[Theros] Master of Waves

[serracollector]

No its not a merfolk lord, but with all the lords costing UU, this can easily be an uncounterable (via Caverns etc) MASS of 2/1 creatures to swarm the opponent. Can be considered an uncounterable Empty the Warrens for Merfolk.   I like it.

[Guli]

I like how you look at the card. Since merfolks aren't going to chain spells in one big turn, they gradually build up forces and they all have  or  in their casting cost. Then Master of Waves comes in, rewarding all your previous spells. It is indeed like a delayed Empty the Warrens.

[brianpk80]

This is one of the most Vintage playable cards in the set so far.  It seems like an analogue to Talrand for decks that have a high number of creatures/permanents as opposed to instants/sorceries.  It's quite nice that it can't be Bolted. 

[Chubby Rain]

Seems like a win more card in merfolk. If you have enough devotion to make a significant amount of elementals, then you probably have enough lords to win the game. Also, empty the warrens dodges spot removal, but stp kills the master and all the elementals.

Random thought: might be fun in the U/W flash deck with jaces, cliques, mages, and restoration angels.

[serracollector]

Yea merfolk was just my first thought, and realize this gets around bolt AND Abrupt decay with its 4 cc.  True a swords becomes possible big CA, but thats magic.  Being unkillable by 2/3 of the biggest creature hosers used atm is nice.  Also this doesn't have to be ridiculously huge like Empty because the creatures are 2/1's, not 1/1's.  Think first turn cavern, merfolk, turn 2 lord, turn 3 lord, turn  him, and you get 6 2/1's with him.  Thats 10 creatures on turn 4, and most like a turn 5 win.  And thats without a single Mox or Lotus, and still leaves plenty of cards in hand for FOW/MisD/Daze etc etc.  But this also could work well in conjuction with cards like Selkie/Clique/Snaps/Jace as a 1-2 of instead of EtW.  I just like in better in Merfolk since caverns makes it uncounterable.

[Guli]

It is all about catching them with their pants down. If they don't deal with it and let you untap and use a combat phase, this will end the game. A good finisher for Merfolk.

Swords to Plowshares remains the best removal. As a side note, did you know Wildfire Emissary is the only creature in existence that can not be STP'ed, Bolted or Decayed?

[evouga]

Emrakul?

[Guli]

Emrakul?

True, but totally below the belt..

[msg67183]

Guardian of the Guildpact?
Bloodlord of Vizcopa?
Progenitus?
Malakir Bloodwitch?
Inkwell Leviathan?
Thrun the Last Troll?

[MaximumCDawg]

Emrakul?

True, but totally below the belt..

To be fair, you kind of walked into that one.

Anyway, this card is bunk.  Go ahead, ye speculators, spend all your money on Capt' Elemental here.  I don't see him doing anything in eternal.  In Standard, who knows, but I cannot imagine a board state in any other format where you have UU or UUU out there on the board and what you really need is an instant army of 2/1s.  Sounds to me like you're already doing just fine.

[Guli]

Doing fine doesn't mean you are winning these days. Master of Waves introduces very fast clock that can mean the difference between winning and losing.

Emrakul?

True, but totally below the belt..

To be fair, you kind of walked into that one.

I guess so, but I thought we were discussing 4cc creatures with an easy mana cost.

[gkraigher]

lightning bolt kills the team, this card is bad. 

[ed0]

lightning bolt kills the team, this card is bad. 

Could you clarify what exactly you mean? As far as i can see Bolt wouldn't make a noteworthy dent in the "team" of elementals.

[gkraigher]

oh it has pro-red, ok, well then swords to plowshares kills the team.

[d8dk32]

Dismember also kills the team.

But if your opponent can't find and cast Plowshares or Dismember in one turn, they're more than likely dead. By the time a Merfolk deck craps this thing out around turn 4, it'll probably have 4-5 devotion. So that's 10 power worth of elementals, plus whatever else you have on board. That'll likely be lethal more than half the time.

[Guli]

Dismember is a 1 off in a deck. The team was free to begin with. So it will be a trade. I think this guy will finish a lot people before dismember or stp can be fired off.

Funny how straightforward some people think. You give them card A, they list up all the cards that directly deal with it (card X, card Y, ...).

Flusterstorm and Mindbreak kill the team too: Empty the Warrens and Tendrils of Agony.

[DubDub]

Funny how straightforward some people think. You give them card A, they list up all the cards that directly deal with it (card X, card Y, ...).

Flusterstorm and Mindbreak kill the team too: Empty the Warrens and Tendrils of Agony.

Empty and Tendrils give a strategy to a deck: Storm, that encourages one to play several spells in a turn.  Some of those spells can be Duress or Silence which proactively answer Flusterstorm and Mindbreak Trap.

The strategy here is: have a lot of blue permanents in play, play this guy, wait a turn.  That's not a very good strategy, and there's no inherent way to proactively answer Dismember/Swords/GENERIC-REMOVAL.  Unless you're thinking of playing Meddling Mage alongside it to provide devotion 1 and 'answer' Dismember?  In which case, thank you for naming Dismember with Meddling Mage while I kill you with Tinker/Yawgwill/Jace/etc.

[Guli]

Funny how straightforward some people think. You give them card A, they list up all the cards that directly deal with it (card X, card Y, ...).

Flusterstorm and Mindbreak kill the team too: Empty the Warrens and Tendrils of Agony.

Empty and Tendrils give a strategy to a deck: Storm, that encourages one to play several spells in a turn.  Some of those spells can be Duress or Silence which proactively answer Flusterstorm and Mindbreak Trap.

The strategy here is: have a lot of blue permanents in play, play this guy, wait a turn.  That's not a very good strategy, and there's no inherent way to proactively answer Dismember/Swords/GENERIC-REMOVAL.  Unless you're thinking of playing Meddling Mage alongside it to provide devotion 1 and 'answer' Dismember?  In which case, thank you for naming Dismember with Meddling Mage while I kill you with Tinker/Yawgwill/Jace/etc.

I just don't agree with this reasoning. Oh well...

[Stormanimagus]

Funny how straightforward some people think. You give them card A, they list up all the cards that directly deal with it (card X, card Y, ...).

Flusterstorm and Mindbreak kill the team too: Empty the Warrens and Tendrils of Agony.

Empty and Tendrils give a strategy to a deck: Storm, that encourages one to play several spells in a turn.  Some of those spells can be Duress or Silence which proactively answer Flusterstorm and Mindbreak Trap.

The strategy here is: have a lot of blue permanents in play, play this guy, wait a turn.  That's not a very good strategy, and there's no inherent way to proactively answer Dismember/Swords/GENERIC-REMOVAL.  Unless you're thinking of playing Meddling Mage alongside it to provide devotion 1 and 'answer' Dismember?  In which case, thank you for naming Dismember with Meddling Mage while I kill you with Tinker/Yawgwill/Jace/etc.

I just don't agree with this reasoning. Oh well...

Don't try. People are being short-sighted about this guy and not understanding his true role. His role is as an Empty-esque effect in a deck that isn't splashing red for Empty and is also not going for Storm as much. To me it is reasonable to imagine scenarios where your devotion to blue is at least 4 with this guy in play (1 Snapcaster Mage and 1 Jace). One could argue that you are winning any game in which you resolve a Jace, but I'm not so sure that is true anymore. Having 10 power of guys on the board in a control deck is a pretty sweet deal if you ask me and this guy makes a cool finisher in a mono-blue list with Mana Drains. The fact that he only costs one blue mana makes him ripe for drain abuse with moxen (possibly even ancient tomb). I'm not saying I'm sold on this guy as a threat, but he could be a legit alternative to BSC in a deck that doesn't want to run many moxen (can't really see why you wouldn't want to run moxen in full even in mono-blue, but IF you did this guy might be your solution.

The old "card X and card Y answer this so it must suck" argument has always been pretty much bunk no matter what card you are critiquing so I wouldn't pay much heed to that. What really is the ultimate metric for a card is what it can do pro-actively to end the game and how quickly it can do that. This card doesn't seem to do pro-actively what it needs to do fast enough so that is my main concern with its effectiveness, but that has nothing to do with which cards can or can't answer it.

-Storm

[ed0]

Empty and Tendrils give a strategy to a deck: Storm, that encourages one to play several spells in a turn.  Some of those spells can be Duress or Silence which proactively answer Flusterstorm and Mindbreak Trap.

The strategy here is: have a lot of blue permanents in play, play this guy, wait a turn.  That's not a very good strategy, and there's no inherent way to proactively answer Dismember/Swords/GENERIC-REMOVAL.  Unless you're thinking of playing Meddling Mage alongside it to provide devotion 1 and 'answer' Dismember?  In which case, thank you for naming Dismember with Meddling Mage while I kill you with Tinker/Yawgwill/Jace/etc.

Yay for generic aggro-archetype bashing!
By playing a lot of dudes you ARE inherently protecting Master of Waves from removal spells - simply due to the fact that the opponent likely won't hold on to the removal with a bunch of juicy (and dangerous) targets on the board for the off-chance there might be a bigger threat a few turns down the road.
Not to mention those dudes might be Spellstutter/Cursecatcher-esque or say a Hisoka's Guard...

[DubDub]

So, to recap, the card that's going to put Aggro over the top... i.e. where it might start winning tournaments, is a four mana creature that doesn't play nice with Tarmogoyf.  Ok.

You guys know that Young Pyromancer exists right?  This 'army' of blue elementals is going to run into an... army of red elementals that was generated for two less mana.  Or, because Young Pyromancer/Oath exists you're just going to take splash hate from Illness in the Ranks.

[d8dk32]

You guys know that Young Pyromancer exists right?  This 'army' of blue elementals is going to run into an... army of red elementals that was generated for two less mana.  Or, because Young Pyromancer/Oath exists you're just going to take splash hate from Illness in the Ranks.

Pyromancer doesn't create the tokens when he comes down. In fact to make the most of him you need to warp your deck around him. This card doesn't really require that, since the only decks that would probably ever make good use of it is already skewed heavily towards blue. One or two of these in the average Merfolk deck, or maybe in a Mono-Blue Control list, will let you occasionally pull out wins that you might not have been able to otherwise.

One could argue that you are winning any game in which you resolve a Jace, but I'm not so sure that is true anymore. Having 10 power of guys on the board in a control deck is a pretty sweet deal if you ask me

I really don't think resolving a Jace means you're winning these days. I do think that having 10 power worth of creatures on the board in any deck gives you a pretty decent shot at winning.

But Jace himself is another card that can get rid of this guy, at least temporarily. If you played this dude, and then your opponent played Jace  and -1'd him, your army is gone and your opponent has a powerful card-advantage engine on the board. I can see that being a problem.

[serracollector]

Don't forget that pretty much any deck running him is also going to be running a slew or FoW/Drains/Missteps/Dazes, it isn't like we won't have ways to protect him from said StP's/Dismembers/Opposing Jaces.  I see him as a mix between an empty the warrens and a Precursor Golem.  This is even better than a precursor golem in many a situation, and that card see's plenty of play.

[DubDub]

You guys know that Young Pyromancer exists right?  This 'army' of blue elementals is going to run into an... army of red elementals that was generated for two less mana.  Or, because Young Pyromancer/Oath exists you're just going to take splash hate from Illness in the Ranks.

Pyromancer doesn't create the tokens when he comes down. In fact to make the most of him you need to warp your deck around him. This card doesn't really require that, since the only decks that would probably ever make good use of it is already skewed heavily towards blue. One or two of these in the average Merfolk deck, or maybe in a Mono-Blue Control list, will let you occasionally pull out wins that you might not have been able to otherwise.

On the one hand I could be forced to 'warp' my deck to include Gush and Gitaxian Probe and Mental Misstep and Force of Will, and on the other hand I could just play a deck already skewed heavily toward Merfolk.  Jeez, I hope no one puts Tinker in my deck because then I would have to 'warp' my deck with Time Vault and Mox Sapphire and Mox Jet and the other Moxen and Mana Crypt.  Do you see how being forced to 'warp' your deck to include SOME OF THE BEST CARDS OF ALL TIME is really not a problem?  And just saying that alternatively you could play a bunch of Merfolk and profit equally is a bit of a joke?

And I'll repeat, Pyromancer costs less.  So he gets out there turn 1/2, you force their first threat, gaining a 1/1, then untap and make a bunch of 1/1s, then untap again and make more 1/1s with a chain of Gushes.
To build up to Master of Waves we're talking about a turn 2  'folk, force a thing, untap and lay another  'folk, then untap again to play this guy and get 10+ power.  And you don't have any excess mana to spend filtering the top of your deck because you spent  on setup Merfolk while the Pyromancer deck was spending  on Ponder, Preordain, Merchant Scroll and Ancestral Recall while getting Gush and Gitaxian Probe for free.

[Guli]

What kind of comparison and analysis is that? It makes absolutely no sense.

I just want to state; I don't even think I will ever play Merfolks. I was trying to give a decent review and analyse it as best as I can.

[d8dk32]

On the one hand I could be forced to 'warp' my deck to include Gush and Gitaxian Probe and Mental Misstep and Force of Will, and on the other hand I could just play a deck already skewed heavily toward Merfolk.  Jeez, I hope no one puts Tinker in my deck because then I would have to 'warp' my deck with Time Vault and Mox Sapphire and Mox Jet and the other Moxen and Mana Crypt.  Do you see how being forced to 'warp' your deck to include SOME OF THE BEST CARDS OF ALL TIME is really not a problem?  And just saying that alternatively you could play a bunch of Merfolk and profit equally is a bit of a joke?

And I'll repeat, Pyromancer costs less.  So he gets out there turn 1/2, you force their first threat, gaining a 1/1, then untap and make a bunch of 1/1s, then untap again and make more 1/1s with a chain of Gushes.
To build up to Master of Waves we're talking about a turn 2  'folk, force a thing, untap and lay another  'folk, then untap again to play this guy and get 10+ power.  And you don't have any excess mana to spend filtering the top of your deck because you spent  on setup Merfolk while the Pyromancer deck was spending  on Ponder, Preordain, Merchant Scroll and Ancestral Recall while getting Gush and Gitaxian Probe for free.

Fankly I'm not very familliar with merfolk decks in Vintage, but I assume that getting enough devotion to make it worthwhile by the time you can play it is going to be a fairly common occurrence, since the point of the deck seems to be playing creatures with U in their mana costs.

Perhaps warp wasn't the right word, since I guess you interpreted as a negative thing. I meant that Pyromancer needs to be built around, and the deck needs him on the field for maximum value. This new guy does not need to be built around. A single copy of this creature can be slotted into an existing deck with little to no other changes, and possibly have a very strong impact if and when he comes down.

Again, let me reiterate that I am not saying this thing is going to be spectacular, format-defining card that everybody needs a playset of. I'm saying it could be good in a single deck that doesn't see all that much play anyway. I'm trying to be optimistic here.

[vaughnbros]

Fankly I'm not very familliar with merfolk decks in Vintage, but I assume that getting enough devotion to make it worthwhile by the time you can play it is going to be a fairly common occurrence, since the point of the deck seems to be playing creatures with U in their mana costs.

4 mana is not a realistic amount of mana for merfolk decks in vintage.  Not only that, but if I have a table full of merfolk any lord has an immediate effect on my damage output whereas this I have to wait a full turn to attack.  

[xouman]

At first I thought this card was garbage, but now I'm not sure, and I should make a little study. Let's compare it to a 3 mana lord, depending on the number of creatures:

-If you have no creatures in play, lord is a lone 2/2, while master means two 2/1. In both cases, you'd better draw something else, but at this point master is better.

-If you already have a lord in play, lord is a 3/3, giving a bonus to other lord. Master is a 2/1 that puts three 2/1 creatures into play. This is probably the best scenario for master, specially against creatureless opponent, because it means a 2 turn kill.

-If you have a couple of creatures but each with U in the CC, the lord gives them +1/+1 and some other bonus, while master creates three 2/1 elementals again. still better for master, but closer.

-with three creatures or more, both lord or master would mean a two turn kill. in fact lord would be probably better, since it would grant islandwalk to existant merfolks (jumping blockers) and having an instant impact. besides, it comes into play earlier



Against MUD, I prefer a lord. Master is harder to cast and lord pumps merfolks to deal with golems and so.

Against grixis/rug, I'm not sure. Master dodges bolts, but he cannot attack because of flashed snapcasters or other blocking creatures. Lord would make unblockable pumped creatures and master creates battlefield superiority.

against redless control/midrange, master protection is useless but still must be answered quickly. EE 0 deal with elementals, but EE 2 deals with lord and maybe more, so master is better facing EE. Against restoration angel I'd prefer a lord because of the islandwalk effect.

against pure aggro I'd play master because of the horde to deal with opponent creatures.

against dredge, while both lord and master are bad imho, lord is quicker so should be better.

against oath, lord is an instant impact while master is slower and may came too late.


so under my point of view, a lord is better than master in lots of scenarios. unless opponent is not playing islands (and also not playing spheres), I'd play a lord to pump merfolks. I understand that master would mean some more attack power, but with so many creatures around he would be better at creating chumpblocks than attacking.