Pointed Discussion

No idea why someone gave this the worst possible rating. With Protean Hulk it's part of the scary Hulk-Flash tournament deck. You use the flash to play the hulk, which instantly dies, lets you tutor for tons of stuff. I think the trick was to tutor for a guy which causes lifeloss to opponens when artifacts come into play, as well as tons of 0 mana artifacts. Something like that.
The card looks bad at first glance, but in the Hulk-Flash deck, it can kill on turn one and at instant speed.

Whoever rated it low probably lost to it :)

I don't understand the second sentence. "You may pay up to 2...If you don't sacrafice it" when they are talking about sacrafice, do they mean the creature you are summoning?

Yes. You summon the creature, and if you don't pay (mana cost - 2), it is sacrificed.

Cast Flash, choose to summon Protean Hulk. Pay 3GG or sacrifice Protean Hulk.

someone, please. tell me.

http://www.wizards.com/Magic/TCG/Resources.aspx?x=judge/resources/sfrvintage

that link claims that flash is restricted, i'm inclined to believe it; however, when looking at this page and clicking "sets & legality" at the top, on the vintage line, it says "legal".

based on -that- information, and the information obtained on other MT:G resource sites (ie: essential magic), i was playing with 4 flash in my deck... so, IS it restricted for sure? this would mean that wizards has conflicting information on their site, and multiple other MT:G sites are ALL wrong - is this the case?

all things considered it -should- probably be restricted, as the list suggests, but why with all of the false information then?

I think the combo was 4 Disciple of the vault with 4 shifting wall after you pulled a protean hulk for a relatively reliable turn two kill

The combo is gemstone caverns and simian spirit guide to supply mana, then flash into protean hulk, search for 4xdisciple of the vault, 4xshifting wall, and 4xphyrexian marauder for 36 damage before the opponents first upkeep.

we need more of this sweet david ho art.

as it is we only have this and blistering barrier

i for one would like to see some david ho art in the new sets.

I had a friend who used that deck type for awhile. He would use Gemstone Cavern for the blue mana, drop a simian spirit guide or elvish spirit guide, cast Flash, play Protean Hulk, let it sac, search for four Disciple of the Vault, one Arcbound Ravager, four Ornithopter, four Phyrexian Walker, and four Shield sphere. All said and done, sacrificing the zero-cost creatures to the Ravager, he could deal 12 points of damage PER Disciple of the Vault. It was enough to take out two other players, first turn at (as said) instant speed.

We all made him stop playing the deck, as no one really ever one against him. But it was still beautiful to watch when you hadn't seen it in a while.

@captainjash

Flash is restricted. The confliction is probably simply a screw-up.

Actually, I think there the where 3 popular ways to play this deck.

At first, people used to play it using 0 mana cost artifacts with disiple of the vault. However, this combo needed about 10 cards to work properly and assure a certain concistency within the deck.

Soon after that, people started to use 4 virulent sliver + 1 heart sliver, leaving more space into the deck to put tutors. This is the way I played it about 80% of the time.

At about the same time, people tried another combo using kiki-jiki, karmic guide and carrion feeder, allowing them to create an infinite number of creature. That whas my side deck combo used in 20% of my games.

This deck was dangerous mainly because of is high first/second turn kill probability. However, people figured out a way to improve it again by adding 4 serum powder, allowing them to take mulligans without any drawback...this is at that point my friends decided to stop playing against my flash deck for the rest of the times...

Turn 1: Island
Turn 2: Island
Turn 3: Island, Flash, Storm Crow, win.

The card that inspired the keyword ability of the same name.
With the exception that the keyword "Flash" (as opposed to Affinity) isn't inherently broken.

The possiblity to abuse triggers of costy creatures that you get when they enter or leave the battlefield is obvious.

Yet if you seriously only intend to use this spell to cast a certain creature at instant speed, i'd advise using Scout's Warning instead.

Turn 1: Mountian, Shock your stupid Storm Crow
Turn 2: Repeat this process until everyone stop talking about Storm Crow.
Turn 3: Wizards grants auto-win to the non-Storm Crow deck owner.


Please stop doing the Storm Crow thing people, it's very very old.

i pulled this, some crap rare, and a city of brass in a six edition tournament pack. this was in the days of 8th coming around, and i did it just to get the good old cards.

i was happy over the CoB, because it was the best painland during that time, but i pretty much threw rthis card away. i had no idea why it was even printed. now i do :)

1: elvish spirit guide and island to flash protean hulk, search for heart sliver and virulent sliver x4, and swing for the win.

FLASH...AAAAAAAHHHHHH...SAVIOUR OF THE UNIVERSE!

Couldn't resist, gets 5/5 for broken-ness but otherwise a fairly meh card if not used for hulking etc.

since this is restricted
mystical tutor

This is so great with persist and citp abilities.

I prefer the not totally busted uses for this card.
Like pooping out big, fat persistent bastards.

It feels way more satisfying than dealing a bajillion damage, I assure you.

Can someone please explain to me why this is good?
Lets say I have something big, like a terra stomper.

I cast flash, and use it to put the stomper on the field. This costs me two.

Now I have to pay 4, or else it dies immediately.

Total cost to play w/flash: 6

Regular Cost: 6

I can understand that it lets you block something, or get a "enters play effect," but besides that, its nothing special. Besides, we already have good stuff that lets us do the first two.

I see it as redundant.

Aaron’s Random Card Comment of the Day #78, 6/8/11

Check out the printed text on this card:

Put a creature card from your hand into play. You may pay its mana cost reduced by up to . If you don't, sacrifice it.

That seems pretty straightforward. You can put any creature card from your hand onto the battlefield, at which point you have to sacrifice it unless you pay its mana cost minus 2. If the card you choose to put into play happened to have a particularly nasty ability that triggered when it entered or left the battlefield, such as, say, Academy Rector or Protean Hulk, well, congratulations, you created a pretty potent combo! If you look at the Mirage printing of the card, you’ll see that it reads essentially the same way.

The card didn’t always work that way. Don’t get me wrong, it worked that way just fine when it was printed back in Mirage, but there weren’t any particularly powerful creatures to combo it with, at least until Academy Rector came out at the end of the Urza’s block. Flashing out a Rector let you search up Yawgmoth's Bargain, one of the most degenerate card-drawers of all time, at which point you usually won the game.

So what did R&D do about that particular combo? No, they didn’t ban either of the cards; they had to save the big guns—banning—for cards so broken that they had no other realistic fix, such as Tolarian Academy and Tinker. There was only so much they could bear to ban. No, for Flash and a handful of other cards, they developed them further after they had been released, issuing “power-level errata” to change how the card functioned in tournaments. From the time Urza’s Destiny came out until Planar Chaos was released, Flash worked like this:

Choose a creature card in your hand. You may pay its mana cost reduced by up to . If you do, put that card into play. If you don't, put that card into your graveyard.

With that wording, the creature never even hits the battlefield unless you can pay for it, cirçumventing all the enters and leaves triggers.

In my ideal world, players don’t need Oracle at all. Cards do what they say on their most recent printing (assuming knowledge of modern templating). And if what the cards say on them is too powerful, we ban or restrict the cards (assuming we can’t neuter them quickly by printing effective counter-strategies). If we screw up and make a card that’s too powerful, that’s on us. Unlike video games, we don’t get to patch and keep working on things that are out the door. I know we'll never get to that idealized state with Oracle—there are too many awkward corner cases—but I'd like to get as close as possible.

In line with my philosophy, we removed huge swaths of power-level errata from Oracle around the time of Time Spiral block. Restoring Flash to its original functionality made it a potent combo with Protean Hulk, so much so that the “Flash Hulk” deck won the Legacy Grand Prix in Columbus and the card Flash was quickly banned in that format and restricted in Vintage.

So be it. That was the card’s proper fate. Trust me—you don’t want a game that empowers its creators to further develop cards on the fly after they’ve been released. If Flash could get new wording, why couldn’t Skullclamp get a new mana cost, for example? Who would be able to keep track of all that in their head? It’s a slippery slope indeed.

Note for confused commenters: the "fair" use of this card is allowing you to play a creature at instant speed by, essentially, spending one blue mana instead of one generic mana in the spell's cost. Nowadays, we have cards like Scout's Warning that do essentially the same thing without the strange shenanigans that this card involves.

I very much appreciate the goal of cards always doing what they say, so that players don't have to have constant access to Oracle, but I'm not convinced that it's better to ban a card, effectively negating its existence, than it is to simply fix it. Particularly when the errata is in the original spirit of the card as, I would argue, was the case with Flash.

At the time Flash was printed, there weren't many creatures with ETB triggers at all and reading the original card to me feels like the designer's wanted to say "Choose a creature card in your hand. You may pay its mana cost reduced by up to 2. If you do, put that card into play. If you don't, put that card into your graveyard," but this was also before anyone figured out templating and so they printed it the first way it occurred to them to print. It's pretty clear that the intent of the card was to allow a player to cast a creature at instant speed with no extra mana cost and not to enable ETB/LTB shenanigans.

If it's okay to change creature types and it's okay to abandon game words like "bury" (and I believe both of those are quite worthy), than I also believe it is better to change a card to work as intended rather than as printed, particularly when that allows us to avoid a banning.

I love it when "jank" becomes broken a couple years later with interactions with new cards.

Unlike Aaron, I believe that giving Flash a new wording, Skullclamp a new mana cost, and so forth is exactly what should be done. The whole "cards should work exactly as printed" thing doesn't work anyway, because of nonsense like Castle, whose sixth-edition printing locked it in as working opposite how the original does with regard to Serra Angel and such. There's no hope of making every printed card work right, so I say you should make every card work right with respect to MODO and to tournaments where the participants can be reasonably expected to master the Oracle effects of all cards in their deck, and then let the casual crowd play every card as written unless their friends don't want them to. I understand the urge to have a definitional right answer even when it doesn't really matter, but I don't think it's a good urge or one that should be indulged to the extent it is.

@ God of the Smurfs: The entire original point of Flash was that you could block something, or more generically just that you could keep counterspell mana open throughout your opponent's turn and then play a creature if you got the chance. Flash was printed one set before the first creature with an "enters the battlefield" trigger ability of any consequence; that entire usage was not yet imagined. The concept of "card advantage" was in its infancy, so the designers figured it was totally fair to make you pay a full card for the freedom to play a creature outside the turn order and maybe kill an attacking creature in the process. I'm certain the designers didn't plan on things like Flash-Hulk ever working, and thus I'm in favor of the power-level eratta; I am not, ever, in favor of banning cards.

@willpell
You can't say ETB effects weren't imagined at that point. Wizards works in advanced. While one set is being released, the next is being playtested internally, and another is being designed behind that.

That say, I will agree that they probably didn't see the carnage that was Flash Hulk ahead of time. But turn it around, how could they not see Flash when they made the Hulk? I know they can't be expected to remember every card when they design new ones, but that is what play testers are paid to do, as well as why they have multiple levels in the design process. Aaron even mentioned Flash gave them a problem before so it is by no means out of line to at least consider it might again when designing a similar creature. (ETB/LTB tutor effect tied to a creature)

Second worse f*cking art in the game, after Word of Command.
Yet one of the most broken cards. That said, there are probably more elegant cave drawings.
Apologies, it just makes me angry D:

If you're not using this with Protean Hulk, Flash is useful for casting fat creatures with persist such as Woodfall Primus. Also, do keep in mind that there are other etb/pig abilities out there; Pelakka Wurm, Bogardan Hellkite, Sharuum, Spawnbroker.. The list goes on and on. You could even make four 1/1 insects with flying and deathtouch for with Hornet Queen if you feel like it.

Hulk Flash, Hulk SMASH!!!!!

Stifle/Trickbind when it comes into play so you can reduce the mana cost and cap it at 3/4 cmc, respectively.

I don't think that works, raptorman333. The rulings say: No player will get priority in between the creature entering the battlefield and being sacrificed.

Power 8.9

I played this in a game when my opponent was oh so carefully blocking all of my tokens, making absolutely sure he'd survive. Finally, he finished assigning his blockers.
I counted it up. "So you'll be at four life, then?"
"Yes, and then on my turn you'll die. Or, you have eight mana. . . so maybe you won't, but all your tokens die."
"Actually. . . I'm going to flash a Craterhoof Behemoth."
The expression on his face was just priceless.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3bF_B8P1-mo

Here comes the rain.

Bogardan Hellkite to the face ftw!

Anybody who flashes in a Protean Hulk in my play group would have their opponent (including me) reach across the table and slap them in the face. As so for Ancestral Recall, Black Lotus, and ANY moxen.

To quote someone's post I read somewhere on the gatherer (forgot who):
Flash+Protean Hulk? Broken? Yes. Good? Never.

At the very least it's a "target creature you control has Flash" spell, possibly for no mana cost.

At best, it's a beast of a card.

Just checked out the spoilers for the Return to Ravnica set. Looks like I have a new favorite card to Flash in-- Worldspine Wurm. Two mana for three 5/5 green trampling wurms? Yes please.

Combos with Mimic Vat

I dont think this card was intended to be "evoke". There was a total of 0 things to abuse when this came out.

So if any card needs an oracle, its this card. The wording was designed not to be abused, but more so because they were not sure how else to word it. And they did oracle this card for awhile, and when they changed it back, it quickly broke legacy in half, followed by Banned/Restricted.

Still don't see why this card would be banned from Legacy. It's more or less giving you the possibility to play a Funeral Charm + Animate Dead. Perhaps it's broken because you cannot react on the come into play ability if you didn't pay 2?

This card would have made Reanimator decks playable again, since it allows you to avoid Extirpate, Deathrite Shaman or Relic of Progenitus.

Would be nice if the Wizards would explain why a card is banned.

@CorkBulb; I've never understood people like that. Why do some play groups have a hate on for good cards?

@Lord_Sauran; I believe it's banned because people cried about it. Well, it's also because people would abuse either Protean Hulk to bring in a ton of 0 cmc artifact creatures among a few other things; or to bring in Academy Rector to grab Yawgmoth's Bargain and basically win the game.

Essentially; if a deck becomes to good/dominant Wizards will ban the card that basically makes it function. Essentially it's because if they don't, you see the same deck (built and copied by different people) win every Legacy tournament.

Flash into Protean Hulk

Promptly use the Hulk to summon six of Kokusho, the Evening Star

Drink tears.

I get the card is amazing at all, but don't you think it is a little over-rated? I mean, its restricted in vintage and banned in legacy, where for one more mana, you can get a card that allows you to actually keep the card you dropped "for free": Show and Tell. Not only that, but that card lets you drop anything, not just creatures. It seems like it combos with anything with a high mana cost, rather than just hulk or something.

Now granted they have the potential to do the same back to you if you're not careful, so perhaps this is a bit better, but is it really that much better? Just wondering.

This was not reprinted in From The Vault: Exiled.


Think about that for a sec. It's so broken, it couldn't be reprinted in a set alongside Balance.


They really should have pulled a Loxodon Warhammer* retcon and just permanently changed the functionality of the card in a reprint to mirror Aluren. "The next creature spell you cast this turn can be cast as if it had flash. If you cast a creature spell in this way, you may pay up to less to cast it."

*Loxodon Warhammer had a lifegain triggered ability that got retconned into lifelink (a static ability).

Wtf is with this art? Did the guy just summon that dragon and now he's all: "What do ya think?" Is the dragon flashing in behind him without his knowing, about to attack; and if so, why is he looking at the viewer. You're breaking the 4th wall, dude. Also, I know he's supposed to be an uncivilized native or something, but why did they draw him so retarded looking? It's almost racist. lol

The artwork on this card sucks. However, the deck that made it famous, Steve Sadin's "Hulk Flash", has been called "the best deck ever brought to a tournament".

turn zero

I have a question regarding the functionality of this card with creatures that have both "Enters the battlefield" and "Leaves the battlefield" abilities...

If I used this to play a card like Hypnox, which exiles the opponent's hand as it enters, and then returns the exiled cards to their hand when it leaves... If I don't pay it's mana cost from Flashing it in, it gets sacrificed immediately. Does the enters the battlefield ability resolve before the leaves the battlefield ability gets put on the stack? If not, then that means the leaves the battlefield ability is essentially countered because there is no target (their hand hasn't been exiled yet). On the other hand, if the enters ability resolves, then the card leaves the battlefield, it was just a waste of to Flash it in because the cards get exiled and then immediately return to their hand.

combos with Phage the Untouchable

@Lord_Sauron they did explain it. It needed no explaining, really.
In legacy a while back there was this amazing combo between flash and Protean Hulk where you would, on turn one, flash the hulk, bringing into play 4 disciple of the vault and 4 phyrexian marauder and 4 shifting wall using 0 as their converted mana costs. The artifact creatures would die, and due to the disciples, your opponent would lose 32 life, and the game would be over. It was obscene, so flash, the biggest part of the combo, had to be banned. Also flash combos super well with newer cards so it's good it was banned then.

@Noobian
Yes. There are ways to work around show and tell. Legacy goblin decks actually have angel of despair on the sideboard. If their opponent is playing a show and tell deck, angel of despair will answer basically anything they can throw out with it.

With this card, yes, you lose some of the power you can gain from it, but you also make your combo more safe and 1-sided. Being 1 less mana also makes a huge difference in legacy.

Keep in mind that having the creature die can also be a good thing. The infamous combo called 'flash hulk' uses this to put protean hulk into play, and then uses it's "when it dies" effect to combo out for victory. In fact, the way it works, if flash is not countered, and protean hulk's triggered ability isn't countered, the combo ends the game and there is no room to stop it.

The only thing that bothers me about this, and this is getting REALLY nit-picky, is that you can't flash 1-drops. Since you can't pay negative mana, you have to pay 2 mana for a 1-mana creature.

@SirLibraryEater: That's wrong. Flash reduces if by up to {2}. You can choose reduce it by {0} or {1} to let you play cheaper cards.

This card...it's got the white border...the art is bowling-shoe ugly, it's got that weird ability and it's banned in all these formats for reasons that make no sense if you haven't seen the decks it's been in.

Probably not Wizards' finest moment.

When is see the art, u think the guy is like "da faq?!"