October 1, 2020
fine – verb : clarify (beer or wine) by causing the precipitation of sediment during production
Magic can be a silly game.
Within just a few days of Zendikar Rising releasing on Arena, there were a number of players reporting boardstates like the following…on turn 4:
During ZNR spoiler season the general consensus seemed to be that the set wasn’t particularly powerful. And it’s quite possible that’s mostly true. But Lotus Cobra and the new Omnath, Locus of Creation have enabled some truly ridiculous shenanigans, at least by Standard’s standards.
In less than a week after release, and 3 days before ZNR released in paper, Wizards of the Coast announced they were “closing monitoring developments in Standard” and that an announcement was coming soon.
And Monday, only Uro ate the banhammer. Standard players seem genuinely enraged, with most cynically claiming that WotC didn’t ban the Cobra or Omnath in order to preserve short-term sales of Zendikar Rising. I’m not convinced that was WotC’s reasoning, or that banning either card would stop the vast majority of players from buying packs to avoid opening a banned card. But I absolutely understand the vitriol being spewed: there’s simply no way the loss of Uro significantly slows down these decks. More bans are assured, but in the interim, Standard players are left to wallow in the quagmire.
Anywayhow…
My “middle class Magic” take on ZNR thus far is pretty simple: it’s…fine.
Bold statement, I know. Really putting myself out there.
No, really, the set seems (mostly) fine. I preordered prerelease kits from my LGS and the kid and I battled with them about a week ago. We both got showcase mythics: him a Moraug, Fury of Akoum and me a Nissa of Shadowed Boughs (in foil!)
Strangely, neither of our prerelease promos were date-stamped, which is one of those niggling little details that shouldn’t have bothered me, but did. I’ve been attending prereleases (off an on) since Tempest in 1997, and the date-stamped promos are wonderful rectangles of cardboard nostalgia that I treasure. My Skyclave Relic (yawn) looks like every other foil Skyclave Relic that’ll be released. Lame. I wrote WotC to voice my disappointment and was offered 2 draft boosters – one for each unstamped promo – as compensation. The documentation required to submit the request is excessive, but I feel like they OWE me (or at least the kid) so I’ll probably cave and do it when I feel like mostly wasting 30 minutes of my time.
Beyond that…the actual games with our sealed decks were a lot of fun. In our second game the kid used a turn-one Akoum Hellhound that he then equipped with Skyclave Pick-Axe, Scavenged Blade, and Cliffhaven Kitesail to obliterate me in just a few turns thanks to Landfall triggers. My sealed pool was painfully lacking in removal, and my opening-hand Nissa of Shadowed Boughs was useless to stop the assault. I had no way to block a 6/5 flyer and I was dead on turn 5. The other games were closer: I took game one, and my splashed Phylath, World Sculptor was too hard for him to overcome game 3. As the winner of the match, I got first pick from the ZNR Set Booster we got for preordering our kits.
I raved (a bit hyperbolically) about set boosters in a previous post, and this was my chance to open one and rate the experience. I was not disappointed (much.)
The pack had a foil full-art swamp and two rares: Orah, Skyclave Hierophant and Scute Swarm. I knew the kid would want the green rare, so I took Orah with the first pick and let the kid snarf the bug.
The pack also had a showcase Makindi Ox, a card I will never play but love dearly. What a chunk!
My only whine about the Set booster is one I’ve seen echoed frequently: the “connected” commons and uncommons had zero discernible connection. While an admittedly trifling issue, I thought connected cards would encourage some janky deckbuilding whims, especially if I decide to try playing sealed deck with Set boosters. I’ll admit that I didn’t spend a lot of time trying to decipher the connective tissue among the cards, but they didn’t share colors, mechanics, themes, or tribes. Lame.
Faith was nominally restored when our prize packs were satisfactorily solid: the kid picked the two sealed boosters he was convinced had the good stuff, and got a foil in each pack (as a kid, he likes these more than your average player) and a Grakmaw, Skyclave Ravager (ok, this is a bobo, but it looks fun). I was even more fortunate, getting a showcase Kazandu Mammoth MDFC (modal double-faced card) and a Sea Gate Stormcaller.
My experience with ZNR on Arena has been a bit different, but still…mostly fine. I’ll give the set, and the new Standard, a few more weeks to evolve before weighing in further.
In the meantime, I will wait for my preordered ZNR products to arrive. They shipped Friday the 26th with an estimated arrival date of Tuesday (two days ago.) When I checked their whereabouts this morning, they’ve been sitting in the same USPS distribution center for the last 5 days without any movement or update. Thankfully they’re only Magic cards and not something critical like medicine. Or a ballot.
And that’s all I will say about that.
Casual Magicking 