^ It's understandable. Baneslayer Angel's one of those cards that, if you have it, you're contractually obligated to play it. Right up there with Batterskull and Griselbrand.
As for dealing with Ziggy....
I'd suggest Chant of Mul Daya, but that deck has no flyers. Best bet would be Liliana, Garruk or Jace.
|So, I've had a problem with this card for some time, and due to the ungodly hype and controvesy surrounding I've let it lie. But I think I'll take my crack at it, and let my comment get washed away in the 9+ pages sea of them.
The problem I have with this is not that it's broken. Frankly, the reason I love Magic is that for every strategy, however intricate, there is something that can answer it, however remote. And cards like this, however undercosted, always offer some glimmer of hope for the defending player. This is just another nail in a coffin, and one nail does not make for a secure lid.
It is, of course, a very undercosted, very sturdy nail, but you've heard all those complaints before.
No, my problem with this lies in the long term.
I'm not exactly talking about power creep, though something not unlike it. I'm talking about psychology. Players define what is standard and acceptable in a long-running game by holding it to the standard of their early experiences with that game. Dungeons and Dragons makes for a good example, but to stay in-game with this, look at Counterspell. The Counterspell thing has been going on for some time now, and has been largely abated by the inclusion of Mana Leak, but it generally isn't a nostolgia issue for those involved. People who grew up with counterspell accepted it as a universal standard for counter magic, and now every blue instant is held to that regard. We seek solid, defineable objects to compare things to, to say that one thing is better than another. We look to categorize, and our early experiences take priority.
New players aren't taught that Baneslayer is "broken" or undercosted. They find out for themselves that it is very good, and thus the angel becomes a baseline, an impossible standard that they hold other cards to. Soon they say things like "Yeah, that Serra Angel is okay, but isn't it kind of undercosted compared to Baneslayer?". And the point is thus: Wizards, if you keep printing big flashy, hyper-efficient things to impress Timmy (or even Spike), the new players you care about so much won't be able to properly value everything else you're putting out there.
Don't believe me? I dare you to count how many comments are made of older creatures on Gatherer that are merely offhand references to modern ones, rather than a discussion of the card in it's own right. Mind you, I'm sure that modern non-creatures have similarly reversed commentary (I'm looking at you, blue), but that's quickly being ammended- what with white's powerhouse enchantments, red and black's return to absurd creature destruction and discard, and blue's slowly returning power of control.
In short, this is not exactly power creep. But when the new players feel that this is normal, when they grow up with Baneslayers as a game staple, their voices can and will change the game as we know it. I don't know if it will be better or worse for the game as a whole, but as a personal supporter of longer and more complex games, I just hope people never accept this as the norm.|
Quoth other person: Basically, any 5 cost flyer in White now has to be better than or different enough to Baneslayer to be valued. That's not a good thing. At least the Obliterator had the decency to be very black mana intensive.
Sure, she dies to removal, but Wizards did set a bar a bit too high for other cards to follow. Anything that wants to be a basic efficient 5-drop flyer is always going to compete against this.
Long story short, Baneslayer Angel's strictly better than Serra Angel in almost every aspect (the one exception being vigilance), which was the standard that all other 5-CMC white fliers are compared to. In addition, she's also a beast on the field, as you've no doubt seen. Creating such a card, even at Mythic Rare level, means that every 5 CMC flyer in white that's not as powerful is going to have the stigma of not being as powerful as that card. This devalues a number of popular low-cost staples, specifically Serra Angel.
There's a bit more I could say about this, but I should probably dip out now.
Also a point where Marxist discourse overlaps with antinatalist discourse.
You know, while I am politically quite far from a moderate, and I agree that our double standards regarding faith in the Muslim world are pretty morally reprehensible, I take issue with the characterisation of the people who have taken up arms against both Assad and ISIS.
|I was playing a friend with my casual sliver deck. I had just played a kicked Rite of Replication on my Might Sliver, so I had 18 unblockable, double striking, lifelinking, shrouded, etc. 15/15 creatures. On the next turn, he played this card. I couldn't believe my eyes. I looked at the card, read it over a couple of times, and scooped. How could a couple of comparatively vanilla 15/15's stand up to this? Plus, it rhymed. "Descending" and "unending?" How cool is that?
I was an instant convert. The next day, I made a mono blue deck with 56 islands and a playset of these as the only win condition. I took it to a local tournament and showed it off to a couple of people there ("LOOK AT THIS AND WEEP!!!!"). Based on the nervous laughter and expressions of disbelief ("Is this some sort of sick joke?") that I got, I could tell that they were terrified of the sheer power of the storm crow.
Also, I know that there are a lot of haters out there who think, "This card sucks." I have a question for you. Actually, three: Does Vengevine have flying? Can you attack for one every turn with your Jace, the Mind Sculptor? Does Bloodbraid Elf cost two mana? It doesn't. It's fine by me if you all want to blow your money on forty-dollar Baneslayer Angels (which, by the way, die to doom blade just the same). I'm sticking with this bad boy here.|
I carry one of these guys in my wallet, in front of my license. When I'm in a hurry, I frantically take out my wallet and brandish my ID. No one asks questions; they immediately stand aside. Some drop to their knees, others burst into tears. Or flames. Often, I will hold Storm Crow out of the driver's side window and cause all traffic lights to turn green and other vehicles to pull over.
Also a point where Marxist discourse overlaps with antinatalist discourse.
You know, while I am politically quite far from a moderate, and I agree that our double standards regarding faith in the Muslim world are pretty morally reprehensible, I take issue with the characterisation of the people who have taken up arms against both Assad and ISIS.
I need to figure out what position to take via social media on foreign that will make the CIA employ me as a Psyop who wins the hearts and minds of the left via stealthy blogging.
Twitter marxists ASSURE me this is a real thing that happens all the time.
Also a point where Marxist discourse overlaps with antinatalist discourse.
You know, while I am politically quite far from a moderate, and I agree that our double standards regarding faith in the Muslim world are pretty morally reprehensible, I take issue with the characterisation of the people who have taken up arms against both Assad and ISIS.
I need to figure out what position to take via social media on foreign that will make the CIA employ me as a Psyop who wins the hearts and minds of the left via stealthy blogging.
Twitter marxists ASSURE me this is a real thing that happens all the time.
That actually does happen, but it's usually like, Sony hiring people to review things positively in the comments sections of tech blogs.
Also a point where Marxist discourse overlaps with antinatalist discourse.
You know, while I am politically quite far from a moderate, and I agree that our double standards regarding faith in the Muslim world are pretty morally reprehensible, I take issue with the characterisation of the people who have taken up arms against both Assad and ISIS.
I need to figure out what position to take via social media on foreign that will make the CIA employ me as a Psyop who wins the hearts and minds of the left via stealthy blogging.
Twitter marxists ASSURE me this is a real thing that happens all the time.
That actually does happen, but it's usually like, Sony hiring people to review things positively in the comments sections of tech blogs.
Tangentially involving Sony: I'm thinking of how Hollywood movie/TV studios will hire plants to talk up projects/defend the studios in the comments sections of trade sites like Deadline.
You are the end result of a “would you push the button” prompt where the prompt was “you have unlimited godlike powers but you appear to all and sundry to be an impetuous child” – Zero, 2022
You are the end result of a “would you push the button” prompt where the prompt was “you have unlimited godlike powers but you appear to all and sundry to be an impetuous child” – Zero, 2022
dad, i have a job programming cyborgs, i don't want to be haughty but i'm pretty sure i don't need to see "the 50 most mind-blowing ideas in neuroscience, each explained in half a minute"
dad, i have a job programming cyborgs, i don't want to be haughty but i'm pretty sure i don't need to see "the 50 most mind-blowing ideas in neuroscience, each explained in half a minute"
My mom only hopes I become one of those talking head philosophers who appears on the news sometimes.
dad, i have a job programming cyborgs, i don't want to be haughty but i'm pretty sure i don't need to see "the 50 most mind-blowing ideas in neuroscience, each explained in half a minute"
My mom only hopes I become one of those talking head philosophers who appears on the news sometimes.
my mom's into sci-fi so she's convinced i'm going to be the transhumanist version of herbert re animator
dad, i have a job programming cyborgs, i don't want to be haughty but i'm pretty sure i don't need to see "the 50 most mind-blowing ideas in neuroscience, each explained in half a minute"
My mom only hopes I become one of those talking head philosophers who appears on the news sometimes.
my mom's into sci-fi so she's convinced i'm going to be the transhumanist version of herbert re animator
That short story might actually be the prototype of the flesh-eating zombie cliché.
i don't care if they are fast zombies or slow zombies or smart zombies or of they're mutants or if they're the result of an ancient curse, they're boring piles of poop
cuz the worst thing they're gonna do is eat you or give you a disease that kills you
woop de fuckin do lots of things can eat you
lions can eat you, sharks can eat you, hippos can rip you in half with their teeth but not eat you because they're vegetarians, being eaten is a thing that happens w/e
and the flu can totally kill you
so all a zombie is functionally identical to a lion that sneezes on you when it tries to kill you
and you cannot seriously tell me that that's horror film worthy
Comments
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
|So, I've had a problem with this card for some time, and due to the ungodly hype and controvesy surrounding I've let it lie. But I think I'll take my crack at it, and let my comment get washed away in the 9+ pages sea of them.
The problem I have with this is not that it's broken. Frankly, the reason I love Magic is that for every strategy, however intricate, there is something that can answer it, however remote. And cards like this, however undercosted, always offer some glimmer of hope for the defending player. This is just another nail in a coffin, and one nail does not make for a secure lid.
It is, of course, a very undercosted, very sturdy nail, but you've heard all those complaints before.
No, my problem with this lies in the long term.
I'm not exactly talking about power creep, though something not unlike it. I'm talking about psychology. Players define what is standard and acceptable in a long-running game by holding it to the standard of their early experiences with that game. Dungeons and Dragons makes for a good example, but to stay in-game with this, look at Counterspell. The Counterspell thing has been going on for some time now, and has been largely abated by the inclusion of Mana Leak, but it generally isn't a nostolgia issue for those involved. People who grew up with counterspell accepted it as a universal standard for counter magic, and now every blue instant is held to that regard. We seek solid, defineable objects to compare things to, to say that one thing is better than another. We look to categorize, and our early experiences take priority.
New players aren't taught that Baneslayer is "broken" or undercosted. They find out for themselves that it is very good, and thus the angel becomes a baseline, an impossible standard that they hold other cards to. Soon they say things like "Yeah, that Serra Angel is okay, but isn't it kind of undercosted compared to Baneslayer?". And the point is thus: Wizards, if you keep printing big flashy, hyper-efficient things to impress Timmy (or even Spike), the new players you care about so much won't be able to properly value everything else you're putting out there.
Don't believe me? I dare you to count how many comments are made of older creatures on Gatherer that are merely offhand references to modern ones, rather than a discussion of the card in it's own right. Mind you, I'm sure that modern non-creatures have similarly reversed commentary (I'm looking at you, blue), but that's quickly being ammended- what with white's powerhouse enchantments, red and black's return to absurd creature destruction and discard, and blue's slowly returning power of control.
In short, this is not exactly power creep. But when the new players feel that this is normal, when they grow up with Baneslayers as a game staple, their voices can and will change the game as we know it. I don't know if it will be better or worse for the game as a whole, but as a personal supporter of longer and more complex games, I just hope people never accept this as the norm.|
Quoth other person:
Basically, any 5 cost flyer in White now has to be better than or different enough to Baneslayer to be valued. That's not a good thing. At least the Obliterator had the decency to be very black mana intensive.
Sure, she dies to removal, but Wizards did set a bar a bit too high for other cards to follow. Anything that wants to be a basic efficient 5-drop flyer is always going to compete against this.
i think i like this card
Oh, it's leatherback Baloth's twin brother.
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
I don't even know why it bothers me, it just does.
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
Assassin poems, Poems that shoot
guns. Poems that wrestle cops into alleys
and take their weapons leaving them dead
I was an instant convert. The next day, I made a mono blue deck with 56 islands and a playset of these as the only win condition. I took it to a local tournament and showed it off to a couple of people there ("LOOK AT THIS AND WEEP!!!!"). Based on the nervous laughter and expressions of disbelief ("Is this some sort of sick joke?") that I got, I could tell that they were terrified of the sheer power of the storm crow.
Also, I know that there are a lot of haters out there who think, "This card sucks." I have a question for you. Actually, three: Does Vengevine have flying? Can you attack for one every turn with your Jace, the Mind Sculptor? Does Bloodbraid Elf cost two mana? It doesn't. It's fine by me if you all want to blow your money on forty-dollar Baneslayer Angels (which, by the way, die to doom blade just the same). I'm sticking with this bad boy here.|
I wished it said Kevin instead of David, but oh well.
"No! I gave him life"
i don't care if they are fast zombies or slow zombies or smart zombies or of they're mutants or if they're the result of an ancient curse, they're boring piles of poop
cuz the worst thing they're gonna do is eat you or give you a disease that kills you
woop de fuckin do lots of things can eat you
lions can eat you, sharks can eat you, hippos can rip you in half with their teeth but not eat you because they're vegetarians, being eaten is a thing that happens w/e
and the flu can totally kill you
so all a zombie is functionally identical to a lion that sneezes on you when it tries to kill you
and you cannot seriously tell me that that's horror film worthy
anyway the best zombies were the ones in franken fran. they weren't scary, just kind of morally worrying at best
somewhere in here is a part where the opera singer starts rapping about Wittgenstein so imagine that i just linked to that bit specifically