Vague Rantings #3: The New Lorwyn Limited
I had a chance to hit up a prerelease a few weekends ago and cut up a few draft pods, some 2HG pods, and a few sealed pods. After all that and reading some other’s thoughts on the matter I figured I’d chime in a bit.
How much does the M in LLM changes things?
If I had to take a wild guess I’d put it somewhere around 33%, but in all honesty I don’t think it’s even that much. You’re probably going to be playing 3-6 Morningtide cards tops, and it’s hard to make a plan around a Morningtide card when you only get one packs worth. Morningtide does have a lot of neat interactions, but I think they will all feel sort of tacked on when you play them. You’ll probably just shrug and say “that was nifty,” but I’m guessing that will be the end of it.
What about Kinship?
Kinship is a mechanic I really like a lot. There are several Kinship cards that can be game breaking if you trigger them even once, and a few that can get out of hand if you trigger them several times. If I had to pick the five best cards with Kinship my list would look like this: Wolf-Skull Shaman, Kithkin Zephyrnaut, Winnower Patrol, Waterspout Weavers, and Squeaking Pie Grubfellows. This list might look a little odd at first but the one thing these all have in common is that they fit into already well established draft archetypes.
Wolf-Skull Shaman is absolutely nuts in your standard elf deck. I had this guy in one of my Draft decks and played him on turn 2 both games in the second round. He made over 15 tokens that round. That might be a little extreme, but you get the idea.
With Kithkin being under drafted a lot these days you should be able to get together a pile capable of activating him at least every other turn. While playing 2HG this card was responsible for dealing 16 damage to our first round opponents. Even with two decks worth of answers to find they could never find a way to deal with in anything that they would call favorable. A common that can single handed win games is good. Even better in a color you know nobody else wants to be drafting.
Winnower Patrol is just very solid. 3/2 for 2G that will often swing for 4 it’s first trip into the Red Zone. Not much else to say really.
Waterspout Weavers is another card that can be absolutely nuts in the right deck. Imagine this in a deck with Stoneybrook Schoolmaster and/or Summon the School. Activating this guy will be GG just about every time it happens. If only it was easier to draft merfolk . . .
Squeaking Pie Grubfellows make the list because out of all the remaining Kinship effects out there his will trigger more often and comes with the most reasonable body. A 3/2 for 3B is passable and randomly eating cards out of your opponents hand is pretty good too. The reason I picked this card over Leaf-Crown Elder is that Treefolk just aren’t that strong of an archetype and I don’t think you want to commit to them in hopes of grabbing one of powerhouse Treefolk rares in Morningtide, but I could be wrong on this one.
What about Prowl?
Prowl is sweet. In fact I don’t think there is a single card with Prowl that isn’t good. Faeries where already pretty insane, but Prowl adds a whole other level to them. Aside from the obviously good Prowl cards here are two that I think might get overlooked by most people.
Morsel Theft is just retarded, 1B for a six life point swing? Ok, thanks. In one of the drafts I did I ran 2 or 3 of these and they were always good. In fact using 2 of these a Frogtosser Banneret and an Auntie’s Snitch I killed a guy on turn 4 while sitting at 26 life, oh and I almost forgot it cantrips. RE-DONK-U-LUS!
Thieves’ Fortune is very solid. It’s basically Impulse in the right deck. It might not be as good as Morsel Theft, but it’s nothing to be scoffing at.
What about Reinforce?
Reinforce is my least favorite new mechanic. I forget who said this, but I remember reading/hearing someone say that it was like cycling except you got 1/1 counters instead of new cards, and that pretty much sums it up. That said it’s pretty good in limited. It makes a lot of cards just so good, and gives White a huge boost because it gives them so many more tricks. In fact what might be the best uncommon in Morningtide is both White, weird I know, and has Reinforce.
Swell of Courage looks like garbage at first, but once you play with it you’ll understand. It’s basically a white Titan’s Revenge, except at instant speed and if you don’t kill them with it you still have a huge dooder left. White is just keeps looking better and better.
What cards do I want to be on the lookout for?
Aside from all the fancy new mechanics Morningtide has some solid spells without anything fancy to them. Most of them are removal, but some of them might be surprising. So in no particular order here they are.
Elvish Warrior is a card that I think is really strong. It can handle every 1 drop in the block and most of the other 2 drops. Add that to the fact that it’s part of what maybe the best archetype in LLM and I think it’s a card that you should take pretty high, around 5-8.
Pack’s Disdain is just sick. It’s cheap, instant speed, splashable and hits everything that isn’t Chameleon Colossus. I’d rate this higher than just about any other common in Morningtide I can think of right now and I think it might even be better than Nameless Inversion, but I might just be getting over excited again.
Violet Pall is another great removal spell. Again it’s instant speed and splashable, but it’s also very demoralizing at times. The first time I cast it at the prerelease my opponent read it and when I put the token into play he was so shocked. “Wait YOU get the token?” I got the same reaction every time I cast it.
Distant Melody is another really good card. At the prerelease I saw someone draw 8 cards with it. On average you will probably get 2-3 cards out of it and even for that it’s still pretty good.
Everbark Shaman has a very unassuming ability to take over a game. A 3/5 for 4G isn’t all terrible either. I remember playing a draft match where a guy named Barry used this to take all the land out of his deck. Sure it’s a tad bit slow, but at the end of a game when you’re both out of gas this guy sure makes it easy to avoid getting flooded.
Weed-Pruner Poplar can be very good in the right deck. If you aren’t running a lot of x/1s it can be very strong for you. It can take care of a lot of good utility guys from Lorwyn (Douser, Harrier) and a 3/3 for 3B isn’t the worst thing in the world either.
Spitebellows makes for a very good removal spell. For 1RR you can kill anything with 6 or less toughness. He’s also a pretty effective attack if you ever get around to casting him for real. All in all a very solid card.
The 1/1 counter elementals (Fertilid and the like) are all very solid. They won’t always be something you want to main deck, but they all have very relavent abilites and all get the bonus from the new Lord creatures like Bramble Wood Paragon. So don’t be too quick to discount them.
I tried to focus on cards that other people might have overlooked. Everyone else can tell you about all the great first picks, but I think anyone can tell you what a good first pick is, and while none of these might be first picks they will almost always make your deck.
What cards from Lorwyn got better?
Ameboid Changeling makes Kinship really good for you and really bad for your opponent. He also makes Pack’s Disdain better (or worse) and just got a real upgrade overall.
White cards are a lot stronger now. There are so many strong White cards in Morningtide that it’s hard to ignore them. Though once people catch onto this it will lose a lot of its bang.
Axe-Grinder Giant. No really he did. I promise.
Cloudgoat Ranger got a little bit better. There are a few cards in Morningtide that just make him absolutely insane. I let you discover what they are for yourself.
All in all I like Morningtide a lot and I’m kind of upset that there won’t be a 3rd expansion to go with it. Lorwyn limited has been on of my favorite ever and I think that it’s going to get even better. Until next time.
-Bob
Tags: Limited
Related to:
Magic: the Gathering
