The Worst Creatures in the History of Magic: the Gathering
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- Опубликовано: 30 май 2024
- In Magic good cards get all the glory, but today we're changing that by giving a shout out to the very worst creatures in the history of the game!
Today's video is brought to you by Card Kingdom. You can pick up some Magic: the Gathering cards (and help support the show) at www.cardkingdom.com/mtggoldfish
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What else would you add to the worst creatures list?
I'd probably add Leviathan, it's a 10/10 for 5UUUU ... that doesn't untap or attack unless you sac 2 islands and comes into play tapped,
Sky swallower might be in the discussion but at least you can torpor orb it,
one can find "Icatian Moneychanger" pretty bad, at least worse than a 1/1 for 1,
Flailing Soldier comes with the ability to let your opponent remove it without using a card but he is at least above curve so I don't know,
Gate Hound is a really funny 1/1 for 3 (sure it has a weird upside but.. come on... seriously?)
Infectious Host suffers from the same issue but technically if you jump through some basic hoops it's like you almost got 2 mana worth for your 3 mana creature?
Hawkeater Moth is a flier! and it has shroud! And... it's a 1/2 for 4 mana, did I mention it has shroud?
Deathcurse Ogre is like.. I am sorry, why am I also losing 3 life? Who is this card for?
I was honestly surprised scornful egotist wasn’t on the list at all. To me that’s the quintessential bad creature.
EXILED BOGGART
Aven Trooper
Shelkin Brownie.
Sorry Seth but a vanilla 1/1 for 1 with no downside is already good enough to never compete for a place on this list, it's on curve! It's bad sure, unplayable sure, but come on.. Tenth worst creature? Why? What did he do to you that actual vanilla 1/1 for 1 are better?
The burden of information management
Yeah, it's a dumb pick for sure, there are much worse creatures than a 1 mana 1/1 without drawbacks.
yeah it's genuinely insane to put a 1/1 for 1 in a list of bad creatures. like if we're talking about really shitty old creatures there are tons of 1/1s for 2 or 3 with useless abilities in Alpha alone, or like any 0 power wall being basically entirely useless.
Seth just dunkin on an actual little guy.
Yeah I was gonna say I think he just wanted to talk about the leprechaun. “1/1 for 1 is about as bad as a creature can be” is so so wrong lol
Rumbling Baloth is *not* forgettable. It's a certified Sparky classic.
True. Also I am first reply yay!
Lol, so true. Sparky staple.
Warping Wurm still grows way too slow, but the "pay mana or phases out" actually gives it one counter every turn, not every other turn. It phases in on your untap step, then both triggers with go on the stack at the beginning of your upkeep, and you order them to get a counter before declining to pay 2GU and it phase out again.
I'm not familiar with the rule that puts the +1/+1 counter during upkeep. You are correct with the every turn buildup, but I'm pretty sure you don't order the triggers. It gets the counter before the phasing cost trigger goes on the stack.
@@xaldath4265 No player gains priority during the Untap Step, which is when Phasing permanent changed phasing states (Phased In/Out). As such, nothing can actually go on the stack during this time. The earliest part of a turn any player gains priority is the beginning of the upkeep. Both the "When Warping Wurm phases in, put a +1/+1 counter on it" and the "At the beginning of your upkeep, pay 2GU or Warping Wurm phases out" triggers will both try to be placed on the stack at the same time. Because you control both triggers, you choose the order they are placed on the stack/will resolve. Even though the condition for the "...phases in" did happen first, during the Untap Step, the trigger itself doesn't go on the stack at that time.
I came to say this. I think Seth forgot that it would phase back in on its controller's untap step anytime its phased out, and sincenit phases itself out on your upkeep, it's not every other turn like other phasing cards.
It really goes turn 4: 1/1
Turn 5:phases out
Turn 6:becomes grizzly bear
Turn 7:becomes centaur
Turn 8:becomes rumbling baloth
You only skip the next counter if you pay to keep it for the turn
Give the leprechaun protection from green. Overpowered.
It doesn't seem hard to fix Merchant Ship tbh. You just give it 4 power, and to compensate for that buff you take away the life gain and one point of toughness and make it cost an extra U. Then you merely design an entire format around it, including sharing a single deck with your opponent. Easy.
I once made a Merchant Ship deck, way back in the days of early Magic. First, you put in Phantasmal Terrain. Not only does this two mana land enchantment guarantee that your opponent has an island so you can attack them, it can quite often hurt them by taking away a color of available mana for a few turns in the early game. Next, Fishliver Oil to give your Merchant Ship islandwalk. Now you're getting that two life a turn! But why stop there? Next slap on some Unstable Mutations. Give your Merchant Ship the ability to deal some real damage (for a few turns). Protect your ships with all the counter magic you can, toss in some Psionic Blasts for targeted removal or to finish the opponent off, and you have a deck from the very early days of MtG that will send your opponent to the shadow realm when they realize just how awful the deck they lost to was.
You sound like a friend of mine who would take cards people would complain about being terrible and build winning decks around them just to break opponents. I salute you and players like you for making the game interesting.
I made good use of Warping Wurm in a Drop of Honey deck years ago. You cast it, then leave it alone to grow (It phases in, gets a counter and IMMEDIATELY phases out, making it nearly impossible to remove, and giving it a counter EVERY turn, not every other ). Then once it is large, do a board wipe like Wrath of God and slam them with a large Wurm. My best move is when I was able to get my Unstable Shapeshifter to become a Wurm, and eventually I kept it in play, cast a Deadly Insect and now had a 13/8 Deadly Insect (because of the 7 counters on it.
I also use Primordial Ooze in my Zedruu deck. When the upkeep gets to high, I gift it to my opponent. It is also useful in a deck with CoP Red, which can prevent its damage.
Wouldnt Warping Wurm phase in literally every turn? So after 6 turns youd have like 5 or so counters.
Turn 5: Phase Out
Turn 6: Phase In, Counter, Phase Out by not paying
Turn 7 onward: Repeat Turn 6.
Still pr bad but could see a use theoretically. Something like Simic Ascendancy.
That’s how I believe that works nowadays. Back before Teferi’s Protection (iirc, that card had been coupled with a rules change on phasing), objects would phase in at the same point that they phased out initially (so if they phased out in combat on your turn, they phase in during combat on your next turn). So the wurm wouldn’t be around for the beginning of the upkeep since that’s when it phases back in due to its own effect. But I could be mistaken, I didn’t deal with phasing when I first started up
To my knowledge, you are correct. Still a bad card but not as bad.
@@xenosai371 Unsure if it was always the case but phasing back in (and presumably out, if you have Phasing) happen before Untap.
@@mikeheath4916 ugh the effort of actually doing research. No clue what the basis on my thoughts of old phasing was, but cards like Rainbow Efreet and Vanishing come to mind. You are correct, the only rules change I could find was that in 2017 for Teferi’s protection, cards are not changing zones which meant that tokens no longer die when phasing out. Indirect phasing of auras, equipment and fortifications is still wack though
@@xenosai371 Phasing-in (or out if due to the static phasing ability) was a part of the untap step since at least 6th edition. That's not too long after mirage, but they did tweak a lot of things at that point so maybe that was the case? but I am skeptical,
Card Kingdom actually doesnt have a Goblin Firebug in stock rn. 😂
Beamtown Bullies stonks
lol, oops
@@MTGGoldfish And you oop. f
Ayy now it does lol
'Magic's original Ent'
Ironwood Treefolk: Am I joke to you?!
You didn't even spell his name right, so yes.
Singing Tree in shambles
Seeing Merchant Ship reminds me how much I used to love these high concept cards that seem to tell a story on their own. Now we only put highly efficient over the curve cards in our decks, but our first decks was just cards that looked cool and fun.
I enjoy magic still so I don't want to come off as "it ain't what it used to be!" But man, nothing beats those memories from 1994 of opening packs and just getting lost in all of the art, throwing some cards into a deck, taking that deck with a rubber band slapped around it outside at recess and playing unsleeved on the ground. Magic was legit magical then. Cards were weird. The art was weird. Magic design today is burdened by the weight of 30 years of precedent.
I'm adding merchant ship to my dandan and no one can stop me! Make every game 10x longer. 10:29
Against the odds: Wood elemental
I wish it was in Modern. Doing in in Legacy seems super hard.
Seriously though, I'd love to see some against the odds decks try to make some of these cards actually work. It'd be fun for the memes if nothing else.
Primordial ooze is a funny donate feels like it would be worth it to try building around it once.
stuff for zedruu player but in blue they are already true abominations to give already
@@munsterotaku3058 yeah this seems absolutely fine in zedruu
@@munsterotaku3058 Ah, so maybe use it in a mono-red "donate" deck featuring Harmless Offering!
What about that 8 mana 1/1 that's basically vanil- ALL HAIL THE GREAT LORD SCORNFUL EGOTIST
That might be on the best creature list I'm working on. Legit bomb.
You can at least play that one face down as a 2/2 for 3 mana
Very nearly played that in a tournament because I didn't have 4 Exalted Angels and Morph creatures were kill on sight in the meta. The psychological damage was almost worth it but I went with a different swerve in the end.
Scornful egotist eas in a set with a bunch of cards that care about the highest mana value among permanents you control. It was meant for Limited, and actually served a purpose in it.
Morph Egotist into Torrent of Fire or Rush of Knowledge is real.
@@MTGGoldfish Breaking mh3 Emerge cards with Egotist?
On Takeno's cavalry;
Kamigawa Block is one of those weird sets like Rise of the Eldrazi or Coldsnap, designed to be entirely self-contained. It had almost no interaction with Mirrodin or Ravnica blocks, except for some tribal stuff (even then only goblins and spirits) and two broken artifacts adding to affinity's power (Divining Top / Jitte). It was entirely self-contained. Meaning that a card that ONLY looks at spirits - which were a big thing in the block - might actually be pretty useful.
of course, Cavalry was never "pretty useful," even in block, even in limited. You could have a 3/2 blocker vs. spirits, or maybe hold back some spirit with 1 toughness, woopee. But then we get back into set dynamics - Betrayers was a bad set. The two cards anyone remembers from it are Jitte (because broken) and Ink-Eyes (for... other reasons). For a long time it was the Homelands of Modern (until like, uh... Dragon Maze and such) and now it's not even remembered for its badness.
Kamigawa was not all bad. The power level was just all over the place. Devoted Retainer and Ronin Houndmaster would have been amazing cards if not competing with affinity. Even in Mirrodin itself there were some really good non artifacts like raise the alarm and Auriok Gleivemaster. Many of the one mana white arcane spells from kamigawa were fine, too. It is just cards like Kitsune Healer another 4 mana 2/2 from kamigawa that make you think none of the commons were playable in that era.
You should make a commander clash, where you make a technically correct deck (10 ramps spells, 3 board wipes, win con etc) but cannot choose good cards, and just use stuff like this! =D
Regarding Merchant Ship flavor: Blue had quite a few creatures like this early in magic's history, where they required islands to function. The problem really happens when you give your Merchant Ship flying and it still can't attack your opponent if they don't have an island.
Yep . Reminds me a bit of when your opponent casts Walk the Plank on your giant octopus or whale or whatever, and kills it by … putting it in the water 😂
Warping wurm actually works a little differently. Phasing happens in the untap step. Pretty weird i know. That means turn 4 you cast it. Untap step turn 5 it phases out, untap step turn 6 it phases back in, the second triggered ability triggers, but as nothing can go on the stack in the untap step it goes on the stack in the upkeep, move to upkeep, the first triggered ability triggers and you can arrange both abilities on the stack as you like, so you put the first abilities first on the stack. The wurm gets a counter, then you can pay four mana and if you don't it immediately phases back out, but with the additional counter.
That means at least it grows every turn until you pay the mana. So turn 6 it's a 2/2, turn 7 a 3/3, turn 10 a 6/6 but you gotta pay an additional four if you wanna use it for a turn and you can do nothing to stop it phasing out in your untap step a turn later. Actually the idea is kinda cool. It's an ever growing threat that, i imagine, couldn't easily be removed back then because it's only on the board for a couple seconds in your upkeep each turn to get a +1/+1 counter. So you would set it up early and keep playing until you got rid of all your opponent's blockers and pay the four mana to hit him for lethal in a single attack with you grown wurm.
The artist spends several hours creating a beautiful illustration for the card and asks Hasbro:
"This card is going to be very powerful, isn't it?"
Hasbro: 😅👍
I think Seth just declared war on Ireland with that pronunciation of 'Aisling'
"But Aisling Leprechaun doesn't DO anything!"
"Yeah, you're right. It does nothing."
I'd love to see subjects like this tackled a bit more from the perspective of "What was the intent of this, was it ever good?" type of breakdowns. For instance, the Leprechaun is commented as a "one and done", when at the time a goal was to pair it with regenerate (to make that repeatable). Given power creep that's a crazy amount to pay for that effect now, but players may not be aware of how these things were used back in the day.
This is a good point. Historians always have to be careful not to be anachronistic, and comparing 1990's MTG cards to cards from the 2020's out of context is just not particularly useful or interesting.
He came for my leprechaun right out the gate! It's a staple in my favorite old school deck, Leprechaun Ward! You give home green ward and use COP green to outlast the other players long enough to slam some Force of Nature
4:40 I hope that "literally" isn't meant literally or else Spinal Parasite will never forgive you.
Aisling Leprechaun seems like a pretty harsh psycological attack if you're playing against Crim, can you imagine putting a lure on it and forcing Crim to make his one creature (probably Opposition Agent) a green creature?
I actually love Warping Wurm. With counter doublers, simic ascendancy, and something like that sphinx that gives you a second beginning phase, Warping Wurm can be a hard to interact with inevitability for simic ascendancy. Still janky and slow, sure. Fun, absolutely.
Bravo to Dripping Dead for somehow not appearing on this list. Though it's definitely worse than Aisling Leprechaun.
Re: Merchant Ship, I like the landhome ability. Bringing it back could open up a new design space that would allow a less powerful form of land destruction. Start printing cards to better support changing land types. This would support landhome and introduce quasi-land destruction more generally.
A few cards that stand out off the top of my head that didn't make the list:
Erzatz Gnomes, a 3 mana 1/1 Gnome that lets you tap it to make a spell or permanent colorless until end of turn.
Shelkin Brownie, a 2 mana 1/1 Ouphe that you can tap to remove "bands with other" from target creature until end of turn.
Both probably markedly worse than a 1 mana 1/1 with a do-nothing ability.
Lol, good choices. Gnomes is hilariously bad.
Ersatz Gnomes can be used with Dromar, the Banisher to prevent him from bouncing himself so it has its uses.
Shelkin Brownie is hilariously bad since even if "bands with other" ended up being a strong mechanic, of the 6 black border cards that use the mechanic, it didn't actually stop any of them.
The "bands with others" works when you have at least one creature with the ability and any number with the correct quality. None of the 6 cards that use it actually have it themselves, but they instead give it to other creatures.
There is a cycle of lands (Cathedral of Serra is one of them) that give bands with other legendary creatures to your legends of a specific color. If you had Cathedral of Serra to give all your white legends "bands with other legends" then it would only be relevant if you had multiple legends and at that point removing the "bands with others" ability from one wouldn't be relevant (except for the specific case where you had multiple legends, only one of which is white) since you only needed one of them to have it.
The 6th card is Master of the Hunt which creates Wolves of the Hunt tokens which "band with other creatures named Wolves of the Hunt". Shelkin Brownie doesn't work here for the same issue since "bands with other" is only relevant with multiple wolves, but each of the wolves has it so removing it from a single one is useless.
It would take a decade until Old Fogey was printed in Unhinged with "Bands with other dinosaurs" for there to actually be a card with "bands with others" which Shelkin Brownie could stop. Of course there weren't officially any dinosaurs for it to band with until some point around Ixilan which was more than another decade after that.
You can use Goblin Firebug in a Zedruu deck. Donate it to your opponent and then bounce it back under your control to make it a repeatable land destruction.
The Goatman that has a built in donate and there is an artifact that bounces a card you own back to your hand
I think the first problem I see with this list is that many of the "really bad" creatures on this list are Commons from 15+ years ago and you're comparing them to less-than-five-year-ago Rares and Mythics. That seems like an incredibly bad matchup for anyone.
Goblin Firebug was printed at a time when Red really didn't get Grizzly Bears at common, and this had a relevant creature type (Goblin, of course), and its drawback only mattered when it left play, so that wasn't as bad as some from that era or before that had worse drawbacks, like sacrificing itself if you don't meet a certain condition or not being able to block (and out of 9 cards before this, 3 couldn't block and Ironclaw Orcs could only block stuff smaller than itself). So I say it was the best version available at the time.
Merchant Ship is one of the ultra-rare blue cards that let you actually gain life without needing access to another colour. It was one of my favourite cards for a long time in part because of that.
Also Wood Elemental "the forest come to life"? I think you missed Living Lands :D
@MTGGoldfish , since Bruvac the Grandiloquent doubles the amount of cards an opponent mills and Maddening Cacophony (kicked) mills half the opponents deck rounded up. Would pairing them mill the opponents entire deck?
Yes.
Aisling is normally pronounce d as Ashling
Thanks for pointing it out already, the way he pronounces it in the video was so painful (no offense Seth :)). I personally wouldn't pronounce the end as "ling"; more like "lin".
@@PM-ut6sy I've know two Aislings and one of them people called Ashlin and the other people called Ashling. I just went with the crowd.
It's a nice list, but it feels like something is missi- ALL HAIL THE GREAT LORD EGOTIST!
Nah, Scornful Egotist is worst-case scenario a 3-mana 2/2 when you play it morph, which is behind the curve but not actively terrible (it's marginally better than a regular 3-mana 2/2 because your opponent at least doesn't know what it is). And its front side did have a point: Scourge had a lot of cards that were stronger if you had permanents with high mana costs in play so the idea was you'd play it for 3 mana, turn it up for 1, then use its high mana cost to get big power off of something like Rush of Knowledge). It at least had a use, especially in Limited.
@@lseths I don't think anyone familiar with the ancient meme from Gatherer is going to mistake it for being a genuinely usel-ALL HAIL THE GREAT LORD EGOTIST!
Goblin Firebug really hittin that "Think, Mark!" pose
I love these types of videos because most of the terrible cards were around when I played (3-5th edition). I haven't played in over 20 years but I still remember these bad cards lol.
I played a lot of limited during Ravnica and Kamigawa blocks, and I can confirm that I never saw anyone play Takeno's Cavalry or Zephyr Spirit, even in those formats. Those two were always draft pick #15 in any booster they showed up in.
Confirmed, yup I'm taking the basic land over this.
Clearly you're supposed to donate the Firebug to the opponent.
I played the leprechaun in a deck. St Patrick's day deck: turn the entire opponents deck green. Lures for it, lifelace, circle of protection green to last, stuff to make lands creatures to turn them green...
"My client pleads insanity, Your Honor."
"He seems sane to me."
"He cast Wood Elemental."
"Insanity plea accepted."
Saw the title, thought "If Wood Elemental doesn't make this video, we riot." I will not be rioting today! (Wood Elemental might be my favorite ever magic card because it's art is amazing and it's so comically bad)
I love it too! I've basically made a career off of playing bad cards :)
@@MTGGoldfish I just love that it specifies where the stars are located, Plague Rats is another fun one (and also extremely bad)
First place award for the "I didn't expect that person's voice to sound like that"
I remembered Takeno's Cavalry being an ok draft common.
Half the creatures in the set were spirits, and they were all similarly underpowered, so 1 damage often was a big deal.
I played quite a bit of Kamigawa block Limited, and... not really. Something weird is up if you're siding the Cavalry in, even in a spirit-heavy environment.
sorta a question if you give primordial ooze lifelink or some other life gain effect like vampiric link would you gain life
Yes, though since it still dealt damage to you your net change of life total would be 0. Of course if you gave it both then you would life every turn, but at that point there's better things you could be doing.
@@seandun7083 thanks for the explanation
Seth pronounced "Takeno's Calvary" really well. I dunno why, but it made me smile.
I think phantasmal sphere might be worse than wood elemental as it actively wins your opponent the game and taps you out every turn.
It’s a 1U
0/1
flyer
Which gets a counter each turn.
This sounds kinda fine at first, however the caveats are many. You also have to Pay one for each counter on it. So it basically has cumulative upkeep 1
And when it leaves play, not dies LEAVES PLAY. It gives your opponent a */* flyer token (orb) equal to the number of counters on it.
So it actively wins your opponent the game after making you out over multiple turns.
Phantasmal sphere is by quite a margin better then Wood Elemental. Within the context of sealed its got a decent chance of winning the game for you. But mono green sealed (already a ludicrous notion) somehow getting a 16/16 for 20 is still not likely to break a stalemate.
@@totalvoid6234 in sealed players often have a much higher concentration of removal including bounce, got forbid they have multiple
Bounce spells and you spend turns getting it to three power being forced to tap out and they bounce it, this could happen multiple times. That is actively hurting you. Or just wait for the 4th pay and get a 4/4 flyer with removal.
I would rather have a dead card, that might do something super late game when I am otherwise out of resources than card that cuts me off of resources early game and gives my OP resources later.
But we can both agree they are both awful
And I do agree if your opponent has 0 interaction sphere does kill in 6 turns if you hit your land drops. So that might happen more than I think. Partially if we are playing alliances sealed specifically.
The new desert Bloom Deck could definitely use creature number 9. it literally benefits from destroying your own lands, sending them to the graveyard and even bringing them back.
0:29 I clicked off the video the minute we started comparing a card from Legends to a card from Modern Horizons 2
13:43 or Zuran orb if you want to be able to sacrifice your lands multiple times (great if you have effects that let you play lands from grave, gets explosive when you sac and replay a Nykthos three times in a turn)
I actually play the alabaster leech (plus the red and green ones) in a jank kitchen table deck. Its actually really fun to play and can win occasionally. Main threat is Marath so leeches help him enter bigger. Lots of ramp and the rest of the spells are colorless. Admit the leeches will always suck but I'd take them over a goblin firebug, zephyr spirit, or a merchant ship any day.
Warping Wurm in fact plays a bit different than you described, Seth :)
On turn 5 it phases in again and then at upkeep it phases out again. So if you dont mind having no creature a few turns, it actually grows a +2/+2 counter each turn instead of each other turn and then, if you can cash it in as a crreature by paying the mana.
Still bad, but not quite as bad as you described it :)
Goblin firebug is playable in beamtown bullies commander decks. But i am surprised not seeing rust elemental
merchant ship actually has a use, in jon irenicus you can donate it an opponent without islands you draw the game and it’s the cheapest way to do it
will their be more of these videos?
Squirrels + card that turns everything into a forest + Wood Elemental = One Yuge Nut...pick any token strat that can play the convertor card and You Are There.
Zephyr Spirit's reason for existing the only reason WotC needs to pink slip MaRo
I think it can be fun to try to figure out what the worst cards printed in modern magic sets are. They generally make cards that are functional. But I think about Stumpsquall Hydra a lot.
I'm seeing a suspicious lack of a particular -1/-1 for 5 here lol
I remember it being a 4/4, if you paid every color.
@@funkydiscogod yeah paying wubrg for a 4/4 with a niche ability that shrinks it to a 2/2 or a 0/0 is still pretty aggressively terrible but at least it can sometimes be like a 5 mana do nothing 2/2. Just in particular the statline of -1/-1 is funny as shit. Maelstrom elemental was a 7/7 vanilla and it was godawful unplayable but spinal parasite is at least just a card that can win a game in theory, and there are a lot of creatures that can't
Thanks for reminding me that Goblin Firebug is a thing. That goes into my Zedruu deck.
Dawg how did the flailing cycle from mercadian masques not make it on the list
some great cards for a Momir Vig Format,
Jon Irenicus. loves bad creatures it can give to oppo ( Bad Santa decks)
Zedruu the Greathearted. gifts bad stuff and gains life and cards for it.
so all the bad can work well for you in oppo control. :)
"Red didn't get 2/2s for 2 until Crimson Vow"
Laughs in Goblin Guide
Don't forget that Leech took a rare slot in a pack. Just to add some injury to the insult.
Ah Wood Elemental. A card I've long argued isn't just the worst creature in Magic, but literally the worst CARD in Magic (from a strict gameplay value POV). After all, even something as bad as One With Nothing is at least good for the meme, and Seth DID get someone to counter it! (once)
I don't think you described phasing quite accurately. You're talking about the Warping Wurm going away every other turn but when something phases out it phases in with the untap step. In a way, the card is both better and worse than how you described it. On one hand, it pumps itself faster than what you said it did. On the other hand, it ceases to exist every single turn that you don't pay the cost, as opposed to every other turn. It isn't a turn 10 4/4, it would be a turn 10 6/6 ish, but it's one that wouldn't exist most of the time. So depending on how you look at it, it's better or worse than you think it is.
Also, in theory you could build a janky control deck with the warping wurm as your win condition, and use the fact that it keeps phasing out to repeatedly wipe the board but the wurm survives all the wipes and keeps getting stronger because it's always phased out when you wipe
Wood Elemental can be tutored for in Titania in EDH
Imo if you want to make merchant ship thematic and at least a bit stronger, give it islandwalk and have the reward being drawing a card or two when it successfully “returns”
Sixth Edition rules changes made Gerrard Capashen go from bad to unplayable.
I mean, you could still tap stuff down before blocks though it's not the most efficient rate.
Master of Arms gets super confusing if you aren't aware of that rules change (though first strike makes it probably still playable in limited).
Beasts of Bogardan.
A creature with such a cool name and artwork has no right to be this disappointing. It is a 3/3 creature with Protection From Red for 5 mana. If the opponent controls white cards, it gets +1/+1, which is still bad.
First, Aisling is pronounced "Ashling", second, if you pair it with the amazing 1 mana white aura "Green Ward", it becomes unkillable in combat. If it blocks or is blocked, its triggered ability goes off, turning the other creature green, but since it has protection from green, Leprechaun doesn't take any damage. A perfect combo!
Also equipped with sword of harth and home.
I once designed a Wood Elemental deck that was actually pretty strong! All I had to do was to include 4 copies each of Fastbond and most of the Power Nine! 😎
Would be interesting to see a Top 10 Win More cards which are strictly Win More as in they do nothing outside of weird jank interactions unless you are already ahead.
On another note, everyone says that powercreep is a clear sign of cash grabbing but I feel that reverse powercreep/pullback in the same rarity slots is even more cash grabby because they're basically selling you overpriced toilet paper when they do that.
7:00 Here is the obligatory Seth not understanding the card moment. During t6 it would phase back out if you didn't pay the cost so turn 7 it will come in as a 3/3 if you decide to pay the cost. If you didn't then it will be a 4/4 turn 8. Still bad but you forgot about it phasing back out on upkeep.
You can slap a green ward on aisling leprechaun and suddenly it can block everything and survive
Surprisingly, my main take-away is that a lot of these cards... aren't actually that bad! Zephyr Spirit is the only one that seems genuinely terrible in almost every situation, whereas the others you can usually imagine building around in some way...
I have to ask... how did Aisling Leprechaun make the list when cards like Fugitive Wizard exist?
Man too bad for Aisling Leprechaun, if it said deal damage and turn that creature into green, it'll see way more play.
Jade Leech actually saw play in Fires of Yavimaya decks. A 5/5 for 4 was pretty dang decent at the time, even with a drawback, but it was especially good when it also had haste from Fires.
(Of course, Blastoderm was much better in Fires. So, even in this case, it was 2nd best.)
Takeno's cavalry. Archer on a horse. Has neither reach nor horsemanship.
Goblin Firebug really hammers in how Ironclaw Orcs actually was good enough to run in the Sligh decks of that time. 2/2 for 2 with a minor downside was actually somehow good enough to win top tier games then.
Of course, nowadays you can get a 3/2 with upside for 2 mana fairly easily, so all the 2/2s with downsides are basically now consigned to the annals of magic history
Aisling is supposed to be pronounced "ASH-ling". It's an Irish word, for an Irish card.
Hey hey! Goblin firebug can be decent in...the new desert commander from Thunder Junction?
I plau a Hazezon Commander deck and was thinking just that - I love my Deserts in the graveyard
Aisling Leprechaun is a beast if you give it protection from green
I actually wish the game design had stuck with flavorful mechanics like Merchant Ship. It harkens back to a time when playing the game for theme was enjoyable when you were likely to face off against someone else who was playing for flavor theme.
believe it or not, in the 90s I remember a couple of people actually playing wood elemental. If you have no idea of what mana curve and tempo are in mtg, I guess your deckbuilding can be bad enough to stuff your 120 cards deck with 60 forests... leading you to think it's very well worth sacrifcing 9 of them to get a 9/9 in a long drawn out game where you just can't suffer drawing more of those damn FORESTS.
warping wurm is actually very nice to create enter/leave battlefield effects for free each turn. once activated, its generating value and kinda immun to other stuff. There is for sure place in a commander deck for it.
Sadly, phasing doesn't cause creatures to enter or leave the battlefield. It is simply "treated as though it doesn't exist" while phased out.
Flailing Manticore: a 4 Mana 3/3 with flying and first strike would be good back then BUT your opponent can pay colorless mana to destroy it.
Goblin Spy: a 1 Mana 1/1 that forces you to play with the top card of your library revealed
I've always been a big fan of Mercenaries. What more could you want in a rare than a hill giant with downside.
I remember once seeing a magic card in the late 2000s on top of the trash can at my LGS in the game room. I was like who would do this?!?!? Then I found it was a zephyr spirit and promptly returned it to the trash. myself.
I remember opening Alabaster Leech and hated that in the rare slot.
Are there any artifacts or enchantments that reward you for sacrificing a lot of forests? I could see Wood Elemental being good in that case.
Well, actually Wood Elemental makes sence if you have something to bring destroyed lands back and proc massive landfalls, like Aftermath Analyst. It is for sure WAS a horrible card, but not when you have Landfall creatures and ways to massively revive you lands.
Stay with me here. Turn 1: Forest, 1 Mana Dork. Turn 2: Forest, 3 Mana Dorks. Turn 3: Forest, use your Mana Dorks to cast Wood Elemental, sacrificing your three forests for a 4-mana 3/3.
Not sure you thought this through very well. The Wurm is only here because you misunderstood how it works, and the 1 mana 1/1 with (pretty bad) upside is worse than all the 1 mana 1/1s with no upside? Or like a 3 mana 1/1?
Pfft, you never lost to the Aisling Leprechaun Green Ward unstoppable combo.
I feel like primordial ooze would be right at home in a rowan, scion of war commander deck
I actually legit might put wood elemental in gruul omnath though. worst case scenario it does and then omnath gets remorse rage and smacks something for 4
best case scenario a lot of landfalling happens and its a relatively beeg elemental that people have to keep checking my boardstate about and hopefully distracting them from the fact that in 1998 omnath threw yawgmoth off hell in a cell, who plummeted 16ft into a sylex.
Personally, gifting goblin firebug to an opponent just to kill it and have them sacrifice a land sounds funny.