Much like the Origins incarnation of Liliana,
Vryn's Prodigy and Telepath Unbound are a
well-crafted tribute to nearly a decade of Jace:
a little card drawing a la Lorwyn, some
foreshadowing of the tricks he'd use as the
Architect of Thought, and a powerful milling
attack. If you do get him in play on your second
turn, it's surprisingly easy to get five or more
cards in your graveyard over the next two turns
(though it's also easy to overkill on the cheap
cantrips trying to do that and then lack enough
to actually do with them, so be careful). Once
you do, ascended Jace is likely to be used most
often for another casting of a value spell, as
his numbers are quite specific and he's not as
good at defending himself as some planeswalkers
are. But then, Snapcaster Mage taught us that
that's often more than enough to win a match.
Welcome back readrers todays card of the day is
the number one card of the year unveiled its
Jace! No suprise as Jace has been one of the
most powerful planeswalker. Merfolk Looter has
always been a solid card an early play that can
help you shape your hand. Jace is Merfolk Looter
with a tremendous upside allowing you slowly
scultp your hand in the early game to transform
later. The planeswalker side is where the meat
of the card is. The +1 is all but
inconsequantial but allows you to hold back some
agressive creatures in a pinch. The second
ability to basically flashback a spell form your
graveyard is amazingly powerful and with a wide
variety of spells available to control decks in
particular you can accrue even more advantage as
you grind your opponent out recuring spells. The
ultimate is rarely activated on planeswalkers
and is basically gravy, this one is basically a
long term win condition for control mirror match
ups that can on some occasionaly inadverently
benefit your opponent making it unattractive. In
standard this card has increased in both price
and popularity appearing in a wide swath of
control decks over the year propelling blue
decks into the top tier and a resurgance for
control one of the most powerful and played
cards in standard. In modern, legacy and even
vintage this card has made small ripples and is
seeing play across all formats a testament to
its power. In casual, multiplayer, and EDH its
underwelming, its Merfolk Looter with a slightly
underwleming planeswalker as a bonus when
transformed. The abilities are simply not
powerful enough in formats with some of the
powerhouses of the kitchen table. In limited its
powerful allowing you to turn through your deck
and planeswalkers are in most occasions bombs.
Jace is once again one of the most powerful
planeswalkers printed and our number one card of
the year.
The number one card of the year is Jace, Vryn's
Prodigy and the transformed Jace, Telepath
Unbound. This can be played with a few
cards already in the grave to accelerate the
transformation, though the draw and discard is
beneficial in and of itself the 0/2 for two is
vulnerable.
Transformed this has a defensive +1 of giving a
-2/-0 to one creature until your next turn which
is useful for avoiding a trade and minimizing
potential damage to Jace. The -3 allows
casting of an instant or sorcery from the
graveyard which works well with the 0/2 as
setup. The
-9 has you mill five cards from an opponent
whenever you cast a spell which is a nice boost
for a library destruction deck, though aside
from the -3 the earlier abilities don't really
support that kind of build.
Overall this is a planeswalker with some decent
support effects and the low base cost should
make it fairly popular in current formats.
In Limited nearly any planeswalker is worth a
first pick and even though this is a little weak
in the format it still rates a first pick in
Booster as the +1 and -3 are both effective
tools. For Sealed this depends more on the
pool than other planeswalkers as it can't carry
a deck and should be sidedecked or splashed at
best if Blue is weak.
Snapcas.... Oops. Looter... Damn it. Jace the
min.... F***.
We wrap up our list of the years best... with...
An effective reprint of snapcaster mage that's
slower, but a bit more versatile. in the way of
number of abilities, not.... exceptional
versatility like Snappy. Anyway, the main reason
you're going to run this is for the possibility
(and I mean vague possibility) of being able to
repeat the flashback ability more than once. At
it's start, it's a looter. it draws and dumps.
The +1 is okay, and the Ult. is nothing to write
home about, So... yeah. It does stuff, but I
hardly think it's no. 1 this year, and totally
not worth the 60 some-odd bucks it's going for
right now. Seriously, go look, it's going for
MORE than snapcaster. Just because it's standard
legal and snappy is not.
Finally, Happy new year to you guys. Let's hope
our next year of Magic has more variety, and not
repeats of the same stuff (Although I wouldn't
hold my breath...)
Constructed: 3 (And i'm being really generous
here. Flashback is nice, but repetition does not
help the meta.)
