The Werewolves are Bearing Some New Teeth!

Hello Everybody!

So yesterday I was talking about Sorin and how nuts he is, but one thing i didn't spend too much time talking about was the problems that would surface because of his -2 ability. The other planeswalkers up until now that made emblems (not named elspeth) basically caused concessions on the spot because they were so back breaking and hard to beat (though I have been 1 turn away from beating my opponent against both Koth AND Venser's Emblems before. note: I didn't win). However, Sorin's emblem both does not win on the spot, and is very relevant when stacked. WotC recognized this problem, and Aaron Forsythe sent this little nugget out on twitter:

The overall reaction has actually been negative to this card. While most have acknowledged the need for an Emblem token, many have been saying the card looks pretty poor visually. I don't think it looks THAT bad, but it easily could have been better. Andrew said when he went to Anime Boston and had a Koth token made up that was Koth flipping the opponent off. While they obviously would print those tokens, something actually worth looking at would have been nice. Aaron Forsythe also mentioned that there would be Emblem tokens included in the Koth vs Venser Duel Decks.

So if you want to start an argument over the recent power creep of MTG, just compare Thalia to Glowrider. Yeah... -1 mana and we gain first strike? Obviously Thalia is going to be good in the humans deck, but I don't how yet HOW good. The only problem with Thalia is that in Legacy and Modern Ethersworn Canonist is almost always strictly better. The thing that really sucks about this card is that it is REALLY good against Burning Vengeance!

Here's another card that obviously REALLY good, but no one knows quite where yet.... I think with the addition of Gravecrawler a competetive aggressive Zombies deck may emerge, and if so I think Lich with top out the curve and add a huge amount of resiliency. Right now he is preselling at 15, but I expect that will go down to 8-10 shortly before people figure out what to do with him. One thing that's really cool is you can flash in a Snapcaster from your graveyard now! Your opponent think they're all safe when all of a sudden your snapcaster comes in for 3 mana and dissipate comes out, all while you have 0 cards in hand! Also, with Necrotic Ooze, we can have a hyper graveyard recursion deck. The problem here is that hes a little too high cost for aggro, and theres not much besides snapcaster for control (although that is a very good target), so its all a little awkward.

So this is the multicolored DFC that we saw on the token, and as it turns out it isn't legendary, but it sure it sweet! One of the problems with Werewolves is that if you want to force a transform you have to either Moonmist or pass turn while casting no spells and hope your opponent doesn't have an instant. When that happens, the werewolves return to their useless state if your opponent just casts 2 spells in 1 turn. However, Huntmaster has triggers on its flips, so even if it never stays transformed, you still keep on gaining value by developing your board and killing your opponent's weenies. The only thing that sucks about Huntmaster is that its basically an over glorified Moan of the Unhallowed, and that card isn't seeing any play. To say the least, its current $18 pre-order price will never sustain. Feel free to immediately sell any and all you open as quickly as you can. Sure he will be played in the Werewolf deck, but it's going to take a lot for the Werewolf deck to take off.....

Like this:

Yeah! Another 1 drop! I think it's fairly obvious, but Wolfbitten Captive is WAY better than Reckless Waif. Thanks to the Basking Rootwalla pump ability (everyone forgets about the pump, and only remembers the 0 cost madness), you can play an aggressive game without casting spells allowing your deck to transform faster while not completely durdling. At the very least, it's obvious the Werewolf deck with now have access to 8 very good quality 1 drops, which may make it playable all by itself. Consider this opening:

T1 - Wolfbitten Captive
T2 - Transform, attack for 2, Mayor of Avabruck
T3 - Immerwolf, attack for 5
T4 - Moonmist, attack for 11, Incinerate, GG

That's pretty good for an aggro deck I hear! Nevermind if the game goes long and you HAVE to use that Kessig Wolf Run. As everyone who has drafted against Werewolves knows, if the game goes on too long, the Werewolves completely take over the game and winning is futile. I am VERY excited to see if this deck materializes, although I think the thing most holding it back is how the format is going to become overly aggressive as every color and tribe gets new sick beat face cards, and there haven't been many good control cards yet (Sorin, I guess, but he's good everywhere). I will withhold from making decklists until next week, when we should have full set to work with as Werewolves is a deck that's either perfect or terrible, and if we get another Moonmist card than the deck will be amazing!

But that's all I have time for today! Until next time, stay classy!

Ryan Lackie
Ryan.Lackie92@gmail.com
@ThingsILack
mtgo: ThingsILack