[New Card Discussion] Ancestral Vision

[klu]

Vintage deck will soon be able to run up to 5 ancestral recall.
The suspend mechanic appears not to be good in vintage but there are some cards in the extension that can make it viable (because of a low Cc and the possible synergies with someothers cards) :


This card can accelerate the coming of the ancestral by 1-2 turns

It can also be used against stax : to remove the tockens of the smokestack/tangle/triskel each turn. Deals with chalice even @1 (costs 4)
EDIT : doesn't deal with chalice for 1
It can have some other utilities like deplating a gemmstone mine or removing counters from an aether vial/jitte or remove a fate counter from the myojins 
Another thing, if you run tangle wire in a non-WS deck, you can wait for your suspend spells to come by keeping your wire to 4 (or more)


Even if the card does nothing by itself, earning a second upkeep can be quite synergistic with some other cards : dark confidant, oath of druids, squee ... but ..nothing fantastic.

Just some food for Thought

[Komatteru]

Deals with chalice even @1 (costs 4)

No.  CMC is always the number in the corner, regardless of the mana you actually pay.  Trinisphere, Sphere of Resistance, Buyback, Kicker, Entwine, Chill, and the like do not affect the CMC.  If Chalice 1 is out there, this can't fix it.

[klu]

mmh, my mystake, i'll edit my post
my brain is not fonctionning well at early morning

[zeus-online]

About the A-Recall:
You have to wait 5 turns to get the 3 cards.....i Don't really want my opponent to get 5 turns to get his MisD, or just win before the back-up arrives.....so in T1? Nope.....in all other formats?  Maybe.

The other two cards seems like a waste of deck space...i really hate to draw dead-cards.

/Zeus

[klu]

I aggree with you that the card is probably really bad in the current format.
But we don't have all the cards of Timespiral yet and the mechanism is new (never saw what it looks like)
I'm not trying to bring it in any current archetypes but i'm brainstorming arround what cards could give you enough tempo to prevent the opponent to win since you don't have drawn your cards.

[chrissss]

I think Ancestral vision is great.  1 mana 3 cards is great, even if you have to wait a few turns for the cards.

What people here dont see, is that YOU also know that the AV is coming, not just your opponent. He might get a misdirection, or a counter, but you can do the same, and you will have all the mana in your pool to protect it, since the AV doesnt cost anything on the turn it comes into play. Its also great against duress and other discard spells. I am not saying that Suspend it the best mechanic ever, but its a lot better than most people give it credit. Its just a matter of time before people break the cards, and some time spiral cards are put on the restricted list.

[Shmn]

I think Suspend might have some potential with cards like Balance, Cataclysm and Mindslicer. Not broken, though, but at least not completely useless.

Ancestral Vision is certainly interesting, and could perhaps provide a card drawing engine in a control deck. I don't, however, think it has a place in Vintage as it is, on it's own (without synergy, that is). But, nonetheless, I really like the card.

[Conan_barberarn]

But what about Paradox Haze? As far as I know, draw step is a part of upkeep which means that this is a Howling Mine for you but not your opponent. Am I getting this right?

[Engine_number_9]

But what about Paradox Haze? As far as I know, draw step is a part of upkeep which means that this is a Howling Mine for you but not your opponent. Am I getting this right?

No, you don't an additional draw step only an additional upkeep step

[kombat]

No.  CMC is always the number in the corner, regardless of the mana you actually pay.

Just to add a little clarification, JDizzle, CMC's with X in them change, depending on whether the spell is on the stack or in play.  CMC is not always the number in the corner.  For example, a Chalice for 2, while on the stack, has a CMC of 4.  However, once it resolves, it has a CMC of 0, even though it has 2 counters on it.  Gorilla Shaman can eat it for 1.

[Gabethebabe]

Funny that Mark Poole also drew the art on the new ancestral.

I guess suspend cards do not have a mana cost and are therefore countered by Chalice = 0 ?

[Draven]

Funny that Mark Poole also drew the art on the new ancestral.

I guess suspend cards do not have a mana cost and are therefore countered by Chalice = 0 ?

Hmmm Gabe... That is an intersting question. Also, what about Draining the spell once it is played? Eek, if Chalice=0 shuts these cards off then they are even more ass-tastic then they were before you made that point...

[Gandalf_The_White_1]

Funny that Mark Poole also drew the art on the new ancestral.

I guess suspend cards do not have a mana cost and are therefore countered by Chalice = 0 ?

Hmmm Gabe... That is an intersting question. Also, what about Draining the spell once it is played? Eek, if Chalice=0 shuts these cards off then they are even more ass-tastic then they were before you made that point...

Chalice 0 WILL counter them; when the game looks for a value that isn't there, it finds 0.  So yes, basically if someone chalices for 0 after you suspend this you are screwed unless you can get rid of it.

This card is intriguing and looks powerful, but I think that it is simply just too slow to be worthwhile running.  As many people have said, this card is barely playable FIRST turn under some circumstances... imagine topdecking it; that would just be horrible.  Brainstorm is WAY better than this card; I can't think of a deck that I would rather play this first turn over brainstorm, or as a matter of fact even prefer it any other time over brainstorm.

[49 Cents]

Funny that Mark Poole also drew the art on the new ancestral.

I guess suspend cards do not have a mana cost and are therefore countered by Chalice = 0 ?

Hmmm Gabe... That is an intersting question. Also, what about Draining the spell once it is played? Eek, if Chalice=0 shuts these cards off then they are even more ass-tastic then they were before you made that point...

Chalice 0 WILL counter them; when the game looks for a value that isn't there, it finds 0.  So yes, basically if someone chalices for 0 after you suspend this you are screwed unless you can get rid of it.

There is no way you can say this. The mechanic doesn't even excists yet; there are no rulings on it. We have to wait another 2 weeks to know.

[Disburden]

Funny that Mark Poole also drew the art on the new ancestral.

I guess suspend cards do not have a mana cost and are therefore countered by Chalice = 0 ?

Hmmm Gabe... That is an intersting question. Also, what about Draining the spell once it is played? Eek, if Chalice=0 shuts these cards off then they are even more ass-tastic then they were before you made that point...

Chalice 0 WILL counter them; when the game looks for a value that isn't there, it finds 0.  So yes, basically if someone chalices for 0 after you suspend this you are screwed unless you can get rid of it.

There is no way you can say this. The mechanic doesn't even excists yet; there are no rulings on it. We have to wait another 2 weeks to know.

If you go to the Forum I started down a little in the Open Forum you will see the Rulings on Suspend. Mark Rosewater posted them himself in one of the articles earlier this week on MTG.com. They are not yet "official" but the man himself revealed them at the end of his article to clearify.

[FlamingCloud]

What does it matter this card is horrible against everything but SUI black and MUC, and against MUC REB is still better.

[parallax]

What does it matter this card is horrible against everything but SUI black and MUC, and against MUC REB is still better.

Actually, it'd be pretty good IN sui black or MUC. 

[zeus-online]

Actually it sux against MUC, 'cause MUC runs misdirections

[Liam-K]

Paradox Haze seems breakable.  Maybe not with Suspend, but two upkeeps screams "overlooked abusive interaction."  I'm not even sure if you or your opponent will be the right target.

[parallax]

Paradox Haze seems breakable.  Maybe not with Suspend, but two upkeeps screams "overlooked abusive interaction."  I'm not even sure if you or your opponent will be the right target.

I highly doubt it. When Eon Hub was printed, I thought messing with the upkeep would break something. Then I realized that the upkeep was filled with mostly small meaningless effects. In other words, if one upkeep doesn't break a card, why would two?

[FlamingCloud]

I highly doubt it. When Eon Hub was printed, I thought messing with the upkeep would break something. Then I realized that the upkeep was filled with mostly small meaningless effects. In other words, if one upkeep doesn't break a card, why would two?

Eon Hub would be an amazing card if it costed less.  Its' problem is cost, not effect.


Fine, good against MUC that doesn't play MisD.  Good against SUI black because it protects your hand and their deck is slow.  The card is great in any game destined to go 15 turns and no good otherwise.

Maybe you could make a deck with haze, this, dark confidants and other upkeep effects it would be powerful to have twice.  You might even be able to get it to tier 2.

[zeus-online]

Hmmm 15 turns against suicide? .... Suicide is bad, but it definetly goldfishes turn 4-5.....

*Sigh* Hate it when people randomly flames some oldschool deck without knowing all that much about it.

/Zeus

[diopter]

After, because with all of the suspend turns it takes for Bad-Recall to go onto the stack, you can easily find a counter for it.

[brianpk80]

After, because with all of the suspend turns it takes for Bad-Recall to go onto the stack, you can easily find a counter for it.

That may be true, but I think the counterargument would be that your opponent should have something better to do with his/her counters than sitting around waiting to ward off a spell that happened four turns ago.

My take on the card is that it's decent first turn, pretty bad any time afterwards, will see a little bit of novelty play initially like all of the nostalgic cards (how sad it was for the kiddies that when Lotus Vale was released, Strip Mine was unrestricted), and shouldn't impact the format too greatly right now.  That said two things can happen to really give this card a boost.  The most obvious is that something in Time Spiral will give Suspend cards a major uplift much like Fluctuator did in Urza's (I don't think Clockspinning is quite what the doctor ordered).  Secondly, the card might become playable if some thing happens that slows the format down dramatically.  For instance, a super Tendrils hoser (something like "Instant, W: Gain 3 Life, Storm") could send everyone scrambling from Rituals back to Drains, or some radical change in the banned/restricted list could have a similar effect.  So Ancestral Vision is a really neat card in terms of flavor and design but isn't the silver bullet from Time Spiral right now.  It may be a sleeper. 

-BPK   

   

[diopter]

After, because with all of the suspend turns it takes for Bad-Recall to go onto the stack, you can easily find a counter for it.

That may be true, but I think the counterargument would be that your opponent should have something better to do with his/her counters than sitting around waiting to ward off a spell that happened four turns ago.

Good point. However, one has to keep in mind that by playing Bad-Recall, you are at -1 card advantage for 4 turns. Granted, if you have a decent hand with lots of draw in it, this will be somewhat mitigated, but in a tight resource war, that -1 CA will give your opponent a slight edge that will allow him to find more counters for your stuff now and more counters for your Bad-Recall 4 turns from now.

[brianpk80]

After, because with all of the suspend turns it takes for Bad-Recall to go onto the stack, you can easily find a counter for it.

That may be true, but I think the counterargument would be that your opponent should have something better to do with his/her counters than sitting around waiting to ward off a spell that happened four turns ago.

Good point. However, one has to keep in mind that by playing Bad-Recall, you are at -1 card advantage for 4 turns. Granted, if you have a decent hand with lots of draw in it, this will be somewhat mitigated, but in a tight resource war, that -1 CA will give your opponent a slight edge that will allow him to find more counters for your stuff now and more counters for your Bad-Recall 4 turns from now.

I think you're definitely right that AV results in a short term card disadvantage.  But 1 card and 1 mana on the first turn isn't necessarily the end of the world.  Think about times where you Duress and opponent's hand is entirely land and creatures or having a Daze that is useless because of their Sol Ring.  Also, once in a while you'll have a FoW in hand that you can't cast for lack of a blue card.  The question is whether that slight disadvantage is worth the payoff four turns later.  On the first turn against a Fish or Drain deck, particularly Slaver, I would think yes, and possibly even against Stax (it never hurts to draw a Land and a Mox and 2 other cards on the 5th turn where you're likely stuck in some Tangle Wire based battle of attrition).  But it's not something I'd want to see on the first turn against Oath, Dragon, or Storm Combo.  At this point, I wouldn't play it in any existing archetype.  I also don't think I'd ever want to see it after turn 2.  If there's a deck to be built that can really make this card shine, it would have to slow the game down incredibly so its best home would be in a Root Maze based lock deck, like Stasis.  That said, I'd sooner play Standstill over Ancestral Vision. 

-BPK

[AIcOPed]

HI, I have been absent for a long while from these forums, but isn't this card at least decent. ON an Isocron, it is a Ancestral, yes?

[RaleighNCTourneys]

It's a sorcery

[That0neguy]

Secondly, the card might become playable if some thing happens that slows the format down dramatically.  For instance, a super Tendrils hoser (something like "Instant, W: Gain 3 Life, Storm") could send everyone scrambling from Rituals back to Drains, or some radical change in the banned/restricted list could have a similar effect.

Condition met?

Trickbind 1U

Instant   
Split second (As long as this spell is on the stack, players can't play spells or activated abilities that aren't mana abilities.)
Counter target activated or triggered ability.
Activated or triggered abilities cannot be played by that card until end of turn.

Im not sure this slows down the format enough but it is a crazy tendrils hoser.

[AIcOPed]

Thank you for the correction. I should have figured out that someone before me would have said isochron if it was an instant.

I win the prize.