Single Card Discussion: Darkblast as anti-welder technology?

[seer]

I was browsing through Ravnica and I came upon Darkblast:

http://sales.starcitygames.com/carddisplay.php?product=39073

I was thinking, in some ways this is superior to Lava Dart. It kills infinite welders (well if you have an infinite library ) and can set up a huge yawgmoth's will. The converse to that statement is that you might mill your own will into the graveyard. However, using brainstorm, etc, you can decrease the chances of that happening.

Also, this card has obvious synergy WITH goblin welder in a slavery deck.

So I guess, the question is, is this card going to be a viable replacement for Lava Dart? Or is it just going to be better in a couple of decks? Or is it strictly worse?

[xrobx]

As far as I'm concerned, this card is a silver bullet to decks like CS.  It mills the library, sets up will, and removes other welders and is almost un-counterable (you MUST counter it many times to keep that welder alive).

Excellent card, yes it could replace dart.

[Polynomial P]

Darkblast does everything Lava dart does and more. To kill those pesky 2/2s you need 2 black mana and a draw. In Gifts or Stax darkblast will work synergistically with the rest of the deck. In slaver it isnt bad either (unless you mill your will), but if it gives you welder advantage and a welder target you are golden.

The downside to Darkblast is that it doesnt pitch to force of will and requries the fetching of a black source, but it may be worth it for recurring welder kill.

[Necrologia]

The important thing to remember with Darkblast is that it costs you a draw. Lava Dart can kill 2 welders or an X/2 for a land, Darkblast can only do that at the cost of whatever it is you would have drawn. It's decent in Gifts though if only because Gifting for this guarentees the ability to kill multiple welders, even if it ends up in the yard.

If only U/B/g tog saw play anymore, this would be a perfect fit.

[Revvik]

If only U/B/g tog saw play anymore, this would be a perfect fit.

If only! 
Or, to put things more politely, that's exactly where I saw myself playing this thing.

[Dralock]

I think Darkblast fits in to stax, tog, slaver and, most importantly, oath.

Oath can abuse the ever living crap out of this card, and the mill effects are minor thanks to good ole blessing.

[MoxMonkey]

I see this in Gifts Oath 3CC SB and Tog.  Cs will not take it on since they have better access to Lava Dart which is Red which in my mind is much better than Darkblast in Slaver.

[Dralock]

I see this in Gifts Oath 3CC SB and Tog.  Cs will not take it on since they have better access to Lava Dart which is Red which in my mind is much better than Darkblast in Slaver.

1 damage is not the same as -1/-1, which can finish off indestructable fatties.

[seer]

I'm just wondering if gifts really needs this card. Does it care that much about welders that it needs to kill them? Perhaps it does, but maybe pithing needle is a bit more robust since it can hit more cards in the welder deck.


Of course you can't bounce a Darkblast after it is cast!

[Revvik]

Or eat it with a Gorilla Shaman.

[cssamerican]

Decks that have access to black, draw a ton of cards, and use the graveyard will love this thing. I have tested it in two decks so far:
CronStax: it is good at keeping welders and mox monkeys off the table, but you can only Dredge once a turn so, it's pretty narrow. I am going to run it simply because Goblin Welder is an important cards to protect yourself against, and it can't be destroyed or bounced. However, if I could use the flashback on Lava Dart I would probably rather run it, just because everytime you Dredge in this deck you completely skip your draw for the turn. So, the card just isn't very usefull for anything other than Welder removal in my testing. Even though it is extremely narrow it will probably still be played by every 5c Stax player just because removing Welders is extremely important.
Sex: In this deck Darkblast is much more versatile. I don't run it maindeck just cause there are a lot of decks it doesn't have targets for, but I do keep three in my board now. The Dredge mechanic gets my Werebears to threshhold faster, drops juicy targets in the yard, and with all the draw the deck runs you can Dredge multiple times in a turn. Now the deck actually has a good answer for problem cards such as a Goblin Welder, Goblin Piledriver, and an early Goblin Lackey. Hell, they should have just made the card say destroy target Goblin.

1 damage is not the same as -1/-1, which can finish off indestructable fatties.

Do you mean that if I attack with a DSC and my opponent blocks with his DSC I can Darkblast his DSC and send it packing? If so than it is even better than I thought in my Sex deck.

[twiggy]

I'm sorry, Sex deck?  I don't know it and I am sure you can imagine my googling success with "sex deck".  Would someone mind posting a link or a brief rundown for me  please?

[Sagath]

1 damage is not the same as -1/-1, which can finish off indestructable fatties.

Do you mean that if I attack with a DSC and my opponent blocks with his DSC I can Darkblast his DSC and send it packing? If so than it is even better than I thought in my Sex deck.

No, this does not work. You need to get DSC to 0/0 for it to die. Damage doesnt kill it. Only state based effects do.

[Dralock]

Name:   Darksteel Colossus   
Set & Rarity:   Darksteel rare   
Cost:      11
Card Type:   Artifact Creature    
P/T:   11/11   
Rules Text (Oracle):   Trample
Darksteel Colossus is indestructible. (“Destroy� effects and lethal damage don’t destroy it.)
If Darksteel Colossus would be put into a graveyard from anywhere, reveal Darksteel Colossus and shuffle it into its owner’s library instead.

So yeah, reducing its life to -1/-1 isn't damage, and it dies.

No, this does not work. You need to get DSC to 0/0 for it to die. Damage doesnt kill it. Only state based effects do.

That doesn't matke sense, I'm going to check this out.

[Almighty]

Name:   Darksteel Colossus   
Set & Rarity:   Darksteel rare   
Cost:      11
Card Type:   Artifact Creature    
P/T:   11/11   
Rules Text (Oracle):   Trample
Darksteel Colossus is indestructible. (“Destroy� effects and lethal damage don’t destroy it.)
If Darksteel Colossus would be put into a graveyard from anywhere, reveal Darksteel Colossus and shuffle it into its owner’s library instead.

So yeah, reducing its life to -1/-1 isn't damage, and it dies.

No, this does not work. You need to get DSC to 0/0 for it to die. Damage doesnt kill it. Only state based effects do.

That doesn't matke sense, I'm going to check this out.

Darkblasting a colossus with 11 damage results in a 10/10 colossus that has 11 damage on it. It's still indestructable, just... smaller.

[cssamerican]

Darkblasting a colossus with 11 damage results in a 10/10 colossus that has 11 damage on it. It's still indestructable, just... smaller.

This sounds right.

I'm sorry, Sex deck?  I don't know it and I am sure you can imagine my googling success with "sex deck".  Would someone mind posting a link or a brief rundown for me  please?

Twiggy, its a recursion deck using Werebear, Eternal Witness and Nostagic Dreams. It is more of a fun deck that can steal wins from good decks every now and then. I pmed you a link to a thread on it; however, in the future just use the search feature here. That way you are guaranteed to get something related to Magic:)

[Dozer]

I'm just wondering if gifts really needs this card.

For the maindeck, I consider Darkblast more versatile than Pithing Needle. The main reason is that even though Needle hits problem cards, Darkblast is reusable. Hitting Welders and Shamans can be as essential as improving the first game against Fish. Losing a draw for the Dredge is not a problem for versions running Thirst for Knowledge. I don't see Darkblast in Meandeck Gifts, because it has not nearly enough black to support early Blasts, and also has no actual draw besides Ancestral. (Gifts doesn't say "draw", as we all are well aware.) Also, Darkblast is a good answer to - don't laugh - True Believer. It basically competes with Echoing Truth, which is superior for clearing up Meddling Mages and Believers, but does far less against Welders and Shamans (since you want those gone for ever, and they don't impede your combo turn anyway).

I like Darkblast. Especially since the Dredge can let you set up Will/Recoup without any outside help.

Dozer

[Gabethebabe]

Darkblast is just awesome in any deck that puts things in the GY, decks that run Bazaar, Gifts, Intuition.

Just make sure you don´t mill your Yawgmoth´s will into the GY

I have never really liked the flashback cost of Lava Dart, normally I prefer to invest a card, rather than a land.

[TheStu]

But Lava Dart can deal 2 to the head to finish someone off!

(But seriously, Darkblast is some good tech. I agree with Dralock about putting this into Oath (maybe as a tutorable bullet, since you only really need 1 unless you're facing some serious gy hate, which is almost never played maindeck and almost never sided in vs. oath)

[Binary]

Darkblasting a colossus with 11 damage results in a 10/10 colossus that has 11 damage on it. It's still indestructable, just... smaller.

This is correct. The Colossus is still "being destroyed" due to lethal damage, which is specifically stopped due to being indestructible. The fact that lethal damage is being achieved by reducing toughness by one point, instead of dealing an 11th point of damage, is irrelevant.

If Darkblast actually reduced the toughness of the Colossus to zero, it would indeed get it shuffled back into its owner's deck.

[Dralock]

Nevermind, I just re-read the posts.

[vroman]

granite shard is still my favorite anti-welder tech. too bad null rod is much better
darkblast is definitely better than lava dart. in my test decks, I put dblast in every one supporting black. this card will becoem a sideboard standard.

[rakso]

For blue control, I was wondering if the black mana cost might make it more prohibitive than Lava Dart. Consider Gifts where your accompanying sideboard cards would be REB or Rack and Ruin, hence you'd fetch Volcanic.

I imagine it shines in Oath, though.

[Dozer]

For blue control, I was wondering if the black mana cost might make it more prohibitive than Lava Dart. Consider Gifts where your accompanying sideboard cards would be REB or Rack and Ruin, hence you'd fetch Volcanic.

But the Dredge is much easier for Gifts to take than the sacrifice of a mountain. Sure, you'd have trouble in a Meandeck build with only one swamp, but in different builds with a blacker mana base, Darkblast is better than Lava Dart. Gifts is a mana-hungry deck, and especially if you plan on playing both Recoup and Burning Wish in short order, you don't want to give up red mana. Also, cards in your graveyard generally count as accessible, and you can reap that benefit while killing multiple creatures, especially Shamans and Welders. Lava Dart kills only twice, Darkblast kills as often as you need it.

Against CS, running Darkblast against a Welder is almost a win-win situation, since if they counter it, they just wasted a counter on a spell that will come back soon and have one less against your Gifts. If they don't counter it, they are down a Welder. That should be enough reasons to proclaim Darkblast superior to Lava Dart.

/addendum: The accompanying SB card in this case is likely to be Duress, a choice just as strong as REB. Given that the main artifact hate is not Rack and Ruin, but rather Rebuild/ Echoing Truth for Gifts, the red SB complement doesn't matter nearly as much as it did quite a while ago.

Dozer

[PemsAura]

I don't believe it has been mentioned yet but another bonus to darkblast is that it can be used more than just twice a turn.

Dredge 3 (If you would draw a card, instead you may put exactly three cards from the top of your library into your graveyard. If you do, return this card from your graveyard to your hand. Otherwise, draw a card.)

The text specifically states that whenever you would draw a card... therefore you can cast a draw spell and return it to your hand as well.
~Nate

[Chamelet]

Question:
Can you use this with Sylvan Library to skip drawing so you don`t need to return any cards? (like Abundance)
You would skip a draw to dredge Darkblast, play Darkblast, skip the second draw, play it again and do it again. That would put 9 cards in your graveyard for free. Not that it matters that much, but does it work?

[Jacob Orlove]

You draw both Sylvan cards as part of the same ability (ie you don't get priority in the middle), so unless you have two darkblasts, you can only replace one draw with dredge.

[PemsAura]

However if I understand it right you can replace one of your draws with dredge allowing you to eat a welder or mox monkey with and draw spell when needed and cast it between draw spells to eat larger creatures or more 1/1s.
~Nate

[Necrologia]

However if I understand it right you can replace one of your draws with dredge allowing you to eat a welder or mox monkey with and draw spell when needed and cast it between draw spells to eat larger creatures or more 1/1s.
~Nate

Yes, dredge may replace any draw, not just the one you get for free during your draw step. In fact, if you Ancestral, you can draw the first one, dredge on the second draw, then draw the third. All Jacob was saying is that you don't get priority to actually cast the spell you've dredged if all the draws are from the same effect. I'd be the same thing as drawing 3 with Brainstorm, then casting spells before putting 2 back. Once a spell starts to resolve it finishes before anyone get priority. Casting Peek twice to kill a 2/2 is fine, casting AK for 2 to pull it off is not.

[mulder]

I'd like to mention that this card has good synergy with Brainstorm too. In your upkeep, play Brainstorm, put two useless cards back; dredge and draw a new card next turn.
In my eyes, this card is superior to Lava Dart because it has a much bigger chance to kill a Welder, Shaman or Lackey. You can use it every turn if necessary.