Panda's Card Tier List - Updated for 1.3 Patch

Hibernum_JC

Hey people, I'm just popping in this thread to let you know that I thoroughly enjoyed reading this thread and Panda's analysis of the cards. This type of feedback is incredibly useful for us as it helps us get a good pulse on what the community considers useful/bad.

With our next update comes some balance changes that will see some changes to some of these cards, so I'm curious to see how you like what we've done to them.

Unknown

Neat, glad to see you guys found it useful.

I actually was going to move some ranks around from other players feedback but I sort of got destroyed by Blade and Soul and the east coast blizzard.

I forgot that other things existed for the last week.

Malcrof

Hibernum_JC wrote:

Hey people, I'm just popping in this thread to let you know that I thoroughly enjoyed reading this thread and Panda's analysis of the cards. This type of feedback is incredibly useful for us as it helps us get a good pulse on what the community considers useful/bad.

With our next update comes some balance changes that will see some changes to some of these cards, so I'm curious to see how you like what we've done to them.

Will we be getting a preview thread of some of the changes?

Unknown

I want to bring up Day's Undoing once more; it really should be in A-tier.

At a cost of 6 mana, it refreshes one's hand and dumps 15 mana total for a net of 9 mana. As an opener this is crazy powerful for kicking off things like Jace's Sanctum, Sphinx's Tutelage, and Claustrophobia (my denial combo). It has mid-match utility if you're using in conjunction with a Soulblade Djinn and Evolving Wilds (which you've ranked C-tier). Now, you're refreshing your hand, dumping mana into it, auto-casting EW (regularly more than one), buffing creatures via SD, and then dumping more mana into the first card in your hand at the beginning of your next turn. Better yet, cast DU before a match-5 to really capitalize.

But wait, there's more. Assume mid-match you have JS and ST out for mana-denial and your opponent is slowly building up that first card, likely DotR. Drop DU and reset your opponent's hand. Better yet, drop a Disperse (or 2) to bounce just prior to casting DU the same turn, completely mitigating Disperse's drawback.

I get a lot of mileage out of Day's Undoing and often means the difference between a slow match and a fast match, it just requires strategic use.

Unknown

For Gideon, I would rank Sigil of the Empty Throne a little higher. Utilizing it with Knight Valor, Suppression Bonds, Murder Investigation, and Blessed Spirits allows for a virtually creature-free deck; throw in Sword of the Animist. Now MI (5 mana) yields a 4/4 flyer each time you fortify it as does SB (6 mana). KV (9 mana) creates a vigilant 2/2 with +2/+2 Vigilance buff and a 4/4 flyer. Do you have a Blessed Spirits out? Now you're perma-buffing it +2/+2 for everyone of those supports you cast. Throw in Gideon's abilities and you have some heavy hitters.

Unknown

I keep meaning to move Day's Undoing up but it keeps crashing whenever I edit it, because the post is so long. I probably should've reserved more posts. Oh well. I'll have to shorten it somehow. Probably all the markdown.

Anyway so the reason I didn't rank Sigil very highly is because White has some of the best creatures in the game, why would you want to play a white without creatures?

I can see it being somewhat efficient as the game goes on but remember the point of white is to get a creature out asap so you can start wiping board with his first ability. While you're placing sigil you are doing nothing to defend.

It is at least 20 mana (well maybe 17) to cast sigil + 1 other support. For that mana you could've already played Consul's Lieutenant + sword of the animist for an 7/6 first striker and won the game. Or you can play Archangel of Tithes and have full flyer coverage as well inside a whopping 7/9 body, as well as mana ramp down the road.

I don't mean to say your combo doesn't work, it just for the archetypal Gideon deck the main issues are

• Gideon starts with 6 creature allotment, and only 2 support. What level do you have to be to fit 4 or 5 supports?
• Gideon has so many good creatures, it seems a waste to not use them.
• Gideon's strength is fast efficient creatures that are pumped, sigil requires you to have at least one other card to combo with it, and is vulnerable to artefact destruction.

Meto5000

pandabear wrote:

For that mana you could've already played Consul's Lieutenant + sword of the animist for an 7/6 first striker and won the game.

Orrrrr, you could cast Relic Seeker for 12 mana and win the game with a single card + Planeswalker ability.

Unknown

I assume the list will get overhauled considering the resent changes.

Unknown

So I was in the process of trying to update this, but I haven't had enough variety of games (full disclosure: I only played Gideon for fast wins and didn't try anything else except Jace vs storyline and one or two Liliana games trying a new strat).

Please send feedback on cards.

Major changes for now:

1. Gonna rank knight of the white orchid as equal to or lower than Iroas's now. He's really inefficient. However I am going to rank Iroas's a bit higher now. She is a valid choice for Gideon.

2. Angelic Tomb is now rank F for failure. The only thing ranked worse than it is Valor in Akros which is a worse version that costs more rofl. Note: it actually does serve a purpose for Gideon, and that is to allow Knight to regain some of its former glory, at the low low cost of 28 total mana.

3. Liliana got a HUGE boost with Dark Petition. Cast corruption to ditch a Erebos' Titan or something, then pop it into place for 9 mana. Woot.

4. Nissa's Pilgrimage is way too good.

5. Claustrophobia is worthless.

6. Hint: to fight Jace, only cast one creature at a time, keep hand full at all times. Laugh in his face. That is, if you can actually cast a creature.

Unknown

I think Harbinger might need to just be S, but I'm not sure. It's still strong.
Also, in my experience Iroas's Champion is S rank, because once you get it out and slap a Sharp Eyes on it, your opponent can pretty much only cast flyers, and the AI isn't smart enough to not waste their mana.
Finally, Nissa's Pilgrimage is very broken- did they change it? As is it gets you your mana back almost immediately.
EDIT- I see they did.
Thanks for the Enshrouding Mists tip. It seems like white has the best commons and uncommons.

Morphis

I found no info in your review and even not in mtgpq.com database on this card
http://imgur.com/bt2k9ed (link tag image does not work)
It is simply great and help unleashing all hand on the table...
Tryin evolutionary leap but that still seems too slow... Trying to see if leveling nissa(with more mana production) it will become viable.

Unknown

What's the card you linked to? Its name?

aesith

Great thread wether people agree or disagree with rankings. It brings people out to discuss combos or reasons to use card X.
Gideons Phalanx is a Rare by the way.

Unknown

Combos? You want combos?
Relic Seeker + Any Creature.
Seriously, it's incredible. Especially with Champion, Irregulars, or Ascetic.

Unknown

Keral_Keep wrote:

Combos? You want combos?
Relic Seeker + Any Creature.
Seriously, it's incredible. Especially with Champion, Irregulars, or Ascetic.

How about Relic Seeker by itself, it buffs itself if it's in the first position.

Unknown

RE: HofT

Because of the change to the bounce mechanic, this card went from being premier to being filler. They hit it with the nerf bat in three ways:

- Changed 6/6 to 4/4; good, it was overpowered.
- Reduced mana-penalty on bounced creature from 9 to 6; okay, it's a rare and it should stand out.
- Broke bounce mechanic; now it's a 4/4 at a cost of 10 mana with an ability hardly triggers, there are so many better options.

Unknown

I see you have Iroas's Champion in S tier for red, which is funny, because I would have done it the opposite.
Red has the best removal in the game. It doesn't need Champion to kill stuff, and it doesn't have good buff effects to take advantage of the double strike. The entire reason it's good in white is because Gideon can give it vigilance so it chews up attackers, in addition to functionally doubling the buffs from so many white cards.
Also, I think Relic Seeker should have its own tier. Every other white card pales in comparison to its efficiency and its rapid growth.

Morphis

Keral_Keep wrote:

What's the card you linked to? Its name?

Clicking the link did not work?
Anyways Is named animist awaken

10 mana green spell

"Place 1 green 1 turn duration tile. When it expires or if u manage to trigger it the same turn u play it, transform 10 gems in green.
If u have at least 8 green gem on the field when u cast it IN ADDITION instantly transform 10 gems to green.
Never ending cascades

EDHdad

I love this thread. The main reason I even joined this discussion board was to thank you for posting this thread and to comment on it.

That said, I think you should probably make a new thread in light of all the changes, or possibly a different thread for each color.

Now for some comments. Bear in mind, I agree with probably 95% of what you've written, so my comments are mostly going to be points of disagreement.

In the original post, I strongly disagree about Day's Undoing, which is a top tier card. But other people already gave you sufficient grief and you seem to have seen the light.

In the original post, I think Fiery Impulse should be moved to B or possibly A. It's not "Strictly Worse" than the other direct damage spells, because it costs less than any of them. This game has a lot of 4 and sometimes 5 toughness creatures. Chandra can usually do 3 damage on her own, but Fiery Impulse can get through for the last 2. And since it only costs 4, you don't have to power it up before it's time to use it. You can usually cast it in one turn for red, black or green match-3.

I disagree with Iroas' Champion as a B in white (but an A in red?). She is an all-star in any deck, especially the white deck where she can be pumped and be given "come at me bro".

In general, I don't think that 15 to 18 mana is too much to pay for a high-impact creature. I would rather run 3 or 4 high impact creatures and 6 or 7 removal spells than a bunch of vanilla 1/1's and 2/2's.

In this vein, I strongly disagree with Fiery Conclusion being an A tier card. Chandra can do 3 damage on her own. Chanda's spells can do 2-6 damage for 4-6 mana. What creature are you going to sacrifice to make this spell worth your while? And why are you putting that creature in your deck in the first place? This is the problem with Fiery Conclusion. It incentivizes you to play bad cards, and only works in corner cases.

EDHdad

Now to discuss some new cards.

The ability to discard has made some cards much better. You can put a lot more situational cards in your deck and toss them out later. You can also afford to take several turns to build up the mana to cast a high-impact spell, rather than worry about it clogging up your hand. You really don't need to run more than 3 or possibly 4 creatures in your entire deck. These should be creatures which impact the board, not simply vanilla beaters.

Some cards which should be given a new look:

Black:

Dark Petition - better now because you won't clog up your hand, and if it's a dead spell, you can pitch it.

Demonic Pact - worse because they changed it to deal 30 damage to you when it dies.

Graveblade Marauder - actually, he's as good as he ever was. But I wanted to point out that he's much better than the original list gave him credit for being.

Priest of the Blood Rite - they made it so it deals more damage to you, but I haven't played with it since they made the change.