FIVE Theros-inspired Planeswalkers!!
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Posted on July 28, 2013, 4:20 a.m. by IAmKingTony
The full set if you will :)
Elspeth!
An oracle themed planeswalker. It was suggested I could drop the cost to U or 1U. What do you think?
Minotaur 'walker! Made for aggro, hence there not being an ultimate.
A Centaur 'walker. Also a Ravnican on Theros.
Uh oh, four abilities...
I'm not sure what I think about all 4 ultimates making an emblem and two of those emblems granting indestructible. Emblems are cool though eh?
What does everyone think of these!?
megawurmple says... #4
I have to say, these are all too powerful or a bit too weak, apart from Elspeth. She's cool.
The Oracle is really weak. Blue doesn't have many creatures to protect her with, so she is most probably going to die next turn against any strategy involving creatures.
The Minotaur is way too strong. It's basically a 3 mana 4/4 trample haste, which is way above curve. Alternatively, he makes sure your attack gets through or unleashes a 6 power trample swing when you need it. Compare to Thatcher Revolt , which has the same CMC but 3 less total power and no trample.
The Centaur is very easy to break. For example, his +1 can untap all of your ramp creatures, almost doubling your mana. His -3 is broken as well. 4 mana Bramblecrush with added power that can then wreak havoc next turn is insanely powerful.
Lahkos is too powerful as well. He is a 5 mana reanimate spell that grants haste, which is very strong. He also acts as removal and a recursion engine.
July 28, 2013 6:18 a.m.
I don't think lahkos is too powerful at all, your blowing 5 mana down the drain and possibly his life away as well to get the -5 off where as now you can spend 4 mana for an aristocrat and then turn 5 thundermaw.
July 28, 2013 10:08 a.m.
@TitansFTW that's why I was thinking that making her cost U would be worth considering - since you could think of that as paying U for her +1 only.
July 28, 2013 10:18 a.m.
IAmKingTony says... #7
I like the idea of making her cost U
Tinos can be a 4/4 haste trample but activating that opens him to any removal, plus whatever danage he takes doesn't go away
2WG for Bramblecrush+life is fine. Especially since you get nothing if you hit a land.
that part of Lahkos is basically Entering
July 28, 2013 10:45 a.m.
Lahkos ultimate needs to say a graveyard not your graveyard
July 28, 2013 11:18 a.m.
Lahkos ultimate needs to say a graveyard not your graveyard
Oh yes, because we need not one, but TWO overpowered abilities on him now.
July 28, 2013 1:47 p.m.
megawurmple says... #10
That's my point though; Lahkos is one half of Breaking / Entering , which is a rare no less, except he's 1 mana cheaper and has far more versatility. Planeswalkers aren't designed to be the same as another spell. Planeswalkers are meant to be unique and do their own thing, not just do the same thing as something else but with other options. That's why I don't really like Caphiathus; he's just a better Bramblecrush with a bit added on. And the added on bit is very easy to abuse.
This is just my opinion, but Planeswalkers that just do the same as another spell are no fun to play with.
July 29, 2013 6:22 a.m.
IAmKingTony says... #11
Almost every planeswalker ability outside of ultimates are other cards though aren't they?
July 29, 2013 6:20 p.m.
Just checking a few PW that I am familiar with:
Abilities that are / similar to cards that I can think of (non-ultimate):
Abilities that I couldn't think of a card for:
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The other thing you could do with Pythia is to make her cost 1UU and have 3 loyalty. I guess that I have never seen a PW with so little loyalty LOL. It was a neat idea, though!
July 29, 2013 6:37 p.m.
megawurmple says... #13
I should have made this more clear; I don't mind a Planeswalker ability being similar to another card, I just don't like 'Walkers that are strictly better than another card. Most of the examples you listed have abilities similar to that of a card, but the 'Walker costs more mana. For example, compare Venser, the Sojourner to Cloudshift . Venser's +2 is a slightly different Cloudshift , but I don't mind that as he costs more mana. There's probably a card that I can't think of that is similar to or the same as Venser's -1, but it won't cost 3WU. However, some of these 'Walkers render other spells redundant; why play Breaking / Entering in a reanimate deck when you could have a Planeswalker that does more for less mana?
July 29, 2013 6:56 p.m.
TheAvenger1 says... #14
Elspeth: Did you not learn from the mistake of Nissa? Tribal Planeswalkers don't work. They only fit into a few decks and piss off a lot of people who were expecting something better.
Pytheia: As a 2-drop planeswalker, we have nothing to compare her to except bad planeswalker posterchild Tibalt, the Fiend-Blooded . Being that she's at least better than Tibalt, she seems at least playable.
Tinos De-Bregan: Extremely lackluster. Did we not learn from the failures that were Gideon, Champion of Justice (Because of the bad animate ability) or Chandra, Pyromaster (By having its plus ability be its only good ability despite that in this case it is worse than the card it is being compared to)?
Caphiathus: I would actually probably play him.
Lahkos: Remove the -5 ability and he'll be a lot more balanced.
July 29, 2013 6:58 p.m.
TheAvenger2 says... #15
Elspeth: Did you not learn from the mistake of Nissa? Tribal Planeswalkers don't work. They only fit into a few decks and piss off a lot of people who were expecting something better.
Pytheia: As a 2-drop planeswalker, we have nothing to compare her to except bad planeswalker posterchild Tibalt, the Fiend-Blooded . Being that she's at least better than Tibalt, she seems at least playable.
Tinos De-Bregan: Extremely lackluster. Did we not learn from the failures that were Gideon, Champion of Justice (Because of the bad animate ability) or Chandra, Pyromaster (By having its plus ability be its only good ability despite that in this case it is worse than the card it is being compared to)?
Caphiathus: I would actually probably play him.
Lahkos: Remove the -5 ability and he'll be a lot more balanced.
July 29, 2013 8:11 p.m.
I'm not sure I agree with your assessment of Lahkos's -5 ability.
It appears, at a glance, to be similar to Entering part of Breaking / Entering ... but Entering seems to be over costed. This is common with cards that give options... (Giant Growth , vs Simic Charm ).
Compare Lahkos to Unburial Rites , and you see the CMC being the same, and only lacking Haste... only Lahkos needs 2 mana of specific colours... and Unburial Rites can be used 2 turns in a row, while Lahkos needs 5 turns to get enough counters to do this again... meaning you are almost never getting it twice, and are foregoing the ultimate.
As well, a main point of a PW is that it can have an effect when it hits the board. Using the -5 right away kills it, so it's either a one time thing, or something your opponent will see coming.
I think the -5 is perfectly balanced... more-so than the -9, which should be something more like , "Whenever a non-token creature would die exile it instead, then put target creature from any graveyard onto the Battlefield under your control". (non-token makes it slightly less abusable, and exiling makes it not self-feeding... but still works well with discard or other effects)
July 29, 2013 9:39 p.m.
My thought is that the lower the loyalty and the harder it is for a PW to defend itself by itself, the more important it is to have its cost to cast tied closely to its +1 (since there is a fair chance of "that is all you will get out of it").
Elspeth:
- Her +1 might protect herself
- Her -3 definitely can
- She can only get taken out by Lightning Bolt
immediately upon being cast
- Her ultimate takes 4 turns and will probably win the game for most match-ups
Elspeth's +1 is a slightly better version of existing cards because it lasts essentially two combat turns (depending on how you use it).
So I would say Elspeth's casting cost should be related to her ultimate and certainly higher than the cost of the similar cards to her +1 since it is better.
Pythia:
- Her +1 might get her exactly nothing at all - no protection, really
- Her -2 might be more likely to offer some protection but only if you use the cards you draw with her to keep her out
- Her ultimate is finally capable of protecting her without it being at a loss for her controller and it requires surviving 5 turns to get to where she can even do that
Pythia's +1 is a slightly worse version of existing cards because there is a fair chance that you get nothing from it (unless you combo it up).
So I would say that Pythia's casting cost should be related to her +1 and it should be slightly less than the similar card to her ability since her ability is slightly worse and useless without set-up (so not so useful consistently on T1 anyway).
I think a way to fix this might actually be to re-think the +1 and replace it with something that she could use for fending off attacks (although any DD spell at all, even Prodigal Sorcerer will one-shot her anyway - so it still comes down to the value of that +1 ... in my opinion ... and this is probably one reason why we don't see too many Pw with loyalty 1 LOL).
Tinos:
- His +1 can maybe help defend him in the right situation.
- His 0 is aggro - not thinking about self defense anymore
- His -4 is also aggro. The idea isn't to get him out for an ultimate
I'd say this is a very different style PW and his casting cost should be tied to his 0 ability. So how much should a 4/4 red haste trample Minautar Soldier creature cost to cast?
Caphiathus:
- His +1 makes it so hard to take him out by the time you could cast him.
- His -3 also helps.
- His ultimate is insanely powerful with a very high likelihood of being hit. It only takes 5 turns to get there.
Caphiathus casting cost should be really closely tied to his ultimate.
Lahkos:
- His +1 might help protect him.
- His 0 is less likely to help but still could without cost to his controller
- His -5 definitely can help.
- His -9 leads to game domination especially when playing B and if he is still on the board (effectively stopping any creature with toughness less than 2 from being playable). It only takes 5 turns to get there.
I think that previous comments by TitansFTW about the casting cost for Breaking / Entering (very comparable to his 0 ability) are highly relevant.
Zephiel says... #2
Elspeth: Did you not learn from the mistake of Nissa? Tribal Planeswalkers don't work. They only fit into a few decks and piss off a lot of people who were expecting something better.
Pytheia: As a 2-drop planeswalker, we have nothing to compare her to except bad planeswalker posterchild Tibalt, the Fiend-Blooded . Being that she's at least better than Tibalt, she seems at least playable.
Tinos De-Bregan: Extremely lackluster. Did we not learn from the failures that were Gideon, Champion of Justice (Because of the bad animate ability) or Chandra, Pyromaster (By having its plus ability be its only good ability despite that in this case it is worse than the card it is being compared to)?
Caphiathus: I would actually probably play him.
Lahkos: Remove the -5 ability and he'll be a lot more balanced.
July 28, 2013 4:59 a.m.