Pointed Discussion

I really like this card. It's a nice combination of irritating control abilities, and can really mess up an opponent in several ways. It mills, which I've always been a fan of, and has the potential to mill a great deal, especially if it hits a mana pocket or if the deck is low on creatures, and of course, when it hits a creature, you become the proud owner. Given that a lot of the better decks tend to be heavy in spells and outstanding creatures, Telemin Performance can really hamper your opponent while netting you a decent creature.

this would be good against a deck with 4 progenitus'. you could get lucky and get one of the progenitus' and mill a bunch of cards

how about this against a 5cc, nailing a broodmate in the mill, or for 2 more you twincast it, you wanted to keep both of those broodmate dragons Mr. 5cc, sorry, not happening

Perfct for no creature burns or no creatures control/mill. My friend plays a creatureless red/blue control/mill, and this card will be the deck killer if I can get it out. For other decks, Use this with a Counterbore to knock out their creatures and leave an open path to mill up to 15 cards. Mana cost a little too high though.

What abouting waiting until your opponent releases their biggie on you then playing lapse of certainty on it, next turn that card is all yours!

It would be hilarious to construct a deck which featured a huge game-winning fattie like Progenitus as its only creature and then cast Telemin Performance targeting yourself to insta-summon Progenitus on turn 5.

Probably the most interesting play I ever had with this card was in a multiplayer casual group. I used it on an opposing deck I knew had few creatures. While I knocked off half their deck with it the creature they wound up drawing was Phage the Untouchable. Instant loss for me and a free killing machine for them when they got control of it after.

Somehow, I've only ever had terrible luck with this card. Like a Dragonsoul Knight I couldn't activate, a Wild Leotau I couldn't pay the upkeep cost for, and a Goblin Mountaineer from the top of the deck. C'est la vie, the lack of predictability makes gameplay more interesting, though.

To Vinifera7: Nice thought, but you can only target an opponent. This card is a little stronger in multi-player formats.

Goes great with Sadistic Sacrament. If you can get the kicker off, remove the creatures you don't want (by the time you've got 10 mana, they've at least gone through a few of their lesser creatures). Remove their small creatures, leave a few big things like Protogenitus in, and start milling until you hit them. Worst case scenario, you pay 5 mana to get control of an ~equal cost creature that they had topdeck and would've done bad things to you.

Its great against creatureless decks, against anything else its hard to say, its like a mind control with a gamble attached to it. One thing that makes it more powerful however, is that you get to keep the creature without any enchantment on it, so they can't get their creature back just by destroying the enchantment like they can with mind control and confiscate. There are of course, several ways to make sure a creature is on top of the deck, but in general its great to mill a bunch of their removal between the top of their library and wherever their next creature is. Probably less effective against green color decks that rely on creatures, and most effective against blue, or black, that plays with more spells usually.

Goes great against creature-less control decks, the card states that all non-creature cards revealed this way are milled, if there are no creatures, all the cards are milled

What happens when this card fetches a Bloodbraid Elf or something? Does Cascade trigger?

All your deck are belong to us.

@Flaming0: Cascade triggers when a spell is played, not for entering the battlefield (which only applies to permanents). On the other hand, effects like those of Clone or Iona, Shield of Emeria work fine.

I only use this card as sideboard against decks with few or no creatures; otherwise it's inferior both as milling (same casting cost as the much more reliable Traumatize and Archive Trap) and as creature theft.

This can be brilliant, and if not, you steal a creature either way.

I cast this against my friend, and ended up destroying most of his land and a couple of insta-kills, and ended by stealing an igneous pouncer.

On the other end, I played it against a different friend, and just took an aven squire or something.

A big gamble, but the potential is brilliant.

Really interesting spell that COULD result in a devastating swing for the other player. The real trick is hitting him with something that sets it up.

4/5

kills my polymorph deck

@ vinifera7: try a polymorph deck

@LG: To be pedantic, cascade triggers when a spell is cast, not played. Only land cards are played; spells are cast.
But yes, you are right in that cacade does not trigger.

I run u/r control and someone played this against me
I only have 4 creatures in the deck: sphinx of jwar isle x4

That sucked

My friend won 2nd place at fnm using this in a cruel control deck against polymorph. Got out Iona and chose blue ftw. That play there earned this card my respect.

This card is a very good answer to the surge of Polymorph decks post-Rise of the Eldrazi. 哈哈

hmm, I played this with Cast Though Time and Echo Mage leveled up to 5; it was awesome! Played it 3 times, then 3 more times next turn.

I once milled 44 cards off my friends burn deck then stole his only useful creature. Needless to say the fight was over. Good card versus low creature decks and amazing versus creatureless decks, I suggest sideboarding it in any blue/ black mill decks.

Well that would certianly put the kai-bosh on my burn deck. It's got no creatures. And before you all start going "NO DUMMY" look at the rullings. It will anhililate a creatureless deck.
On another note, It was fun beating you down with your own Emrakul.

Either way you mill them for a few cards, plus you can get a creature out of it, especially against control decks to grab their finisher. I run a 3 of in my u/w/b mill.

"Target player playing a creatureless deck loses the game."

It's also fun with things like Sadistic Sacrament or Memoricide.

Byebye burn decks.
I take your Mogg Fanatic and mill you to half dead on top of that, shoot Fanatic to your face.

This card is hi-larious in EDH (or Commander for you new-fangled players to the format). Everyone's decks are full of bombs, so you're either going to get something completely game-breaking of take away a good utility card.

And with a mana vault, you can do it turn 2.

Yes! Phage the untou . . . . . wait what!?

this card says 3BB: Target creatureless player loses.

Die Polymorph, Die.

Erik's Random card 6/26/2011
Originally this was an "exploding X" card. The set had a few X cards which gave a bonus when X>=5.

This was:

XU
Sorcery
Target opponent puts the top X cards of his or her library into his or her graveyard. If X was 5 or more, you may choose a creature card from among those cards and put it into play under your control.

The problem was that these are supposed to be OK if X =5. Spending 2 mana to mill a card, or 5 mana to mill 4 cards is just bad. On the other hand, the development team the effect. Some designers commented that this didn't feel black, or they hated bribery, but we liked the basic idea and wanted to fix it.

Our first attempt was:

5U
Sorcery
Target opponent puts the top 6 cards of his or her library into his or her graveyard. You may choose a creature card from among those cards and put it into play under your control.

This still wasn't so great. I loved Helm of Possession (from Alliances, and Master's Edition II), and talked about how I really like that Helm was actually great against creatureless decks. I used to sideboard Wall of Air into my counterposts decks, in part because people would bring in Helms (also people would sideboard out their creature removal, and their creatures were usually too small to get around the wall). Mike decided that was great; we should make the card really punish creatureless decks, and came up with the final wording:

3UU
Sorcery
Target opponent reveals cards from the top of his or her library until he or she reveals a creature card. Put that card into play under your control. The player puts all other cards revealed this way into his or her graveyard.

Sometimes when you develop a card, you find that the card is good, except the set mechanic is messing it up. Fortunately designers put their mechanics on too many cards, so it all works out :)

If you hate having friends, or feel like getting murdered in your sleep this week, this goes GREAT with Jace, the Mind Sculptor! =D

Absolutely wonderful with any sort of opponent deck control. I like it best with Second Sight. I was playing against an angel deck and stole Blazing Archon. It was a very satisfying moment.
But i don't think I'd like playing it as much without knowing what I might get.

At first my mind swirled around amazing combos that could be pulled off with this and a single copy of Laboratory Maniac. Find Laboratory Maniac, use something like Bant Charm to place him waaaay down under, then play this to get him out and Brainstorm for the win!!!

And then I read the card again. Target opponent...f@&$! ;_;

I kind of want to put this in a dedicated mill deck, but even against decks with relatively few creatures, this doesn't end up milling for all that much.

For example:

Against a deck that has 10 creatures, this will, on average, reduce the size of the library by 6.

In my opinion, this needs a little extra kick. Maybe make it mill 5 cards at the start of the effect.

This is very satisfying to use against creatureless decks ran by self-assured players who point out that all creatures can be killed by some spell or another.