Am I missing something essential here? What does the card do against mentor/pyromancer tokens?
It's only phasing out nontoken permanents, so at best it slows the mentor/pyromancer player by stopping him from generating tokens during your turn.

I haven't played Humans for quite a while, but is drawing a card really a relevant deterrent for the opponent not to destroy your most punishing creature?
I would imagine that your opponent would be rather happy with the outcome of getting rid of your Thalia/Mayor/Notion Thief/whatever for a measly card you at best can only leverage at your next turn, especially considering you wasted mana and a turn into the Grim Haruspex guy.
I would rather play Saffi Eriksdotter than this to keep my most powerful threats plowing along.

Saffi Eriksdotter
GW
Legendary Creature — Human Scout

Sacrifice Saffi Eriksdotter: When target creature is put into your graveyard from the battlefield this turn, return that card to the battlefield.

2 / 2

Considering gatherer states multiple Reflecting Pools won't enable those pools to produce any mana and the effect of Fellwar Stone and Reflecting Pool being pretty much identical (swapping out "you" for "an opponent" and "type" for "color") I would argue that with only a Reflecting Pool on the opponents side you couldn't tap Fellwar Stone for mana.

gatherer has an entry for that question:

Fellwar Stone

the extra vote wouldn't do you any good.

you vote for a permanent - then the opponent votes for a permanent (which will be the same one you voted for) - now you get another vote which wouldn't change the outcome as you either have two votes on one permanent and one on another (no parity, thus only the one with the two votes is exiled) or three votes on one permanent (which is just as good as 2 votes on it).

Yay for generic aggro-archetype bashing!
By playing a lot of dudes you ARE inherently protecting Master of Waves from removal spells - simply due to the fact that the opponent likely won't hold on to the removal with a bunch of juicy (and dangerous) targets on the board for the off-chance there might be a bigger threat a few turns down the road.
Not to mention those dudes might be Spellstutter/Cursecatcher-esque or say a Hisoka's Guard...

Could you clarify what exactly you mean? As far as i can see Bolt wouldn't make a noteworthy dent in the "team" of elementals.

The full art imo suggests male. But considering the thing is missing half its head i'm not sure the usual indicators are of any relevance.
Also: this.

I don't think the card will see any play in vintage. It
- has no synergies with cards played in vintage (nor a way to interface with them in the future for that matter)
- is slow (it basically does nothing on the first turn and then nothing every other turn)
- is extremely unreliable (you can't pick which creatures to exile or might never exile a creature to begin with...)

It could be worth a consideration if you were able to exile cards from your deck with the first ability too, but with just the opponents deck there is a non-negligible chance the walker survives for a number of turns without actually doing anything.

Parallax Tide only exiles lands ... i believe you are confusing Parallax Tide with Parallax Wave, which exiles creatures but is white.

I don't think that was what he was asking, AmbivalentDuck.

Once the first cascade trigger resolves and Rite goes on the stack (your step 2) he can respond with a counter from the top of his deck targeting the rite and with the copy from Melek targeting the Wanderer.
Assuming no responses from the opponent the two counters resolve.
The stack then looks like this: Rite (countered), trigger, Wanderer (countered)
The trigger resolves putting Garruk on the stack.
Garruk resolves.

His opponent seems to be somehow under the impression that the triggers on the stack somehow protect the Wanderer from being targeted or countered.

1. Unfortunately no.
While the printed text on the card suggests yes, the card was errated from "... put a indestructible legendary 20/20..." to read: "...put a legendary 20/20 black Avatar creature token with flying and "This creature is indestructible" named Marit Lage onto the battlefield."

With that the land is creating a creature token and giving that token an ability that makes the creature indestructible. Thus putting it in the same situation as Blightsteel.

2. No change aside from that they could now change the text again to read "...put a legendary 20/20 black Avatar creature token with flying and indestructible named Marit Lage onto the battlefield." without changing the functionality.

To the best of my knowledge: No.
While being indestructible in itself is not an ability at the moment (so if for example another ability or spell would make a creature indestructible, that indestructible creature could not be made destructible with Sudden Spoiling), the thing that makes Blightsteel indestructible is the ability printed on Blightsteel - which can be suppressed with Sudden Spoiling.

The M14 rules change addresses exactly that discrepancy - now indestructibility on a permanent acts the same regardless of the original source.

there is a huge difference between Insist (sorcery, no flash component) and Savage Summoning (instant that gives the next creature cast flash).

xUG creature decks could for example keep up mana for counterspells and cast creatures at the end of the opponents turn with it if nothing worthwhile to counter comes up.

Looking at your decklist and after doing some goldfishing i'm split between suggesting that you are focusing *to much* on survival and *not enough* on survival.

Survival of the Fittest is a toolbox, so why don't you have any tools in your deck aside from the basic Vengevine enablers?
If you don't draw or can't resolve Survival your deck basically does nothing.

At best the deck produces some decent - albeit unprotected - beaters relatively fast with no way to up the pressure further or react to specific new threats.
At worst you never draw Survival or it gets countered so you are playing overcosted beaters without any immediate board impact, while helplessly watching your opponent dominate the board and/or stack riding it out to his certain victory.

Things you should imo consider:

1) Strengthen the toolbox aspect of Survival of the Fittest by adding some one-of creatures you can pitch or retrieve with it. Some older ideas - i'm not really up to date on the best creatures and i don't know your meta - so you can get an idea:
Wonder (to give your beaters some evasion against other creature strategies)
Trygon Predator/Qasali Pridemage (to deal with artifacts and enchantments)
Gaddock Teeg (FoW, Jace, etc. suck)
Aven Mindcensor (backbreaking against any deck that relies on searching/fetching etc.)
... and other answers to things your deck currently struggles with.

2a) Go all in on the Vengevine mechanic by diversifying your discard outlets to lessen your reliance on drawing and resolving Survial - the usual suspects are Wild Mongrel and Aquamoeba - and consider adding cards that allow you to recoup lost resources to keep up the pressure - like Bazaar (new cards) and Squee (discardables).
or
2b) Diversify your decks path to victory by including synergyzing substrategies - like for example Stoneforge Mystic and 1 or two fetchable equipments - that don't rely on being able to discard and play 2 creatures in a turn.

Threats and answers are two sides of the same coin.

Your deck follows a specific path to victory. Advancing you on that path is what threats do, hindering your opponent to advance on his path to victory is what answers do. In the end they are supposed to do the same thing: Allow you to reach the end of the path before your opponent does.

So the question of whether to pick a threat or an answer (and which specifically) depends on an analyses of which paths to victory are employed in a specific meta. If your selection of threats are unable to race a specific path with non-marginal use, you either need to use faster and/or more resilient threats or deploy answers that hinder that specific path.

see below, no, no, no.
after muligans are finished the starting player puts all the leylines he wants into play, then the next player does the same. they aren't cast as spells, don't use the stack, can't be countered and you can't play any other cards (that don't have a similar effect, like gemstone caverns) during the leyline drop phase.
the games first turn begins after everyone that wanted to has put their leylines on the battlefield. the first phase of the first turn would be where you could start playing spells with leyline of anticipation.

from a goldfish perspective there wouldn't really be much of a difference between a leyline of anticipation and a "normal" Turn 1 win. Anticipation is only good for scenarios where you are playing against an actual opponent, thus are not guaranteed to be on the play.

Gemstone Cavern is a land, so it does not work with the combo if you don't have it in your starting hand.

It has mostly to do with the fact that the majority of vintage fish decks rely on a selection of creatures with effects that are most powerful in synergy with other different effects, and not creatures that are most powerful in multiples on the board.
With the selection of creatures so broad it's in most cases better to add a new creature to the deck so you have a different angle of disruption than to double up on creatures you have already on the board.
Among the frequently played vintage creatures Meddling Mage, Phyrexian Revoker and Snapcaster Mage are the only ones i would consider to not have diminishing returns by doubling up.

In addition Phantasmal Image can be a reliability on drawing your initial hand. In the worst case scenario you have no creature to copy (legendary, or a mostly dead effect for the match up), thus a dead card in your hand.

Casting Spelltwine is not free either. whether you pay 6 mana for Spelltwine and nothing for the "reanimated" instant/sorcery or 2 mana for snapcaster/regrowth and 1-4 mana for your average vintage playable instant/sorcery is pretty much irrelevant, no?
it would only be an improvement if you plan to play an otherwise crappy instant/sorcery - but if you are trying that, why not just win with a decent reanimated dude?

with semi-power you mean stuff on the restricted list / that is banned in legacy?
Like Tinker, Yawg, Demo Tutor, Vamp Tutor, Gush, ...

i don't think there is a deck, build around time vault, that would not benefit from the power eight.

but i could totally see a creative build working within limits - with jaces, tops, delvers and B (confis + tutors) or G (cobras + gush/bond)
you might even be able to squeeze in temporal mastery if you have so much topdeck manipulation.

That's horribly oversimplifying it.
1) As long as you have more than one card in your hand you have a choice between different plays - whatever you cascade into, you can only play that single card
2) The range of actions for that single card is greater. If you cascade into a card there are 3 possible outcomes - you can cast the card and it improves your board position or you can cast the card and it potentially improves the board position (second stony if your opponent has a single target enchantment destroyer/bouncer) or you can't cast the card at all (counterspell, legendary, ...). If you draw a card you have the additional option of delaying an otherwise impossible or inadvisable cast for a more opportune moment.
3) Saying you would've drawn the card anyway if you hadn't cascaded into it is not necessary true - as you could've drawn a more expensive card or a land and shuffled the card away before reaching it.
4) In addition it doesn't really matter because the card you play is Shardless Agent, not the card you cascade into/would've drawn the next turn. So instead of the Agent you would've played a beater with a useful effect (as you picked the card to play from the selection available in your hand, the chance for the effect to be useful is at least considerably higher).

For me there is a clear difference between a) having a good effect and beater this turn and a potentially crappy beater or effect the next turn and b) having a beater and potentially crappy beater or effect this turn and a potentially crappy beater or effect the next turn.
The potential for b) to be more powerful is certainly there, but you are buying that potential for an increased uncertainty.

I agree on the general assessment, but this is the exact reason why Shardless Agent does not make the cut in a fish style deck in my opinion.
After you have established some disruption and a manabase in the first few turns your focus shifts more towards blocking specific outs the opponent might have at the current board position. That means that your choice towards new disruptive pieces becomes more selective - so the 3 drop should enable you to generate a selection of new disruptive pieces to either plug holes or replace losses.

In Shardless Agent case, with the card you cascade into either being an unwanted piece of disruption (a second Thalia - which you couldn't even cast - or second Ethersworn) or no disruption at all (Hierarch, Goyf, Lord, ...) there is a good chance you don't advance the board state by a margin you would expect from a 3 drop.

In comparison a resolved Edric puts a lot more pressure on the opponent to react to it. not only will he generate 1-2 cards this turn, but more every turn starting from there - in addition to protecting your other disruptive bears somewhat (as the opponent has has to split his removal).
Edric is a threat that needs to be addressed or you are buried with card advantage.

That is not to say that Shardless Agent is not a very strong card if your decks goal is to exploit the cascade mechanic.

i'm pretty sure that's not the case.
Sower enters the battlefield and the effect "gain control of target creature for as long as Sower of Temptation remains on the battlefield." is put on the stack.
If he responds with edict to that trigger Sower leaves the battlefield, so its ability will have no effect as you only gain control for as long as Sower remains on the battlefield.

Sowers ability is not composed of a enters the battlefield (gain control) and leaves the battlefield (lose control) part where such stack shenanigans would work (like for example on Worldgorger Dragon or Oblivion Ring), but one enters the battlefield ability that has a continuous requirement (remain on the battlefield).

Gulis question is aimed at the timing in the "Combat Phase".
In the "Combat Damage Step", after all the damage has been dealt players may cast spells or activate abilities.
Creatures are removed from combat only at the end of the "End of Combat Step" and according to  which would mean that even after the damage is dealt the creature is still considered an attacking creature, thus could be untapped with Reconnaissance.

The question is whether the damage is undone by this action, basically rolling back the whole damage calculation. I couldn't find any indication why it should do so.

Phyrexian Metamorph enters the battlefield with all the copyable values of the original.
copyable values are those directly derived from the text printed on the card (name, mana cost, color indicator, card type, subtype, supertype, expansion symbol, rules text, power, toughness, loyalty) - status, counters, text- or type changing effects are not copied.

so for both scenarios metamorph enters the battlefield as a pristine 2/2 Scavenging Ooze (that is also an artifact).

*psst* it's #14

i agree on the comment that splitting it up into clear pros and cons might not be the best idea. obviously every card has cons in some fashion (even ancestral recall requires you to play at least a single blue manasource *eww* and it's couterable *eww*) - the interesting part is in what relation those stand to the pros, and in what setting one might be able to break the card. that can only be answered (or rather attempted to be answered) in a more integrated fashion.

i also really miss the situation analyses - those were a lot of fun and i would like to see them return.

the power of Sylvan Library is less in it's ability to draw but in its ability to manipulate your drawstep. with library out you always at least draw the best card of your top3. and if your opponent is planning on comboing out with blightsteel or you have some way to regain life (say in a G/W(/U) deck with stoneforge and batterskull) you can draw an additional card every now and then.

this question is already specifically answered with a ruling on gatherer:

sounds like two-card monte.

Grafdigger's Cage doesn't stop you from searching with Tezz - you just can't search for a creature, which you probably wouldn't do in the first place.
neither does it stop recurring lands via crucible either, as lands are played, not cast.

in blue decks the card stops tinker, yawgwill, snapcaster and in workshop forgemaster.

regarding the "one turn slower than SoFaI" thingy:
there are actually situations to consider where Elbrus is just as fast or slower than SoFaI or not executable. those situations would generally occur whenever your opponent has a creature with a power equal to the toughness of the with Elbrus enchanted creature in play (and that enchanted creature has no evasion).

assuming a metagame shift towards more creature heavy builds it's likely we can expect more bobs, snapcasters, trygons, tarmos and whatever vintage viable "blue" creatures run around - not to mention the workshop guys. a pumped tarmo would even be able to block Elbrus indefinitely if attached to a 2/2 body without exalted while no creature currently played in vintage aside from robots would be able to stop/stall SoFaIs 6/6.

Elbrus has advantages once transformed due to not being an artifact anymore, but to get there seems like a major exertion with a win-more-maybe result. it's an investment like tinker/bot, but without the certainty or speed of it.

the only conclusion i can draw from this is that SoFaI is superior as it is roughly equally fast, allows for more board-control (can kill revoker, panther, bobs, ...), nets you cards (to further advance or protect your threats) and is moderately cast-able even without SFM.