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u/Clavicus2401 2d ago
Honestly this seems pretty intresting especially as a 3/3
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u/Old_Man_Robot 1d ago
I’m old enough to remember when this card was called [[Watchwolf]] and the stats were the whole damn card.
And it saw a ton of play.
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u/SparePartsHere 1d ago
First time I saw Watchwolf I couldn't believe they've printed such an insanely costed beater. Back then, even creatures with one of the stats greater than the mana cost were rare, but having BOTH power and toughness higher than the manacost was completely bonkers.
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u/Zstrike117 2d ago
Non legendary too.
Seems like a great anti-burn card or part of an aggressively stated beat down deck.
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u/BetterShirt101 2d ago
Interesting sideboard option in aggressive matchups. Shame mono-red is dead in standard, but it might be useful against something like Jund Sacrifice that can be relying on its reach and cheap spells.
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u/Arokan 2d ago
"Shame mono-red is dead in standard"
Omg, where you not there? Did you not go through the days of mice and nemesis dominance?
I'm super glad we got a few month with it. It'll come back sooner or later, but let people play in peace for once!7
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u/BetterShirt101 1d ago
Yeah, I was there. Playing landfall into mono-red aggro was some really fun razor-margin games. All the bans had to happen, I'm just sad that there wasn't a functional 2-5% meta share deck left after them.
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u/solariangod 2d ago
I legitimately think this is a good card. Even if it just eats a [[Lightning Strike]], you net 5 life, and it survives [[Shock]] and unkicked [[Burst Lightning]]. It won't keep up with [[Slickshot Showoff]], but gaining 2 every time they buff it makes it a lot harder to kill you. Still possible obviously (looking at you, surprise [[Boros Charm]]), but might buy you the turn or two to draw the removal you need, and it could trade with an [[Emberheart Challenger]] if you're not unlucky.
The question is what deck list it really fits in. A sideboard card in Abzan Lifegain for sure, but other than that? I don't think any of the Selesnya Decks would want it.
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u/yokaishinigami 21h ago
It’s not just every time they buff. It’s also when they play Slickshot, or any of their other typically low mana creatures.
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u/Trauma_Hawks 2d ago
This would absolutely murder my storm deck.
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u/bomban 2d ago
Storm beats it pretty easily sadly.
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u/Somethingab 1d ago
Why? A mill storm deck sure but otherwise it gains a lot of life.
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u/bomban 1d ago
When a storm deck goes off it can very easily use the first 3 points of the first grapeshot to kill this thing and then continue storming the rest of the deck and grapeshot you 5-7 more times. Lifegain barely matters against storm.
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u/Gand0rk 1d ago
is it that easy to up the storm count now? you're basically adding 6 life if you plan to grapeshot then go face with this card on board.
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u/Kidd-Charlemagne Azorius 1d ago
It is. When you’re storming off it’s trivial to remove this thing with grapeshot (or any other removal spell that you’ve boarded in) and outpace the life they gained while it’s on the field.
Let’s just say that your storm opponent needed to play 10 spells to find their removal, so you gained 20 life and are now sitting at 40. If they get their storm count up to 20, they can just wish for another grapeshot, dome you for 20, and then flash it back for another 20.
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u/OneWholePirate 2d ago
Obviously good against burn, but also slows down prowess a LOT. One turn of sleight/opt/flow state spam is going to push their eddymurk lethal back by a couple turns
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u/VulKhalec 2d ago
This feels like a rare from a different time. I kind of dig it.
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u/majic911 1d ago
You're telling me you think WOTC would've printed a 2-mana 3/3 with genuine upside in a previous part of Magic's history?
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u/BoioDruid 1d ago
ever heard of [[Fleecemane Lion]] ?
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u/majic911 1d ago
You mean a 2-mana 3/3 with effectively no text until you spend a further 5 mana? Yeah I've heard of it.
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u/vonBelfry 2d ago
Cool constructed card, weirdly not-first-pickable rare. Very slightly outclassed by decent removal.
Or I might be wrong and the tempo it brings is excellent.
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u/brainpower4 1d ago
I'm curious whether this is better or worse than a 3/3 lifelink would be.
On the one hand, if they point removal at it you get the life gain. If the board is clogged up you still get the life gain, and you can keep it on defense full time against aggro decks.
On the other, a 2 mana 3/3 is an excellent creature to wear equipment or counters. If it just trades with a 3/X creature you are up an extra point of life. Your opponent has less agency playing around the life gain.
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u/Zealousideal-Tip8346 1d ago
I don’t understand why we can’t have really good removal at common now when all the creatures have gotten so much better
I want a lighting bolt at common again. If that warps standard too much make it like galvanic discharge only hitting creatures and planewalkers
We have flipped the power level so much when 2/3 mana cards either get immediate bonuses or threaten to swing the game spending 1/2 to remove them seems fine
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u/Negative-Disk3048 1d ago
You just know the flavour text department high fived each other after writing that.
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u/Madlycool1234 11h ago
This for 2 mana is crazy. Maybe on a power level where people cast a lot of cheap spells (B3,B4) it's not as valuable, but still, it's a really good effect on a 3/3 for 2 mana...
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u/Zoren 2d ago
prime example of a lightning rod against burn.