[SCD : Theros] Thassa, God of the Sea

[Guli]

I think this card has potential. It has a great trigger at your upkeep for starters. It is indestructable. It has an activated ability that is very relevant in a meta with Jace (to get passed any blockers). It can become a 5/5 in the mid game.

Seems like a card that does many things for just 2


Not that it is relevant for most of you guys, but some of us have been testing Zur, the Enchanter, and this is a potential tutor target.

[vaughnbros]

This is an interesting card and should surely see play in other formats, but the mechanic to animate it seems a little restrictive to make it vintage worthy.  Here if you have 5 blue mana symbols on the table you are probably already dominating the game.

[DubDub]

It is a combination of effects, but with the rarity and win-more nature of the animating clause (what, you have Jace and Counterbalance out too?  Or Jace and double Snapcaster/one Clique?), I just don't think it's going to make it.  Scrying 1 each turn is so so much weaker than Top, which costs less to cast and activate than this does just to cast (and then you have to live to your next upkeep to start getting value).  And Top is nearly indestructible, given it's ability to protect itself.

No, Top doesn't turn into a creature, but the best creatures for are Tinker and Show and Tell.

And Zur?  Aren't you wanting to fetch Necropotence first?  Maybe the black god will be a better fit there, especially in conjunction with Necropotence providing some easy devotion points.

[Guli]

Zur doesn't like to get Necro because it does not go in decks that produce  or win the next turn. It just doesn't make sense from a design perspective.


Well, Clique likes it too. Cold-Eyed Selkie, Trygon Predator, Meddling Mage...

[TheShop]

...yet BSC fits in decks that typically don't produce 12...I would be willing to risk drawing necro...

[DubDub]

Zur doesn't like to get Necro because Zur doesn't like to efficiently trade a useless resource, life, for a useful resource, cards.

Oh.  Right.  My mistake.

Well, Clique likes it too. Cold-Eyed Selkie, Trygon Predator, Meddling Mage...

My understanding is that Devotion counts symbols as opposed to referring to 'blue mana symbols', and hence hybrid mana symbols (and phyrexian mana symbols) don't count.  So Selkie may not play nice.

[GrandpaBelcher]

I like this card. A lot of times you'll be able to pay 2U to put a card on the bottom of your library, next turn, or not...

[Bill Copes]

The only deck I can see having enough devoted blue out to make this worth while is Merfolk, and I'm not sure this is any better than anything already in that deck.  If making things unblockable was a viable strategy, we would have been doing that already.  Scy 1 every turn is pretty damn useful.

[ChronoExile]

It will play nice with hybrid, and Phyrexian mana.  I do not know if this makes it any more or less playable, but at least we know what symbols devotion counts.

[AmbivalentDuck]

It'll be interesting to see the gods in colors that are more likely to swarm the board with permanents. Goblins has made something of a Legacy comeback using Thalia and Elves!!! has an easy time with devotion. Hard to imagine a large, underpriced critter suddenly making either Vintage-worthy in the current meta, but not impossible.

[TheShop]

It'll be interesting to see the gods in colors that are more likely to swarm the board with permanents. Goblins has made something of a Legacy comeback using Thalia and Elves!!! has an easy time with devotion. Hard to imagine a large, underpriced critter suddenly making either Vintage-worthy in the current meta, but not impossible.

Will you be able to zenith or nat order the green god out of the deck if your devotion is below the amount to make it a creature?  Equivalently, is the god a creature card when in a zone other than the battlefield if he devotion requirement is not met?

[evouga]

Top is IMO severely underrated by many Vintage players, and free Scry 1 is also very, very good. I will be putting this into my more casual blue decks.

2U is just too much for Vintage though.

[evouga]

It'll be interesting to see the gods in colors that are more likely to swarm the board with permanents. Goblins has made something of a Legacy comeback using Thalia and Elves!!! has an easy time with devotion. Hard to imagine a large, underpriced critter suddenly making either Vintage-worthy in the current meta, but not impossible.

Will you be able to zenith or nat order the green god out of the deck if your devotion is below the amount to make it a creature?  Equivalently, is the god a creature card when in a zone other than the battlefield if he devotion requirement is not met?

Unless they modify the rules, it won't be a characteristic-defining ability and so will function only on the battlefield. Zenith works.

[AmbivalentDuck]

2U is just too much for Vintage though.

For now. Like folks have noted, Merfolk could conceivably become a thing. This card definitely hits the list of "not good enough...yet" cards.

[TheWhiteDragon]

I'm not entirely sure this card is that terrible.  Top costs 1 and then 1 to use, and you see/can draw the best card immediately - but then it costs 1 EVERY turn thereafter to just bury the crap you don't want until you can shuffle it away.  For 3 mana, you get to scry every turn, which seems pretty darn good for free and especially with things like bob.  It's also not shut off by chalice @1 or null rod.  The ability to make any of your critters unblockable is not bad either.  It seems most fish decks would like the card filter offered by top, but will want to spend all its mana on critters, not activations.  Add the fact that you could get a 5/5 after dropping your typical WGU critters and you could get a 5/5.  I believe these also stack, which is nice.

[gkraigher]

i think this is a very good card, and might be a card to build a new vintage deck around.  

a 5/5 indestructible creature for 3 mana is very good vs MUD.  The scry ability makes it good vs control.  It's solid vs other creature based decks.  

it just needs to be designed around, and we will see if that happens.  but very promising card, and will see play in modern and legacy for sure.  

The other gods haven't been released yet, and this certainly makes me excited for what else might be on the way, but the blue one is probably going to be the most vintage worthy of the lot--considering it is blue and costs 3.  I can't imagine the other ones to have that low of a CC.

[gkraigher]

Will you be able to zenith or nat order the green god out of the deck if your devotion is below the amount to make it a creature?  Equivalently, is the god a creature card when in a zone other than the battlefield if he devotion requirement is not met?

There are a lot of unanswered questions about how the gods interact.  This is a good one, but my guess is because its type is creature it would be searchable regardless of whether or not it actually is one on the battlefield.

The closest card to these is Soul Sculptor from Urza's Saga--which I would defer to on any combat rulings.  

[DubDub]

I believe these also stack, which is nice.

Not sure what you mean by this, but the card is Legendary, so you don't want to play more than one at a time.

[Guli]

Actually, a card like Cold-Eyed Selkie clearly has the  symbol twice. It is just a little bit smaller than a non-hybrid card.

[DubDub]

Actually, a card like Cold-Eyed Selkie clearly has the  symbol twice. It is just a little bit smaller than a non-hybrid card.

This is incorrect, there's a difference in the rules between ' ', and 'blue mana symbol'.  A blue/x hybrid mana symbol is the latter, but not the former.  Given MaRo's linked responses to hybrid/phyrexian mana symbol questions above it appears devotion will technically refer to 'blue mana symbol'.

[Samoht]

Actually, a card like Cold-Eyed Selkie clearly has the  symbol twice. It is just a little bit smaller than a non-hybrid card.

This is incorrect, there's a difference in the rules between ' ', and 'blue mana symbol'.  A blue/x hybrid mana symbol is the latter, but not the former.  Given MaRo's linked responses to hybrid/phyrexian mana symbol questions above it appears devotion will technically refer to 'blue mana symbol'.

Didn't Sanity Grinding count all of  the 5 cmc Hybrid cards?

[MaximumCDawg]

I'm with White Dragon.  This card seems pretty unimpressive, but I'm not sure its really terrible.  I am not prepared to say it's Vintage playable, however.  Darksteel Pendant, Crystal Ball, and Eyes of the Watcher do something very similar to Thassa and are unplayable in Vintage.  

Pendant is probably closest, since it costs the same at first (3 mana to cast and scry 1, basically).  It's indestructible, too.  After that, it's a trade off.  Since Pendant can be activated whenever, you can wait until the end of your opponent's turn to use it.  You can also use it during your own turn after shuffling.  That's better than Thassa, which only activates during upkeep.  Of course, Thassa is free after you cast it, so there's that.  So, bottom line, I feel like Thassa's non-devoted state is probably about as good as Pendant, which is to say, it's not Vintage playable.

The ability to eventually become a 5/5 is nothing to sneeze at, and makes it probably better than Pendant.  But, here, I am having a hard time imagining a board state in Vintage involving UUUUU in which you are not winning anyway, and with better cards.  Do you have two active Selkies?  You should be winning.  Do you have a Jace and a Tezz?  Winning.  Do you have a pair of Lords of Atlantis?  You're playing Legacy.  

Bottom line, this card is bad unless there is a Vintage deck where the upside matters.  I don't see one now, but that doesn't mean there might not be oen in the future.

[Protoaddict]

It occurs to me that this card may actually be better for some decks if you never actually hit Devotion to Blue.

While a 5/5 is nothing horrible, it opens it up to Swords to Plowshares, which is fairly common and invalidates the indestructible.

The card is already basically immune to Bolt, Abrupt decay, Natures claim, and other common removal spells

If you don't have devotion to blue though there is virtually nothing played in format that can remove it. Cannot be edicted, Jace bounced, Lilianaed, Duplicanted, Dismembered, etc. and it's 2 abilities are totally worth 3 mana in the right deck.

[DubDub]

Actually, a card like Cold-Eyed Selkie clearly has the  symbol twice. It is just a little bit smaller than a non-hybrid card.

This is incorrect, there's a difference in the rules between ' ', and 'blue mana symbol'.  A blue/x hybrid mana symbol is the latter, but not the former.  Given MaRo's linked responses to hybrid/phyrexian mana symbol questions above it appears devotion will technically refer to 'blue mana symbol'.

Didn't Sanity Grinding count all of  the 5 cmc Hybrid cards?

It did.  Because...

"Chroma — Reveal the top ten cards of your library. For each blue mana symbol in the mana costs of the revealed cards, target opponent puts the top card of his or her library into his or her graveyard. Then put the cards you revealed this way on the bottom of your library in any order."

As I said, hybrid (and phyrexian, though that wasn't created in Sanity Grinding's time) mana counts as 'blue mana symbols', but doesn't count as ' '.

[Protoaddict]

Hybrid Counts:
http://tabakrules.tumblr.com/post/59494575491/just-to-be-clear-since-we-are-coming-off-a-block-with

[MaximumCDawg]

On a similar note, can you use Sleight of Mind to change the word "blue" on Sanity Grinding? 

This reminds me of the old beta Llanowar Elves issue, where it used to say "green mana" instead of "G."

[Guli]

Actually, a card like Cold-Eyed Selkie clearly has the  symbol twice. It is just a little bit smaller than a non-hybrid card.

This is incorrect, there's a difference in the rules between ' ', and 'blue mana symbol'.  A blue/x hybrid mana symbol is the latter, but not the former.  Given MaRo's linked responses to hybrid/phyrexian mana symbol questions above it appears devotion will technically refer to 'blue mana symbol'.

No it isn't. It has the symbol. I never referred to the rules or anything. I just stated what I saw on the cards, visually. And it makes sense too, why wouldn't it count? That god can't see if something isn't blue or not? LOL

[DubDub]

Actually, a card like Cold-Eyed Selkie clearly has the  symbol twice. It is just a little bit smaller than a non-hybrid card.

This is incorrect, there's a difference in the rules between ' ', and 'blue mana symbol'.  A blue/x hybrid mana symbol is the latter, but not the former.  Given MaRo's linked responses to hybrid/phyrexian mana symbol questions above it appears devotion will technically refer to 'blue mana symbol'.

No it isn't. It has the symbol. I never referred to the rules or anything. I just stated what I saw on the cards, visually. And it makes sense too, why wouldn't it count? That god can't see if something isn't blue or not? LOL

Yes it is.  It has the hybrid mana symbol, not the , which is what you said, which was wrong.  It's fine that you 'never referred to the rules or anything', but in the context of the game Magic, which has rules, you are wrong.  It's fine that you 'just stated what you saw on the cards, visually', but that doesn't mean crap where the rules of the game are concerned.  If you want to talk about cards 'visually', and in the context of works of art, there's a forum for that elsewhere on TMD.  I agree with you that, given that the rules specify ' ' differently from 'blue mana symbol', which they do, the broader choice when designing the card was the better choice.  Indeed, it matches the flavor of a god better to be able to count devotion even from hybrid and phyrexian mana cost cards.  ROFL

[MaximumCDawg]

Indeed, it matches the flavor of a god better to be able to count devotion even from hybrid and phyrexian mana cost cards.  ROFL

Depends on the god.  I hear that the Christian God does not like it when you worship someone else in addition to Him.

[Commandant]

I can't believe the discussion for this card has gone on this long. Absolutely unplayable trash.