Constellation or Raid?

While we know very little about Khans of Tarkir, we know what 3 of the 6 mechanics are: Prowess, Raid and Morph. Of these, Raid is getting my most attention. This is partially for a number of reasons:

• Prowess is a keyword and is very simple to understand
• Morph is a returning mechanic so it’s already understood to a certain extent
• We don’t know too much about Raid. As an ability word, it depends on the individual card in many circumstances, so for now it is best to just speculate.

However, my main reason for wanting to look at Raid closer is due to how it applies to creatures. Raid only triggers once when a given creature enters the battlefield – even then you have to attack first. This is different to abilities such as Landfall, which can trigger more than once, or the current Constellation ability in Standard. For example, let’s compare the following two cards: Mardu Heart-Piercer…

…and Forgeborn Oreads.At first glance, we can see a few similarities. Both creatures are Red and Uncommon, coming in at 4 mana. They both have an ability word – in this case, Constellation vs Raid – which enable you to deal damage to creatures or players. However, this is where the similarities end.

Maximizing Damage

Whether it’s a standard environment or a limited draft, you want to make the most potential out of any possible card. Let’s look at Mardu Heart-Piercer first: This card can do a maximum of 2 damage. There is no sliding scale here, you’re either dealing 2 damage or you are not and this option only happens once.

Forgeborn Oreads, has a little more reach. When it enters the battlefield, it can deal 1 damage, which is the minimum you can ever deal with this card. The thing is, however, that anything after this is almost upside. Play a second enchantment and you can deal 1 more damage, making for a total equaling that of Mardu-Heart Piercer. Yet anything more than this is a pure bonus, and the right deck can easily make the most of Forgeborn Oread.

Of course, Mardu Heart-Piercer has a slight advantage in that it can deal 2 damage off the bat. This makes it more useful for taking out 2 toughness creatures, where as Forgeborn Oread acts more like a pinger: if you want to deal multiple amounts of damage you need to save up your enchantments to play them in succession on the same turn. Depending on the match up, there may be bigger reasons for Mardu Heart-Piercer, but there is more potential in the long run with Forgeborn Oread.

So, what does this mean about the two abilities? Straight away, we can see that Raid looks to give you  a little more power for a very extensive limiting factor. Constellation triggers once, guaranteed, and then requires you to play a decks worth of enchantments. Raid, on the other hand, only triggers once – and even then, it requires you to meet an additional criteria – but it gives a slightly bigger benefit.

Stats

Triggering abilities aside, what are the stats like? Both aren’t the best on a vanilla scale, which is to be expected, but there is a little difference. MHP is a 2/3, while FBO is a 4/2. The former gets 5 points worth of stats while the latter gets 6. If you’re going for aggression, which is a well known Red strategy, FBO has an advantage. Yet there are also a few drawbacks; of the two creatures, MHP well survive longer with 3 toughness, while FBO has only 2 toughness and will likely trade down.

Again, we might need to look back at the abilities of each. The MHP creature only triggers once so, after dealing the damage, you don’t need to save it anymore: it’s just a 2/3. You can use it to block or attack without having to worry about more triggers. Constellation, on the other hand, is a different matter. Do you swing in and risk losing a ping engine or do you play more conservatively? People are playing Eidolon of Blossoms for it’s card draw, but the creature itself is only a 2/2 for 4 mana.

Enchantment vs Creature Enchantment

Additionally, Constellation does have one big drawback – it only appears on an enchantment creatures. While there is nothing stopping the ability appearing on other permanents in the future, for now this is the only option. The problem, of course, is that enchantment creatures are much easier to kill. Green can rarely destroy creatures outright, for instance, but it can destroy enchantments. A similar argument can be made for White, while Blue’s ability to answer these cards stays around the same. Black can always kill creatures anyway and Red will find it easier – as we’ve discussed, Constellation creatures are often under-powered when it comes to stats. A 4-mana creature with 2 toughness is not hard to deal with in Red on turn 4.

Raid, on the other hand, doesn’t appear on enchantment-creatures. MHP is a 2/3, not a 2/2 along the lines of FBO and Eidolon of BLossoms. Furthermore, Raid can also appear on cards outside of creatures. This gives the mechanic much more reach and, as I’ve already predicted, Raid has the potential to appear on instants and sorcery spells (similar to Landfall and/or Metalcraft). The end result is that Raid permanents stand to be harder to remove.

Of course, this is just speculation, since there’s only one Raid card to go off so far. I do expert more from this, both in other forms and different rarities, and Raid will have it’s own place in Khans of Tarkir limited. When it comes to Standard, however, I’m just trying to figure out what kind of decks want it. We’ll know more when Khans of Tarkir previews start up.

Deck Tech: Black-White Constellation

This deck may seem gimmicky, but it could prove effective. I’ve already mentioned and toyed with the idea of black white enchantments when I looked at stab wound, so this is really more of a continuation of that idea.

The plan is to focus on cheaper creatures that benefit from enchantments (using Constellation), a few larger threats and plenty of enchantments. Mostly, these enchantments will come in the form of auras, such as Stab Wound, and possibly a few bestow creatures for extra versatility.

Nonetheless, let’s see if Black-White constellation is any good. First, the deck list:

LANDS

4 Godless Shrine

4 Temple of Silence

8 Swamp

8 Plains

CREATURES

4 Gnarled Scarhide

4 Underworld Coinsmith

4 Doomwake Giant

4 Nighthowler

ENCHANTMENTS

4 Stab Wound

4 Banishing Light

SPELLS

4  Heroes Downfall

4 Ultimate Price

4 Sign in Blood

(I should note this deck is subject to change after Khans of Tarkir. I’ve tried to keep few Return to Ravnica cards in here, but there isn’t much great black removal since M15 didn’t have a doom-blade like effect. Theros block has a few ket cards but Ultimate Price is still very powerful. In the right matchs, this could be replaced with Devour Flesh but that somewhat slows down the ‘life loss’ plan).

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 THE PLAN

Everything in this deck aims to trigger off enchantments or is itself an enchantment. Of the constellation effects, I’ve gone for ones that hamper the opponent rather than benefit you. Underworld Coinsmith is a slow life-loss engine, for instance, while Doomwake Giant can weaken their creatures or even remove them.

Because of this, I’ve used  both Banishing Light and Stab Wound as possible answers. These aren’t the most effective cards but the ability to trigger Constellation makes them worth it. Stab Wound also goes well with the Coinsmith in causing the opponent to lose life, or it can simply get rid of a threat – especially one that’s indestructible.

As a result, this deck doesn’t neccessarily want to attack. Unless it’s risk free, it’s much better to keep your important creatures back. The same goes for blocking – sending creatures in whenever you get the chance is not encouraged. Without constellation creatures this deck will fall apart.

Alternative Options

The problem I have with this deck as there are many options when it comes to black enchantments. I’ve cone with a playset of Nighthowlers, as these can get bigger and bigger and also work well as bestow creatures at only 4 mana. The same argument also goes for Scared Gnarlhide, which has extra versatility if you do want to attack.

However, there are other ways to run this deck. Herald of Torment is a great creature with a 3/3 body and flying for just 3 mana. It can also be bestowed for 5 mana, putting it in a similar position as the Nighthowler. Likewise, there may be potential for Master of the Feast.

Similarly, if you wanted to keep the curve down and go for something a little faster, Oppressive Rays could be an option. It is a great lock down in the early game and, even later, it is a way to trigger Constellation for a White mana. In this way, one could also argue Nyx Fleece Ram. This enchantment creature gives you life and works well with Underworld Coinsmith.

For now, many of these cards can be put into the sideboard, but this deck will need a lot of tweaking to make it as optimal as possible.

The Weak Point

There is one major Achilles’s heel to a deck that uses a high amount of enchantments and, following M15, there is one card that can – and will – be a major problem:

Yes, that’s a 2 mana instant speed answer to all enchantments. If you’re in Green and not playing enchantments, why would you not run this? This will be in nearly every Green players sideboards at the very least, proving a real problem for Constellation decks.

In short, it’s too powerful and Constellation decks cannot pick up too much steam as a result. These decks are slow and losing all your enchantments puts a very powerful stop on things. Still, I think the deck is fun and while it is not very competitive, it’s cheap to put together and is easy to play with.

Journey Into Nyx mechanics

Spoilers started earlier this week, so we’re starting to get a good look at Journey Into Nyx – for a mostly up to date list, the official gallery is a good place to look.

Anyway, what are the mechanics like? These abilities are often a good way to measure where a set is going and Journey Into Nyx has plenty to look into. It has:

• Heroic
• Bestow
• Devotion
• Monstrosity
• Inspired
• Strive
• Constellation

So, while Born Of The God‘s Tribute did not return, along side the addition of new mechanics Strive and Constellation, this small set has, uh, 8 mechanics. I know Dragon’s Maze had 11 but, still, this is another small set bristling with mechanics…

HEROIC

Heroic is more or less the same as it has always been, although the generic “put a +1/+1 counter on this” is bleeding into other colors. In Theros and Born Of The Gods, this was mostly in white and green; the former often got single counters or counters across the board, while green doubled or tripled up on the counters given to a single card.

This time red and blue get in on the action, and I wouldn’t be surprised i black gets involved, too. Red seems to be the bog standard – so far there is a common 1/1 for Red that gets a +1/+1 counter. Maybe not standard playable, but good in the right limited deck.

However, blue’s Sage of Hours showcases some of the design space still left. Sure it’s blue’s mythic ‘extra turn’ card, but it encourages you to use the counters in different means. Given Master Biomancer is still in standard, I like the creative ways to encourage the mechanic. Blue is arguably the last color to care about this strategy (it isn’t sneaky enough) but this looks promising.

BESTOW

Bestow is another staple of the block and has seen an interesting evolution in Theros block. Aside from the rares and mythics (Chromanticore for the win), Theros defined bestow with two cycles. The Dryad cycle and Emissary cycle gave bestowed creatures, or itself, a boost to power and toughness and an ability. The former had evergreen abilities and the latter had more complex options.

Born Of The Gods followed this with vanilla creatures. Although this was a step backwards, they proved vital in limited and probably saw enough play in homebrew Standard.

Journey Into Nyx takes this to the logic extent, a cycle of cards that offer a mostly negative ability. The idea? Play them on your own guys for power at a cost, or boost your opponents stuff to get a loophole advantage. Why would you bestow an opponents creature? To make sure it can’t block. Given this gives them an edge, too, you have to be careful with how to use these guys.

I like this, I’m just not sure they’re all that playable. It’s still a large boost you wouldn’t want to give your opponent and, well, I would consider drafting Mogis’s Warhounds myself. In a Red/White deck – an archetype that already plays a minotaur that has to attack – having to attack each turn is a decent trade for +2/+2.

DEVOTION

Devotion only makes a small appearance here, as it’s only on the five gods. These five follow the five in Born Of The Gods; if you have seven Devotion in the right colors, your indestructible enchantment becomes a creature. This worked then, so it will work now. I’ll likely look at the Gods more when the last three have been revealed.

MONSTROSITY

Tribute might have taken its place in Born Of The Gods, but Monstrosity is back in Journey Into Nyx. Similar to Theros, this seems to have potential. What has been shown for is a standard creature – Ravenous Leucrocota is a 2/4 vigilance with monstrosity with a CMC of 4 – that simply gets better for a big cost. At the moment, nothing strikes me as Standard playable, but making your vigilance creature even bigger in the late game definitely makes it worth while in a slower, limited format.

It’s a very green mechanic. Of course, it’s creature centric but it asks you to keep your creatures alive for a bigger pay off. I’d also expect to maybe see it in red and black – yet, with so many mechanics, I think blue might get a break from Monstrosity in this set.

If there are better cards in uncommon and rare, there may be some staples of Red, Green monsters, but its nonetheless a solid ability.

SCRY

Scry is simple and elegant. It’s used as you would expect here, with tap abilities and scry lands. While it hasn’t been spoiled, I wouldn’t be surprised if we have a few instants and sorceries with scry. It seems plausible, but it would be competing with Strive for space – as such, this set might let the new mechanic take a greater share of the spotlight.

INSPIRED

Nothing has been shown so far, but Born Of The God’s Inspired is said to return. It’s another creature-only ability (unless there are enchantments that grant it) so it should arguably be a limited run. Still, it was useful in limited and I expect this will continue if it has a fair mana cost.

STRIVE

The first of this set’s new mechanics, Strive is most commonly being viewed as a tweaked Multi-kicker. While the latter was very broad, Strive lets you play the strive cost as many times as you like for additional targets (think of it as how Fireball worked).

I like it, but I have concerns. From the one card seen so far, the Strive cost ensures you can’t go all-out nuts. This is most likely to ensure it’s not used in a white Heroic deck (all the triggers would be insane), but it has its options. For one mana, Ajani’s presence saves one of your guys and hopefully gets a Heroic trigger. Yet, pay the Strive cost once for a total CMC of 4 mana and it saves two. That seems very plausible but three creatures, which needs a CMC of 7, is not as likely. Who keeps up that kind of mana? While the potential is broad, the reality seems much more narrow right now.

CONSTELLATION

Finally, another new mechanic. If Strike was a re-worked Multi-kicker, Constellation is a combination of Landfall and Allies for enchantments. This is a good thing.

So far, all the creatures with Constellation have been enchantment-creatures themselves. The result is one guaranteed trigger with the promise of more. While this triggers in a similar fashion to Landfall, you can play more than one enchantment a turn. The result is something akin to Allies and I expect ‘Constellation decks’ may be a thing.

Eidolon of Blossoms, for instance, is a prime example. For four mana, you get a 2/2 and a card. From then on, any enchantment nets you an extra card, creating a pretty powerful card draw engine.

The only drawback is the cost. Eidolon of Blossoms is ideal, but larger costs may be too much of a late game hope. I remember Allies in Zendikar and Worldwake – at a lower cost, the idea was to get multiple triggers and as many benefits as possible. It wasn’t always aggro or rush, but it was at the short to mid-range end of the spectrum.