Seismic Apprentice

[Swanky]

Seismic Apprentice (R)

When Seismic Apprentice comes into play, each player sacrifices a land.  If any land sacrificed in this manner is a non-basic land, sacrifice Seismic Apprentice.

2/1

Seismic apprentices, eager to prove themselves to their master, often forego the part of training concerned with aim, thinking it to be too rudimentary for their level of achievement.

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With this card, I wanted to accomplish two things:  1.) An early drop for Red Land Destruction decks (a guilty casual pleasure of mine), and 2.) a card with humorous flavor to it. (the imagery of a reckless adolescent mage being swallowed up by a fissure of his own creation made me snicker a sadistic snicker)

A decent Jackal Pup-ian threat with a modified Raze attatched to it, I feel as though this card may be undercosted.  I considered making it a 2/2, as most decks (as far as Type 1 is concerned, at least) running many non-basics would take great joy in 2-for-1'ing a 2/1 with another early threat, but that seemed far too good for only one red mana.

The non-basic element was added in order to allow relatively-easy removal for more controllish decks that may not enjoy an early threat of this variety, while making it a decent threat against oft-monochrome aggro decks.

Tear it asunder!

[Matt]

This is probably really, really strong. Raze was borderline playable, and this is a lot better than Raze. The tempo this thing generates is insane, since it will trade for most two- or even three-drops.

It's really like a red time walk.

[johnstown713]

It is hard to say it is like a red time walk when you sacrafice a land also.  So all your oppenent has to do is sac a nonbasic land to kill your land and a creature.  I think the card is ok but not sure if it is balanced.

Johnstown713

[Matt]

Nonbasics are really not that common in formats where a 2/1 is any good. This is a lot like the card we made called Slash and Burn, but with a 2/1 for R attatched. And 2/1s for R are really very good.

If you knew this was only going to kill like one of three or four lands, that would be one thing, but the fact that it kills the FIRST land means it's going to screw people over pretty hard, because you need that early land to play the cards that get you more land.

The reason this is scary is because it takes any hand which is even a little beat weak and turns it into a terrible hand, possibly a game-losing hand.

[PucktheCat]

Except for the fact that your opponent choses which land to get rid of (which won't matter that often) isn't this strictly superior to Raze?  Against basically any monocolor deck this is like leading with both a Jackel Pup and a Strip Mine turn one.

Also, this punishes basic land.  There are good reasons most cards punish non-basic lands more than basics.

Leo

[GerryMander]

cost it at and lose the flavor text.

[Jacob Orlove]

Even at 3 mana, this is brutal going first. Creatures that destroy lands really need to cost at least 4 mana.

[Ephraim]

It is less of an issue, because this is red, so there's more likely going to be lots of basic lands running around, but there's also the clever balance issue of being forced to play this first turn with a basic mountain. A deck packed with dual lands can't make use of this very well, since it would be like: Plateau, Seismic Apprentice...sacrifice the land and the Seismic Apprentice

[Matt]

That's fine for vintage, but that is no kind of drawback in formats where Revised isn't legal.