Man i've watched enough of MTG goldfish with Richard playing the heck out of secret rendez-vous to win me over. The card is actually great. Few things, how often is EDH 1v1v1v1 versus it being 3v1. Normally someone is always ahead and you need to draw answers to solve the problem. In that case you can just make the person who drew the other cards play their answer to the board before you do. In this case scenario you have 6 chances to draw removal to the problem. Second, you get to choose who gets to draw. You can just pick the person who is struggling and there is always someone struggling. Thirdly, you make an ally for basically the rest of the game. Like when someone draws you three cards, what wouldn't you do for that. Lastly, its THREE mana for THREE cards in hand. what other cards does that? The card needs to be played politically to be good, but when you take into consideration how allies work the math checks out theoretically.
100% agree with all this and yea, Richard convinced me too lol. Political cards tend to be hard to rate and their power depends on how well you use them in tandem with deals.
(Painful truths is also a three for three) But I totally agree. The only thing I would’ve changed about Secret Rendezvous is giving the other person 2 cards rather than three. Bc at the end of it, you are up two cards and they are up three cards, but Richard is entirely correct. The power of SR comes with the power of choice. It’s like you make someone else get an answer with scheming symmetry while you benefit
The only factor I can see that we didn’t think about was politics but I don’t know how really judge that without playing it and the card is so butts I don’t wanna play it lol.
Helping the table dig for answers against one player seem like the best applicantioj for it, it's a very bad top deck if you're in a leading position and might be targeted already I do think it's a cool card though, not sure what deck to place it in though
A few of these are cEDH staples, which is definitely inflating the percentages here. Dark Ritual, for example, is an absolute staple of black cEDH decks- every single black deck in that format has a Ritual in it. Same goes for Pyroblast/REB, even for decks that also have access to blue. When almost every deck is blue, those cards are just broken.
I don’t disagree that the numbers are inflated because of cEDH but I can tell by looking at other cEDH cards that it does push the percentage up that much.
@@Kazz1187 I just wanted to know, what do they mean by “other cedh card”. Dor Example, If it’s a comparesment with LED, or Drake, its just a bad research.
I think the problem is edh rec in general. Alot of people make cedh lists and never play the decks or build them. This is also true for regular edh but I imagine only 25 percent of cedh deck lists ever actually see the light of day. So there is probably more research you would have to do to actually see if red blast is overplayed.
People play spark double, to copy their commanders. The Card doubles any value-engine you Commander might provide. In that regard its better then Sakashima. (Because of the counter, and a possibility to copy a planeswalker/commander, like estrid or saheeli) Nobody cares about Legendary-Rule thing Sakahima provides. Thats a very-specific thing for a very specific deck Plus, the Spark is cheaper AND much older.
I think they serve 2 different roles. Sakashima is generally if you play it in the command zone with a partner that you want to copy, similar to what you said for spark double, and you play it if you're trying to clone that card a lot (note: Krakashima decks). With Spark Double, you play it in the 99 since it isn't legendary, and it fits that niche role of copying planeswalkers while still being similar to sakashima in copying a creature as being not legendary. Plus like you said it's cheaper which is very relevant, and it's at rare rather than mythic so it's probably a bit more plentiful on the market too.
@@fosterdawson7339 I agree. But i think The KrarkKashima is the only big-popular deck what actually uses the “legend rule” part of his text. So it might be an exception. Most of time (as you said) Sakashima is a weaker version of Spark Double in Command Zone (Two Timnas, Kodama/Sakashima). ,
@@razin_6298 Eh.. ok? Rite or replication is a niche card. Furthermore, if your rite of replication works only with just 1 cards in your deck, its a bad include.
9:35 gotta argue here. Brainstorm is excellent for "whenever you draw a card" triggers as well. There's a lot of things you can do with it strategy wise to keep your hand moving too. Like tuck some slow or ineffective cards before you fetch, and things like that. It's an underated card in my opinion. Not saying it can't be replaced in a lot of decks, but it has some not necessarily obvious synergies with a lot of abilities that don't necessarily care about the top. Like dredge decks can make sure those two dredges weren't good casts next turn. Maybe you're a surveil deck that needs to get something in your hand into the graveyard, but you have no discard. It doesn't feel bad as a isochron imprint either. So maybe it's not the best play in every slot, but 29% makes a lot of sense to me for the above reasoning.
I run it in my Exodia deck as a cheap way to dig an extra 3. Also in Pir ft. Toothy it's a nifty way to put 3 to 9 +1/+1 counters on Toothy, and has the secret tech where I can cast it, then cast Toothy, "search" my library for Pir, and shuffle.
@@outacontrol7528 or they're like Sheldon, relies too much their personal pool of friends/store as the reference point for all games outside of their sphere
40:06 I will always use reliquary tower in my decks if cyclonic rift is still legal. If someone casts it on my endstep and I have to discard to hand size with my board reset, it hurts
Reliquary tower is great. It does everything thought vessel does but better. (Unless you are about artifacts) And it’s also mana positive or Neutral. It’s also useable land that comes in untapped that has a great native usable ability. With the amount of lands you have and such the point you can decide what one’s to put in what order. I doubt there’s a statical downside to tapping for colorless.
My pod went through a phase where everyone BUT me ran Rift. After building my board state 3 times in a game and having this exact scenario happen 3 times I started adding Reins of Power to my blue decks.
They actually lost me as a subscriber on elixir and relquary. i was thinking they were taking the piss out of these cards until i noticed it wasnt an april fools video. i mean i get my secret weapon decks for cEDH are too secret for people to expect all the synergies, but i thought people would examine cards more often and break every card possible
Merciless Eviction is awesome. You’ll never convince me otherwise. It always answers everything you need it to to stall out the player in the lead, and you don’t bust your own board to do it. Playing Superfriends? Great. Artifacts? Enchantress? Phenomenal. It’s worse than Austere command and Farewell, but far better than other destroy features. It has never failed me when casting it.
I also believe Merciless Eviction is better than many people online give it credit for. Solving an artifact board state with Darksteel Forge for good or one opponent which has spiraled out of control with his superfriends is very good, the fact that it circumvents answers like Heroic Intervention or other budget options against ordinary board wipes is also a thing which should be kept in mind. It is, however, still overshadowed by certain other removal spells and I only consider it in certain color combinations and archetypes (my Mardu voltron deck has problems with superfriends, for example).
@@jamesoakley9333 i mean i could also Mana leak it, flusterstorm it, teferis protection my board, blink my board some other way, use any number of other free counterspells, etc
I play Espertron (Esper super-friends) and my buddy loves his all color super-friends so we kinda have a MAD agreement with Merciless. It has lead to some of the most back stabby politics I've ever seen and we both absolutely love it.
Brainstorm is way more valuable the higher power level you play. It's not a trap, it's be a better player. You can manipulate your draws in response to a wheel, set up your own wheels, you can dig deeper for a counterspell, you can of course throw away unneeded cards for better cards early on when fetching, give you information and card selection... Brainstorm is beyond good, it just needs to be used well when it's being used to see value. Also, rituals are combo pieces. They are there to cheat out mana to keep you casting earlier than you're supposed to.
I know all the upsides brainstorm and can agree on a very high powered meta it is better but the percentage of decks it is indicates that it is not just in higher power.
@@NitpickingNerds In a 100 card singleton format, seeing cards is INSANELY important, since not all cards have a copy with a redundant effect, you seeing 3 cards off the top can be make or break on if you pull an answer to something or pull the card you need to pull out a win. The card does not need to be in a high power meta to be useful, that is just where you are used to seeing it.
@@ACertainGuy0 In a singleton format with a 99 card deck, the likely hood of getting anything good out of brainstorm is 0%. Unless you have synergies such as Parun decks it isn't that great. You are spending a card to get a card, potential trading cards in your hand for better ones. It does not gain you any resources, it merely exchanges them. ONCE.
Brainstorm is fantastic in the early game, and still useful in the later game, setting up your draws, and helping you stay on curve. I run it in Capt Jhoira
Without reliable shuffling (or other synergies), brainstorm drops below many of the other cantrips (ponder, preordain, serum visions, opt, consider...)
@@simonteesdale9752 While the lack of "gaining" resources when compared to exchanging them does seem kind of rough, I don't see why you don't play all of them. It being an instant gives it good points in my book when compared to preordain or serum visions, and being able to see 3 cards and put back cards you wont need at the moment is better than simply drawing a single card with no replacement
I have beef with the o ring, removal spell and combo piece all rolled into one is sooooo good. Banishing light is def awful since you have to target other people's stuff and you can't do the cheeky sac in response to exile forever. Y'all have the commander takes I agree with the most! Edit: oh dang lmao my deck is a ghen deck, paused to make the comment and got sooooooooo burned lmao
REB and Pyroblast are great against Cyclonic Rift, Rhystic Study, most countermagic and there is many great Commanders that play blue. imo The opportunity cost is quite small for all the times these red instants shine like a star.
@@NitpickingNerds I run Magus of the Wheel because Wheel of Fortune is $500, Time Spiral is $150-200, Wheel of Misfortune can miss, Memory Jar is $55-60 and hard to find, Magus of the Jar is too mana costly, Timetwister is $900-1500, and because instead of 5cmc, Magus of the Wheel is 5 mana over 2 installments. It's good enough for Nekusar, and if you recur it and reuse it just once, it's huge. Aetherize is actually effective for Locust God on a budget, especially if you've forced a tempo race.
"Dark ritual is not good in commander" Me who saw my opponent: >play land >play dark ritual >play jeweled lotus >gitrog turn one >played second land >cracked it for bayou >drew off gitrog before grabbing dual >played rain of filth >sac first land for black >draws >imperial sealed a dakmoor salvage >puts it on top of library >cracked second land for black >draws the dakmor >plays putrid imp with last mana >draws through entire deck using dakmor plus discard outlet >wins Wasn't even mad, he payed well over a thousand dollars for that win. He deserved it. Plus it just meant we got to play another game that night. But yeah, rituals are always good when you got a degenerate/combo centric commander.
Grave Titan does great work in my Ayara deck where really all I care about it's repeated value in the form of black creature ETBs. I Alongside Bitterblossom, Dreadhorde Invasion, Jadar, and the new Gisa are just a taste of my "token swarm each rotation" package...and the Ayara pings really add up
CORRECTION to @27:08 - Yesterday, I played my Carpet of Flowers for the first time. My friend pointed out that I use it during BOTH main phases. So, I wasn't getting just 6 mana of any color for his Islands, but 6 TWICE that turn. I just now read the Oracle text, and it does indeed say that this enchantment triggers during EACH main phase. (And, yes, it helped me color-fix for my GWB deck.)
The last time you guys brought up arcane denial, you indicated that being 1 card behind 1 player is better than being 1 card behind 2 other players, which is what normally results from spot removal. Secret Rendezvous seems to run on similar math in my mind, leaving you one card behind another player but ending with you two cards ahead of 2 other players. I get that an instant speed answer for 2 mana is very different from sorcery speed card flow for 3 mana but the math seems somewhat comparable on paper. Where am I going wrong here?
Answers nearly always put you down cards to the table, but card draw spells are meant to give you extra cards. This one does not get you ahead on cards either. The only reason to play it is for group hug / political reasons
No one commander is going to make a dent in the overall % for these cards, though. Like we said it definitely works well in certain more specific decks
dark ritual is an all star in any 3 mana mono black commander. can be thought of as a 1 mana jeweled lotus which im not trying to sounf trolly but definetly should be a point
While I did disagree with a couple of the cards on your list, I do think something a lot of people don't understand when deckbuilding is the concept of opportunity cost. The idea that, just because you saw something do good doesn't mean that is the average performance of that card is good. And even when it is good, there is quite possibly something that would make a better use of that slot in your deck. Not even just the opportunity cost of the slot it self but also the cost of drawing the card vs any other card in your deck. Many of people will cite situations where a card outperformed its average while missing incremental quality out of other cards. I remember this being a large talking point in the argument of nature's claim over krosan grip. Players will often miss all the times when that mana efficiency will help them out, in places where they are quitely hindered by grip. Simply because they remember the times they got the big blowout with grip and not the many other times it was just slightly a pain in the ass to hold up, or simply chose not to hold it up. I was quite a sport stat nerd for much of my youth, and something this always reminds me of is the WAR stat commonly used in baseball. It stands for Wins Above Replacement, and is one of the overarching stats that can most effectively represent the usefulness of a player. The idea being that, should you replace a league average player with someone else, how many more/less games would you win on average. That is how I try to evaluate cards in my mind. Looking at any given card I want to put in my deck, on average, how much better will this perform than any other card I would replace it for *on average*. This includes the time it sits in my hand with no targets, or I don't have the mana to cast it. And in a way, this kind of evaluation can be extended out to metrics other than just competitiveness. One could even consider, 'how much more fun will this card give me on average than the cards I would be replacing it with'. Essentially, consider everything that card will do. The highs, the lows, the most often and least often uses.
I use elixir of immortality in my scion of the ur dragon deck since he puts the dragons in my gy and turns into a copy of them i need a way to get them back into the deck for subsequent activation's. but outside of that one weird deck that needs to both use its gy and also be able to add the cards in the gy back to the deck i got no idea where it goes.
MTG Goldfish did a big episode on white card draw and went on about how good secret rendezvous performs. It made me tempted to try it out. The idea is for you it is a good rate, and you make an ally or help out the person losing.
Goldfish often plays really low power games so of course they are higher on it, so there that 3 cards is putting an infinite combo piece in a players had. Against some of my decks giving my 3 cards can hand me a win, power level is the defining factor for this cards playability
@@NitpickingNerds not if that player works with you to deal with the biggest threat at the table. “Politics” (I.e. threat assessment and table sentiment of each player) are part of every game whether people explicitly talk about it or not, and it’s a very powerful and versatile political tool to get the upper hand on the player who is most threatening to you.
So I disagree with you guys about brain storm. Brainstorm is a very versatile card. Here's why Brainstorm is so good. 1. It's instant speed, you can cast this and get to see the top 3 cards, whenever you want. 2. It only costs 1 mana. 3. Unlike other cantrips where you look at the top three or 4 and choose one, if all 3 cards are good, you get to keep all of those cards and put 2 that were already in your hand back on top, Brainstorm is also very good with fetchlands and shuffle effects, which happen a lot in commander. 4. Brainstorm is "draw three cards" so anything that triggers when you "draw a card" triggers off of Brainstorm. 5. In conclusion you're wrong about Brainstorm guys.
as a clone, spasrk double is very unique, there are 3 or 4 clones that clone legendary things, it is one of them. Sakashima of a 1000 faces is special, he lets every clone do it, but if they blow him up, you lose everything. Spark double is played alot for a reason
Comparing spark double to a clone isn’t really accurate because it’s really just; 4 mana make a second copy of your commander that isn’t legendary. A copy of your commander can be ridiculously powerful. that being said I think people do jam it into decks without really thinking
It's awesome to have two Commanders, but the setup cost can be high, and if that's your only high-value target, you're also kind of open for a 2-for-1 removal spell
@@DankTrainTom I hardly ever agree with the nerds... you can say I'm nitpicky lol but Spark double does suffer from only hitting your board, Clever impersonator and Phyrexian metamorph are better clone effects and all of the Sakishima's are better extra commanders but i also have SD in multiple decks.
Almost certainly the reason Spark Double seems as much play as it does is because it's more accessible than Sakashima (and it came out first). Whilst not budget, it's still about 1/3 of the price, which is enough for a lot of people to play Spark Double over Sakashima. Also, it has upside for any +1/+1 counters decks as well as superfriends (e.g. I run it in my Atraxa +1/+1 counters deck).
Watching these list videos made very clear to me, the value and playability of a card heavily depends on your playing environment/group, your budget and your approach to deckbuilding. I made EDH decks with whatever i had around from the last 10-15 years mega casual drafting, and i'm a greedy builder. So i'd never switch Merciless Conviction out. In my group ppl run so many repeatable value engines that "destroy" basically means "delay for 1 turn" and playing smothering tithe basically means "1 person has to spend 3 mana somehow sometime to kill it". When you're up against Meren, Sigarda, Host of Herons voltron or soon to be atraxa superfriends ALL THE TIME, you start to see cards in a different light.
So for decks that want elixir of immortality, it's real good in magda. What's important for her is getting your combo pieces back into your library if they get interrupted. It's also easy to search with her if you need that effect, I believe even the cedh version plays it
@@MetalSnake009 In the process of making a U/G ramp/draw deck and this immediately got added because I need to ensure my chances of my win cons working and not drawing out.
Brainstorm is one of the best magic cards ever printed. Every deck should be playing it. every deck should be playing as many fetches and tutors as they can (if we ignore budget and power level concerns)
Yeah. They clearly never played legacy. Honestly, it feels like they never even played the card itself. It allows you to instant speed dig for an answer to a game winning spell. Who care if you have to put two back on top if you draw your force of will for their thassa's oracle? It allows you to play around with cards that care about the top of your deck, of which there are many. Miracles, for one. Even when you DO get brainstorm locked, it allows you to sequence your cards better. Maybe you drew the lands that you needed to not miss a land drop, or maybe you made sure you're gonna play on curve for the following turns. Also, it pitches to FoW, which is relevant Honestly, what are the deckbuilding costs of brainstorm? It is a card with such a decent floor for a low cost and very high upside, it would be silly NOT to run it in any blue deck that has even a handful of fetches and tutors.
Nah, Secret rendezvous is super good. When you're talking about multi-player format and the table needs to find an answer to someone about to win, you and another player getting to dig down for 6 is so good. And that's without talking about its synergies with smothering tithe.
Agreed - there will always be another player other than you that is behind the rest of the table, and getting them cards won't affect you as much and may earn you a temporary friend. Lots of potential politicking with this card - makes it hard to evaluate on power level sometimes.
The stronger the decks at the table the worst secret rendezvous and cards like Arcane Denial are. Maybe you find an answer to a threat, or maybe you just drew them another threat they can play after you use the removal you got on the first one.
I also run sheldred in my teneb deck, its more something to cheat in to make opponents choose if they want to hit her or teneb, or it forces them to boardwipe which when I can reanimate from any graveyard is fine. She's not great but she has places where she works. But teneb is also just a grindy low mid range deck
I am in complete disagreement on Mana Tithe, especially early game, you can counter someone's mana rock or draw engine and slow down commanders that benefit off of those
I agree here. I know they gave the disclaimer, but in faster metas where youre seeing free spells like the Forces and fierce guardianship, mana tithe is a neat gotcha card
I absolutely agree that Mana Tithe is a good card. I have won at least 20% of my games by stopping someones strategy. I have gotten rid of Wurmcoil Engine turn 4, Lion's Eye Diamond reanimater with Unburial Rites turn 2, etc. Very underrated.
The problem I see with everyone claiming Brainstorm is a bad card because you're not getting rid of the next 2 cards is that it seems they are all reading the card wrong. It IS NOT look at the top three and draw one of them, IT IS draw three cards and put back any two which includes cards already in your hand. You can literally keep all of the cards you just drew and put back ones you don't need YET or don't have the mama for YET. The "you can't shuffle away the ones you don't want" argument seems pointless because if you didn't want to draw them at all why would you even have them in your deck? I don't see how drawing three cards, then putting back the two cards in my hand I'm not ready to play YET is a bad thing by any stretch of the imagination. ...but maybe it's just me.
Mana Tilth - love this card, I catch my opponent nearly all the time - as they hold those 7 lands to rift or counter these "cast without mana cost" spells and they are usually tapped out, awesome feeling to just have that 1 white open - it's a fun card for me and just for 1 mana :) oh yeah, go ahead and use that extra mana to cast your commander for the 3rd time... oh no, oh no no no :)
Nevinyrial's Disk is good because it is an artifact you can recur. If you have artifact synergies I think it can be quite strong, even though it does destroy your own artifacts. I do agree that it is probably overplayed though
love the disk and like it more then oblivion stone! Yea it sucks you cant pop it off right off but it answer's almost everything on the board. It dosen't hit planeswalkers but I like to try and take advantage of that by creating a board state where I can protect my walkers and drop and pop the disk leaving just my super friends
If you have a way to sacrifice oring its a 3 mana exile anything thats not a land. if you sacrifice it with the exile on the stack the 2nd trigger goes off first and then it just gets removed with bonus of whatever you sacced it too. That's why its played so much.
My Mairsil deck loves Nevynirral’s Disk and Magus of the Wheel. Threat of activation, they call it. Elixir of Immortality is great for when you get that infinite draw combo and you don’t want to die due to an empty library (And you can’t afford nor want to play Thassa’s Oracle).
Sometimes you guys nail it but sometimes you guys really undervalue good cards imo. Secretary rendezvous is a mono white and boros staple, alongside oblation, gift of estates, etc. To me broken cards that see play in cedh don’t justify calling it a staple; its a cedh card. Staples are basic lands, 2 drops rocks, creatures, etc. Mana crypt and force of will are not staples. Idk what your average deck price is but when most decks i play are $100 - $200 range then most of the higher end cards dont make the lists and dont need to tbh. Reliquary tower is a land so it has no downside even without synergy, brainstorm is 1 mana dig through 3 cards, sheoldread is literally removal and reanimate in one card, and so on. Mana tithe is one of the few counters in white and in higher power level does work, although rebuff the wicked is my favorite one.
The problem with cards like Fracture (and why it's a bad card) is that the card always asks more of you (harder to cast compared to Disenchant) but only sometimes gives you more (on the rare case where you kill a planeswalker with it).
Sheoldred was my first love- er, commander. I have used her to great effect with a ramp-heavy deck, and my opponents are never happy to see her. I still tweak her deck as I learn more about deck building and new cards are released. That Jeweled Lotus I pulled from a pack doesn't hurt either...
On MTG Goldfish podcast, they did an episode about white card draw and convinced me Secret Rendezvous is a pretty good card in multiplayer and in mono white
It's a good card, dont take NN as gospel. They are another perspective - with that said, they often make good points; give it a try and see for how it works for you.
you guys did a good job evaluating somewhat popular cards that shouldn't see much as play as they do with this and gave me good reasons why i shouldn't play oblivion ring lol which i play a lot, but i don't think in this video you really covered the worse offenders very well, like i don't think any of the top 10 most played edh cards are here except commander's sphere and arguably atm the top 10 non land ones in order according to the number of decks that they are via the list table on edhrec: sol ring, arcane signet, swiftfoot boots, lighting graves, swords to plowshares, cultivate, counterspell, beast within, mind stone and fellwar stone with ring and signet being in more than a 1 million decks each.
I play both Brainstorm and Spark Double in my Pir and Toothy deck... I feel like I'm being roasted, although at the same time I know both cards have synergy in the deck.
You go on about how terrible Carpet of Flowers is by saying you had one island in play the whole game, but... that's two mana per turn from a one mana enchantment, and that's pretty good rate. It's only bad if none of your opponents have any islands at all, which is actually kinda uncommon.
Sheoldred... Now THAT is a card that sounds good the first time you read it. And then you stick it in a deck. And then you play you that deck 100 times and actually use Sheoldred about twice... And then you realize it's not as effective as it's text box wants you to believe.
you don't have to metagame to expect a blue player at the table. when taking into consideration that you don't see every card every game and red will loot/rummage/exile a good portion of cards, REB and pyroblast are rarely bad. people play hate cards/silverbullets for less frequent occasions.
Yeah...some of these takes feel like they come from a very specific meta, and not necessarily one indicative of your average table. Meanwhile, Pyroblast can "counter" an Atraxa, Muldrotha, Yuriko, Hinata, Ur-Dragon, and so on, and that's before we even consider it's use as a clutch answer to a Cyclonic Rift or wayward counterspell. Along the lines of what you're saying, I'd argue that REB and Pyroblast will "whiff" less often than dedicated graveyard hate, honestly.
12:30 I use Aetherize in "combo" with Elite Arcanist (in a Blue-Wizard thematic deck _for fun_ ) to protect myself while building up the actual mechanics (depending on the list: mill, flood with tokens & steal others' creatures or casting "Time Stop" copies ad infinitum), 16:15 Grave Titan should have a "B, TAP: Destroy other target creature. It can't be regenerated." This is a very "death in function" :D
you really don't understand why people play mana tithe. its not about power its about countering someones spell with mana tithe they will never mentally recover from this.
It's funny how on Secret Rendezvous the opinions clash sooo much. I see it rated between F and S (probably both exaggerated simply because others disagree so heavily) by different content creators and the most funny thing is, one of the advocates for it that resonates most with me is Richard from MTG Goldfish. And he has the highest win % on their show, constantly playing white ramp, bad card draw and is just constantly outmanouvering his playgroup by political play, often being "the underdog" on the table despite of his record to be the most "winning" player. I think it goes to show that card that put your opponents ahead CAN be useful if you alter your playstyle towards them and Secret Rendezvous might be one of those. If you believe that being the threat and pushing that advantage you gained over the line is your best way to victory hell no you don't wanna play this. If you believe that coasting by and being part of the majority alliance against the "archenemy" is your best way to victory, heck yes that card is amazing. Richard argued the following: If by playing this I get 3 new cards and somebody I aligned (or use this to align) myself with draws 3 cards to use against another player that is ahead of both of us, it creates a scenario where this card is essentially your "alliance" being 5 cards up on the other 2 opponents. Sometimes, he also said, it even makes the player you gave the cards to as being perceived as the new threat. Additionally the perception of Secret Rendezvous being a bad card often leads to reactions that diminish the threat of the person having played it, leading to a perfect storm of where someone is happy to assist you, another player is sad he got left out and salty at the player who received "free" stuff and the actual current threat who is the person those ressources are most often used against. I know, none of this makes sense if everyone goes "wait a minute, he just gave me free stuff, now I can punish him" but to be really honest, that is kind of a more CEDH/spikey mentality, that a lot of players do not follow in EDH games. To close of, I def. understand why from your perspective the card is overplayed. You subscribe to the mentality of being your own agent and doing everything you can to win your game by your own means. So, the card is actually terrible. But I believe that taking playstyles into consideration (not in a hypeothetical discussion about power lvl of cards but in applying those discussions to deckbuilding and gameplay) is valid and a good thing to do. It just so happens that Secret Rendezvous perfectly puts those ideologies against each other!
Summed it up perfectly. Maybe one addition: In my opinion it also coincides with the actual power level of the decks played around the table (not only the mentality of the players). I think the lower you go, the better the card gets.
Aetherize has saved me when facing infinite creatures when a combo an opponent controls went off and it was a one-sided board wipe since they were mainly tokens. It's been very good in my games.
I think Secret Rendezvous is one of the best white card-draw cards, all the others are conditional. Also a strong political card. I play it in two color decks
Not to be argumentative, but Planeswalkers aren't as uncommon as you guys think in competitive meta. Namely, Tevesh Szat, who's one of the best competitive commanders. Love the channel, though!
Theres a very limited amount of planeswalkers at that level, and the majority of those either win on the turn they hit the board or are glorified tutors (looking at you tezzeret)
I play all the blue cards and they feel pretty good whaha. Probably depends on the meta too. I think aetherize is super good in dealing with an arch enemy. It also allows you to protect yourself with a mass bounce effect that actually gets favour with the other 2 players
I love me some big flash lightning rods like Sheoldred! It draws the removal right into it providing pseudo protection for more important pieces. Oh, and on the off chance she sticks around for a bit! Granted I only run her where she synergies. Like in Negan where I run all the edicts 😬
Elixir of immortality is in my tame Narset deck to over saturate my library with non lands! I have a really great experience with that card. Very cool effect!
I run sheoldred in my meren deck because at some point meren Costs like 14 mana, and sheoldred can stand in for her as well as reanimate her from the graveyard. But that's the only use I've found for that card
Idk man. I feel like you’re not considering a lot of these are just “fun cards to play” in casual groups. Feels too focused on “more optimal thinking” versus just playing stuff cuz it’s fun.
Spark Double in general isn’t the best, but it’s fantastic in Marchesa the Dusk Rose, entering with the counter on it each time is a huge gain, can sacrifice it each players turn.
Honestly I think spark double is amazing. I play orvar so copying him and going infinite in half of the time is so good. And i think the reason why sakishima is so low is because its $30 i would have played that so quick if it was under $10.
I run Sheoldree in my WUB dungeon deck. I agree it’s mostly cool factor but it puts in work with Sefris. Though I do also run 3 fresh bag variants. The deck is straight jank. I put every card in WUB that delves in it.
To the Spark Double/ Sakashima point, War of the Spark is one of the well received and loved sets of recent memory with a high print run and strong presence in multiple formats. I tis also in the rare slot so it was more accessible as many people got them from opening packs or from draft events. Sakashima on the other hand was from Commander legends and is a Mythic which lowers its accessibility and from opening packs and I don't think many places have commander draft events.
Spark Double is actually in the Jace pre-con for War of the Spark. That's how I got mine. I also pulled Liliana, Dreadhorde General out of one of the packs it came with so that was pretty sweet.
field of ruin is another land card thats sac for particular reasons and less for sac to get land out, but its notable as well that the lands brought out arent tapped when they come into play. early on in edh i would use this to deny a player a multi-land or similar effect
I have so many things to say about this video but it just isn't worth it to go into all of them. You have mentioned a few cards that I don't disagree with, but it seems very obvious to me that you guys ignore the fact that there are a ton of budget and precon decks that are being played and are effecting these statistics. And this is completely emphasized by the literal statement of "Spend $10 to fix your mana base, not on chromatic lantern". I don't know what world you are living in but the cheapest shock and fetch lands are $12ish. Triomes are expensive, and many of the dual color lands are creeping to around $5. Considering the fact that lands take up about 1/3 of your deck, I would find it hard pressed to have $10 really "improve" my land base. But hey, maybe I'm wrong.
May be biased here from playing so much 60 card MTG, but Brainstorm is so good. Shuffle effects, hand protection, dig for answer, instant/cantrip, etc... If playing mono blue, for me it is a no brain auto-include. As for Aetherize, you just did a video about the difference in the game when you power down your decks from a 7-9 to 5-7 and how much combat comes into play at that level, especially when infinite combo is gone. In light of that, don't you understand its value after that for only 6% of blue decks. Honestly surprised it isn't used more.
I play Dark Ritual in my Gisa monoblack deck. It can be useful sometimes but I agree that spending a card (or having a dead card late game) for 3 mana can be kinda poop. However, I'm on a budget and I'm wondering which ramp card can replace it. Any ideas guys ?
hard to answer without knowing what is already in your deck other than sol ring...but i guess sth like Arcane signet, Fellwar Stone, Coldsteel Heart, Wayfarer's Bauble, Traveler's amulet?
I'm so confused on the red counter blue spell cards.... using 2 slots for red instant speed interaction to protect your game ending bombs from blue counter spells seems worth only using 2 slots out of 99
Dark Ritual is nuts to ramp into Bolas’s Citadel then go crazy from the top of your deck or to cheat a haymaker out in early. Its good at throwing you instant resources for combo pieces that could take two turns to get out otherwise. Them two extra Black pips can be so valuable
brainstorm is also good if you have lots of cards that trigger off of drawing a card, like alhammaret’s archive or niv-mizzet. spark double is a great backup in sakashima clone decks. i wanna have as many vial smasher clones as possible in my deck, and spark double lets me get one even if sakashima has been kept off the table.
i use aetherize as ramp since it has instant speed REMEMBer, how blue ramp is to make others dont ramp (or destroy others' ramp) so when i have blue, i always make sure i have at least 5 cards of extra turn
What people think the want is Brainstorm, but what they really need is Ponder. Also I have a Mardu combo deck that has 6 counterspells in it so there is a deck that uses Mana Tithe.
I like unclaimed territory and the new secluded courtyard mainly because they come in untapped and are perfect in my Sethron deck. Granted i see the downsides of them yea they wont help with instants sorcs etc but its mainly a horde deck thats main goal is to smash face's with minotuars and having that free untapped mana is nice.
I have an enchantment themed zedruu deck and use the O-Ring type cards as removal that I give away to let me draw more. The deck has answers to everything and lots of enchantment recursion
I actually didn’t realize field of ruin ramped each player, I was playing it in my omnath deck to get the extra trigger. Definitely taking it out for a fetch now
In fairness Not only is dark ritual great, but cabal ritual and culling the weak are great as well in that high level almost cedh borderline, youre going to hit one of them early on MOST of the time which you can use to immediately tutor for a full combo plus another ritual to cast said combo if your opening hand allows it
To add to the hate on Chromatic Lantern. Even when you do have it out you will pay for things very carefully because you always need to be prepared for if it gets blown up. You dont want it gone and then you cant case your instant speed spells because you tapped wrong.
Spark Double is in all the decks with blue and their command has any sort of trigger that your entire deck runs around. . . which is a non insignificant number of commands that have blue in them
Carpet of flowers I think works decently well, most games you're going to end up with at least one player playing blue, and even if they only have one island that's still two mana gained each turn for one mana cost. That's sol ring levels of mana. Now you can only use it for sorcery speed stuff, but if they play a few islands then you're looking at spending most of your turn using this banked mana and saving all your normal mana sources for your instant speed stuff. Honestly I think the biggest issue is that it ramps so fast unless you have massive card draw you're going to be wasting so much.
I strictly disagree with the spark double. I play it in every deck with blue in it, especially in Marchesa and Orvar Imbiss an awesome card. It is basically a copy of your commander, so if your deck revolves around it play it
Kind of important to take into consideration the cost difference between spark double and Sakashima. Of course Spark double isn’t budget but it is 1/3 the cost of Sakashima
@@robertmonroe1883 Budget is a pretty broad term. Doesn’t always mean all my cards have to be under a dollar, but if I have $100 budget to spend on a deck that would love to have a Sakashima it’s a lot easier to find room for $9 and settle on a Spark double. Even if it is strictly worse.
I agree with most of these cards, but Carpet of Flowers is an exception. Even if it gets you one mana, it's better than Wild Growth that's already good and if it gets you two it's absolutly amazing.
Couldn't agree more. They talk about Carpet of Flowers having the supposed downside of maybe only netting you a single mana...as though this isn't a great rate considering that Carpet also fixes. Since when is a 1cmc card that ramps you for a single mana bad? If you get more than one mana, Carpet is essentially another Sol Ring.
@@NitpickingNerds From a power standpoint, preordain, ponder, and brainstorm all appreciably improve consistency at practically no cost, what reason is there not to run at least the first two in any blue deck barring special circumstances
Villainous wealth is the ONE off-theme fun card I allow myself in my Muldrotha deck. It can be an alternate win con or just a fast way to recover after a board wipe.
Think you guys missed the most important part of field of ruin. It's not an optional shuffle effect, so you can use it to disrupt topdeck tutors or other topdeck shenanigans. Opponents won't usually expect it so people rarely play around it, and it's hard to interact with since it's an activated ability. Sure it's narrow and won't be relevant every game, but that's standard for utility lands. When it works you are often stopping a tutor for a win con or a tutor for an answer to your win con, which is a way bigger potential upside than most utility lands offer. As a bonus it can even help fix, not a huge deal but it makes it an easier include in multicolor decks where utility lands are generally harder to slot in.
I have a few super-budget (~$15 total) 2-3 color creature-heavy tribal decks and Unclaimed Territory has overperformed every time because it's one of if not the only multi-colored land that enters untapped in those decks.
Had the video on mute since I’m winding down for the night but thanks for all these new card recommendations. Excited to put them in all my decks
oh no...
I do this the other way around - listen to it like a podcast
Man i've watched enough of MTG goldfish with Richard playing the heck out of secret rendez-vous to win me over. The card is actually great. Few things, how often is EDH 1v1v1v1 versus it being 3v1. Normally someone is always ahead and you need to draw answers to solve the problem. In that case you can just make the person who drew the other cards play their answer to the board before you do. In this case scenario you have 6 chances to draw removal to the problem. Second, you get to choose who gets to draw. You can just pick the person who is struggling and there is always someone struggling. Thirdly, you make an ally for basically the rest of the game. Like when someone draws you three cards, what wouldn't you do for that. Lastly, its THREE mana for THREE cards in hand. what other cards does that? The card needs to be played politically to be good, but when you take into consideration how allies work the math checks out theoretically.
100% agree with all this and yea, Richard convinced me too lol. Political cards tend to be hard to rate and their power depends on how well you use them in tandem with deals.
(Painful truths is also a three for three) But I totally agree. The only thing I would’ve changed about Secret Rendezvous is giving the other person 2 cards rather than three. Bc at the end of it, you are up two cards and they are up three cards, but Richard is entirely correct. The power of SR comes with the power of choice. It’s like you make someone else get an answer with scheming symmetry while you benefit
The only factor I can see that we didn’t think about was politics but I don’t know how really judge that without playing it and the card is so butts I don’t wanna play it lol.
Helping the table dig for answers against one player seem like the best applicantioj for it, it's a very bad top deck if you're in a leading position and might be targeted already
I do think it's a cool card though, not sure what deck to place it in though
Richard is an actual pleb, do not take advice from him. Secret Rendezvous is an awful card.
A few of these are cEDH staples, which is definitely inflating the percentages here. Dark Ritual, for example, is an absolute staple of black cEDH decks- every single black deck in that format has a Ritual in it. Same goes for Pyroblast/REB, even for decks that also have access to blue. When almost every deck is blue, those cards are just broken.
I don’t disagree that the numbers are inflated because of cEDH but I can tell by looking at other cEDH cards that it does push the percentage up that much.
@@NitpickingNerds
By “other” CEDH cards you mean?
@@Uefeti you’re welcome to do your own research for other cards
@@Kazz1187
I just wanted to know, what do they mean by “other cedh card”.
Dor Example, If it’s a comparesment with LED, or Drake, its just a bad research.
I think the problem is edh rec in general. Alot of people make cedh lists and never play the decks or build them. This is also true for regular edh but I imagine only 25 percent of cedh deck lists ever actually see the light of day. So there is probably more research you would have to do to actually see if red blast is overplayed.
People play spark double, to copy their commanders. The Card doubles any value-engine you Commander might provide. In that regard its better then Sakashima. (Because of the counter, and a possibility to copy a planeswalker/commander, like estrid or saheeli)
Nobody cares about Legendary-Rule thing Sakahima provides. Thats a very-specific thing for a very specific deck
Plus, the Spark is cheaper AND much older.
I think they serve 2 different roles. Sakashima is generally if you play it in the command zone with a partner that you want to copy, similar to what you said for spark double, and you play it if you're trying to clone that card a lot (note: Krakashima decks). With Spark Double, you play it in the 99 since it isn't legendary, and it fits that niche role of copying planeswalkers while still being similar to sakashima in copying a creature as being not legendary. Plus like you said it's cheaper which is very relevant, and it's at rare rather than mythic so it's probably a bit more plentiful on the market too.
@@fosterdawson7339
I agree. But i think The KrarkKashima is the only big-popular deck what actually uses the “legend rule” part of his text. So it might be an exception.
Most of time (as you said) Sakashima is a weaker version of Spark Double in Command Zone (Two Timnas, Kodama/Sakashima).
,
@@Uefeti i dunno i play koma, cosmos serpent and the sakashima rule lets me play cards like rite of replication on koma
@@razin_6298
Eh.. ok? Rite or replication is a niche card.
Furthermore, if your rite of replication works only with just 1 cards in your deck, its a bad include.
@@Uefeti im playing green so its super easy to ramp into and i have other great stuff to copy if i dont have sakashima
9:35 gotta argue here. Brainstorm is excellent for "whenever you draw a card" triggers as well. There's a lot of things you can do with it strategy wise to keep your hand moving too. Like tuck some slow or ineffective cards before you fetch, and things like that. It's an underated card in my opinion. Not saying it can't be replaced in a lot of decks, but it has some not necessarily obvious synergies with a lot of abilities that don't necessarily care about the top. Like dredge decks can make sure those two dredges weren't good casts next turn. Maybe you're a surveil deck that needs to get something in your hand into the graveyard, but you have no discard. It doesn't feel bad as a isochron imprint either.
So maybe it's not the best play in every slot, but 29% makes a lot of sense to me for the above reasoning.
I run it in my Exodia deck as a cheap way to dig an extra 3. Also in Pir ft. Toothy it's a nifty way to put 3 to 9 +1/+1 counters on Toothy, and has the secret tech where I can cast it, then cast Toothy, "search" my library for Pir, and shuffle.
I don't know if underrated is the word for Brainstorm
@@nolanknarr1299 fair. I probably should've said it's an underappreciated card for the amount of overall utility it actually has instead.
Sometimes I think they are new to magic
@@outacontrol7528 or they're like Sheldon, relies too much their personal pool of friends/store as the reference point for all games outside of their sphere
40:06 I will always use reliquary tower in my decks if cyclonic rift is still legal. If someone casts it on my endstep and I have to discard to hand size with my board reset, it hurts
That isn’t completely unfair.
@@NitpickingNerds true, it just completely sucks
Reliquary tower is great. It does everything thought vessel does but better. (Unless you are about artifacts)
And it’s also mana positive or Neutral.
It’s also useable land that comes in untapped that has a great native usable ability. With the amount of lands you have and such the point you can decide what one’s to put in what order. I doubt there’s a statical downside to tapping for colorless.
My pod went through a phase where everyone BUT me ran Rift. After building my board state 3 times in a game and having this exact scenario happen 3 times I started adding Reins of Power to my blue decks.
They actually lost me as a subscriber on elixir and relquary. i was thinking they were taking the piss out of these cards until i noticed it wasnt an april fools video. i mean i get my secret weapon decks for cEDH are too secret for people to expect all the synergies, but i thought people would examine cards more often and break every card possible
Merciless Eviction is awesome. You’ll never convince me otherwise. It always answers everything you need it to to stall out the player in the lead, and you don’t bust your own board to do it. Playing Superfriends? Great. Artifacts? Enchantress? Phenomenal.
It’s worse than Austere command and Farewell, but far better than other destroy features. It has never failed me when casting it.
I also believe Merciless Eviction is better than many people online give it credit for.
Solving an artifact board state with Darksteel Forge for good or one opponent which has spiraled out of control with his superfriends is very good, the fact that it circumvents answers like Heroic Intervention or other budget options against ordinary board wipes is also a thing which should be kept in mind.
It is, however, still overshadowed by certain other removal spells and I only consider it in certain color combinations and archetypes (my Mardu voltron deck has problems with superfriends, for example).
Force of will
I just spend 0 mana to stop your excessively expensive boardwipe
@@V2ULTRAKill why didnt you use that to stop the combo guy? Let big CMC cards live a little.
@@jamesoakley9333 i mean i could also
Mana leak it, flusterstorm it, teferis protection my board, blink my board some other way, use any number of other free counterspells, etc
I play Espertron (Esper super-friends) and my buddy loves his all color super-friends so we kinda have a MAD agreement with Merciless. It has lead to some of the most back stabby politics I've ever seen and we both absolutely love it.
Brainstorm is way more valuable the higher power level you play. It's not a trap, it's be a better player. You can manipulate your draws in response to a wheel, set up your own wheels, you can dig deeper for a counterspell, you can of course throw away unneeded cards for better cards early on when fetching, give you information and card selection... Brainstorm is beyond good, it just needs to be used well when it's being used to see value.
Also, rituals are combo pieces. They are there to cheat out mana to keep you casting earlier than you're supposed to.
I know all the upsides brainstorm and can agree on a very high powered meta it is better but the percentage of decks it is indicates that it is not just in higher power.
Brainstorm should continue to be a staple for blue. It is always worth including. It is NOT overplayed. If anything, it is underplayed.
@@NitpickingNerds In a 100 card singleton format, seeing cards is INSANELY important, since not all cards have a copy with a redundant effect, you seeing 3 cards off the top can be make or break on if you pull an answer to something or pull the card you need to pull out a win. The card does not need to be in a high power meta to be useful, that is just where you are used to seeing it.
Also if its in your opener and you’ve mulled down to 5 or 6 it always serms to overperform to me
@@ACertainGuy0 In a singleton format with a 99 card deck, the likely hood of getting anything good out of brainstorm is 0%. Unless you have synergies such as Parun decks it isn't that great. You are spending a card to get a card, potential trading cards in your hand for better ones. It does not gain you any resources, it merely exchanges them. ONCE.
Brainstorm is fantastic in the early game, and still useful in the later game, setting up your draws, and helping you stay on curve. I run it in Capt Jhoira
Without reliable shuffling (or other synergies), brainstorm drops below many of the other cantrips (ponder, preordain, serum visions, opt, consider...)
@@simonteesdale9752 While the lack of "gaining" resources when compared to exchanging them does seem kind of rough, I don't see why you don't play all of them. It being an instant gives it good points in my book when compared to preordain or serum visions, and being able to see 3 cards and put back cards you wont need at the moment is better than simply drawing a single card with no replacement
Just moved from Arena to paper a couple weeks ago, and you guys have quickly become one of my fav mtg channels =] thanks for the great videos
I have beef with the o ring, removal spell and combo piece all rolled into one is sooooo good. Banishing light is def awful since you have to target other people's stuff and you can't do the cheeky sac in response to exile forever. Y'all have the commander takes I agree with the most!
Edit: oh dang lmao my deck is a ghen deck, paused to make the comment and got sooooooooo burned lmao
Classic! 🥰 Much love
Mwahahahaaaa! Thanks for supporting the channel ❤
I run o ring in Ghen
O ring lets you win with Barren Glory + Worldfire tho.....
REB and Pyroblast are great against Cyclonic Rift, Rhystic Study, most countermagic and there is many great Commanders that play blue. imo The opportunity cost is quite small for all the times these red instants shine like a star.
Magus of the wheel works well in my Rionya deck. It's useful for the turn I go off or sometimes as a group hug card when an opponent is mana screwed.
Totally fair
Also good enough in Elesha, Who Smiles at Death
@@NitpickingNerds I run Magus of the Wheel because Wheel of Fortune is $500, Time Spiral is $150-200, Wheel of Misfortune can miss, Memory Jar is $55-60 and hard to find, Magus of the Jar is too mana costly, Timetwister is $900-1500, and because instead of 5cmc, Magus of the Wheel is 5 mana over 2 installments. It's good enough for Nekusar, and if you recur it and reuse it just once, it's huge.
Aetherize is actually effective for Locust God on a budget, especially if you've forced a tempo race.
"Dark ritual is not good in commander"
Me who saw my opponent:
>play land
>play dark ritual
>play jeweled lotus
>gitrog turn one
>played second land
>cracked it for bayou
>drew off gitrog before grabbing dual
>played rain of filth
>sac first land for black
>draws
>imperial sealed a dakmoor salvage
>puts it on top of library
>cracked second land for black
>draws the dakmor
>plays putrid imp with last mana
>draws through entire deck using dakmor plus discard outlet
>wins
Wasn't even mad, he payed well over a thousand dollars for that win. He deserved it. Plus it just meant we got to play another game that night.
But yeah, rituals are always good when you got a degenerate/combo centric commander.
Grave Titan does great work in my Ayara deck where really all I care about it's repeated value in the form of black creature ETBs. I Alongside Bitterblossom, Dreadhorde Invasion, Jadar, and the new Gisa are just a taste of my "token swarm each rotation" package...and the Ayara pings really add up
That is a fair spot for it I would have to look into it😊
I also think it's ok in decks where haste is a big factor. Sedris, for example. Or decks that revolve around Sneak Attack.
it works in a lot of decks, their hate for the card is meme at this point.
abhorrent overlord does the same thing in that spot but better, and it's almost 20 times cheaper lol
CORRECTION to @27:08 - Yesterday, I played my Carpet of Flowers for the first time. My friend pointed out that I use it during BOTH main phases. So, I wasn't getting just 6 mana of any color for his Islands, but 6 TWICE that turn. I just now read the Oracle text, and it does indeed say that this enchantment triggers during EACH main phase. (And, yes, it helped me color-fix for my GWB deck.)
The last time you guys brought up arcane denial, you indicated that being 1 card behind 1 player is better than being 1 card behind 2 other players, which is what normally results from spot removal.
Secret Rendezvous seems to run on similar math in my mind, leaving you one card behind another player but ending with you two cards ahead of 2 other players. I get that an instant speed answer for 2 mana is very different from sorcery speed card flow for 3 mana but the math seems somewhat comparable on paper. Where am I going wrong here?
Answers nearly always put you down cards to the table, but card draw spells are meant to give you extra cards. This one does not get you ahead on cards either. The only reason to play it is for group hug / political reasons
Bro sheoldred literally triggers on the start of each opponents turn and then keeps going. It’s pretty alright
No. There are literally a million better cards for less mana... or if you want better for more mana, drop portal to phyrexia
@@veerkillerx literally a million? Quite possibly the worst use of the word "literally" in history
Brainstorm is a powerhouse in Niv-Mizzet and it is like the top 20 most played commander.
It is good in that deck for sure
No one commander is going to make a dent in the overall % for these cards, though. Like we said it definitely works well in certain more specific decks
Not to mention yuriko.
@@mportillo78 brainstorm in yuriko is op. I play a Niv Mizzet Parun next and it’s great in that as well.
@@jakepincus9342 and Intet, the Dreamer
dark ritual is an all star in any 3 mana mono black commander. can be thought of as a 1 mana jeweled lotus which im not trying to sounf trolly but definetly should be a point
While I did disagree with a couple of the cards on your list, I do think something a lot of people don't understand when deckbuilding is the concept of opportunity cost. The idea that, just because you saw something do good doesn't mean that is the average performance of that card is good. And even when it is good, there is quite possibly something that would make a better use of that slot in your deck. Not even just the opportunity cost of the slot it self but also the cost of drawing the card vs any other card in your deck. Many of people will cite situations where a card outperformed its average while missing incremental quality out of other cards. I remember this being a large talking point in the argument of nature's claim over krosan grip. Players will often miss all the times when that mana efficiency will help them out, in places where they are quitely hindered by grip. Simply because they remember the times they got the big blowout with grip and not the many other times it was just slightly a pain in the ass to hold up, or simply chose not to hold it up.
I was quite a sport stat nerd for much of my youth, and something this always reminds me of is the WAR stat commonly used in baseball. It stands for Wins Above Replacement, and is one of the overarching stats that can most effectively represent the usefulness of a player. The idea being that, should you replace a league average player with someone else, how many more/less games would you win on average. That is how I try to evaluate cards in my mind. Looking at any given card I want to put in my deck, on average, how much better will this perform than any other card I would replace it for *on average*. This includes the time it sits in my hand with no targets, or I don't have the mana to cast it. And in a way, this kind of evaluation can be extended out to metrics other than just competitiveness. One could even consider, 'how much more fun will this card give me on average than the cards I would be replacing it with'. Essentially, consider everything that card will do. The highs, the lows, the most often and least often uses.
I ain't reading that... :P
I use elixir of immortality in my scion of the ur dragon deck since he puts the dragons in my gy and turns into a copy of them i need a way to get them back into the deck for subsequent activation's. but outside of that one weird deck that needs to both use its gy and also be able to add the cards in the gy back to the deck i got no idea where it goes.
MTG Goldfish did a big episode on white card draw and went on about how good secret rendezvous performs. It made me tempted to try it out. The idea is for you it is a good rate, and you make an ally or help out the person losing.
Goldfish often plays really low power games so of course they are higher on it, so there that 3 cards is putting an infinite combo piece in a players had. Against some of my decks giving my 3 cards can hand me a win, power level is the defining factor for this cards playability
@@spudster8887 but the nerds play at a 5-6 power level with no easy infinites. So it should be great for their tables.
It is interesting but I just think overall the card is pretty bad. Giving a player more than you get is insulting
We generally don't like handing out cards, and I think mono white / boros has better card draw options than this currently :)
@@NitpickingNerds not if that player works with you to deal with the biggest threat at the table. “Politics” (I.e. threat assessment and table sentiment of each player) are part of every game whether people explicitly talk about it or not, and it’s a very powerful and versatile political tool to get the upper hand on the player who is most threatening to you.
So I disagree with you guys about brain storm. Brainstorm is a very versatile card. Here's why Brainstorm is so good.
1. It's instant speed, you can cast this and get to see the top 3 cards, whenever you want.
2. It only costs 1 mana.
3. Unlike other cantrips where you look at the top three or 4 and choose one, if all 3 cards are good, you get to keep all of those cards and put 2 that were already in your hand back on top, Brainstorm is also very good with fetchlands and shuffle effects, which happen a lot in commander.
4. Brainstorm is "draw three cards" so anything that triggers when you "draw a card" triggers off of Brainstorm.
5. In conclusion you're wrong about Brainstorm guys.
as a clone, spasrk double is very unique, there are 3 or 4 clones that clone legendary things, it is one of them. Sakashima of a 1000 faces is special, he lets every clone do it, but if they blow him up, you lose everything. Spark double is played alot for a reason
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Comparing spark double to a clone isn’t really accurate because it’s really just; 4 mana make a second copy of your commander that isn’t legendary. A copy of your commander can be ridiculously powerful. that being said I think people do jam it into decks without really thinking
It's awesome to have two Commanders, but the setup cost can be high, and if that's your only high-value target, you're also kind of open for a 2-for-1 removal spell
@@NitpickingNerds I mean, there are always good targets for a clone. This card will almost never get you "2-for-1'd".
@@DankTrainTom I hardly ever agree with the nerds... you can say I'm nitpicky lol but Spark double does suffer from only hitting your board, Clever impersonator and Phyrexian metamorph are better clone effects and all of the Sakishima's are better extra commanders but i also have SD in multiple decks.
Almost certainly the reason Spark Double seems as much play as it does is because it's more accessible than Sakashima (and it came out first). Whilst not budget, it's still about 1/3 of the price, which is enough for a lot of people to play Spark Double over Sakashima. Also, it has upside for any +1/+1 counters decks as well as superfriends (e.g. I run it in my Atraxa +1/+1 counters deck).
@@Primal314
Sakashima is litteraly a worse spark double. If it’s not in your command zone, its just weaker.
Watching these list videos made very clear to me, the value and playability of a card heavily depends on your playing environment/group, your budget and your approach to deckbuilding.
I made EDH decks with whatever i had around from the last 10-15 years mega casual drafting, and i'm a greedy builder. So i'd never switch Merciless Conviction out. In my group ppl run so many repeatable value engines that "destroy" basically means "delay for 1 turn" and playing smothering tithe basically means "1 person has to spend 3 mana somehow sometime to kill it".
When you're up against Meren, Sigarda, Host of Herons voltron or soon to be atraxa superfriends ALL THE TIME, you start to see cards in a different light.
Meta will always be something that can change how good cards are
As a person who loves cantrips and drawings cards, there will never be a blue deck where I don’t play brainstorm.
It was literally my dog, cosmo’s birthday when this aired lol. Thanks for including him lol!
So for decks that want elixir of immortality, it's real good in magda. What's important for her is getting your combo pieces back into your library if they get interrupted. It's also easy to search with her if you need that effect, I believe even the cedh version plays it
Learned something new so that is cool
Not just magda. Any tutoring commander with a narrow strategy, uses elixir.
Sisay, Vanifar fro example
@@NitpickingNerds elixir si a budget option for cycling your library un some combos... When You have infinit mana and draw
@@MetalSnake009 In the process of making a U/G ramp/draw deck and this immediately got added because I need to ensure my chances of my win cons working and not drawing out.
@@Uefeti Sisay doesn't use it, atleast the cedh version doesn't, unless you mean WG sisay and not WUBRG sisay?
Brainstorm is one of the best magic cards ever printed. Every deck should be playing it. every deck should be playing as many fetches and tutors as they can (if we ignore budget and power level concerns)
Yeah. They clearly never played legacy. Honestly, it feels like they never even played the card itself.
It allows you to instant speed dig for an answer to a game winning spell. Who care if you have to put two back on top if you draw your force of will for their thassa's oracle?
It allows you to play around with cards that care about the top of your deck, of which there are many. Miracles, for one.
Even when you DO get brainstorm locked, it allows you to sequence your cards better. Maybe you drew the lands that you needed to not miss a land drop, or maybe you made sure you're gonna play on curve for the following turns.
Also, it pitches to FoW, which is relevant
Honestly, what are the deckbuilding costs of brainstorm? It is a card with such a decent floor for a low cost and very high upside, it would be silly NOT to run it in any blue deck that has even a handful of fetches and tutors.
Nah, Secret rendezvous is super good. When you're talking about multi-player format and the table needs to find an answer to someone about to win, you and another player getting to dig down for 6 is so good. And that's without talking about its synergies with smothering tithe.
Agreed - there will always be another player other than you that is behind the rest of the table, and getting them cards won't affect you as much and may earn you a temporary friend. Lots of potential politicking with this card - makes it hard to evaluate on power level sometimes.
The stronger the decks at the table the worst secret rendezvous and cards like Arcane Denial are. Maybe you find an answer to a threat, or maybe you just drew them another threat they can play after you use the removal you got on the first one.
I also run sheldred in my teneb deck, its more something to cheat in to make opponents choose if they want to hit her or teneb, or it forces them to boardwipe which when I can reanimate from any graveyard is fine. She's not great but she has places where she works. But teneb is also just a grindy low mid range deck
I am in complete disagreement on Mana Tithe, especially early game, you can counter someone's mana rock or draw engine and slow down commanders that benefit off of those
I agree here. I know they gave the disclaimer, but in faster metas where youre seeing free spells like the Forces and fierce guardianship, mana tithe is a neat gotcha card
I absolutely agree that Mana Tithe is a good card. I have won at least 20% of my games by stopping someones strategy. I have gotten rid of Wurmcoil Engine turn 4, Lion's Eye Diamond reanimater with Unburial Rites turn 2, etc.
Very underrated.
Hell yeah 100% I spell pierced my sons turn 1 sol ring and it slowed him down tremendously. That was two years ago and he’s still mad lol
Hell yeah 100% I spell pierced my sons turn 1 sol ring and it slowed him down tremendously. That was two years ago and he’s still mad lol
The problem I see with everyone claiming Brainstorm is a bad card because you're not getting rid of the next 2 cards is that it seems they are all reading the card wrong. It IS NOT look at the top three and draw one of them, IT IS draw three cards and put back any two which includes cards already in your hand. You can literally keep all of the cards you just drew and put back ones you don't need YET or don't have the mama for YET. The "you can't shuffle away the ones you don't want" argument seems pointless because if you didn't want to draw them at all why would you even have them in your deck? I don't see how drawing three cards, then putting back the two cards in my hand I'm not ready to play YET is a bad thing by any stretch of the imagination.
...but maybe it's just me.
Mana Tilth - love this card, I catch my opponent nearly all the time - as they hold those 7 lands to rift or counter these "cast without mana cost" spells and they are usually tapped out, awesome feeling to just have that 1 white open - it's a fun card for me and just for 1 mana :) oh yeah, go ahead and use that extra mana to cast your commander for the 3rd time... oh no, oh no no no :)
If I had a nickel for every time Spark Double won someone a game I could beat anyone with a sock full of nickels.
Nevinyrial's Disk is good because it is an artifact you can recur. If you have artifact synergies I think it can be quite strong, even though it does destroy your own artifacts. I do agree that it is probably overplayed though
love the disk and like it more then oblivion stone! Yea it sucks you cant pop it off right off but it answer's almost everything on the board. It dosen't hit planeswalkers but I like to try and take advantage of that by creating a board state where I can protect my walkers and drop and pop the disk leaving just my super friends
or tutor for with in a magda deck and play in on a persons end step
If you have a way to sacrifice oring its a 3 mana exile anything thats not a land. if you sacrifice it with the exile on the stack the 2nd trigger goes off first and then it just gets removed with bonus of whatever you sacced it too. That's why its played so much.
My Mairsil deck loves Nevynirral’s Disk and Magus of the Wheel. Threat of activation, they call it.
Elixir of Immortality is great for when you get that infinite draw combo and you don’t want to die due to an empty library (And you can’t afford nor want to play Thassa’s Oracle).
I literally removed Thassa's Oracle from my deck. I don't like winning with it. Feels too cheap.
I usually go with the Eldrazi to discard instead of the elixir
@@NitpickingNerdsI'm not into that kind of budget, pal.
The synergy is that its a artifact in this deck so totally get it, much more efficient than an eldrazi in this scenario
Sometimes you guys nail it but sometimes you guys really undervalue good cards imo. Secretary rendezvous is a mono white and boros staple, alongside oblation, gift of estates, etc. To me broken cards that see play in cedh don’t justify calling it a staple; its a cedh card. Staples are basic lands, 2 drops rocks, creatures, etc. Mana crypt and force of will are not staples. Idk what your average deck price is but when most decks i play are $100 - $200 range then most of the higher end cards dont make the lists and dont need to tbh. Reliquary tower is a land so it has no downside even without synergy, brainstorm is 1 mana dig through 3 cards, sheoldread is literally removal and reanimate in one card, and so on. Mana tithe is one of the few counters in white and in higher power level does work, although rebuff the wicked is my favorite one.
The problem with cards like Fracture (and why it's a bad card) is that the card always asks more of you (harder to cast compared to Disenchant) but only sometimes gives you more (on the rare case where you kill a planeswalker with it).
Agreed completely, well said
but the artwork is awesome
Sheoldred was my first love- er, commander. I have used her to great effect with a ramp-heavy deck, and my opponents are never happy to see her. I still tweak her deck as I learn more about deck building and new cards are released. That Jeweled Lotus I pulled from a pack doesn't hurt either...
On MTG Goldfish podcast, they did an episode about white card draw and convinced me Secret Rendezvous is a pretty good card in multiplayer and in mono white
It's a good card, dont take NN as gospel. They are another perspective - with that said, they often make good points; give it a try and see for how it works for you.
you guys did a good job evaluating somewhat popular cards that shouldn't see much as play as they do with this and gave me good reasons why i shouldn't play oblivion ring lol which i play a lot, but i don't think in this video you really covered the worse offenders very well, like i don't think any of the top 10 most played edh cards are here except commander's sphere and arguably atm the top 10 non land ones in order according to the number of decks that they are via the list table on edhrec: sol ring, arcane signet, swiftfoot boots, lighting graves, swords to plowshares, cultivate, counterspell, beast within, mind stone and fellwar stone with ring and signet being in more than a 1 million decks each.
I play both Brainstorm and Spark Double in my Pir and Toothy deck... I feel like I'm being roasted, although at the same time I know both cards have synergy in the deck.
Having 2 commanders to copy makes spark double a little better but not super interesting. And toothy loves brainstorm
Seems like good synergy to me
You go on about how terrible Carpet of Flowers is by saying you had one island in play the whole game, but... that's two mana per turn from a one mana enchantment, and that's pretty good rate. It's only bad if none of your opponents have any islands at all, which is actually kinda uncommon.
Sheoldred... Now THAT is a card that sounds good the first time you read it. And then you stick it in a deck. And then you play you that deck 100 times and actually use Sheoldred about twice... And then you realize it's not as effective as it's text box wants you to believe.
What is wrong with brainstorm and fetchlands? That seems quite powerful to me.
Nothing. It's mostly how much worse brainstorm is without fetchlands.
you don't have to metagame to expect a blue player at the table. when taking into consideration that you don't see every card every game and red will loot/rummage/exile a good portion of cards, REB and pyroblast are rarely bad. people play hate cards/silverbullets for less frequent occasions.
Yeah...some of these takes feel like they come from a very specific meta, and not necessarily one indicative of your average table. Meanwhile, Pyroblast can "counter" an Atraxa, Muldrotha, Yuriko, Hinata, Ur-Dragon, and so on, and that's before we even consider it's use as a clutch answer to a Cyclonic Rift or wayward counterspell.
Along the lines of what you're saying, I'd argue that REB and Pyroblast will "whiff" less often than dedicated graveyard hate, honestly.
12:30 I use Aetherize in "combo" with Elite Arcanist (in a Blue-Wizard thematic deck _for fun_ ) to protect myself while building up the actual mechanics (depending on the list: mill, flood with tokens & steal others' creatures or casting "Time Stop" copies ad infinitum),
16:15 Grave Titan should have a "B, TAP: Destroy other target creature. It can't be regenerated."
This is a very "death in function" :D
you really don't understand why people play mana tithe. its not about power its about countering someones spell with mana tithe they will never mentally recover from this.
One of my friends signature spells. At locals he always gets it off someone casting a huge X spell.
I am 100% here for acknowledging pets' birthdays. This is the content the world needs.
We truly are pioneers
It's funny how on Secret Rendezvous the opinions clash sooo much. I see it rated between F and S (probably both exaggerated simply because others disagree so heavily) by different content creators and the most funny thing is, one of the advocates for it that resonates most with me is Richard from MTG Goldfish. And he has the highest win % on their show, constantly playing white ramp, bad card draw and is just constantly outmanouvering his playgroup by political play, often being "the underdog" on the table despite of his record to be the most "winning" player.
I think it goes to show that card that put your opponents ahead CAN be useful if you alter your playstyle towards them and Secret Rendezvous might be one of those.
If you believe that being the threat and pushing that advantage you gained over the line is your best way to victory hell no you don't wanna play this.
If you believe that coasting by and being part of the majority alliance against the "archenemy" is your best way to victory, heck yes that card is amazing.
Richard argued the following: If by playing this I get 3 new cards and somebody I aligned (or use this to align) myself with draws 3 cards to use against another player that is ahead of both of us, it creates a scenario where this card is essentially your "alliance" being 5 cards up on the other 2 opponents. Sometimes, he also said, it even makes the player you gave the cards to as being perceived as the new threat.
Additionally the perception of Secret Rendezvous being a bad card often leads to reactions that diminish the threat of the person having played it, leading to a perfect storm of where someone is happy to assist you, another player is sad he got left out and salty at the player who received "free" stuff and the actual current threat who is the person those ressources are most often used against.
I know, none of this makes sense if everyone goes "wait a minute, he just gave me free stuff, now I can punish him" but to be really honest, that is kind of a more CEDH/spikey mentality, that a lot of players do not follow in EDH games.
To close of, I def. understand why from your perspective the card is overplayed. You subscribe to the mentality of being your own agent and doing everything you can to win your game by your own means. So, the card is actually terrible.
But I believe that taking playstyles into consideration (not in a hypeothetical discussion about power lvl of cards but in applying those discussions to deckbuilding and gameplay) is valid and a good thing to do. It just so happens that Secret Rendezvous perfectly puts those ideologies against each other!
Summed it up perfectly. Maybe one addition: In my opinion it also coincides with the actual power level of the decks played around the table (not only the mentality of the players). I think the lower you go, the better the card gets.
Aetherize has saved me when facing infinite creatures when a combo an opponent controls went off and it was a one-sided board wipe since they were mainly tokens. It's been very good in my games.
I think Secret Rendezvous is one of the best white card-draw cards, all the others are conditional. Also a strong political card. I play it in two color decks
I have sheoldred in my korvold deck as a power down.
She is in my Tetosu deck as power down
Not to be argumentative, but Planeswalkers aren't as uncommon as you guys think in competitive meta. Namely, Tevesh Szat, who's one of the best competitive commanders. Love the channel, though!
Theres a very limited amount of planeswalkers at that level, and the majority of those either win on the turn they hit the board or are glorified tutors (looking at you tezzeret)
I play all the blue cards and they feel pretty good whaha. Probably depends on the meta too. I think aetherize is super good in dealing with an arch enemy. It also allows you to protect yourself with a mass bounce effect that actually gets favour with the other 2 players
I love me some big flash lightning rods like Sheoldred! It draws the removal right into it providing pseudo protection for more important pieces. Oh, and on the off chance she sticks around for a bit!
Granted I only run her where she synergies. Like in Negan where I run all the edicts 😬
She is so bad but I love her too
@@NitpickingNerds she is so good that she is generally a must answer card 😬
Elixir of immortality is in my tame Narset deck to over saturate my library with non lands! I have a really great experience with that card. Very cool effect!
Edhrec only counts the decks from the last 2 years, in regards to the relic of the past argument.
I run sheoldred in my meren deck because at some point meren Costs like 14 mana, and sheoldred can stand in for her as well as reanimate her from the graveyard. But that's the only use I've found for that card
Idk man. I feel like you’re not considering a lot of these are just “fun cards to play” in casual groups. Feels too focused on “more optimal thinking” versus just playing stuff cuz it’s fun.
Spark Double in general isn’t the best, but it’s fantastic in Marchesa the Dusk Rose, entering with the counter on it each time is a huge gain, can sacrifice it each players turn.
Honestly I think spark double is amazing. I play orvar so copying him and going infinite in half of the time is so good. And i think the reason why sakishima is so low is because its $30 i would have played that so quick if it was under $10.
I think spark double has a few homes but just not that many
@@NitpickingNerds I agree, was just saying the one deck I’d play it in where the point isn’t to clone your commander
I definitely agree about Sheoldred. The only deck I used to play her in was my Ayara deck. But I found Witch of the Moors works much better.
I run Sheoldree in my WUB dungeon deck. I agree it’s mostly cool factor but it puts in work with Sefris. Though I do also run 3 fresh bag variants. The deck is straight jank. I put every card in WUB that delves in it.
To the Spark Double/ Sakashima point, War of the Spark is one of the well received and loved sets of recent memory with a high print run and strong presence in multiple formats. I tis also in the rare slot so it was more accessible as many people got them from opening packs or from draft events. Sakashima on the other hand was from Commander legends and is a Mythic which lowers its accessibility and from opening packs and I don't think many places have commander draft events.
Spark Double is actually in the Jace pre-con for War of the Spark. That's how I got mine. I also pulled Liliana, Dreadhorde General out of one of the packs it came with so that was pretty sweet.
This a fair point
field of ruin is another land card thats sac for particular reasons and less for sac to get land out, but its notable as well that the lands brought out arent tapped when they come into play.
early on in edh i would use this to deny a player a multi-land or similar effect
I have so many things to say about this video but it just isn't worth it to go into all of them. You have mentioned a few cards that I don't disagree with, but it seems very obvious to me that you guys ignore the fact that there are a ton of budget and precon decks that are being played and are effecting these statistics. And this is completely emphasized by the literal statement of "Spend $10 to fix your mana base, not on chromatic lantern". I don't know what world you are living in but the cheapest shock and fetch lands are $12ish. Triomes are expensive, and many of the dual color lands are creeping to around $5. Considering the fact that lands take up about 1/3 of your deck, I would find it hard pressed to have $10 really "improve" my land base.
But hey, maybe I'm wrong.
May be biased here from playing so much 60 card MTG, but Brainstorm is so good. Shuffle effects, hand protection, dig for answer, instant/cantrip, etc... If playing mono blue, for me it is a no brain auto-include.
As for Aetherize, you just did a video about the difference in the game when you power down your decks from a 7-9 to 5-7 and how much combat comes into play at that level, especially when infinite combo is gone. In light of that, don't you understand its value after that for only 6% of blue decks. Honestly surprised it isn't used more.
In our games I will say I have not seen many case where I wanted it or thought it would be good
I agree about brainstorm.
I play Dark Ritual in my Gisa monoblack deck. It can be useful sometimes but I agree that spending a card (or having a dead card late game) for 3 mana can be kinda poop. However, I'm on a budget and I'm wondering which ramp card can replace it. Any ideas guys ?
hard to answer without knowing what is already in your deck other than sol ring...but i guess sth like Arcane signet, Fellwar Stone, Coldsteel Heart, Wayfarer's Bauble, Traveler's amulet?
@@theotherguy22 Thx for you answer. Made me realize I didn't even put a Mind's Stone... I'll go with it.
I'm so confused on the red counter blue spell cards.... using 2 slots for red instant speed interaction to protect your game ending bombs from blue counter spells seems worth only using 2 slots out of 99
Loving the content as always Nerds. Keep doing you!
Dark Ritual is nuts to ramp into Bolas’s Citadel then go crazy from the top of your deck or to cheat a haymaker out in early.
Its good at throwing you instant resources for combo pieces that could take two turns to get out otherwise. Them two extra Black pips can be so valuable
YOOOO!!! Taking budget and CEDH into consideration?! GET HYPED!!!
Lol great video as always guys!!
Thank you for the kind words
Morning guys! Thanks for the pre-work show!
Happy to provide it!
Today is actually my birthday. Thanks nerds.
Happy Bday hope you enjoy!
Secret Rendez-Vous is great with Hive Mind
brainstorm is also good if you have lots of cards that trigger off of drawing a card, like alhammaret’s archive or niv-mizzet. spark double is a great backup in sakashima clone decks. i wanna have as many vial smasher clones as possible in my deck, and spark double lets me get one even if sakashima has been kept off the table.
All fine points
i use aetherize as ramp since it has instant speed
REMEMBer, how blue ramp is to make others dont ramp (or destroy others' ramp)
so when i have blue, i always make sure i have at least 5 cards of extra turn
What people think the want is Brainstorm, but what they really need is Ponder. Also I have a Mardu combo deck that has 6 counterspells in it so there is a deck that uses Mana Tithe.
I like unclaimed territory and the new secluded courtyard mainly because they come in untapped and are perfect in my Sethron deck. Granted i see the downsides of them yea they wont help with instants sorcs etc but its mainly a horde deck thats main goal is to smash face's with minotuars and having that free untapped mana is nice.
I have an enchantment themed zedruu deck and use the O-Ring type cards as removal that I give away to let me draw more. The deck has answers to everything and lots of enchantment recursion
I actually didn’t realize field of ruin ramped each player, I was playing it in my omnath deck to get the extra trigger. Definitely taking it out for a fetch now
Play Tectonic Edge instead (or Wastland, or Strip Mine).
In fairness
Not only is dark ritual great, but cabal ritual and culling the weak are great as well in that high level almost cedh borderline, youre going to hit one of them early on MOST of the time which you can use to immediately tutor for a full combo plus another ritual to cast said combo if your opening hand allows it
Great vid. Really helps you learn how to think about deck building
No problem at all glad you liked it.
To add to the hate on Chromatic Lantern. Even when you do have it out you will pay for things very carefully because you always need to be prepared for if it gets blown up.
You dont want it gone and then you cant case your instant speed spells because you tapped wrong.
Your missing out on an amazing card. Saving fetchlands for when you actually need a shuffle effect is insanely valuable.
Spark Double is in all the decks with blue and their command has any sort of trigger that your entire deck runs around. . . which is a non insignificant number of commands that have blue in them
would you fine fellows say that Magus of the Wheel would be good in Chainer? thinking about cutting it, but dont know what to replace with
I kinda like it in chainer actually
@@NitpickingNerds thank you guys! ive been able to reanimate it and its been pretty sweet, i love u
Carpet of flowers I think works decently well, most games you're going to end up with at least one player playing blue, and even if they only have one island that's still two mana gained each turn for one mana cost. That's sol ring levels of mana. Now you can only use it for sorcery speed stuff, but if they play a few islands then you're looking at spending most of your turn using this banked mana and saving all your normal mana sources for your instant speed stuff. Honestly I think the biggest issue is that it ramps so fast unless you have massive card draw you're going to be wasting so much.
NEW NITPICKING NERDS VIDEO!
woot woot
I strictly disagree with the spark double. I play it in every deck with blue in it, especially in Marchesa and Orvar Imbiss an awesome card. It is basically a copy of your commander, so if your deck revolves around it play it
Kind of important to take into consideration the cost difference between spark double and Sakashima. Of course Spark double isn’t budget but it is 1/3 the cost of Sakashima
@@ZachtheUnbowed don’t know your prices but it’s 2€ for a spark double or 18€ for a sakashima over here😅
@@robertmonroe1883 Jean, your prices are insane. This is what bothers me at this channel, we have much more options with cards being
@@robertmonroe1883 Budget is a pretty broad term. Doesn’t always mean all my cards have to be under a dollar, but if I have $100 budget to spend on a deck that would love to have a Sakashima it’s a lot easier to find room for $9 and settle on a Spark double. Even if it is strictly worse.
I agree with most of these cards, but Carpet of Flowers is an exception. Even if it gets you one mana, it's better than Wild Growth that's already good and if it gets you two it's absolutly amazing.
Couldn't agree more. They talk about Carpet of Flowers having the supposed downside of maybe only netting you a single mana...as though this isn't a great rate considering that Carpet also fixes. Since when is a 1cmc card that ramps you for a single mana bad? If you get more than one mana, Carpet is essentially another Sol Ring.
Brainstorm is easily an auto include in any deck that has a modicum of synergy. The floor is strictly better than cycling for 1.
That's true of most cantrips but we don't find ourselves playing too many in decks that don't want to spellsling
@@NitpickingNerds From a power standpoint, preordain, ponder, and brainstorm all appreciably improve consistency at practically no cost, what reason is there not to run at least the first two in any blue deck barring special circumstances
What would you replace Garve Titan with in an Isshin deck?
Villainous wealth is the ONE off-theme fun card I allow myself in my Muldrotha deck. It can be an alternate win con or just a fast way to recover after a board wipe.
I do like the card a lot
Think you guys missed the most important part of field of ruin. It's not an optional shuffle effect, so you can use it to disrupt topdeck tutors or other topdeck shenanigans. Opponents won't usually expect it so people rarely play around it, and it's hard to interact with since it's an activated ability. Sure it's narrow and won't be relevant every game, but that's standard for utility lands. When it works you are often stopping a tutor for a win con or a tutor for an answer to your win con, which is a way bigger potential upside than most utility lands offer.
As a bonus it can even help fix, not a huge deal but it makes it an easier include in multicolor decks where utility lands are generally harder to slot in.
It sounds like it can only be good in those cases if opponents are misplaying or not paying attention though
I have a few super-budget (~$15 total) 2-3 color creature-heavy tribal decks and Unclaimed Territory has overperformed every time because it's one of if not the only multi-colored land that enters untapped in those decks.
Tight budget I can see it being ok