The yearling is much betterthan the mimic, it can attack and block the turn its summoned. The mimic is useless unless your playing a red/white card every turn, which is very inconvenient.
asmallcat
★★★☆☆ (3.6/5.0)(5 votes)
Great beater for 2 mana in any red/white deck. Another great common from this set. Reborn has certainly been kind to commons.
Iiory
★☆☆☆☆ (1.7/5.0)(3 votes)
hire yearling ,hire boy,come hire good yearling,now go crush that little ugly elf
deadguyred
★★☆☆☆ (2.5/5.0)(1 vote)
i love this card, where's the drawback??
don't say Volcanic Fallout. duh.
bowlofgumbo
★★★☆☆ (3.5/5.0)(3 votes)
One of the best commons of Alara Reborn. Don't ever under-rate Haste. Haste wins games.
holgir
★★★★☆ (4.8/5.0)(3 votes)
The Yearling and Battlegate Mimic can fight for the same team. Yearling is better for the short term. If you play the mimic in constructed, you will certainly make sure that you can trigger him as often as possible and a 4 power first striker can really be troublesome, the yearling probably just blocks once.
jugglingguy
★★★☆☆ (3.3/5.0)(3 votes)
I would say that it depends on your deck whether yearling or mimic.
Yearling probably trumps 4/5 times
Gezus82
★★★★☆ (4.9/5.0)(4 votes)
hooray for boros. it will never die
darkfury
★★★☆☆ (3.6/5.0)(5 votes)
the true question, is whether this or Boros Swiftblade is better in the same slot? mimic is situational. this is a flat 2/2 with vigilance and haste, Swiftblade is a 2/1 with doublestrike.
Mafoo
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Geeze, only a common too.
Richard_Hawk
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
oh yes, can attack right away and block the next, get some nice equipment cards on it with shroud and this will be a force.
mdakw576
★★★☆☆ (3.0/5.0)(3 votes)
Swiftblade is better. Once you get cards out like honor of the pure, or jitte (note that jitte will activate twice on swiftblade provided the first hit didn't kill the opposing creature, which is 4 counters, and that's freaking awesome even if swiftblade died in the process), or anything that boosts power, swiftblade gets better really, really fast.
Aaron_Forsythe
★★★★☆ (4.8/5.0)(21 votes)
Aaron’s Random Card Comment of the Day #73, 4/6/11
Although I was the lead designer on Alara Reborn, I didn’t have anything to do with making this card. I believe we handed off something much more complicated in this slot (my first thought is that Intimidation Bolt was at common, although I can’t access Multiverse from home right now to check). I believe Matt Place and his development team added this little guy in.
If you don’t know, Cerodon Yearling is a throwback to the card Bull Cerodon from two sets earlier. The Bull was an uncommon 5/5 for , but otherwise the cards are the same. One surefire way to make a simple, attractive gold card is to put a keyword from each color onto a creature.
I’m not sure this card was the best use of the slot in Alara Reborn. He’s very aggressive, and wants to be cast as soon as possible, but R/W wasn’t a deck in that limited format. He would probably have been better used as a more late-game card for Naya decks or for other multi-colored decks to splash for. The only other enemy-colored two-drop common in the set, Putrid Leech, was pushed for constructed, but I don’t see any sensible way to have done that for the Cerodon. But then again, reading the other comments on the card, he appears to be lovable, which in the end is what’s most important.
WizardsFamiliar
★★★★☆ (4.2/5.0)(6 votes)
I like Cerodon Yearling, but it makes me sad that Rip-Clan Crasher is worse. I get that enemy colors are harder to pair than ally colors, but I really want Rip-Clan Crasher to be better at what he does. Even just trample, as minimal as that would be on a two-power guy would have made me feel better about the duo.
JFM2796
★★★★☆ (4.6/5.0)(5 votes)
Aww Baby Bull Cerodon. I think it would have made more sense with this in Shards of Alara and the Daddy in Alara Reborn. That way, this one would line up in the cycle as each shard had a Enemy colored card. Jhessian Infiltratorfor Bant, Tidehollow Sculler for Esper, Swerve for Grixis, Necrogenesis for Jund, and Bull Cerodon for Naya. If they just switched these two it would be perfect.
Cheza
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.5/5.0)(1 vote)
@ Cerodon Yearling:
Adding white seems needless, since both abilities are red flavored. Therefore it would have been just a fine red knight at uncommon rarity.
@ Naya Shards:
Although I don't like tri-color decks, no matter if it's a wedge or a shard-like combination, I like the concept of forming distinct guilds, groups or "worlds" within a set. This defines a structure, forms keywords and makes it easy to build a theme-based deck around an idea.
I wonder who was responsible for the shards, since they seem to have random concepts, so I never got in touch with any shard but Esper. Since Aaron has mentioned Naya, I see the connection between green fatties and the "power 5+" theme, However, it felt strange to see how both main weenie colors (white and red) are "forced" into this theme. So per se, this card fits quite well into a R/W deck, but maybe the true problem comes from somewhere else... maybe a more color-pie specific problem.
As I've discussed it in the MTG forum, I believe that green is a mix of aggressive creatures, but also include the calm, tranquil and creepingly slow color aspects. White also combines the cold, defensive and thoughtful aspects of a pure white and the active, offensive nature of yellow. And it's this dualism within these two colors that causes so much overlap and color-bleed. Likewise any focus one half of the color-aspects leaves the other half unrecognized. So for me, that's why this card fails within the Naya shard, although it's not a bad card in any other enviroment. (Since a typical RW deck feels fine with just the yellow part within white).
Blitz_Hammer
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
@Cheza
I was reading your post and I couldn't help but realize how your comment didn't make sense to me. You know you had fooled for a minute their but then I realized you make excellent troll. Convincing other players that vigilance is a red ability when there are 99 mono white cards that have or grant vigilance and only three mono red cards that do the same, but I only jest. If you ever read this comment please explain to me why you think vigilance should be a red ability and I would to explain to you why it shouldn't, I'm sure we'll come to a common understanding.
Comments (22)
don't say Volcanic Fallout. duh.
Yearling probably trumps 4/5 times
Although I was the lead designer on Alara Reborn, I didn’t have anything to do with making this card. I believe we handed off something much more complicated in this slot (my first thought is that Intimidation Bolt was at common, although I can’t access Multiverse from home right now to check). I believe Matt Place and his development team added this little guy in.
If you don’t know, Cerodon Yearling is a throwback to the card Bull Cerodon from two sets earlier. The Bull was an uncommon 5/5 for
I’m not sure this card was the best use of the slot in Alara Reborn. He’s very aggressive, and wants to be cast as soon as possible, but R/W wasn’t a deck in that limited format. He would probably have been better used as a more late-game card for Naya decks or for other multi-colored decks to splash for. The only other enemy-colored two-drop common in the set, Putrid Leech, was pushed for constructed, but I don’t see any sensible way to have done that for the Cerodon. But then again, reading the other comments on the card, he appears to be lovable, which in the end is what’s most important.
Adding white seems needless, since both abilities are red flavored. Therefore it would have been just a fine red knight at uncommon rarity.
@ Naya Shards:
Although I don't like tri-color decks, no matter if it's a wedge or a shard-like combination, I like the concept of forming distinct guilds, groups or "worlds" within a set. This defines a structure, forms keywords and makes it easy to build a theme-based deck around an idea.
I wonder who was responsible for the shards, since they seem to have random concepts, so I never got in touch with any shard but Esper. Since Aaron has mentioned Naya, I see the connection between green fatties and the "power 5+" theme, However, it felt strange to see how both main weenie colors (white and red) are "forced" into this theme. So per se, this card fits quite well into a R/W deck, but maybe the true problem comes from somewhere else... maybe a more color-pie specific problem.
As I've discussed it in the MTG forum, I believe that green is a mix of aggressive creatures, but also include the calm, tranquil and creepingly slow color aspects. White also combines the cold, defensive and thoughtful aspects of a pure white and the active, offensive nature of yellow. And it's this dualism within these two colors that causes so much overlap and color-bleed. Likewise any focus one half of the color-aspects leaves the other half unrecognized. So for me, that's why this card fails within the Naya shard, although it's not a bad card in any other enviroment. (Since a typical RW deck feels fine with just the yellow part within white).
I was reading your post and I couldn't help but realize how your comment didn't make sense to me. You know you had fooled for a minute their but then I realized you make excellent troll. Convincing other players that vigilance is a red ability when there are 99 mono white cards that have or grant vigilance and only three mono red cards that do the same, but I only jest. If you ever read this comment please explain to me why you think vigilance should be a red ability and I would to explain to you why it shouldn't, I'm sure we'll come to a common understanding.