Pojo's Magic The Gathering news, tips, strategies and more!

Pojo's MTG
MTG Home
Message Board
News & Archives
Deck Garage
BMoor Dolf BeJoSe

Columnists
Paul's Perspective
Jeff Zandi
DeQuan Watson
Jordon Kronick
IQ
Aburame Shino
Rare Hunter
Tim Stoltzfus
WiCkEd
Judge Bill's Corner


Trading Card
Game

Card of the Day
Guide for Newbies
Decks to Beat
Featured Articles
Peasant Magic
Fan Tips
Tourney Reports


Other
Color Chart
Book Reviews
Online Play
MTG Links
Staff



This Space
For Rent

Pojo's Magic The Gathering
Card of the Day

Daily Since November 2001!

Dack Fayden
Image from Wizards.com

Dack Fayden
- Conspiracy

Reviewed Nov. 24, 2014

Constructed: 3.33
Casual: 3.67
Limited: 4.17
Multiplayer: 3.67

Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale:
1 - Horrible  3 - Average.  5 - Awesome

Click here to see all of our 
Card of the Day Reviews 

BMoor

Deck Garage

Dack Fayden

This guy's Ultimate is CRAZY... if you can get there. Three mana is a pretty cheap price tag, so you can at least start building up pretty quickly. And Dack's +1 is a solid sifter that will help you find what you need, and maybe even enable some graveyard shenanigans. His -2 ability is situational but very strong in that situation. Artifacts tend to be either support cards like mana rocks, or crucial combo pieces. As long as Dack is on the board, most opponents won't even cast any important artifacts... and that's good for you.

And the Ultimate? Suddenly every targeted spell you cast is a Mind Control! That's ferociously powerful... IF you have lots of spells that target your opponent's permanents WITHOUT destroying them or otherwise removing them from play. What do Red and Blue have that do that? Guildpact had the Izzet's Replicate cards, which are happily on-color but a bit out of print at this point. Usually when Red targets something, it's for the express purpose of destroying it. Blue can tap permanents or give creatures a temporary -X/-0, but the cards that do that are usually underpowered without Dack's emblem backing them up. A deck full of tap-down spells and shrink effects that stalls until it can get Dack online would be interesting, but very annoying.

Constructed- 4
Casual- 4.5
Limited- 4.5
Multiplayer- 4.5


David Fanany

Player since 1995

Dack Fayden
 
I rather like Conspiracy. Sure, it draws heavily on drafting and multiplayer, two things I don't really like that much, but how often are we going to get an expansion that looks like Assassin's Creed II crossed with the criminally-underused-in-general clockwork aesthetic? Dack Fayden is, I suppose, our Ezio equivalent, although it remains to be seen whether he has the same staying power as the Renaissance's greatest assassin. He is pretty good in Vintage, though. Vindicate was historically underplayed in that format, and players can struggle against a permanent that's not an artifact or enchantment, but acts like one and gets better the more expensive their deck is. Anywhere else, he's either a metagame call (if the rest of your playgroup is all Mirrodin/Scars of Mirrodin/Stoneforge Mystic decks) or a way to pull off a once-in-a-lifetime combo that starts with Sea King's Blessing and ends with 50 permanents on your side of the table. He's still pretty good at either of those jobs.
 
Constructed: 3/5
Casual: 3/5
Limited: 4/5
Multiplayer: 3/5

Michael "Maikeruu" Pierno

Today's card of the day is Dack Fayden which is a three mana Blue and Red planeswalker with three loyalty.  The +1 has target player draw two cards and discard two cards which is an okay effect and helps filter through the deck a bit to fix your hand which is useful in Commander. 

The -2 of gain control of target artifact is very situational, but potentially a huge advantage and shouldn't be dismissed.  The -6 of an emblem which adds Control Magic to any targeted spell, even multiple targets, is the real standout of the card and in the right build can be very impressive.  Overall Dack's design is to steal anything that isn't nailed down and it can be both effective and entertaining which should have him stay a popular addition to Casual or Commander decks with Izzet colors, though he excels when designed around to maximize targeting efficiency.
 
In a Limited format with this it is solid for the same reasons it works well in Commander, by filtering through the deck to get to needed cards while building up to the emblem for controlling threats.  An easy first pick in Booster and well worth forcing into Sealed by splashing Blue or Red depending on the pool.
 
Constructed: 3.0
Casual: 3.5
Limited: 4.0
Multiplayer: 3.5

  Dack Fayden
 
I just recently acquired my first Dack Fayden in a Conspiracy draft a couple weeks ago. He didn't fit my colors, but when I opened him third pack I wasn't about to pass him! I just this week inserted him into a new Commander deck, so I haven't had much time to use him, but in theory he seems pretty strong.
 
Faithless Looting has been a very popular card since it was introduced, and getting to do that every turn is quite a big deal. Whether you're trying to fill your graveyard, digging for a combo piece, or just want more choices, there are few times when this isn't useful. 
 
Gaining control of an artifact sometimes will be useless, and sometimes will be a game changing play. Given that the only constructed formats he's legal in are Legacy, Vintage, and Commander, that leaves for some pretty powerful artifacts to steal. 
 
The emblem is a bit unusual. In theory, you could play a bunch of cheap spells and gain control of several permanents, but I'm not sure how often it will happen. I don't see him lasting long enough in a legacy or vintage game to build up to ultimate, and most spells I play in my commander decks are powerful enough to either destroy or gain control of a card on its own. 
 
As usual for Planeswalkers, he's just insane in a limited game. Getting to cycle through that many cards gives you a huge advantage, making the +1 worth it all on its own. Getting to steal an artifact or using the emblem are just gravy.
 
In multiplayer, planeswalkers don't usually last too long since everyone on the table wants to destroy one as soon as they see it, so it will often be a three mana "steal target artifact and make opponent use a removal spell" spell, but that's not all bad either.
 
Constructed: 4.0
Casual: 4.5
Limited: 4.5
Multiplayer: 4.0

Copyright© 1998-2014 pojo.com
This site is not sponsored, endorsed, or otherwise affiliated with any of the companies or products featured on this site. This is not an Official Site.