradle is not have the appropriate power level. Oh, just, you don't want a proxy and you don't want to spend however much money. A guy's cradle, so, yeah, I think this is a really cool option to have. Like, I think goat growing rites of its amok is a scene play for sort of similar reasons. Right. And this card will get you access to that guy's cradle effects a bit earlier, I think thing that's in general, it it's, it's obviously easier to kill, but, Yeah, if you want that sort of pseudo guys cradle thing in your cube, I think this is a pretty good option. Yeah, I, I think you've hit the nail on there with that. I, I think the other thing I just want to mention is that for me, this is a Celestia card. Like, this isn't the card that we're happy running in our mono white deck, because effectively that is just A43 over two bodies, which we're not super happy about. Like, James, actually, do you think we have to be force learning or can we be like a two color deck and splash screen to flip it, like, because I'm not super happy about this, but like maybe the cubes this is going into the cut. The cubes where guys cradle is either budgetary restriction or power level restriction. This being this is not flipping immediately isn't the end of the world because because maybe they're a bit slower, but kind of like what? How are you seeing this card? But like, can we splash for this or do you think we need to be full blown Celestia so that we can flip it the turn after we play it? I would want really reliable access to green mana for this card. There's no I free man up for a free two plus a one. One is like. You wouldn't be surprised if that was a card at this comment, right? Yep. That's not the power level for most cubes. You I think you need access to that green mana pretty reliably. And you've got a and you also need like, good things to be doing with that mana, right? This can't just be like, oh, I might get to play my five shot the turn ahead of time. Like, if that's what you want the extra mana for, you should just play a super mana dog you want like mana sinks for this card by, stuff like that. Trick. This a foundry, right? Or blocking something, you can repeatedly put them into retrofit a foundry is a particular stand out because it both, provides the mana sink and fuel this because it generates more tokens and it really snowballs. So, yeah, but yeah, certainly, I think you want to be viewing this a full on slash near gold card. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that makes sense. I go I go along with that. Right. We have another flip card next also with a lot of text we have Urdu carrier of Dawn. It is three white white for a 55 legendary creature elemental god. It has flying lifelink and creature spells. You can't have convoke because a reminder as you. Your creatures can help cast those spells. Each creature you tap while casting a creature spell pays one generic or one man of that creatures color. It also similarly to Brigitte. As I reading of your first main phase, you may pay a black if you do transform Urdu, it transforms into a silhouette carrier of Twilight, which is a 55 legendary creature elemental god with flying lifelink and each other non token which you control has persist, which is a mechanic. We talked about a bit in this episode, but I will read it now when it dies. If it had no minus one, minus one counters on it, returning to the battlefield under its own control with a minus one minus one counter on it, and at the beginning of your first main phase, you may pay a white to transform Zulu back into Urdu. So base stats. Let's talk about this. In a regular creature deck, a five mana at five mana is very close to my top end. A five mana fly with Lifelink it's fine, but nowadays we want something a little bit extra. So yeah, because at five man giving the next spell, we cast convoke. I'm not super excited by like, there's no ETB here. Effectively, we're just playing this as a beta at the top end. So similarly to Brigid, I'm viewing this as a AWS off card. Like it's a it's a card in a lower power level cube. You would I think unlike Brigid, you would probably still run this in a white deck. But you're only happy about it in a two color deck because the backside of this, I'm actually quite high on giving every creature we have this non token persists, or giving every other non-zero which we have persist. I think is really good. That is work that I want to do. I've run Cauldron of Souls and Commander before. That's the artifact that gives everything possessed. That is very cool. This is kind of like this is a version of that that we can run into, because it's also on a fly fly flier. So it can win us the game if we don't have a board state, if it's if we just top decking. But if we have a board site, there's a bunch of cool stuff we can do with this. Like, if you do it like this will work as a creature combo card if you're doing the persist combos. But also on top of that, just doubling up all of your aristocrat death triggers is nice. Like that is pretty good. Like like you can't like this with the blood out is in a second. And any kind of board, you will probably just win the game because you're going to double up all your triggers of all your non-human creatures dying. I think this is a solid card. I don't know the ceiling of it. Like this. This seems like one to me that they will put in the government HQ and it will rotate out. But I think if you're doing aristocrat stuff, I think if you're doing sack stuff, I think this could be quite solid and like a nice little piece and it's like a way of getting like it's also a combo card is actually a good creature on itself and on. Right, which a lot of the comic creatures aren't, because they're quite old now. Sometimes. What do you think of these two elemental gods? I think my issue of obsessed stuff is that it's expensive enough and then takes a turn to get to, so I feel like I'm not going to have it reliably enough to be worth me building around, you know, like, if I am putting sort of otherwise suboptimal cards in my deck to try and get this synergy to work, then I kind of need to get access to synergy right away. Right? And I feel like the games where I'm on tapping with my giant life, linking flier, I'm probably in decent shape. Anyway. Yeah, I, I would be higher on it if this part was on the side. Yeah. Yes, I do agree with that. Oh, we could do it. Oh, we could activate at the same time. The fact we do have to untap with it does suck. Yeah. I for me as it is, I think this card is closer to being Slayer angel than anything else. I mean, that's not the end of the world. No, it's not at all. I think why I'm hot on it is like, that is the flaw on it, but you have the potential to do some Timi nonsense with it as well. Yeah, I'm. I'm a bit low value on V of attacks because. Yeah, I think the convoke part would be really good on a like a one top. It's pretty low impact. Then you got five like. Yes. Like some where you got to pay some plan of come back out another creature right away. But it's not a huge part. So I don't care about that. I don't be possessed stuff like. Sure, if you're building around it, I am, I don't yes, I am, I'm not sure if it can. I don't have access to it enough for it to be worth building around. And then on the facts, like it's good against buffs, but that's kind of about it, because if they have a removal spell, they're going to be removing best, right? Not you other creatures regardless. So I suspect this is closer in value. I think it's pretty close. Which one I prefer between this and then Slayer Ranger. Like, I'm not actually sure all this text adds up to be better than Bane Slayer angel having to strike, you know, because it's good against double economy, double block. Right. And sometimes against a double block. That's basically I think they line up pretty much the same in. But like when you're when this card lives, it's very hard to lose your game. Because you're gaining so much life. It just dominates sphere. But that's the issue of Bane, Slayer, Angel, and similar cards. Fate is that when they are able to deal with it, they'll be doing so for a really big mana advantage. And they don't leave any value behind. Yeah, I, I for me, it's like if you have a slot for that big like key player, you have a bass player in your Lyra Dawn thing or something like that, and you think this card looks cool, then maybe that would be a cool switch. But, I wouldn't be, like, going out of my way to come. My other main issue of this card is for I think this is very clearly a dragon to me. You know, it would be better if it was a dragon, like actively better if it was a dragon. Apart from breathing fire, you know, it's breathing fire and just saying it's breathing sunlight. Okay, I think I, I'm guessing that's what it's doing. Okay. Yeah, yeah, it might be a bit small. My screen, it looks very dragon like to me. My cat. Dragon? Yeah. I think I'd agree with all of that. I think the only other thing is worth mentioning is that, Yeah. James mentioned Lyra, Dawn bringer and Bane Slayer angel. The thing is, apart from that, the you only really have solitude and and, guardian scale Lord that see a great amount of play at fives and white fives isn't the most deep in terms of cards. So I could see this being tested like especially in a larger cube. Maybe that's where this gets in. If you have the massive 20 stuff or some other synergies and it might come off, but like I think this card being tested in a bunch of games. But yeah, I, I agree, if you just in cubes that that would just want more efficient death. This is not that I guess. All right. We we have another question next. James, what do you think of kin scare century? Yeah. So kin scare century is one a white boy? Two, two creature kin soldier. It has first strike and lifelink. That's a good start. Two mana, two to first strike. Lifelink is very solid. Says when this creature attack, you may put a creature card with mana value x or less. For me. A hand on for battlefield. Tapped and attacking. But X is the number of attacking creatures you control. Most of what's going on here is it's two mana and has good keywords. It's it's not a bad flaw, is it? Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Like you think about, you know, people can put, like, gifted football and then cubes, like, that's a really hard to cast two black flag for A23 first class like tactic. Well, is it Lifelink deft touch? Anyway, this is, like, perfectly solid flaw. Like, it's easy to cast. We don't mind it at all. It'll be good again. Silvia. Codex. I'll be good to go when we're pulling in combat with this, you know, the ability there will be a lot of games where you never put a creature in to play with this. Because you need to have multiple creatures with good attacks and have something appropriately cast it in hand and try to get an edge. You kind of need something else to be spending your money on if you're putting in a creature, but you could also have just cast that creature outside, you know, you're, know, getting a big advantage, right? But there will certainly be gains games where tens you're like, okay, carve out into a great carve out, right? Like say I go one two up into this and then on turn three I can put in a 212 with this plus play my free drop. That's now getting out of control really, really quickly. And yeah, tens can be vital. Must have a sweeper. So that is really nice. But I think that will not be the majority of games. I think that adds and plus it does things like maybe later in the game you'll work out permission. You can maybe get in your creature with this ability and bypass stack. Right. And that's, that's something to, I think in general we're looking at, a very solid way to drop that. Not like tier one. You know, if you look at the two drops that you sort of play in the most powerful cube style, I think have a little bit more utility from this. So, yeah, I say this is like a very solid to but probably not tier one, you know. Yeah, I guess that's just because tier one has got so ridiculously powerful, I think. Yeah. No, I quite like this card. I guess Wizards didn't. Oh, didn't get the memo that Boris aggro was a bit too good. Yeah. Yeah, I don't have too much to add to that. I think very solid card I think is we'll see you play in a bunch of cubes. Like, I think this is one that that we will see in the Mega Vintage cube for a little bit. If it's cheap, I'll probably try it in mind like I have other just like generic aggressive creatures because like like, yeah, the floor is fine and there is the potential to just do some really snowball things. Very cool card. Seems like a solid one to me. All right, let's move on to blue. Next up, we have a glamor might. It is two in a blue for a tutu creature. Fairy rogue with flash flying. And when this creature enters, choose one. You can either tap target creature or you can untap target creature. So this is an I guess an entry into the pester might deceive Zork style of card. Flash creature comes in and taps or untap something. Famously we'll go infinite with Kiki cheeky and center twin. We love that. And well, bet deck doesn't see as much play in vintage Q specifically anymore. That's still a favorite archetype in midrange and lower power level cubes and in larger cubes. This is obviously like a third version of that effect, which is quite nice. And cubes already running that combo. My gut is this actually replaces Deceiver Rex arc if you're like a 360 or a 540, because that means that every part of the creature side. So, pester might. Q and this can be found by both impale recruiter and much of the guard. They are creature based shooters that care about black power and toughness. The one that cares about toughness. Can't get to Rex out because it's it's booty's too big. But this can be found by all those pieces. So every part can be found by tutors, which is nice. So that's, I think the main place this will see play. The only other thing worth mentioning is that this is a common and fairies is a deck and proper spell. Such as sprite counters, spells equal to number of fairies that you control. And there's a bunch of other fairy stuff from this set and from previous sets as well, which is quite nice. So if you're running that, then this gets better because it's just another fairy that you might want to run is at like base level is a tempo play. And but if you have some other synergies then cool, we can get out of it as well. Yeah. Cool card I my gut is that's kind of the point I we'll see play pauper or like combo. James are you going to go along with that. Yeah for sure. I think the only place I'd be looking at this is if I'm doing Vex cheek. Spence twin thing. I think in my head it was, passed to me, but was on the chopping block just because, if you wanted to cut one, you can see all the doll feet. But just because, XFC has is the full toughness is harder to me. Right? I think this versus pasta might is actually kind of interesting because this log stands for a second point of toughness, which is is certainly viva like not dying to bowmen specifically is is not nothing. But this has the downside compared to pass my that this only taps on taps creatures. So with pasta like one thing you could do and the same with Isaac, as you go flashing in your hand step, you tap down your opponent's land. Now, if I have a movable spell up, I have to kill it right then. Right. They can't then wait until you put their spin spin on it and blow you out. Because, because you've tapped him out of the manor. Plus, you can occasionally even try and do it all in one turn, where you play your past my untap field and play your spins to this. But this obviously just just taps on top of creatures so it doesn't quite have outside. So, yeah, I think it's another option that. Not in that line. But not like a huge upgrade and not like, you know, these and they're just not a big power level beast of attack. Certainly. No, that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah, I think like that. The non chip art. Yeah. Let's go. Oh I said yeah. Yeah I guess probably actually it's a realistically it's a third copy I guess is, is where we are with it. That kind of architect needs the help we can get. Right. James, we have a familiar ish card coming next. What do you think about Glen Ellender guardian? Yeah. So, Glen land, the Guardian is two in a blue, three for creature. Fairy wizard with flash and flying. And just for battlefield, the minus one. Minus one. Capture an eye and you can pay one to blue to the and counter from this creature and counter target non creature. Spell that its controller draws a card. This I think is a very solid addition for, soft pantheon of lots of blue flash features. Orcs? Yes. Yeah, yeah. And we've got a lot of them recently. Right. Like Shauna's tied binder has been very, really good for us. And Beau and Dillion click. I think having that, so, they have flash fat Evie the blue that's the to play and the speed of time. Right. Because it means they can be holding up counter magic or fattening to pay fat and you can't play around all of them a lot of the time, right. So I think a bit of to that is really nice. This obviously the obviously comparison here is Whitfield Glen landmark mage. That was a much slower card. It costs for manor. It didn't have flash. But it fattens counter to spells potentially this, this on the base that can only count to one and give some the card back. This isn't as strong a face of long term value play, but it gets going sooner and hits way harder to fight. If you play this, you come to a spell and then you have this free fall flier hitting them. But that's a really big deal. So sometimes you're going to pay this with the full five mana available, turns to a spell, and immediately snap off the counter on. So I think more common will be like flash in and bow and step, but that taps out. You then just untap, have that counter available. Plus you're maybe holding of a flash that's in hand. They kind of have to feed your card into it at some point. So yeah, very good. If you have other ways of playing at instant speed, because you, you don't really want to be just holding up for two mana for this all the time when it's in play and then they don't pay off. Obviously, you know, it's on board. They don't have to play into it. So you don't want to be just losing that manner if I don't play into it. But certainly like a, a pretty reasonable card to include and pretty much in like nice about 50 high power level cubes, I'd say. No, I think that's fair. Like, I'm not I think this is a fine card. I'm not super blown away by it, if I'm honest with you. I think it's fine. There's just so many good blue creatures at this point, and like, Yeah, yeah. And I think you nailed it entirely with this. Wants to go in a deck. That is fine. Holding up mana like other flash threats are like other counter spells as well. But there is the danger with this. That kind of like that deck might have enough counter magic already, but I no kind of deck ever have too much counter magic. James and it's counter magic for kills them, right? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. It is the thing of like a three amount of three. Four is that will beat them down like like how do you feel about like actively giving them a card though. Like like, like replacing the spell that I thought you counted with it. I think because this is hitting quite hard in VR, it's kind of okay. Like, I guess I feel both and compensated for that because I now have a free fall and I, like, honestly, you know, would be way stronger if that part wasn't there. But, I sort of think that's okay. The only thing that concerns me about this card on the C is because if you're not using the counter right away, very face up, and then if the things that they are trying to get past this is an instant, you might be in a spot way over looks and that tap, for that matter, even on their hands and step because they can just use play by play the instant while you're tapped out and, you may end up just sort of burning too much mana, right? Because that the old fashioned clan and Dark mage, which has now got slightly power, grab the puppies and that was so good, was it was only one mana to activate. You could basically hold that up so that that I it just didn't cost you that much was to. It's a very real fast. Yeah I agree like like I, I think maybe my part, my issue with the discard is I know I will miss play with it. I think I could see myself leaving up to mana too much basically, or miss timing it. And maybe that's like what? Yeah, basically every time I play this card, I feel I will leave up manor at the wrong time or or counter the wrong thing. That kind of stuff, I don't know. Yeah, I like because he had the effect is powerful. Like like we have like like you touched on earlier, the, the five manor version of this card. I'm not as high on that. Like, it's a it's nice to have, but like, we've run things like the racist great shark in the past. They kind of came out pretty quickly. I think maybe like, maybe this is what actually, if you're just doing a full on flash deck, I think, I think I original, but I don't know, Ninja is more just generically. Oh, it was a staple in Q for a while, but it was a generically good card. My gut with this is that this is if you're doing a archetype that cares about flash more than because I think this one really wants to go in with a lot of other effects that you can cast at instant speed. Not as generically good as my is. My vibe with this. Yeah, that's true, I like that. Maybe if you're playing Cimic and building around, you have this fat like wolf which makes more moves when they cask when you cast stuff on that. Could be. Yeah, it could be a nice and crude fam. All right, let's keep it rolling. We have an ocho, everyone. Don't panic. It's going to be okay. We have Ocho, Lauren Leach. It is two and a blue for a the restarting loyalty. Legendary planeswalker Ocho. So I was wrong earlier when I said we only have one planeswalker. And I swear they said that that was a thing, but never mind. It has a static ability of. At the beginning of your first main phase, you may pay a green. If you do transform Ocho, it has a plus two or up to one target, creature gains or creature types. As a reminder text that that effect does not end it has a plus. One of target creature gets minus two minus oh until your next turn. But obviously if we want tapped with this and we paid a green, we can transform it into Ocho shadow. More cyan, which has. At the beginning of your first main phase, you may pay a blue if you do transform it back. It has a minus one of three cards. You may put a permanent card from among them into your hand. There's a minus three of create two three, three green Eldritch tokens and a minus six of choose a creature type. You have an emblem with creatures you control what the chosen Typekit plus put get plus three plus three and have vigilance and hex proof. So as James mentioned with the creatures, they don't. It doesn't leave play. It's not going to come back in with no loyalty. The loyalty you have on the front will transfer over to the back. So the gimmick with this one is the front. Side pluses us and the backside minuses us. So we have another sexy. I'll go first. Trapping his way through Lauren here. And for me, this does potentially fall into the trap of being too specific to go into most cubes. Like this card is, I think, quite good in cube that are supporting that creature type matters deck. So if you are doing creatures in or if you're doing merfolk, if you're doing elves, if you're doing goblins, if you're doing all these types of archetypes and you want a card to kind of pull things together, that is where I think this is good. Because as a value planeswalker, like take out all the creatures energy, this is not phenomenal. If we just want like, like the ability to gain value and shrink some creatures, we have things like baby juice for that. The front side, I do think is quite anemic if you're not in that creature. I met his deck three managed to shrink. A creature is not great. The backside I do think is better. But then we have to untap and add another manner to get there. The minus three of making some bodies or the minus one. Some card selection I think is nice. Like the middle. Like I think you might run this in a self middle deck if you're a little bit desperate. If you if you missed out on the mulch, then this is at least a repeatable way of, I guess, milling some cards. And I think the emblem on the ultimate is nice, but again, you really need to have a bunch of the same creatures to for that to be worth it. So being honest, I only see this in the car, only I don't see this in a cube where you care about creature types in multiple decks. Again, if you're doing elves or merfolk or zombies and stuff like that, value that, you will get an effect out of all of the abilities. It's how I see this. Like, every part of the card becomes good. You're kind of unlocking the card by having that synergy in your cube, and that's where I would. I could see this being run. James, what do you think? Are you kind of on board with that, or you or do you like. Okay, just as is basically, I kind of think this card sucks, actually. I mean, okay, has not left the gym since Owl Train, so he's not swim for that, but, Or had a Cobb. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Key ketogenic. Okay. Is, it's really do think that, but not power level. And I think that makes sense. You know, if you, if you skip for carbs, I think your power level goes down. And, I know that's what happens. I have, but my issue with the creature type part, right, is that that sort of makes sense in a gameplay idea that you would unlock your creature creature type synergies because you to this card. But from a deck building point of view and your type of matter stack, you're not I don't think you're actually going to run a bunch of off type creatures with the hope that for, okay, who is going to make some work that's just not reliable? If I'm doing the type of stuff I want the vast majority of my creatures to be the right type of ready. So I think that really sort of justifies this guy's inclusion. And yeah, I think outside of that, the power levels is not very bad, right? Because because the front side does so little. You're really sort of just hoping that it survives and gets to the back side. Because normally of a planeswalker, if I deal with it, at least you got one activation, right? Whereas with this you kind of didn't because one side is so low impact. It's, it's kind of a disaster if I, if I do manage to deal with that before you can flip it over, I would guess the most common. Maybe it would be. So if you play this, you do whichever plus leaves you have most loyalty, like, you know, feed minus two minus. I was gonna say that some loyalty even. Maybe you do that. Otherwise you do for minus take the plus team and you flip over and you make two out and hope that's going to be enough to protect it. When you have to flip it back and you really do have to keep investing manner in this card as well, which is a bit annoying. Like, yeah, if you play this on turn three and then you have a full drop, you want to play on turn four, then it's like you can't flip this over and it's just not really unlocking any value. It's not really getting going. Yeah. I don't really believe in this card. No. Yeah, yeah. So I agree with everything you said. The only thing is I in limited like like the decks that are trying to do a creature don't matter deck, they will still have the wrong creatures that aren't the chosen type. Like they'll run a plant and they want to make it an elf. So? So I think it will come up. But I do agree, it's not as, yeah, reliable as you want it to be. So yeah. So effectively it's a plus one most of the time or a plus two for no real gain. That doesn't feel great. But I guess they were scarred by the first. I would go and have really tried to keep it chill since then. Yes, it is aggressively safe. I will get for that. Yes. All right. We have another flip card. Next. James, what do you think of cig? Wonder wine. Wonder wine. Wisdom. Yeah, for sure. If you thought that. Okay, flipping mechanic was neat, then this is good because you can actually play this one. So cig is one of blue for a two true legendary creature. Merfolk. Wizard said sick as sick can't be blocks. Pretty good start. Two mana, two to unblockable. And whenever this creature enters or transforms into cig one divine wisdom targets. Creature gains. Whenever this creature it deals combat damage to a player or planeswalker, to a card to the end of turn, and at the beginning of your first main phase, you may pay white. If you do transform CIG, it transforms into CIG one divine shield. This is also a two to unblockable, but this one has. When this creature transforms into sake, one divine shields target creature you control gains protection from each color until end of turn and and getting a shield maintains you may pay blue. If you do, you transform it back. That was a lot of text. There's so many flip cards in this set. Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know, I know, so I like this one a lot more. This is firstly two minute to two unblockable is just not at the starting point like this. Can factory opponents can affect your at planeswalker cause, it's fairly good if you're fighting over the initiative for the monarchy. All good things. Plus, in the white back, this is gonna quite frequently draw you a card for turn enters by. If you have any creature you can get in. This draws you a card of a way in. At that point. So all of that, you've been fairly good. The transform is been threatening to get another creature, few that it can target itself with that protection ability based it to networks. It's all about him. Blockable. This can fit in to get another creature past their blockers, which is good. And then obviously at that point you have and fanning to flip it back and get more cards and keep that chain going. So I think is quite a lot for to top, I think this is a pretty good power level. The only issue is fight, but this is a creature that needs to go in a deck with lots of other creatures. And, and I feel like in most cubes, that's just not what blue white is about. Really? No, it's specifically the opposite of that. I don't know exactly. Exactly. So for that reason, it's. Yeah, it's only going in a very small subsection of cubes. But I think the cubes that do want this, it's actually going to be very, very good. If your blue white deck is more doing like uptempo fliers thing. I think this is actually a really strong. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Yeah I think you've smash like yeah, yeah. This needs to be in a cube where you're also playing a one drop and your blue white deck. So like those do exist. Like like there is, like I like their tempo in blue. Does exist in, in some cubes in a more mid-range, but in more in more mid-range type cubes like this is maybe you can splash this in like a ninja deck, perhaps. Yeah. And yeah, and, and obviously if you are doing merfolk as well, this is probably quite a good merfolk to play on to. The ninja thing is interesting. Honestly, I feel like for good new black ninjas attack with a bunch of evasive creatures. You can just, you can just play this fight. I think it's fine as an unblockable. Great. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, yeah. Like it's an unblockable creature that combos with your other unblockable creatures to draw. You called. The turn enters, and then later on, if it enables your ninja, it bounces back to your hand. You can then draw more cards by replaying it and and taxing your fish again. I think it's totally fine if you can't flip this. No that's that. Yes. Yeah. Unlike some of the other ones we've seen, the front side is just fine. Yeah. Like it's fine. Like on a stick, a stick, a bone splitter on it. I guess. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. It's weird. I think if you put this in very sort of, high power level cubes. Now, even though it's a blue white car that would more frequently see plain blue black. No. Yeah, I go with that. Yeah. Yeah, it's a cool one. But yeah. Yeah, it I think it just needs the right environment. All right. We have our last blue card next, is thirst for identity. This is two in a blue for an instant. Draw three cards, then discard two cards unless you discard a creature card. So this is another entry in our thirst cycle. Kind of like the Ocho that we saw previously. We. Three mana instance. Draw three, discard two. Unless you discard a certain card. So we've had basic lands, we've had artifacts and enchantments, and now we have creatures. These are all solid cards. Like the instant speed is nice. The discard isn't often the downside in a lot of decks like, we have like, blue has things like delve, we have a pond oculus. We have baby. Just like blue decks are fine with cards going to the graveyard. Similarly to cig, my gut is that if you specifically want this thirst, you want more creatures in your deck, I guess which which, again, isn't too different. Like, if you look at the majority of tubes, blue is the color with the least creatures because it has so many good instant sorceries. When we get the thirst for insert instant and sorcery, that will probably be quite good. So again, you're probably doing something like Nerf Oak or ninjas, some kind of blue base tempo deck that is going to be running more creatures for this to be the the version of choice. I don't know how many of the first actually see a great amount of play like I do like this card. This effect is good, but like we have stock up, we have like chart of course is to mana. And then we have all the other blue card drips under the sun. Yep. Playing card. I could see it coming in for a little bit I, I what do you think of this card, James. Yeah. Stock up. Really embarrasses this card. The snap. Yeah, I, I think of the first cycle, the the base, the one where you discard a basic land is, is is generally the best one. Yeah. Because that's like, not a real card. Does that make sense? Exactly. It's, obviously it's, you know, sometimes you'll need to have that land to discard two of a cards, and that's annoying. But in general, when you cast your free mana card for spell, it's often not on terms, right? It's you cast your cards that impacts the board, and then you cast it later to restock so you'll have more find. You'd rather discard land from the spell? So yeah, for that reason, I think for land one is generally the best. The one upside of is theoretically is in the animator, right, where you're actively looking to discard creatures. But honestly, even in that deck, I'd much rather just have something cheap. Like a careful study sets up my animation and on the see if I'm discarding, the animating my are kind of cool to then it probably wouldn't hurt that much, but I had to discard an extra card because I had to be the first. Knowledge on Guthrie. The basic land? Well, I think so. Whatever. It's instead of this card. Right. Because my good, the animator plan is so powerful that it doesn't actually matter. Discard one more card. So yeah, I, I don't see a huge amount of upside in there. So for I've, first for discovery of, of of of, past this cycle, there's two other insert name here. Yeah. Yes, yes. Continue, continue. You confess to whatever you basically have. All you do you you do you it's not, you know, first. Nice. All right. We're moving on to black James. What do you think of a barren, aberrant, aberrant return? Go with that. Yes. An absolute return is all black. Black? Say, six mana for sorcery. You can put one, two, or three target creature cards from graveyards onto the battlefield under your control. Each of them enters with a minus one. Minus one Champa. So one thing I really like about this card is that it's any graveyard. We don't see how, like, almost all the Re-Animator stuff now is your graveyard, but I think that's really good. That's because this is a command to cart James. I does look suspiciously. Command. Yes. It doesn't. Yeah. It's big, it's flashy, it's powerful. At least it needs loads of set up. Loads of mana. Listen, if you are self milled back in a slow queue, this could be a good finisher for you. And it will end a lot of games. It's quite cool with Buried Alive specifically. Just do live for perfect free creatures out of your dark mind. Gamble back that. I mean, if that doesn't end the game, you probably felt your deck suggest, obviously this is not one for the cubes that require efficiency, but, let's you maybe for your treat yourself cube to this be making the appearance. Yeah, this is definitely one for slower clips like this is isn't going anywhere near a cube that can do dark ritual in tomb reanimate that I see this as a this is cubes where the reanimated deck is more of like a package for a midrange or a control deck that's kind of like grind, like it's not this speedy turn 1 to 3 Re-Animator. It's the I have a slow, I have a controlling deck with some fatties that over the course of the game, will go to the bin. And then this is the thing that kind of like, actually, this is a game winner. Like, like we cast this sometime off the turn six and then it brings back the best, either the best three things that have died over the course of the game. And we use that court advantage to win, or we put some stuff in the bin or we've buried alive, as we mentioned, and then that kind of in, in slower cubes like this I think is a fine six drop to cast to win you the game. But yeah, definitely not one for more efficient ones where you're trying to do the thing very quickly. Yeah, for sure. It's, it does have that limitation of, if you're putting six drops in your deck, you kind of want them to always be good when you have six mana, which this isn't right. This requires sets up like if you compared Vista. Like which should you put this in your deck? Or should you put like a grave Titan? Yes. Yeah. I'm probably win more games by putting the credits. I should then, but why not have two six drops gems of this trick? That is true, you know. Exactly. Yeah, yeah, it's, you know, like, if you have a slower cube environment, I think you'll know if you want this, like. Yeah, like. Yeah. In my treat yourself to my slower cube. All of my reanimation spells I like I think I think maybe we have one at four, but they're all generally like 5 or 6 manner. And they do things like this. So they're I'm excited for this. That seems like a perfect way of winning a game in that. But yeah, not for more efficient cubes as we kind of touched on. All right. We have a cool one. Next we have Bitter Bloom bearer. This is black black 311 creature fairy rogue. It has a flash flying. And at the beginning of your upkeep, you lose one life and create A11 blue and black fairy creature token with flying. So we have bitter blossom here on a stick. But a blossom is a fantastic card in a number of decks, like it's very good at holding down the board, very good at making new fodder for now. Scratch deck, that kind of thing. So the fact we have another one just by itself might mean that this is good enough. The larger cubes that are looking for another one of these effects already, the cubes that are either already running better blossom or have recently cut it. I guess the question is, does it being on a creature make it better? And my kind of assumption maybe is probably not. Like one of the nice things about Better Blossom is that it is going to make you a creature every turn. It is difficult for your opponents to have an answer for like it's an enchantment. It's harder to. And enchantments are traditionally the hardest permanent type to remove from the game. But this being a creature does mean that it dies to all of your opponents removal. It also is A11, so the flash is less good than it would be on a larger creature. Because you're you're not really going to jump scare this as a blocker. Like if you if it stops you losing the game, then sure, you'll do that. But generally speaking, this is not going to get into trouble. Like this is more of a being manner efficient or holding up a removal spell on your opponent's turn and then bringing this in. That's where this is going to come in. Specifically, though, if you're doing the aristocrat build it. Being a creature could be considered an upside like this will trigger your aristocrat stuff when it dies, and in that way, that could be an upside and in that way that that is an upside. But for me, I think the biggest thing of all of the things holding this back over, better boss in itself is the double black pips in the top right hand corner, like the decks that really want this. Definitely to. And often three colors and the double black on turn two, I think is going to be really hard. So for that reason, I'm probably not going to be running out to grab one myself. Like, even though I have Aristocrat Sync and some of my cubes, even though I have like control decks that just want to come up the board and have blockers for my opponents menacingly dreadful Boris creatures. But if I had a 720 cube and I specifically wanted the second version of this effect than perfect, this is a second version of that effect for those environments. The only thing am I under, I know you're a big fan of bitter possible. Like, am I undervaluing this? Would you say? Yeah, I'm a big fan of both. Plus, and because I like the, besides said, it does some interesting stuff. I don't think it's like, you know, a, a card that it should be going in the highest level cubes anymore. And, this is obviously sending a lot less resilience against removal from Better Blossom. It does have a few upsides, though. The, firstly, it's just quicker than the blossom, right. You can actually play this on ten to your attacking on turn three. Which, which this blossom doesn't do. You're basically always one body ahead of blossom, right. Because this gives you a one on one end of itself. Secondly, for flash means that, you're almost always going to get the first token, right, unless they have just passed with the move instant speed removal after not done anything. You know, you're getting that first token right? You flash it on there, then stamp you on top, you get a token, then maybe they kill it next, then, so that's nice. But again, obviously ways you turn these black black is really tough. In most stacks, double pip two drops. You can't reliably cast some of the second, third and end of the game, but that's obviously a big issue. But this and this is a affect. You generally want to get out as early as possible. You want to get that value chain going. Yeah. Listen, I think if you are just interested in repeatable ways to make tokens to enable that aristocrats stuff, you know, maybe I'll running a card like a guitar, for example. At the moment, that card's not that good. You could maybe look at that something like this instead. But I wouldn't be including it just as a sort of generically good card and know. Yeah, I'll go with that. Yeah, I how do you feel about this in like, mono black devotion games like this. And then several turns later we cast a gray merchant of Asphodel. Is that kind of where this is about like, we curve this into necro potency, into for XY and obliterate, into, oh, I'm selling myself on this. I mean, I'm less suspicious of this from the Gray Merchant of Asphodel. If that's not. Yeah, that's that's fair. That's something, I guess. All right, but what about our next card, James, what do you think of Dawn hand? Dissident? I think this card's really cool. I haven't decided if it's very good yet, but I think it's really cool. Yes. So, Dalton dissident is a single black mana for a one to creature elf. Warlock. And this is the first time we're coming across the blight ability in this set. So blight is one of the, sap mechanics, and it comes with a number. So, for example, on this, on this card, you can blight one. And when you blight one, you put a minus one minus one counter on a creature you control. If it was blight free, then you would put three minus one minus one counters on that creature. Notably, you can't spread for counters around. They all have to go on the same creature. But it and it is an additional cost of evacuation visibility. So for this street show, you can tap it and blight one to surveil one, or you can tap it and blight two to exile a card from the graveyard. And then it says, during your turn, you may cast creature spells from among cards you own, exiled with this creature. By removing free counters from among creatures you control, in addition to paying that other costs. So obviously the blight ability is giving you those creatures to remove and faerie and this the blight to abilities, exiling cards from your graveyard when you're going to cast them and move phase counters, you put on the creature and get a little lantern going back. It's does require quite a bit of setup for right? You need other creatures to put the counters on. Plus you need a stocked graveyard I wouldn't be relying on just that's available bility to. Yeah. To fuel your graveyard, you need to use the L one. You need a bit more than that. And ideally the other creature has at least two tusks. Well, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. So I think the sort of generic play passing with this fight is you're gonna light one, put a minus one, minus one counter on itself to, to get a surveil, and then you'll blight two onto something else that has at least three toughness. So it doesn't die, and then immediately cast the creature out of the yard, then move all of phase counters. And you're potentially then the ability to do that again. Right. So that's that is a lot of value for just one manor investment. But there's a lot of sets up. It's very conditional. They can also just kill this. You know, if it's threatening to be a very big problem. It does. It does tie to everything. But for such a large manor investment, I think in a sort of graveyard, if you've got a graveyard theme going, I think this is pretty interesting. You know, it's a peaceful nibble of something like insidious fruits. I do like that card. It does some pretty cool stuff with Empire of Bones as well, because you can, because it's not the move minus one minus one counters. It's move any counters so you can. It's all works both ways, right? You could blight onto the, bones. Put minus one, minus one counts on it. That cancels out V plus one plus one counters. You can then reuse your amphibians using the adaptability and keep going that way. Went on the carrying a lot of cards for the graveyard. Well you could the move for plus one plus one counters from the in order to, to cast a creature out of the yard with this and then get another creature out of a yard with. And then keep the value chain going that way. So I think, I think there's a lot of pretty interesting stuff this space does for just one mana. It might all be too much set up, but I'm interested in trying. Yes. At least, you know. Yeah, I'm going to caveat everything I'm about to say by saying like. Like this is a one man array with three abilities that will probably break a bunch of formats. But yeah, I this is not one for higher powered cubes. For me, I it's not quick and I don't think it's efficient enough for those environments like if you're able to build an engine in your cube like you mentioned insidious roots, I think it is very strong because it has roots. It, is one of the cards that rewards you when link cards leave your graveyard. This does that with the minus two, which is not, or I with the black two, which is nice, and also the cast. When you remove three counters, among creatures you get I basically doubled it with your insidious roots on that, which is nice and yeah, the fact that it can also like it can be great, like you can only cast a card that you own with it, but like what might see this. But I've actually this is a main deck of sideboard card. This is a you can add like if you come up again, like if you're playing this as a value engine, which is probably how most of the time it was gonna be played. It is a sideboard card that you can main deck against reanimate it, or against someone that's trying to do some stuff with key cards in their graveyard, like like you. Yes. You can't get it back from your opponent's graveyard. You can just exile it. But sometimes nothing there arc on is fine. Like sometimes this is a one mana one to that you like to on to itself to answer that thing in the graveyard. Like yes it has to on tap, blah blah blah blah. Maybe the sideboard part of it is what could make it see play in regular cubes, and then the engine part is a nice little bonus, but my gut is to get the most out of this card. You need to be in a in a slow environment where it's going to stick around and you can do that value thing a couple of times, basically. Yeah, I think, I think you certainly need to be in a cube with where there's a dead, pretty dedicated graveyard back. I don't know that it has to be that slow, though, because the nice thing about this is that it is just a one manner investment upfront. And like the abilities don't cost mana to use. And there's the graveyard decks, sort of like having creatures in that graveyard anyway. Right? And they, they're good at getting them back so I can see, well, where you play this because you can play it. You can surveil a bit. And if I die, if it dies, you're just not going to cry about it. It's just gonna go for graveyard. Maybe I'll come back later. Maybe it won't. And you didn't have to invest a lot of mana net. And I had to answer it, so that's maybe good enough, because it is threatening to accrue a lot of value in a long game. Right? No, I think that's fair. Yeah. I as someone who's played I played dredge in a bunch of formats. Not having mana available is something I'm quite aware of, but yeah, I again I'm, I'm open to this card being good, but my gut is it's just going to end up being a little bit too slow. Like, like a standard cool Kraken will probably like good. Like I think there's already talk of some other stuff that works well with this. And like if, if you do happen to have other things that put counters on things in some way, then I think this does get better. Not having to do jump through all the hoops all the time. If there's other ways of making this better because there is, what do you call it? The bailiff Prime was the like to upgrade that we got like it's a four man attempt and the enters with six stun counters on it. That's a nice little way of taking counters or something like if this would take kind of a dark depths, maybe I'd be more hype for it for again, purely Timi reasons, but yeah, yeah, I think it's a fine card. Let's see what we can do. Right as we play batch mode cup, we f panned onto our dark that now it's a creature and we can stop and moving as we go. So it's faster to cast us out of our graveyard. Yeah, we've done it. Absolutely. We have broken both badger mockup and depth. Yeah. Nice. All right, let's keep it going. Next up, we have grave generations. This is three in a black for an enchantment that says when this gentleman enters, you become the monarch at the beginning of your in step. If you are the monarch, return up to one target. Tweet a card from your graveyard to your hand. And whenever a creature you control dies, each opponent loses one life and you gain one life. So play pattern and base level for this. This is a four man, to draw a card and zombified something. And then on top of that, we get a Zulu cut throat style of effect. This is not the any creature dies. Ping someone. This is the commander version of our stuff. Dies paying the whole board. But obviously in 101, you're only picking your opponent up. There are a bunch of these type of effects on creatures. And now someone enchantments. This is generally more expensive than most of those, like. Suitable card throw is two. I know there's, a shaman that does it like three mana and also makes a body. This is more expensive than those, but obviously it does come with the monarchy. And the monarchy we know is a very fair mechanic when it's one on one. I think this is a card for an aristocrat archetype, and I think that's where it's good, because we're going to be sacrificing stuff. So there be creatures in our graveyard that we can get back with this, we will likely have a decent board state, so we'll have blockers to keep the monarchy and some of the other. Importantly, I think some of the other monarch enchantments, kind of very good. Like there's the white one, there's the white court, the makes for four angels. If you're the monarch on your upkeep, that's a very broken card. That could just goes into any power level of cube. This one for me is a monarch card that isn't going to steamroll the game. Like, obviously we have a mention. Like for those unaware, the monarch, if you're the monarch, you draw a card at the end of turn, and if you get hit by your opponent, they become the monarch. A lot of the other monarch enchantments are very back breaking and very game ending. This isn't that. And I think that's why I kind of like it. It's an effect that, like an aristocrat deck would like to run, and it has the addition of bringing the monarchy in the game. And I quite like the monarchy. I think it is nice, but some of the effects of the monarchy are very, very broken. Specifically on the monarchy. This should not be the only monarch card that you run in your cube. If you like the monarch and you are running other monarch based cards, then this becomes part of the conversation. I not I'm not a big fan of just running like one monarch card because it can be. Then it becomes a bit more warping, if that makes sense. James, what are your thoughts on this one? I am aware that generally speaking is a four man. No, I don't know. It's it's it's not a format to do nothing, but it's close. What do you think it's. Yeah, I think this card is going to look really good in games you already wedding, you know, yes. If you're behind and your opponent has a board, then you've just given them some card draw. Yeah, I guess there's a reason for we don't tend to play the monarchy cards that don't affect the board. Right. Because if you spend four mana not affecting the board, it's not necessarily a good thing that you introduce monarchy to that game, you know, because you're putting yourself behind by not affecting the board. And the monarchy is a mechanic for punishes you for being behind, like, there's I think Cloth Face is a great example, actually. That's, that's a super powerful card. It's very rarely pushed. It makes makes you monarch makes it one one every ten. If you offer monarch it makes a full for flying every turn. It's absolutely cracked. That card still like not amazing. It doesn't keep a higher power level cube because it doesn't affect the board right away. And it introduces the monarchy and sometimes you end up being too far behind to pull back. Even with that super powerful ongoing advantage that gets you and that only way to turn to affect the board, right? This isn't like it starts pumping out creatures even after a turn, right? It's just getting something back from your graveyard. You still have to invest in mana. I suspect that there will be a bunch of games where this would actually be better if it just didn't save. Perhaps the monarchy, but, you know. Yeah, I guess, yeah. If it's correct to just not cast it, maybe that doesn't feel good. Yeah I yeah V for mana do nothing. Introduce the monarchy I think is generally kind of tough. Like don't get me wrong, there'll be matchups where it's very good. They'll be games very good. If you're playing against like a control deck without the other creatures, go nuts. This castle would be great in that matchup, but I think in aggregate probably not amazing, actually, no, I think that's that. Like for me, I am saying this it being good in a deck that is spewing out a load of tokens. But yeah, you're like if you're behind this is like effectively unplayable. So that is a bit more of a tougher sell. This next card is uncommon. I'm quite high on James. What do you think of Iron Shield Elf? Yeah, sure. So this is one a black for a free one creature elf warrior at uncommon. And you can discard a card. This creature gains indestructible until end of turn, and you tap it. So basically, this is a color shifted, seasoned hello plate. Uncommon. I think this is really, really good for peasant. Black doesn't tend to have great two mana creatures, especially at peasant. And this, I think is a pretty strong one to also discard out if you need feedback. It's a pretty strong, generic beat down creature and also blocks really well. Like free power, you can give it indestructible light is kind of painful to suffering creatures into this. The only thing this card can struggle against really, at that sort of high level is, decks, which just spew out a lot of, like, low value, low one one creatures. And it just becomes like, not profitable to attack into them because you that they're not lesser card for it's not worth discarding a card to kill one of them. But yeah, in general, I think this is, this is a lot for two manera uncommon. Very like it for person. At higher power levels. Maybe if you want to get another discard outlet in on a otherwise playable creature like this is not bad. It's passive. And, what looks like the two mana version of pewter people used use play. Oh, is that a fairy? No. Yeah, it's very macabre. One that you can just discard itself. Unas. Prowler. Yeah. It's better than those cards. People don't tend to play those cards anymore, but, Yeah, maybe at a slightly higher pile of higher power level if you want something like that. But it's certainly not, you know, getting in for cheap, high power level cubes anytime soon. But I think peasant, this is a slam dunk. To be honest. Yeah, definitely. Yeah. Peasant and low power level cubes that are doing the madness mayhem thing. Like, there isn't actually like the drop off on free discard outlets is actually quite significant. In black like, like repeatable ways of discarding cards for free. Does drop off. Quite so I think so. So yeah. Base level, this is a perfectly solid black aggressive creature. But again, yeah, if you're doing like madness or mayhem, I quite like this card a lot. More like that is the perfect deck for peasant and for like cubes that have rares. But they're not going ham on the power level. You have time to do stuff like I, I really like this card and similarly to like such an aristocrat a few times in this episode, like you never want to be paying for your sacrifice output. You never really want to be paying for your discord outlet. It being free is just phenomenal. Like you can do it at any point. And I really like that. Yeah, I'm I'm quite high on this card, but it doesn't it, it is going in for a specific thing for me. If you can get advantage by discarding then I like it more obviously. Yeah for sure. All right, next up we have a Moonshadow. This is a single black for A77 creature elemental with menace. And this creature enters with six minus one, minus one counts on it. Whenever one or more permanent cards are put into your grave, it from anywhere. While this creature has a minus one minus one count on it, remove five and minus one minus one counter from this creature. This is a this is. This is a cool card. Like it does need some set up, but realistically in most decks, if you can remove two counters from it, then I think you're happy. If you have a one minus three three, that's generally going to be good and the more you think about it, the more counters will come off of this pretty easily. Like if you're a south middle deck, real nice if you're an aristocrat deck, if you have fetch lands, if you have treasure like this will trigger off tokens, which is nice, but or just creatures dying by you playing magic. This will get bigger pretty quickly. Like, unfortunately, I don't think this is a card for just mono black aggro like because it's very cheap and efficient and it gets bigger by everything, by doing anything, by playing and game magic. I think it's solid because even if you draw it late game, while the board's progressed a bit, it will still do things like yes, it will start small later on, but there'll be more things to die, there'll be more trading off. The more things that have like you can get this pretty big. Like I think of this more as a one man or one one that grows rather than, seven, seven. That kind of shrinks, if that makes sense. Like, like a one minor one one with minutes that gets bigger as you play magic. That's very good. You would play that. But yeah, the limit obviously is seven seven. But yeah, I think this is a cool card. Like I think it's going to be a coefficient beta like we've seen like I'm not comparing this to her, but an Oculus is a stretch because that is a very powerful card. They give you card advantage. But it's the same sort of thing of like it is a powerful card with that is cheap to cast. That has some kind of downside. The downside is this it comes in and is smaller and grows. My guess is one that that that this is when we test in more powerful cubes. It probably comes out when the new hotness comes along. But I do think this is cool. Goes quite hard with Dornan. Dissident. This is a great thing to remove counters from. What do you think of Moonshadow? James? Yeah, this is cool. I think if your opponent cast this on turn one, you're going to be pretty sad about it. You know, like, this is going to be a. Yeah. I think this on turn one is very fattening, actually is going to grow really quickly. And the, the menace is huge here, right? Test will be how bad is it when you draw it like game. Like yes. Stuff will trade you. Maybe you've managed to save a fetch land or something, but it's, it's always going to be a little bit behind the curve. I if you do find it late, but, I could certainly see trying this. I think it's interesting. It might be that it's, you know, it's just not quite, is it? It's a bit too inconsistent, but my guess is like in in a black, that kind of stuff is going to a graveyard. It it it it does enough. It's a bit annoying, but it says creature card going to the graveyard because that means it doesn't trigger off tokens. Oh that's 20s. Yeah, because. Because tokens aren't cards are permanent cards. Yes. Okay. Yes. So it's okay. How about these, Trade. It doesn't work. That okay. That's a bit annoying. Yeah, yeah, yeah, but it does. But you know, it triggers a fetch lands and and upstanding of your creatures. And it's nice and it's from anywhere, right? You can just loot or whatever, and it's, and and you're removing this Smith. It's is pretty good. Interestingly, you mentioned upon Oculus, by the way, it's also very, very good if you manifest it, which, because then you can just flip it up for one mana is A77. That's cool. Yeah, yeah. So yeah, we can manifest with Oculus. There's also like, cryptic notes. People play with it. Which manifest card. So that's a nice little bit of synergy in that as well. Yeah I guess. Yeah. Any way of getting this into play that doesn't like it enters and then becomes active I guess like. Yeah, like like morphing or manifesting. Yeah, that's very cool. Yeah, exactly. Also, dress down as a card which cuts up in some cubes sometimes. If you cast this with a dress down in play, it just will enter without any counters on. Done. Can you stifle that ability? No harm enters with, I guess. No acceptances with. Right? Okay. Yeah. It's not a trigger. Unfortunately. But yeah, I think I think there's good stuff to do with that, so I'd be curious to try it. Yeah. It wouldn't shock me if it ended up getting cut, but I think it's certainly worth testing. No. Does it fun? All right, let's get the ball rolling. Next up, we have Twilight Diviner. This is two in a black for A33 creature elf cleric. When this creature enters surveil two. And when one or more other creatures you control enter. If they entered overcast from a graveyard, create a token that's a copy of one of them. Visibility triggers only once each turn. So this is another cool card. It has a lot of utility and a lot of things will trigger it. And but for me, for this to get in a deck, you need to be running a bunch of those effects in your cube already. Like like a three on A33. The civils is fine, but we generally see those on like one manner creatures or at most two minor creatures because it's like that's what our deck is doing very early and then all three drops profit. If that makes sense. And so for this to get into a cube, I want a bunch of effects that will trigger it, but it does trigger off a lot like it triggers with all the animation effects like double arc on of cruelty seems hot. This will trigger off of persist. It'll trigger off of on Earth, it'll trigger off of like all of our black aggressive creatures with recursion like blood ghast and forsaken miner, those kind of things. That does seem cool. My honest opinion is that it does feel a bit like running, fine card to make our good cards better. Like, in everything I've mentioned, the decks are doing the things that we want anyway. If we're doing those things. But getting double tokens can be quite nice. If I was in a queue that was doing a bunch of graveyard stuff, I think this is cool and I probably want to give it a go. If my graveyard section isn't super deep, then this may be a part for me. Yeah, that's about where I'm at. I really like it. Gives you this veil on the way in because it helps you set up your graveyard shenanigans. I kind of feel like you don't need it in these sorts of a streamlined Re-Animator deck way of ascending in hate chop site, like your, kind of cruelty should be enough. You shouldn't have to play a sort of suboptimal card set. Get two account when you get one, you know you should be able to win with one account. But, if you're doing stuff with like, colonial nightmare and I never saw creatures flipping themselves back, you know, maybe you're, like, really leading into the graveyard stuff now it's like phased amalgam or something in your cube that, oh, like blood gas stuff. That's that's where I get really interested in something like Twilight Diviner. And it could, like, really, pull out, all that vacation value you're getting, so, yeah, not one for, like, high power level cube, because there's a build. These sorts of decks just don't get that high power level cubes, to be honest. But more of a mid-level a power level thing if you have a lot of synergistic graveyard stuff, I think this could be worth it. Now that's nice. Yeah. This doing anything with. Yeah, with with because only a nightmare or recurring nightmare. Just like a slow grindy value thing where you just your ballsack explodes. That seems really cool. Actually, I'm there for that. Exactly. Imagine a recurring nightmare, my eternal witness. And now I have two eternal games of value stuff. That already starts over. Okay, cool. We have one more card for today. Last up, we have sinister null bug. It is two and a black fright. Oh, for creature tree folk Warlock. With the beginning of your end, step, draw card and blight one. So go with me on this. James. I kind of think this is like a black wall of omens, or like a wall of blossoms. Like we don't get the ETI. The card drawn ETB but we do still get at that turn, which is nice. And then effectively, there's a world where this just sits there and draws us for cards. That's not terrible. And like, yeah, if you can flicker it or bring it back, it'll go again. Or if you can put the cameras on something else, you're just going to be continuing to draw cards. Like, I know that kind of we're not really in a, in a world where we can run a for X in arena, but like this does still block once or twice. Like maybe that's enough to get the value, like, but yeah, it also if you're making counters like that, that there's another journey. I want to go with you James. Like there's also a well, but this is also a very slow sacrifice outlet in an aristocrat deck. Like if you're making one ones, you can turn them into card draw. Like if you don't have your full on stack outlet, you can use this to just like effectively your it's like a build your own skull clamp. I think a solid card for at a slower cubes. Like I don't think this gets into higher power level cubes just because in those cubes, like the the black card draw we want is immediate, is for things like doomsday, but want to draw the card straight away. Like like because like nice and nice whisper oh oh where we are. But if we're slower, I could see this being a fight card. Yeah for sure, I, I just, I really like the vibes on this card. You know, this is the sort of card where if I have enough of on cube and I see this card, it makes me more excited to just to keep yeah. Like it's a zero fold. We can block your stuff. We can draw some. We can draw cards for days. It's not very quick. That's fine. It's not. You know, this isn't going in the most ruthlessly efficient of cubes. I think the fraction of comparison is a good one. Like, obviously the upside of something like a Venus. It's harder to remove. But, this does a lot of the same thing. It does it on in step, so we get our cards quicker. And also black just has more synergy with having a bunch of creatures in your deck and having a bunch of enchantments in your deck. Yes, definitely. That's a that's really nice. Like, I don't see the blight one as a huge drawback personally. Like, we can blight onto this without costing ourselves a ton. Like, sure, that makes it a slightly worse blocker. I, I struggle to imagine, but we do that for free turns and then have nothing better to blight on to on before and then then this killing itself, you know? Yeah, exactly. Eula found something. It's going to be fine. It is worth noting that this isn't optional. You know, if. Okay. Yeah. It's not. You may blight one. If you do draw a card that you you have to play. Right. Okay. Yeah. But I don't see that as being a future issue. I think we should have enough creatures flying around and in my spells that this, that, that this will continue to be an upside. Yeah. I like this card. I'm not rushing out there to put it in Power Cube or anything like that, but, I think in mid power level cubes, yeah. It's not an aristocrat's cards invert like we're sacking a million creatures right away, but it goes well with our stack. That stuff in there, that stacks are going to have creatures they don't mind putting minus one minus one counters on. Right. Yeah. Good little value engine. Yeah. Very solid. I feel we need to get friend of the channeled, fire truck motor one for his blue nothing cube. Because this is it doesn't have any power. It just sits there and draws cards. Perfect. Yeah. He didn't tell me for this set a few that he expects us to spend 30 minutes talking about this card. I don't think we can promise that. That's, I guess you can just repeat the last two minutes if you want. Well, no, I when you were saying, like, it's not a may, and that could be a downside, I was thinking like, are you going like it's a downside in your doomsday pile that got you suppose in fact, you. That might be a downside actually. Yeah. No no no no. Oh good. All right. So that's going to do it for the episode. We're halfway through the set. Do make sure you like the podcast. Give us a five star review all that good stuff. So get notified that Ring the Bell I think is one subscribe so that you can get notified when part two comes out in a week. Until then. James. Pleasure, man, a lot of cool cards we've gone through today. Yeah, always a pleasure. Marvelous. And until next time, we will see you all soon. You will take care and goodbye.