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Pojo's Magic The Gathering
Card of the Day
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Rob
Lawing
This
Week's Card Selector
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I have always been a fan of the kicker mechanic
and more specifically the
battlemages. Obviously some are better than others
but they are all pretty
good. Generally I would rank them Green, Red,
Black, Blue, and White. I
think the cost are fair and the alternate colored
kickers all contain
interesting abilities which make them very
versatile in both constructed
and limited. I would like to see this group of
cards reprinted in 8th
edition.
Ratings (Average of all 5 cards)
Constructed 3.75
Limited 3.5
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Mason
Peatross
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I personally love the Battlemages. I would love to
see them in 8th Edition,
but we won't - because they have
"kicker" costs, and WOTC doesn't include
special set features in the basic set. If they
did, this would be an easy
one to add in, and the cards are all very well
made, very balanced for what
they do.
Limited: 4
Constructed: 2
8th Edition Readiness: 0
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Scott
Gerhardt
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I'll be honest - as a
card reviewer, somedays you want to review, others
you don't care. Today - I don't
care. I'll summarize:
Battlemages won't
be in 8th because of kicker. Would they be
good? Yeah. It's really moot to even
discuss it, though.
Thorn and Thunder
are the only 2 tournament viable ones since they
deal with things that could be real threats, and
provides other abilities that aren't bad as
well. The other 3 are not viable in
constructed because their abilities are not very
good for their cost.
In limited, any and
all of them are viable. Effect, rather than
cost, is more the issue, and things that can do
two things, PLUS give us a 2/2 body can be
nice. If you play the color schemes, you
play the mages.
Current Price: $.95
- $1.45
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Alex
Hockey
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Today is a 5 for 1 deal so get comfortable.
Firstly, an overview of the cycle. They are all
2/2
creatures for 3 mana with good old fashioned
abilities
(like destroying things, drawing cards...) so they
are
pretty much as good in limited as they are in
constructed (in limited you probably want the
creature
more than the ability, in constructed you may want
the
ability more depending on the deck). That's why
most
of my ratings are the same for both formats.
Nightscape battlemage - The blue kicker gives
great
card advantage and the rted one could really be a
pain
in the butt. A 3.5 in both formats.
Stormscape Battlemage - The White cost is pretty
good,
considering the U/W life gain/control decks
around.
The black cost is a bit overpriced. A 4 in both
formats (due to a 4 in constructed when using the
white kicker and a 4 in limited when using the
black
kicker)
Sunscape Battlemage - The green cost is a wee bit
situational, the blue cost gives good card
advantage
in the midgame. A 3.5 in both formats.
Thornscape Battlemage - Seems good in a fires deck
(2RG for 2 direct damage then attack for 2 more).
Both
abilities are cheap and effective. A 4 in
constructed,
a 3.5 in limited.
Thunderscape battlemage - The black kicker comes
in
too late to be of great use but the green kicker
could
take care of a pesky enchantment (like mirari's
wake).
A 3 in both formats.
Kicker is a keyworded block mechanic so I don't
expect
to see it in 8th edition, although if Wizards have
decided that kicker cards are allowed in the basic
set, these creatures would not be my first pick.
Having a blue ability on a white card for exampe
could
confuse new players. You might not believe that,
but
apparently, creatures that don't have power equals
toughness confuse new players!
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Judge
Bill
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Nightscape Battlemage:
Black has better things to do at 6+ mana than
bouncing 2 creatures or
destroying a land. If I wanted to pay 6 mana to
bounce something, I'd bounce
everything. Can occasionally be good in limited to
break parity for the
final few points of damage, but that's about it.
Constructed: 1.2
Limited: 2.5
Thornscape Battlemage:
Now I have played this occasionally in my
sideboard. Mainly it was to
destroy a problem artifact. These days, there are
very few artifacts to
destroy, but this would be a good choice if there
were a number of good
artifacts. The ability to do 2 damage to something
from a green source isn't
a bad thing, either.
Constructed: 2.2
Limited: 3
Thunderscape Battlemage:
Again, a halfway decent enchantment destroyer if
you are playing red/green.
Was used in some Fires sideboards. The discard
ability is crap, moreso after
the madness of Torment.
Constructed: 2
Limited: 2
Stormscape Battlemage
Six mana to destroy a creature isn't bad - in
limited. In constructed, It's
too slow. Life gain attached to a creature is crap
most of the time.
Constructed: 1.2
Limited: 2.5
Sunscape Battlemage:
Both abilities should see little play. They may be
good in limited,
depending on how good your opponent's fliers are,
but this card is absolute
crap in constructed.
Constructed: 1
Limited: 1.9
This would be a good, versatile cycle of creatures
to be reprinted in
Eighth. However, they won't be reprinted, for one
big reason - This cycle of
cards contains a block mechanic with the mechanic
name on the card. No card
with that quality has been reprinted in a base
set.
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Fletcher
Peatross
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To start off, the Battlemages should
not be included in any base set. They
won't either. Basically because they have a
'set mechanic' in this case,
Kicker. These guys are very good though and
are very powerful in a deck
that can support multi colors. Green's
non-red direct damage effect has
killed many pro-red creatures in its day, and its
secondary ability isn't
too bad, Green is good enough for Constructed.
Blue's banish ability is a
very nice one in Limited and its usually first
pick material if you're with
U/B but it has no place in Constructed.
Red's discard effect and
enchantment removal have made its way into both
Limited and Constructed
decks alike. White's basically only good in
Limited. Black is the weakest
of all of them and it is also only playable in
Limited.
Green - L: 4 C: 3.5
Blue - L: 3.5 C: 2
Red - L: 2.5 C: 3
Black - L: 2 C:1.5
White - L: 3 C: 2
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Michael
Garten |
The Planeshift battlemages would all
serve well as additions to the next
edition. Though only two (Thunderscape and
Thornscape) have practical uses,
printing the entire cycle would add an interesting
twist to Eighth Edition.
Thornscape acts as a miniature Flametongue Kavu
and can destroy things such
as Ensnaring Bridge. Thunderscape provides a
solution to Opposition,
Worship, and Hunting Grounds. These two
battlemages deserve 4 in
constructed, 5 in limited. The others are
rather weak. Sunscape's,
Stormscape's and Nightscape's abilities are too
high costing, and
unfortunately have about the same effect levels as
the others. These all
deserve 2.5's in constructed, 4's in limited.
An overall rating is 3.25 in
constructed, 4.5 in limited. |
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John
Hornberg |
All of the Battlemages have their
uses in one way or another. Some have
key uses in constructed, all of them are decent in
limited.
Thornscape Battlemage and Thunderscape Battlemage
are the two best,
because they are both good in constructed in
limited. Both saw play in
Fires last year for different things, although
Thunderscape saw more
play. He had the kicker costs from hell on
him, either Mind Rotting
someone, or providing green with another way to
get rid of an
enchantment. Thornscape's ability to provide
removal from a green
source, thus killing pro red things for fires.
Both were great utility
cards in a deck that could use him to the fullest.
Now, unfortunately,
the format is less about utility cards like this,
and tempo tempo tempo.
So, in Type II, these two share a rating of
3, and in limited,
Thornscape gets a 4, and Thunderscape gets a 3.5.
On the second teir of battlemages is Stormscape
and Sunscape Battlemage.
Both have their uses, and were awesome picks
in draft, but are nothing
comapred to either Thornscape or Thunderscape.
Sunscape costs a lot,
and that holds him back in the long run (that 2U
kicker is costly, but
worth it.) In constructed, Stornscape gets a
rating of 1.75 because he
is not that good, while Sunscape is a 2.25.
In limited, both get 3.5's.
Then, theirs Nightscape Battlemage, the lowly one.
He is good in
limited, because he bounces 2 creatures for the
blue kicker, but in the
long run, he serves no purpose in constructed.
The combo was taken out
of him when they put in "non black
creatures" for his blue kicker, and
he is overcosted for an LD deck, or any seriously
competative deck.
He's still a bomb drop in limited, but it
isn't to the calibur of the
others in constructed. A 1 in constructed,
and a 3.5 in limted.
As for these in 8th Edition, I don't know WHY they
would reprint them,
because of their special abilities (kickers) but
if they do make a
return, I think it would be good for the
environment. If they saw play,
they could weasel their way into some decks.
Otherwise, I don't have
any problems with their return. They would
definitly make the set
respectable, proving that Wizards is thinking
about what the players
want instead of their own policies. It would
be a step in the right
direction in adding to the power of the set,
although if the cards
aren't seeing play now, I don't knoiw if they will
in the future either. |
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