loadingreadyrun.com

I personally thought it'd be easier for this to be separate than a part of the old megathread.

On the limited side of things: 2-devotion guy that grows with lands? Cool. Might try to draft mono-black if I get lucky. 1-drop Minotaur? Let's live the dream!

On the constructed side? Hall of Triumph seems cool. Anthem for all colors! Let's go, red aggro! And of course, Iroas.

What's everyone excited for so far?

The R for a 1/1 heroic that gets +1/+1 counters is pretty nuts for limited. Dump that out on turn one, hit it with an ordeal on turn 2, get crazy. Having only one pack of theros to build on is actually a huge factor in keeping that balanced.

And, I mean, obviously Iroas. He's going to do to this prerelease what Aurelia did to the Gatecrash prerelease, i.e. dominate it. I'm not going red or white just for him, but I would bet that he's going to show up in a number of nigh-unbeatable decks unless there are some strong god-hosers in this set. Which is plausible.

Oh yay, more krakens for mah deck. That'll be a fun one. hope they have a few more.

The prerelease format is 2 ths 1 bng 2 jin 1 seeded. There for there's plenty of hosers in the first two sets and as long as you choose a color with a god hoser you most likely will get one in your seed pack. as far as the new spoils I'm so stoked for my red/white deity after my white deity dropped the ball on me. also I really hope my izzit god is good too. we will see, I'm madly in love with that merfolk 1 drop. my gut tells me that uncommon will be shaking up all the formats. The starfish I think will may see standard play but it's to early to tell. Again the fact that it's scry on a stick just seems like it will be abused.

Take my beliefs and points with a grain though as I'm a casual at being a casual

It seriously bothers me that the starfish and jellyfish get hit by whelming wave. However with scourge of the fleets I might have a better chance of guard gomazoa still being on field. when Big Daddy Lorthos drops

Jeebus crispies, the new white heroic flier. It has lifelink. It's a 2/4. And it only costs 1 more than Wingsteed. Rare, but talk about a windmill slam P1P1.

And then there's Heroes' Bane. That gives you a possible 8/8 on turn 6 if it comes out on curve. Leave up mana for a Mortal's Resolve just in case and you've got yourself an indestructible 8/8 beating in early.
And that, children, is how you play green.

So... Howling Mine with Flash, ehh? So... I could hold up Dissipate and then if they do nothing, drop this and start drawing cards? I wonder how adding Flash changes things up for old Howling Mine. Better or worse?

Okay. So Godsend is just really really good. And really really cheap both to play and equip. No no, it's fine. Just empty out my wallet why don't you.

Welp, Brimaz is gonna need a godsend....

MowDownJoe wrote:So... Howling Mine with Flash, ehh? So... I could hold up Dissipate and then if they do nothing, drop this and start drawing cards? I wonder how adding Flash changes things up for old Howling Mine. Better or worse?

Definitely better. One of the flaws of Howling Mine is that your opponent gets the first card, and might even be able to remove it, before you get a card out of it. Unless you're specifically building around it (Owling Mine), you're opponent will always be ahead on cards.

Is it good? Well, if you hit it on their turn, you get the card first, but you really need to be able to take advantage of it. Probably not a control deck, as those want to stay in control until you run out of threats, not refill your hand. Maybe Blue devotion would like it?

From a commander stand point the two gods spoiled so far are pretty boring TBH. Keranos wants you to make the counter-top deck but thats just miserable, at least to me and Iroas seems like he would be much better as 1 of 99 in a naya deck than as a general on his own, he will slot into my Rith deck very well.

The Dictates are interesting concepts, Dictate of Kruphix finds a home in painful wheel while I know Dictate of the Twin Gods is going in my mogis deck.

Eidolon of Blossoms is an enchantress, thats about it nothing new there, just makes that deck a bit more viable

Hall of Triumph gives stuff like blue and black tokens a boost which is nice

Scourge of Fleets I can see as being pretty strong in a blink deck and I'm sure there is a way to abuse doombringer giant although I haven't thought one yet.

The Dictates look like they'll be a cycle of flash enchantments. If so we've seen blue and red, so the black, green, and white ones are yet to be revealed. The two so far are things that already exist on other cards but now with flash (Howling Mine and Furnace of Rath), so thinking along those lines...I wonder if the green one will be a "fixed" doubling season (like Primal Vigor).

Flash Exploration maybe?
Or Flash Fecundity?

ArchieO wrote:I'm sure there is a way to abuse doombringer giant although I haven't thought one yet.

I mean, Enchanted Evening+tokens kinda breaks all the constellation cards, so...
Excuse me while I go buy out my local card shop's supply of Enchanted Evenings.

Hmm true my friend has an ertai the corrupted esper tokens deck, i'll mention that to him

Furnace of Rath with flash? jeeze.

The thing about Heros' Bane is that it puts counters equal to its power, NOT equal to the counters on it. Slap an Aspect of Hydra on it ahead of time in pure mono green and you could easily end up with another 10+ counters.

Godsend is of course ridiculous and is going to be utterly insane on Brimaz. It's also going to be a million dollars. Not since Scars was legal in standard have we had relevant equipment in standard and draft, and this one looks seriously relevant. Make no mistake, core white weenie is back with a vengeance. They even have that new colour based anthem artifact. Going to be brutal in combination with spear of heliod.

I'm pretty underwhelmed with Eidolon of Blossoms. If it had even a remotely relevant body I'd likely be all over it but 2/2 is too little.

I can't say I share your enthusiasm for Godsend, Utilitarian. WW casting cost means you'll need to be heavy white to play it. Currently that means you're U/W control, which won't want it, or more likely White Weeny, or Orzhov aggro.

The problem for both of those is the relatively high equip cost. 3 mana is basically a turn for aggro decks, meaning it's not going to be on a creature until turn 4 at least, and you've spent 2 turns not playing creatures, while your opponent sets up a Doom Blade or something similar. Do you want to play Godsend, or Brimaz? Or Bannisher Priest? Or Spear of Heliod? The best equipment printed was either still useful after the creature died (Jitte, if you got at least one hit in), created it's own creature repeatably (if slowly) meaning you had to get rid of it, not just the creature (Batterskull) or put you ahead on cards with one swing (the swords).

The one thing this does do really well, and flavourfully at that, it give small human creatures a way to fight giant red/green monsters. It even kills Blood Baron through protection (if they block). It might also work in W/B humans, as the Necromancer makes it harder to get rid of all the creatures who might carry it.

It seems good if you can get it into combat, but I'm not convinced you can early enough, or consistently enough, to make it a constructed bomb.

Limited on the other hand...

I'm inclined to agree with korvys. It's too slow to be reliable for an aggro deck in constructed, and I'm not sure what other decks would want it. Even in limited, there's still answers for it so it's not broken by any means, but it's quite strong.

Honestly, I prefer Moonsilver Spear over Godsend, for a few reasons:

-First strike is almost as relevant as being able to get rid of a blocker/attacker. It can easily make your trades into just eating their best guy.
-It makes it's own creature when you attack. Not only a creature, but a 4/4 with flying. If you get 2 angels out of the spear, you made the cost of playing and equipping the equipment worth it.
-Colorless means you're going to be able to play it if you have the mana. Double-colored on turn 3 or 4 can actually come back to bite you, especially with shocks and gates rotating out.

The main thing I like more about Godsend is that it actually gives a pump. +3/+3 is relevant. But the issue is, the equipped creature can still be chumped all day every day. And if it doesn't have vigilance, it's not a huge deal.

The mana cost is better than Moonsilver, but I do agree with Korvys that it'll likely hold the spear back from being excellent. It just is super awkward. Part of you want to play it turn 3 and 4 to get it on a guy. But you'd rather go Brimaz into Iroas or Heliod I feel. You can't even play and equip turn 5. And if you're in R/W, you'd rather bring Aurelia out turn 6 if you can.

Duckay wrote:I'm inclined to agree with korvys. It's too slow to be reliable for an aggro deck in constructed, and I'm not sure what other decks would want it. Even in limited, there's still answers for it so it's not broken by any means, but it's quite strong.

Honestly, it'll be good in limited, but not great. With Fades, Revoke Existance, Unravel the Aether, Artisan's Sorry, and likely some other stuff that'll be in JOU, I don't think it'll stay on the board long. Likely just long enough for you to equip it then lose it.

Kapol wrote:

Duckay wrote:I'm inclined to agree with korvys. It's too slow to be reliable for an aggro deck in constructed, and I'm not sure what other decks would want it. Even in limited, there's still answers for it so it's not broken by any means, but it's quite strong.

Honestly, it'll be good in limited, but not great. With Fades, Revoke Existance, Unravel the Aether, Artisan's Sorry, and likely some other stuff that'll be in JOU, I don't think it'll stay on the board long. Likely just long enough for you to equip it then lose it.

True, but it does demand an answer. Which is one less answer they have for your other things. Or, if they waste their artifact removal on something else, you hit them with this.

Interesting interaction: A trampling creature with this will still deal damage if the only blocker is removed. Try chump blocking my Charging Badger now...

Charging Badger! *shakes fist*

To be fair, using that removal on Godsend is one of the better uses. Like, the only other thing really super-worth using it on are the gods themselves.

I feel like being down on Godsend because of the cost is a bit mislead.

Yes it's got double white in its cost but white + support with equipment is a tried and true archetype. Any deck running Brimaz supports Godsend with equal ease, and we're seeing king kitty in plenty of decks from WR to WB to WG.

As for the absolute cost, it's the same casting cost as a Sword of X and Y and only one more to equip. Yes I realize one mana makes a big difference in aggressive decks but I feel like that just means Godsend is "very good" rather than "insanely format annihilating".

As for the question of whether you'd rather have this or a Spear of Heliod, it will entirely depend on your deck and board. Right now I'm running a GW midrange deck and I'd be way more interested in including Godsend than Spear.

Yes it's not as good as Jitte or Batterskull but Jitte is so good it's banned and Batterskull is a creature.

If you compare it to the Sword of X and Y cycle I think it comes in slightly below them but still worth the same level of respect.

I don't remember what I had in mind as a guess to what Ajani's new abilities would be, but I certainly did not expect his last one to be 100 life. I'm laughing really hard right now, I love it.