Worst card ever?
General forum
Posted on Feb. 1, 2015, 8:52 p.m. by ShamaLamaDingDong
What is the single worst card in Magic history? I have asked a ton of people, and they all say something different. What are all of your guy's opinions?
ShamaLamaDingDong says... #3
What do you have against an 8 CMC for a measly 1/1? Just Imagine your opponent using Break Open on it to reveal a fricking 1/1!
February 1, 2015 8:55 p.m.
fluffybunnypants says... #4
Sorrow's Path or the banding lands from Legends.
February 1, 2015 8:58 p.m.
zyphermage says... #6
Scornful Egotist is a 2/2 for 3 really, which you never plan on unmorphing. I'll get back to you on my fav worst card.
February 1, 2015 9:03 p.m.
CharlesMandore says... #7
Back in its set Scornful Egoist had a purpose, mainly in having the highest CMC among creatures. It's a terrible a card, but it served a good purpose once upon a time.
February 1, 2015 9:13 p.m.
Sorrow's Path definitely. I have a cube of the worst cards in magic, and we had to house rule it to make people play it if they drafted it.
February 1, 2015 9:48 p.m.
zyphermage says... #12
I'm going to go with Tombfire as the worst card, a big reason is because it is rare. Shaman's Trance also fits into this category which at first I wanted to like. However it only allows you to cast cards in the graveyard if they could be cast from the graveyard, not just any card could be played from their yard.
February 1, 2015 10:31 p.m.
Not that it's the worst card ever, but for some reason I just hate Trait Doctoring especially at rare
February 1, 2015 11:35 p.m.
I would say Razor Boomerang, but i actually like the flavor text
February 1, 2015 11:48 p.m.
zyphermage says... #17
Snowfall is pretty bad. Basically it has cumulative upkeep and gives more mana to help pay for other cumulative upkeep costs only.
February 2, 2015 12:09 a.m.
KillDatBUG says... #18
Bog Hoodlums? Numai Outcast? Mindless Null? Face of Fear? Chimney Imp?
Man, black really got the short stick here in terms of creatures...
February 2, 2015 1:13 a.m.
Juju Bubble is my contender. I mean, why does that card exist?
Also, Great Wall is pretty terrible, stopping 4 creatures total from having plainswalk.
February 2, 2015 3:38 a.m.
Great Wall. Plainswalk. Yes, Plainswalk.
Power Surge? I doesn't do anything at all...
February 2, 2015 3:51 a.m.
Isn't power surge really good in burn versus control or midrange? That was printed in the days of mama burn so remember tapping lands and not spending mana hurt you too!
February 2, 2015 3:57 a.m.
Great Wall for sure. Nobody, and I mean NOBODY, plays plainswalk. This card does nothing for three mana.
February 2, 2015 5:05 a.m.
My top 10:
1: Power Surge. It does not do anything, when there's no mana burn. (Read oracle text).
2: Great Wall. You stop 4 cards.... It is not good.
3: Blue Mana Battery. Well, it can let you store mana. You just need a shit ton of mana to do it....
4: Juju Bubble. Again, if you have a shit ton of mana, it can be a little useful
5: Razor Boomerang. 5 mana and a tapped creature for 1 dmg? No thanks.
6: Wood Elemental. Sacrifice pay 4 mana, sacrifice another 4 untapped forest and then get a 4/4? No thanks.
7: Snowfall. It might be good, if you play with cummulative upkeeps. But no-one will really ever play with that....
8: Sorrow's Path. This is bad. But it can be a little useful. Still, it is awful.
9: Break Open. You don't want to face up an opponent's creature, when you can just kill it.
10: Mudhole. This might be good in some wierd matchup, but overall it is just bad.
February 2, 2015 5:45 a.m.
No love for Seafarer's Quay, Unholy Citadel, Mountain Stronghold, Cathedral of Serra and Adventurers' Guildhouse?
February 2, 2015 7:01 a.m.
SpartanCEL says... #28
One with Nothing there are specific decks made to empty your hand, so why not cut the middle-man!!!! This actually could have uses though
February 2, 2015 7:35 a.m.
themindxyz says... #29
Sorrow's Path. by and far Sorrow's Path. even though you can give it to an opponent and continuously tap it to be killing off his/her creatures (hint True-Name Nemesis) it is still a horrible card.
February 2, 2015 8:23 a.m.
fluffybunnypants oh I see it now. Sorry for some reason I can't read today. That's like third time something like that happened.
February 2, 2015 12:48 p.m.
zyphermage says... #33
At least it does not punish you for using it. Sorrow's Path fits that category and so does Wood Elemental. Though with Titania, Protector of Argoth it could be better. Great Wall is bad because it only counters 5 cards in existence that are also unplayable. Snowfall is bad because it does nothing itself and helps pay for a super bad cost mechanic and nothing else.
February 2, 2015 2:04 p.m.
Rhadamanthus says... #34
Sorrow's Path holds that label for a lot of people, but in actuality the worst card is Wood Elemental.
February 2, 2015 5:32 p.m.
Gorgosaurusrex says... #35
+1 for Wood Elemental. It's not on the reserved list because of its value. It's on the reserved list because Wizards never wants to reprint it.
February 2, 2015 6:18 p.m.
SimicPower says... #36
I agree with most of what people have said, but let me add another card to the mix: Fasting (it was a rare). Pale Moon isn't great either.
February 3, 2015 4:13 p.m.
Oh.... Soooo many overlooked possibilities.
Snowfall + Doubling Cube... The mana Snowfall produces is only useable for cumulative upkeeps... but the Mana Doubling Cube produces when doubling it is useable for anything.!! Win!
February 3, 2015 4:37 p.m.
No one mentioned Aven Trooper?
Lo and behold, I present... THE WORST CARD OF ALL TIME.
Now, you may point out, stats wise, this isn't truly the worst creature in the game. Bramble Elemental is a less efficient win condition, and there are noncreature cards that have less use (this is still a highly efficient 20 turn clock with evasion!). But as to WHY this is truly the worst creature of all time, let me try and break this down.
First, let's get it out of the way, it is very weak. 3W for a 1/1 flying is only marginally better than Chimney Imp, and that has a pretty sick death ability! The activatable ability is so overcosted that it is mostly irrelevent, but sure, you can sneak a few points of damage in. So this card is obviously weak to the point of being completely unplayable in every situation, but that is hardly unique, every set has a couple of those.
Second, that ability. That ability tempts you. It gives you the promise of "This guy won't just be a 1/1 flying for 4!". With Squire, you have no hope. You lay him down, and you know he'll be just as weak as he looks. Here, they taunt you by giving you a taste of power, but then make the ability so ridiculously overcosted in both cards and mana than it is unusable. In fact, the only time I could imagine activating the ability is if you had another Aven Trooper in hand to dump. Aven Trooper is also more recent than other contenders for worst creature of all time, sure those old Legends cards were overpriced, but they were from Legends! All those guys sucked! This creature was in the same block as efficient creatures like Nimble Mongoose, Basking Rootwalla and Ichorid, I thought WotC had figured out creatures by the Odyssey block?
Third, the flavor/feel of the card. This is the crucial bit. Wood Elemental is a less efficient card stats wise. But, it works better as a card. It makes sense, you cast this Elemental, and he is literally the size of the forests he consumes when he enters play. Pretty flavorful! Most all time bad creatures have that going for them. let's examine Aven Trooper, creature type Aven Soldier. That's how boring this card is, his name is just his creature type with a synonym for the second bit. Imagine if there was just a card Goblin. Or Zombie. No, it's Raging Goblin, or Vengeful Zombie. Those extra words give the cards some nice flavor. This card is literally just a renaming of it's creature type. The creature itself in the art is about as uninspiring as an aven could be, and it is stuck on literally a white background.
Now, along with this flavor, what the is that art. Is that even finished? What card has that much whitespace on it? Is that supposed to be the sky in the background? Because the sky isn't white. Where the is this bird? The flavor text while bad, is easily the highlight of the card. It resembles a sentence, and the word "seethe" is more interesting than the entire rest of the card.
I honestly want to know what happened with this card. Was this some kind of weird twisted template of a card that made it to print? The mana cost is off by about a factor of 4 (and even then the ability would be negligible), it is just a bird soldier, named as such, even the art is unfinished. So again, I present the worst card in Magic the Gathering history. It is the rare card that fails on every conceivable level. In that way, there is a certain beauty to it. A two year old, randomly hitting buttons on a card generator, would invariably make a more interesting card. This card is so forgettable that it sticks with you. It is truly a remarkable feat.
From the gatherer, not my writing
Though I agree with the argument wholeheartedly.
February 4, 2015 10:34 a.m.
Rhadamanthus says... #39
Haha, holy crap I forgot Aven Trooper costs 
. To its credit, it was a common flying creature that could enable Madness at a time when creatures - though getting better - weren't yet what I would call "good" when compared to spells. I can understand why it might have come out of development looking like this after testing for limited play.
Odyssey block as a whole was a shameful mess, stocked full of fiddly little marginal-benefit plays that no one but the most "Spike"-like of players actually felt good about making during a game.
February 4, 2015 11:05 a.m.
Hey odyssey wasnt all bad, I love my squirrel tribal cards!
Sure it activates madness but you have to pay 4 mana for that + the cost of madness which probably makes to cost more mana than hard-casting the madness card
February 4, 2015 11:11 a.m.
zyphermage says... #41
All that text and I am not convinced it is bad, at least more than the cards already mentioned.
February 4, 2015 noon
Eh, its mostly subjective at this point but I will mention great wall stops stuff like Traveler's Cloak and other choose your landwalk type of abilities ( assuming they choose plainswalk)
ThisIsBullshit says... #2
Scornful Egotist
Err, wait, I forgot Storm Crow
hides
February 1, 2015 8:53 p.m.