Adversary Cycle
General forum
Posted on Sept. 10, 2021, 9:09 a.m. by magwaaf
So how is this not being talked about? These cards are efficient dudes that keep getting better as the game goes on. I feel like these can be really annoying on their ability to be blinked and also not having to waste a ton of mana to to throw it into a counter is great.
shadow63 I believe they mean you can blink them and you get another etb, which will allow you another opportunity to sink mana into their abilities.
September 10, 2021 9:54 a.m.
Omniscience_is_life says... #4
They literally have not been released yet, and scryfall doesn't even have the white one in English! There's a lot of spoiler hype right now, it's hard to focus on everything at once.
As far as the actual cards go: I can see the red and black ones as seeing play, but I'm not stoked about the rest.
September 10, 2021 12:37 p.m.
plakjekaas says... #5
The blue one seems decent, with flash you can phase out blockers in the end step, or protect your own creatures from removal, like a Rattlechains' big brother. With both defensive and offensive use on an evasive creature, I like it's chances.
September 10, 2021 1:10 p.m.
1) Blue - Versatile offensive and defensive utility, relevant tribal body, evasion makes the most use of its +1/+1 counters, effective blink target
2) White - Scalable anthem, relevant tribal body, middling body, not viable blink target, potentially highest power output dependent on board state
3) Green - Far less tribally relevant body, most singular power output also opens lands to wraths, best for on the ground combat, viable blink target with middling returns
4) Black - tribally relevant body, second best singular power output, less defensive bodies makes it virtually exclusively offensive, viable blink target
5) Red - haste is good (for a turn), can only plateau or decrease in value with scale, spell based effect mitigates any tribal potential, viable blink target
We’ll ultimately see where they all land.
September 10, 2021 4:09 p.m.
Omniscience_is_life says... #8
September 10, 2021 5:37 p.m.
Omniscience_is_life says... #9
Oops. https://scryfall.com/search?q=Adversary+-Ajani+-Oakhame&unique=cards&as=grid&order=name. Try this plaintext. Sorry.
September 10, 2021 5:39 p.m.
wallisface says... #10
From a modern perspective, none of them are good enough to see the format. It just costs too much mana to get profit out of them, even if you have a 1 mana flicker effect. There’s just better cards to be flickering, and better cards to spend a lot of mana on.
In standard, i’m sure a few of them will see play… though they still feel pretty clunky tbh. The white and red ones feel the most appealing to me.
September 10, 2021 6:14 p.m.
I think that’s generally true but a bit more nuanced. I think Spectral Adversary and Intrepid Adversary have a shot in Modern. I can’t speak to Tainted Adversary and Primal Adversary as they lack homes and as such probably have less of a shot in the format. Intrepid Adversary gets outclassed by Thalia's Lieutenant in the one home it could have and Humans is really tight and probably not looking for redundancy. A similar case goes for Bloodthirsty Adversary which would only serve as redundancy for the bigger Goblin Dark-Dwellers in land destro which is much more fringe than Humans and Spirits. I think blue has the best shot in Modern as it has a home and really comes down to whether the tribal body is more impactful to its deck than the split utility efficiency of Brazen Borrower. I think the offensive and defensive versatility is promising.
September 10, 2021 7:03 p.m. Edited.
wallisface says... #12
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The big issue with Intrepid Adversary is that, other than there just being soo many cards better than it it modern, is that it risks you getting blown-out heavily by your opponent casting a well-timed killspell, which could end up costing you most of your board.
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Spectral Adversary has an issue where it's just a bad Rattlechains in almost every situation. And spirits already have soo many better ways to protect their dudes, on top of that. I just don't see where this card has a home.
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As you've already mentioned, Bloodthirsty Adversary is very similar to Goblin Dark-Dwellers, so might see some fringe play in decks of that vein (potentially even replacing Dwellers, if the deck is wanting to confine itself to running something like Lurrus of the Dream-Den, or Unearth). Imo this is the only one of the 5 that will even come close to seeing modern play, because it explores some interesting avenues, and this effect has seen play in modern already.
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Tainted Adversary and Primal Adversary are clearly the weakest of the 5, and I'm not sure its worth discussing either of these... but they generally just demand too much mana for no real payoff.
September 10, 2021 8:54 p.m.
Omniscience_is_life i watch Strictly Better Mtg's channel on youtube, he runs down everything and mtggoldfish usually has translations
September 11, 2021 9:49 a.m.
I think Intrepid Adversary had the same pitfalls any true lord would. And that’s probably why Thalia's Lieutenant outclasses it. If Humans were tightened down, they could probably work it in but as is, Humans aren’t looking for much.
Spectral Adversary is much more than a bad Rattlechains. It sits between Rattlechains and Brazen Borrower. That versatility of applications is valuable enough to consider for Spirits (which plays Borrower). Just like Intrepid Adversary and Bloodthirsty Adversary, it only has one potential home.
As such, Primal Adversary and Tainted Adversary being at the bottom as far as Modern is concerned.
I wouldn’t know how to analyze these from the Standard lens but I think it would go something like this:
September 11, 2021 12:32 p.m.
Omniscience_is_life says... #15
magwaaf I'm not saying it's impossible to know which cards are out (and scryfall translates too)--just that it's not crazy for people to not have started talking about these cards.
September 11, 2021 1:50 p.m.
Necrosis24 says... #16
In terms of commander I think they can be pretty fun, although not as strong as they initially seem when you realize how mana intensive they really are.
Intrepid Adversary: I would put in a Sidar Kondo of Jamuraa deck for some flicker shenanigans. Swing in with my white weenies then flicker Intrepid Adversary paying its etb to pump my unblocked creatures.
Spectral Adversary: Good for its flexibility and would maybe put it in a simic or bant deck. I like that it can target itself.
Tainted Adversary: Grave Titan but not as good
Primal Adversary I do not care for.
All of these have more efficient cards that more or less do the same, so these cards more of a fun include.
September 11, 2021 9:38 p.m.
Looma like they already are working on standard strategies.
https://articles.starcitygames.com/select/ranking-innistrad-midnight-hunts-adversary-cycle-from-worst-to-first/?utm_campaign=Social%20-%20Select%20Articles&utm_content=179476876&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&hss_channel=fbp-174376972917
Also, the blue one being compared to rattlechains is a bad comparison, its so muxh more than juat hexproof
September 13, 2021 7:28 p.m.
plakjekaas says... #18
I called it Rattlechains' big brother. Baseline is a 2/1 flash flying spirit, just like Rattlechains, and the enter the battlefield trigger can save one of your creatures from removal too. This being a mythic though, it's fair to assume there's more flexibility to be had than the rare 2/1 flying blue spirit from 5 years ago.
However, if you only have 2 mana to spare, Rattlechains is the better card. It doesn't scale as well, but it's the most efficient version of a 2/1 flash flyer with a tricksy effect on it. The comparison is not that bad at all, Rattle is the most similar card we have to this one.
September 13, 2021 7:58 p.m.
i think the cards are almost equal to be honest, rattle because its cheaper and good for single target but only for spirits whereas spectral can save more important guys from board sweepers and also artifacts and enchantments from removal, the longer the games drag on, the more useful it gets. rattlechains is garbage in nonspirit decks whereas this isn't
shadow63 says... #2
You can't blink them and get the effect
September 10, 2021 9:44 a.m.