Just to be clear, the mentor's ability "checks" the token even before the equipment is equipped? Does this mean that Mentor's triggered ability works differently from the state based effect rule (where the SBE is not checked until after the entire effect has resolved)? Would the answer change if the token was forcibly equipped when it enters the battlefield (say, Ronin Warclub or similar effects)?
I have a Mentor of the Meek and a Sword of Fire and Ice in play. I activate Nahiri, the Lithomancer's first ability to put a 1/1 white Kor Soldier creature token onto the battlefield, choosing to attach Sword of Fire and Ice to that 1/1 token. Will I be given an opportunity to pay 1 to draw a card from Mentor of the Meek?
I know that Mentor won't trigger if there is a continuous effect like double Honor of the Pure in play (because the tokens would enter as a 3/3) but I want to know if there is ever a time that the triggered ability "sees" the tokens as a 1/1 in the Sword of Fire and Ice example, long enough for me to trigger the Mentor's effect.
That said, your argument could just as easily say that sol ring and mana crypt should be banned. Really, with both of those banned TA starts to look a lot more acceptable since there aren't many 0 drop artifacts that are popular in EDH, and 1 drops that don't produce mana don't really let TA ramp up much faster than cradle.
I'm just saying, if you take sol ring and mana crypt out of the equation (and let's say mana vault too), it's a lot harder to come up with a realistic situation that results in getting way above the curve earlier than turn 3-4 or so
IIRC, the RC has hinted that the banning of those cards are unlikely; I am on the fence on this as I can see points supporting both side of the argument. My argument tries not to move too many variables at once; in essence, I am arguing "Assuming no radical changes to the ban list, banning Tolarian Academy is justified".
sounds like magical christmas land to me, getting your two best one drop artifacts in your deck in your hand.
Define "Magical Christmasland" then. Given that Tolarian Academy is in hand and assuming that the deck plays something like 5 one drop mana producing artifacts (say, Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, Mana Vault, Chrome Mox, Mox Opal), there is about a 3.9% odds of drawing into AT LEAST TWO 1-drop mana accelerators. As I mentioned, assuming that you drew into just Sol Ring and Mana Crypt (roughly a 13.7% odds), depending on the number of artifacts with CMC <2, it is really not that hard to set up (see my next point).
The problem with TA in EDH specifically is you need to load your deck with random crap in order to get it to function properly, it is at best a one-hit wonder, you get it one game and stomp because you got the nuts draw, or you get flooded with nothing but mana rocks and useless low drop artifacts and die horrifically.
This is interesting. I do understand that Sol Ring and Mana Crypt are relatively weaker during the later portion of the game and that not all decks need them but calling them "random crap" is pretty new to me It is not as if I am saying that Memnite, Ornithopters, Mishra's Bauble, et al are the reasons why Tolarian Academy is broken. Given that artifact is kind of what blue does best, It is not really inconceivable that a blue player (especially one who is not playing green) would load up their decks with rampers given the cliche of how ramp is king in EDH.
With GC on the other hand you have a card that benefits from playing the best/most abusable resource in the game, creatures and you don't need some theoretical god hand to crap out large boardstates by turn 4.
T1: Land, Birds of Paradise
T2: Land, Elvish Visionary, draw a card
T3: Cradle, tap birds + other lands for Wood Elves, grab an untapped forest, tap untapped forest + cradle for 4, play Oracle of Mul Daya, drop another land
T4: Land (5 + cradle now), tap non-cradle lands + birds for Prosh, Skyraider of Kher, get 6 tokens, tap cradle for 12
While that alleged "not-a-god-hand" is somewhat credible, it should be noted that: -
This board position is a lot more likely to be disrupted by a board sweeper. I am aware that Shatterstorm is a card but based on this list, it does suggest that creature sweepers are far more common than artifact sweepers.
Related to the above point, this theoretical play takes about 4 turns to accomplish. This is not a trivial rebuttal; by Turn 3, other players in the multiplayer pod (assuming fairly equal deck power levels) should have ramped up substantially to manage your theoretical Turn 4 (see my point above).
Gaea's cradle doesn't rely on god hands or one-trick pony deckbuilding habits, it is reliably just obscenely freaking good.
Nobody is denying that Gaea's Cradle is a really good card; my point was that the RC does not ban cards simply because they are "just obscenely freaking good". Honestly, your theoretical example would still be somewhat fun (assuming that it does not occur too frequently) -- as I pointed out, it is actually possible to disrupt the play in a relatively competent multiplayer group (running cards from the top 200 most frequently run cards at that).
Obviously, that said, convincing you to avoid comparing Gaea's Cradle with Tolarian Academy would be relatively difficult (it would be likewise difficult to convince me that these cards are really comparable for the reasons I stated above). As someone who played at a time where Tolarian Academy was legal, consider asking your playgroup to unban Tolarian Academy for a limited run (adjusting their decks as necessary) to see the whole new level of brokeness that is Tolarian Academy
Producing lots of mana in long games is perfectly fine with the RC (and to many players, I suspect). It is the anti-climatic (or rather, aclimatic(?)) production of lots of mana during the early games that made Tolarian Academy banned.
same argument can be made for cradle lol
My argument was actually in response to Raining Frogs who explicitly conceded that "Artifacts may be faster and more explosive than creatures but dudes will win the long game" (citation below).
Artifacts may be faster and more explosive than creatures but dudes will win the long game because they are individually far more valuable.
But for the sake of argument, how are you getting fast mana with Gaea's Cradle (say, within Turn 2ish)?
With Tolarian Academy, we were seeing explosive starts to the extent of a fairly consistent: -
Turn 1: Land, Sol Ring and maybe a Sensei's Divining Top to check the top 3 (Note that this can be a little worse if this was say, Mind Stone instead of Sensei's Divining Top and the first land drop was a Seat of the Synod)
Turn 2: Tolarian Academy for 2UUU, probably sufficient for an early Bribery or Tezzeret (or whatever board-impacting spell which you can quite readily find at 5 drops) or the player could sit on that mana for an end of turn Fact or Fiction (or counterspell, if needs be).
Note that the above scenario is not even the Magical Christmasland version of it -- that is actually the watered down version of the more broken plays. I suspect that the Magic Christmasland version would likely have the first land as a Seat of the Synod and include a Mana Crypt somewhere for a cool 10 mana by turn 2 (Turn 1: Seat of Synod, Sol Ring, Mind Stone; Turn 2: Mana Crypt, Tolarian Academy for U++++UUUU=5UUUUU for, oh-I-don't-know, maybe an Omniscience?
Contrast this with Gaea's Cradle. Just theorycrafting, what would your most likely play (up to turn 2) assuming that you already have a Gaea's Cradle in hand?
You are likely going to consistently get a similarly high amount of mana after, say, Turn 4 at the earliest. Mind you, Green getting lots of mana can be pretty daunting too but this is nothing close to the explosive start we mentioned earlier and honestly, green ramping to lots of mana by turn 4 isn't exactly the most exciting news. Heck, with Green, a theoretical: -
Turn 1: Forest, Green Sun's Zenith for Dryad Arbor
Turn 2: Forest, Azusa, Forest, Forest, Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
Turn 3: GGGGGGGGGGwithout even playing a land on turn 3 sans Gaea's Cradle
Relevant parts bolded. If you have to actually ramp into something else (Prosh or AoZ) to make Gaea's Cradle useful, won't that make Gaea's Cradle a "ramp more" card, so to speak? Of course, if you didn't have to ramp into it, it is, by definition, not so much of a "fast mana" card that the RC intends to ban, isn't it? You did mention that you often get this ridiculous board position by Turn 4 -- decks running Tolarian Academy (while it was legal) can get this ridiculous board position fairly consistently (with TA in hand) around Turn 2.
Cradle dropping early has caused more scoops / rage quits in my group than any other card
Of the list, I would argue that only Avenger of Zendikar produces significant amount of creatures for Gaea's Cradle, most of the time. "Comboing" (or rather, "synergising") Gaea's Cradle with Ant Queen and Rampaging Baloth isn't much of a fast mana that the RC is looking forward to ban.
A bunch of opinion backed up by nothing. Creatures get wiped all the time, what would color identity have to do with either? If anything artifacts are better because they are colorless and lots of them make more than one mana.
TA is banned because it is much faster earlier and is less susceptible to common board wipes.
While I am actually on the same side of the argument, to be fair, I thought I'd mention that your original post was not really backed up either
Artifacts may be faster and more explosive than creatures but dudes will win the long game because they are individually far more valuable.
Producing lots of mana in long games is perfectly fine with the RC (and to many players, I suspect). It is the anti-climatic (or rather, aclimatic(?)) production of lots of mana during the early games that made Tolarian Academy banned.
With all the talk about card X costing too much -- for a colour that specialises in mana ramp no less -- one might be thinking that there is some mana shortage somewhere I mean, I understand that cost efficiency is the "in" thing right now but I think we should balance cost efficiency concerns with impact. Efficiency can only get you so far. True, it may be the little cards like Cultivate and Sakura-Tribe Elder that carries you to eventual victory but I think there is a massive underplaying of bombs in the top 50 list (or *cough* removal spells that costs two mana instead of the much cheaper one mana *cough*).
Green is a colour that rocks in mana ramp but you will probably want something to, you know, ramp into and Genesis Wave is one of the better candidate with a nice impact on board; It is a big splashy spell that, more often than not, delivers in most decks (assuming you are running a fair amount of permanents. Maths here). It may not be that awesome in some decks but the same is true of most of the other cards in the Top 50 list -- Academy Rector, Bloodghast (and heck, even Imperial Recruiter and Loyal Retainers).
I'm not saying it's bad just that it's not as good as Nature's Claim due to costing twice as much for an effect that might be better (and possibly worse). There's a few niche applications such as Karn and indestructibles but this isn't enough for me to double the mana cost.
This is... misleading. I mean, it is technically true that Deglamer is double the cost of Nature's Claim but lets not forget that it is just... one... mana =_=
It is not really a niche application with indestructible. Considering that graveyard recursion remains more common (than say, repeated tutoring), Deglamer is often a superior option relative to Nature's Claim.
On the whole Nature’s Claim debate, lowering the removal costs to make them more relevant is a definite thing that's going to continue to expand as more metas start running resource denial, Torpor Orb and Humility to cut back and counter all the top-heavy DEN, and ETB abuse lists. As someone with decks playing on both sides of that conflict, I'm finding I'm running both because both are versatile and relatively cheap. I haven't had occasion to care about the tuck effect on Deglamer yet, the Theros gods haven't taken off with the gusto everyone thought they might. I've definitely found situations where I appreciated the cheap cost of Nature's Claim though. No one expects you to do anything with a single green open. Actually though, I don't know I've I think of either of these as Top 50 cards. The strength of a straight up Naturalize effect seems really situational, more so even than Vernal Bloom or Greater Good, without the extra gravy Krosan Grip provides.
I believe that the Top 50 list should reflect cards that are good in a majority of meta rather than well-developed ones. I mean, I love Brooding Saurians to bits (and I do run it) but in less developed metas (which probably describes the larger EDH meta given that the format is relatively young -- or rather, popularised rather recently), it is just a 4/4 that gets pitched to Survival fairly often.
In younger metas, I think Deglamer would be superior simply because cost efficiency is a secondary concern to its relative versatility -- note that Deglamer is not really irrelevant in developed metas. I would argue that Deglammer is better than Nature's Claim because Deglammer is more useful in less developed metas (which is arguably the majority) and in more developed meta, the utility of Deglammer versus Nature's Claim is more of a toss up.
BTW, for your information: Here are the creature/non-creature splits for all the top 50s of all the colors in the the statistical breakdown. The 20/30 split for blue might be ok, but maybe we need to rethink the 30/20 split for green. White is actually the only color that plays more creatures than non-creature spells.
Currently, we are using a de facto stratified sampling which relies on somewhat arbitrary weights (which may need to be adjusted constantly).
I propose that we eliminate the weights such that we vote for the Top 50 cards of each colours regardless if they are creatures or noncreatures. If that ends up having more creatures nominated for Green, so be it -- Green's forte is its creatures anyway. Assigning arbitrary weights would be, well, arbitrary. That said, as ISBP mentioned, lets keep this in mind for later.
It is niche, but if people want to replace it they should come up with something better than Nature's Claim imo.
I nominate Cultivate // Kodama's Reach (leaning towards Kodama's Reach if I have to choose just one -- there are some niche application of Arcane and few people actually play Arcane-hate in EDH).
I know that Mentor won't trigger if there is a continuous effect like double Honor of the Pure in play (because the tokens would enter as a 3/3) but I want to know if there is ever a time that the triggered ability "sees" the tokens as a 1/1 in the Sword of Fire and Ice example, long enough for me to trigger the Mentor's effect.
Thanks in advance for the answer.
IIRC, the RC has hinted that the banning of those cards are unlikely; I am on the fence on this as I can see points supporting both side of the argument. My argument tries not to move too many variables at once; in essence, I am arguing "Assuming no radical changes to the ban list, banning Tolarian Academy is justified".
Define "Magical Christmasland" then. Given that Tolarian Academy is in hand and assuming that the deck plays something like 5 one drop mana producing artifacts (say, Sol Ring, Mana Crypt, Mana Vault, Chrome Mox, Mox Opal), there is about a 3.9% odds of drawing into AT LEAST TWO 1-drop mana accelerators. As I mentioned, assuming that you drew into just Sol Ring and Mana Crypt (roughly a 13.7% odds), depending on the number of artifacts with CMC <2, it is really not that hard to set up (see my next point).
This is interesting. I do understand that Sol Ring and Mana Crypt are relatively weaker during the later portion of the game and that not all decks need them but calling them "random crap" is pretty new to me
While that alleged "not-a-god-hand" is somewhat credible, it should be noted that: -
Nobody is denying that Gaea's Cradle is a really good card; my point was that the RC does not ban cards simply because they are "just obscenely freaking good". Honestly, your theoretical example would still be somewhat fun (assuming that it does not occur too frequently) -- as I pointed out, it is actually possible to disrupt the play in a relatively competent multiplayer group (running cards from the top 200 most frequently run cards at that).
Obviously, that said, convincing you to avoid comparing Gaea's Cradle with Tolarian Academy would be relatively difficult (it would be likewise difficult to convince me that these cards are really comparable for the reasons I stated above). As someone who played at a time where Tolarian Academy was legal, consider asking your playgroup to unban Tolarian Academy for a limited run (adjusting their decks as necessary) to see the whole new level of brokeness that is Tolarian Academy
My argument was actually in response to Raining Frogs who explicitly conceded that "Artifacts may be faster and more explosive than creatures but dudes will win the long game" (citation below).
But for the sake of argument, how are you getting fast mana with Gaea's Cradle (say, within Turn 2ish)?
With Tolarian Academy, we were seeing explosive starts to the extent of a fairly consistent: -
Turn 1: Land, Sol Ring and maybe a Sensei's Divining Top to check the top 3 (Note that this can be a little worse if this was say, Mind Stone instead of Sensei's Divining Top and the first land drop was a Seat of the Synod)
Turn 2: Tolarian Academy for 2UUU, probably sufficient for an early Bribery or Tezzeret (or whatever board-impacting spell which you can quite readily find at 5 drops) or the player could sit on that mana for an end of turn Fact or Fiction (or counterspell, if needs be).
Note that the above scenario is not even the Magical Christmasland version of it -- that is actually the watered down version of the more broken plays. I suspect that the Magic Christmasland version would likely have the first land as a Seat of the Synod and include a Mana Crypt somewhere for a cool 10 mana by turn 2 (Turn 1: Seat of Synod, Sol Ring, Mind Stone; Turn 2: Mana Crypt, Tolarian Academy for U++++UUUU=5UUUUU for, oh-I-don't-know, maybe an Omniscience?
Contrast this with Gaea's Cradle. Just theorycrafting, what would your most likely play (up to turn 2) assuming that you already have a Gaea's Cradle in hand?
You are likely going to consistently get a similarly high amount of mana after, say, Turn 4 at the earliest. Mind you, Green getting lots of mana can be pretty daunting too but this is nothing close to the explosive start we mentioned earlier and honestly, green ramping to lots of mana by turn 4 isn't exactly the most exciting news. Heck, with Green, a theoretical: -
Turn 1: Forest, Green Sun's Zenith for Dryad Arbor
Turn 2: Forest, Azusa, Forest, Forest, Rofellos, Llanowar Emissary
Turn 3: GGGGGGGGGGwithout even playing a land on turn 3 sans Gaea's Cradle
Note that, while these lands are superficially similar, it is also worth noting that Gaea's Cradle is easier to disrupt; statistically, creature removals / sweepers are more likely to be played than artifact removals / sweepers.
Relevant parts bolded. If you have to actually ramp into something else (Prosh or AoZ) to make Gaea's Cradle useful, won't that make Gaea's Cradle a "ramp more" card, so to speak? Of course, if you didn't have to ramp into it, it is, by definition, not so much of a "fast mana" card that the RC intends to ban, isn't it? You did mention that you often get this ridiculous board position by Turn 4 -- decks running Tolarian Academy (while it was legal) can get this ridiculous board position fairly consistently (with TA in hand) around Turn 2.
Of the list, I would argue that only Avenger of Zendikar produces significant amount of creatures for Gaea's Cradle, most of the time. "Comboing" (or rather, "synergising") Gaea's Cradle with Ant Queen and Rampaging Baloth isn't much of a fast mana that the RC is looking forward to ban.
EDIT: -
While I am actually on the same side of the argument, to be fair, I thought I'd mention that your original post was not really backed up either
Producing lots of mana in long games is perfectly fine with the RC (and to many players, I suspect). It is the anti-climatic (or rather, aclimatic(?)) production of lots of mana during the early games that made Tolarian Academy banned.
Here you go. I follow it like some obituary.
I do have some upper respiratory tract infection today
I found klducks argument to be quite persuasive; I really should have spotted Earthcraft and voted against it :/
With all the talk about card X costing too much -- for a colour that specialises in mana ramp no less -- one might be thinking that there is some mana shortage somewhere
Green is a colour that rocks in mana ramp but you will probably want something to, you know, ramp into and Genesis Wave is one of the better candidate with a nice impact on board; It is a big splashy spell that, more often than not, delivers in most decks (assuming you are running a fair amount of permanents. Maths here). It may not be that awesome in some decks but the same is true of most of the other cards in the Top 50 list -- Academy Rector, Bloodghast (and heck, even Imperial Recruiter and Loyal Retainers).
Just defending one of my more favourite spell
This is... misleading. I mean, it is technically true that Deglamer is double the cost of Nature's Claim but lets not forget that it is just... one... mana =_=
It is not really a niche application with indestructible. Considering that graveyard recursion remains more common (than say, repeated tutoring), Deglamer is often a superior option relative to Nature's Claim.
I believe that the Top 50 list should reflect cards that are good in a majority of meta rather than well-developed ones. I mean, I love Brooding Saurians to bits (and I do run it) but in less developed metas (which probably describes the larger EDH meta given that the format is relatively young -- or rather, popularised rather recently), it is just a 4/4 that gets pitched to Survival fairly often.
In younger metas, I think Deglamer would be superior simply because cost efficiency is a secondary concern to its relative versatility -- note that Deglamer is not really irrelevant in developed metas. I would argue that Deglammer is better than Nature's Claim because Deglammer is more useful in less developed metas (which is arguably the majority) and in more developed meta, the utility of Deglammer versus Nature's Claim is more of a toss up.
Edited for brevity but this a thousand times over.
Currently, we are using a de facto stratified sampling which relies on somewhat arbitrary weights (which may need to be adjusted constantly).
I propose that we eliminate the weights such that we vote for the Top 50 cards of each colours regardless if they are creatures or noncreatures. If that ends up having more creatures nominated for Green, so be it -- Green's forte is its creatures anyway. Assigning arbitrary weights would be, well, arbitrary. That said, as ISBP mentioned, lets keep this in mind for later.
I nominate Cultivate // Kodama's Reach (leaning towards Kodama's Reach if I have to choose just one -- there are some niche application of Arcane and few people actually play Arcane-hate in EDH).
The newly spoiled Unravel the Æther may help too as would Brutalizer Exarch (when it is not a creature yet).