Stoneforge Mystic is now 'Tinker'?

[Guli]

Elbrus, the Binding Blade was spoiled a while ago and yet it has not been discussed on these boards. I have been doing some play testing with the card and it adds venom to the aggro decks. Especially when you are looking to finish quickly. I personally don't want to build a deck around this, I believe that Elbrus makes SFM an even more dangerous card in the mix of all the other 'must' counter threats I am putting down. It can simply not be ignored because once SFM hits, you can't counter it any longer. So the list I am playing starts with turn 1 Teegs, Thalia followed by Magus of the Moon and Aven's. And then in between or after that nasty SFM comes in and says 'hi'. The opponent is at that time usually overloaded anyway and burned away most, if not all, of the counter spells and removal. At that time he is trying to recover by digging, drawing, searching and you are threatening to put down a 13/13 Flying, Trample and Intimidate black Demon in play the very next turn.

I am not sure but this new SFM target could also be used in a blue control shell trying to protect this combo with counters.

In any case I think it should at least be given some thought, it has in my opinion potential.



Elbrus, the Binding Blade // Withengar Unbound   
Legendary Artifact - Equipment    Mythic Rare

Equipped creature gets +1/+0.
Whenever equipped creature deals combat damage to a player, transform Elbrus, the Binding Blade.
Equip 1


////////



Legendary Creature - Demon

Flying, trample, intimidate
Whenever a player loses the game, put thirteen +1/+1 counters on Withengar Unbound.
13/13

[Killane]

Thsi is interesting. In a creature heavy metagame it looses some value, since they can just block whatever dork you've attached it to ad nauseum, however once it flips, it's no longer an artifact so it's not vulnerable to many common hate cards.

It is however more vulnerable to being killed than most Tinker targets have been for several years - it has no protective abilities whatsoever - it could even potentially die in combat.

It gets around Grafdigger's Cage, which might be a big deal in the upcoming meta.

It's slower than Tinker, and takes more set-up, but dodges some hate.

Maybe with Selkie in a Selkie strike type build, so the Islandwalk dodges the blocker. Add Aven Mindcensor as a flyer to get over Workshop duders.

Worth testing, though I'm nto sure it will end up being actually good. Nice find though.

[Norm4eva]

If you compare SFM directly to Tinker, you'll notice that there are a number of differences.

What's one of the quintessential Tinker plays, go get BSC, win next turn?  2U and a turn wins the game.

Compare to SFM and Elbrus.  1W to tutor, a turn and 1W to play it (assuming she's still in play or doesn't have summoning sickness), another creature to attach Elbrus to (SFM is tapped now), that creature has to connect, THEN the sword transforms and the resulting 13/13 still probably has to hit twice to win.

I do think it's interesting, but very rarely will this line of play matter in Vintage.

Speaking as a predominantly Legacy player, if I need to connect three times with some kind of  Voltron that SFM assembles, I'd waaaay rather it be a decent creature with a Sword of X and Y, as the Sword's triggered abilities are helping me control the board while protecting my creature from the opponent's removal.  In my mind this is even preferable to Batterskull, and that thing is a house in a ton of matchups.

[MaximumCDawg]

If you compare SFM directly to Tinker, you'll notice that there are a number of differences.

What's one of the quintessential Tinker plays, go get BSC, win next turn?  2U and a turn wins the game.

Compare to SFM and Elbrus.  1W to tutor, a turn and 1W to play it (assuming she's still in play or doesn't have summoning sickness), another creature to attach Elbrus to (SFM is tapped now), that creature has to connect, THEN the sword transforms and the resulting 13/13 still probably has to hit twice to win.

I do think it's interesting, but very rarely will this line of play matter in Vintage.

Speaking as a predominantly Legacy player, if I need to connect three times with some kind of  Voltron that SFM assembles, I'd waaaay rather it be a decent creature with a Sword of X and Y, as the Sword's triggered abilities are helping me control the board while protecting my creature from the opponent's removal.  In my mind this is even preferable to Batterskull, and that thing is a house in a ton of matchups.

This is truth.  Compare Elbrus to:
Turn 1 - 1W SFM, tutor SoFI
Turn 2 - 1w equip SoFI, swing for 5 plus a card
Turn 3 - swing for 5 plus a card
Turn 4 - swing for 5 plus a card
Turn 5 - swing for 5 plus a card

Versus
Turn 1 - 1W SFM, tutor Elbus
Turn 2 - 1W equip, swing for 2, transform.
Turn 3 - swing for 14.
Turn 4 - swing for 14.

In other words, on turn 4 in magical goldfish land Elbus seals the deal; but this is only a ONE TURN advantage over SoFI, and SoFI nets you card advantage and additional removal all along the way.  If you're looking at equipment, I don't see how a one turn goldfish is worth giving up such incredible versatility and card advantage.

[Wagner]

In those examples, how do you start swinging on turn 2 with a tapped SFM?

[A.-1.]

He's living in magical goldfish land.

I'd have to agree with the rest of the general sentiment. Worth a look see, but probably not playable. Now T4/5 on the other hand...

[MaximumCDawg]

In those examples, how do you start swinging on turn 2 with a tapped SFM?

Hah, good catch, but the point is the same.  Uber-Sword is only one turn faster and doesn't give you goodies along the way.

[Nefarias]

In those examples, how do you start swinging on turn 2 with a tapped SFM?

Hah, good catch, but the point is the same.  Uber-Sword is only one turn faster and doesn't give you goodies along the way.

In Magical Goldfish Land you always have the turn one Vine Dryad/Green Card, and your opponent always controls a Forest.

[bakofried]

Why not play Batterskull? It allows you to play with Stony Silence as well.

[Guli]

Interesting replies. Some more than other. All of them greatly appreciated.

Yes, it is obviously slower than Tinker. I compared it because in the end of the SFM process you get a big fat creature. But you could also add Batterskull and other Equip to the deck. This is the power of SFM in my opinion. It has more options and roads to go for. Tinker usually involves 1 target and it has to be in your deck. SFM does not suffer from this problem.

SFM is not there to fight blue decks. It is a card that watches the backs of those who do. It allows you to take up the role of Control when the opponent goes for the Aggro role. At the same time it can be Aggro too. Highly flexible.

If the deck is designed accordingly, the speed of SFM becomes less relevant. If for example you strategy involves slowing down and hosing the opponent, then SFM becomes 'normal' speed because everything is in a temporal flux and is delayed. (Spock? ^^)

Why not play Batterskull? It allows you to play with Stony Silence as well.

Very very interesting, because we have been discussing the issue of not running Stony for days now on cockatrice with fellow fish designers. But I don't think you are forced to choose between Batterskull and Elbris. You could run both. But then it becomes less interesting to run Stony right? With BANT you can run Elvish Spirit Guides, Noble Hierarch and Trygon Predator to deal with opposing Null Rod while having good game versus Shop and Oath. With NAYA you can still hit Shop and Null Rod with Caustic Wasps with the same game plan (Spirit Guides + moxes + petal/crypt). And both have flying, thus evasion, see topic.

[ed0]

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.

[vaughnbros]

what this allows you to do is have an amazing fetch target against every deck with stoneforge elbrus against non creature decks and batterkull against creature decks.

By fetching either your opponent must answer your stoneforge immediately if not they must answer your artifact at instant speed otherwise you can no longer kill it with hate, since the elbrus will flip and the batterskull can bounce itself.

As far as other equipment are concerned swords in general have always seemed very slow to me, if i want an equipment i can cast jitte is almost always much better because of its ability to kill creatures, pump, and gain life all at instant speed and without needing to connect with your opponents life total.

[nineisnoone]

Stoneforge Mystic is underrated... I don't think it's quite there for Vintage yet, but it's not a bad card.

However, I feel that including Elbrus is a poor choice. Tinker + lots of creatures doesn't really make sense, because Tinker is win-more in that case. And you're going to want lots of creatures because it improves you Elbrus significantly and if you don't the Stoneforge is kind of weak.

Sure, you get some value running Stoneforge with Elbrus as a closer for a fish deck, but Stoneforge isn't that strong a card in itself and drawing Elbrus is not good, and really Tarmogoyf (or some other castable beater) would probably be more ideal.

If Stoneforge were a more viable solo card, then I can see the merits. But I don't really see a meaningful enough package for him to be played.

[MaximumCDawg]

Yes, it is obviously slower than Tinker. I compared it because in the end of the SFM process you get a big fat creature. But you could also add Batterskull and other Equip to the deck. This is the power of SFM in my opinion. It has more options and roads to go for. Tinker usually involves 1 target and it has to be in your deck. SFM does not suffer from this problem.

Tinker doesn't suffer that problem either.  You are free to put as many tinker targets in your deck as you want to.  However, experience shows that drawing a Tinker target is bad news bears, so decks just run the best.  Why do anything but run a creature who wins the game in one hit?

Stoneforge is, as you say, a support card, not a game-ender.  Menedian and Kevin go over this in their latest podcast.  It lets you fetch up different targets, sure, but once you're running several different Stoneforge targets, they all better be castable when you draw them.  Thats where SoFI, SoFF, and Jitte become relevant.

The point everyone is making in this thread is that there is no discernible advantage to running Elbus, and a pretty huge disadvantage (sucks to draw it, useless against a blocker) compared to the other tier one equipment.

Here's a new topic of conversation:
4 Stoneforge Mystic
2 SoFI
2 SoFF
4 Old Man of the Sea

Thoughts?  My thoughts = awesomesauce.