Pointed Discussion

This new border makes me want to buy a new playset of this to replace the old one. I love this card so much.

I WANNA PLAY WITH MY ARTIFACTS :(.

You love it on your side, you despise it on the other. Is there any better sign of a solid card?

oh, how nice. why make me choose between naturalize and disenchant? I'd much rather just get 2 or 3 'kill target mean things' for free every turn in my zoo deck....I mean...wow. they made this? this is a thing? they did THAT? I used to think red was the best at breaking machines...guess not.

Wild Nacatl, Loam Lion, Kird Ape
Fauna Shaman, Stoneforge Mystic
Zendikar Fetches, Ravnica Duals
Aura Shards, Jitte or Sword of X and X
= deck.

This card's potentially explosive, and it has the potential to be hilarious fun in casual Dredge or Elves builds, but playtesting it in my Zoo sideboard (Legacy) never panned out. There's several advantages to boarding Krosan Grip instead:

Aura Shards needs to remain on the battlefield. It's vulnerable to an opponent's enchantment destruction, and it's visible on the table, so an opponent knows to anticipate it. This lets opponents play aggressively when you don't have Shards on the field, and play conservatively when you do.

Against the Painter's Servant + Grindstone combo, the opponent can respond to a Shards trigger by activating their grindstone.

Aura Shards is basically sorcery-speed unless you can play creatures as instants (maybe with Aluren?) Grip's split second prevents the opponent from comboing out in response to your destruction.

Example: I've played Shards vs. someone using Painter's Servant + Grindstone, vs. someone using Leyline of the Void + Helm of Obedience, and vs. various Dream Halls + Conflux builds. In all three cases, the opponent was able to save cards in hand, play lands and battlefield-cloggers and component-finder stuff like Ponder, then explosively play and activate their entire combo in one turn.

Krosan Grip destroys something on turn 3 (or sooner with Noble Hierarch or a mana-Elf), whereas Aura Shards is always one turn slower (unless you have a 0-cc creature to cast the same turn Shards enters play).

Krosan Grip doesn't require a splash of white. Sure, Zoo has Savannah and Plateau, but in games against anyone with Wasteland, Zoo wants to fetch basic lands. Needing to pull a Forest and a Plains is potentially more restrictive. (You need to draw two different fetchlands and/or draw the basic lands themselves.)

Shards can be countered, or the creature you play the following turn can be countered, with Force of Will / Daze / etc. Krosan Grip can't be countered (except maybe by Counterbalance, I guess). Even Mental Misstep can prevent nearly two-thirds of the creatures in a Zoo deck from entering play and triggering Shards. (Side note - Misstep also stops Nature's Claim.)

Shards has one obvious advantage over Grip; its ability can be triggered multiple times. However, in most cases, you only need to destroy one card of a combo deck in order to disrupt their strategy (and then you win by aggressively attacking and burning them out before they fetch the disrupted combo piece).
This means Shards' main advantage isn't much of a priority. Decks with Smokestack or Affinity creatures are an exception, but they're fringe cases not worth precious sideboard space (and Krosan Grip disrupts them too).

Aura Shards is slowed by Thorn of Amethyst and neutered by Torpor Orb. Okay, that's not a particularly important reason... :)

Liquimetal Coating

@Salient

This card pops up on our multiplayer table and it is amazing. You've misunderstood this card to an amazing extent.

First of all, it has card efficiency which is incredibly important in multiplayer--reusing it to get 2 or more of your opponent's cards is very strong.

Secondly, this is not even close to being sorcery speed limited. One of my favorite combos (to hate) is playing this in a strong token deck. A Ghave, Guru of Spores commander can essentially disenchant for 2 mana, and that cost can be reduced or effect increased.

Doubling Season, Earthcraft, Liquimetal Coating, Twilight Drover... any token cards, any activated abilities that play creatures, Vedalken Orrery. It is too easy to combo this card. It can be protected with, eg, Greater Auramancy or Indestructibility. Multiplayer dynamics mean some other players will benefit from it being in play for a while and will leave it alone or even protect it for you.

Worst case, you should be able to get at least one trigger from it or you're almost certainly at fault. For one trigger, it is a bit expensive, but beyond that, it becomes great and can quickly lock down many games.

opalescence? with enchanted evening

This card completely hoses several styles of play, at just three mana and uncommon. It'd be more excusable if it were a creature, but not every color can deal with enchantments. A powerful card, but not a good one.

A good card makes your opponent say "This will be tricky. How will I beat it?" A bad card makes your opponent say "This game will be boring and one-sided, there's no point in even finishing."

It's counter-intuitive for a Magic card to make people not want to play Magic.

this + Mystic Snake most hilarious sh!t EVER!

This is killer against a deck that has no response.

I once got this out with a token deck against an artifact deck.

I've never felt like such an absolute monster in my life. He even had artifact lands out and I had to go for them due to lack of other targets.

I'm not a fan of it personally. You have to get rid of it fast or you're not going to be able to throw down any artifacts whatsoever, and an aura deck is equally doomed (though arguably more likely to have enchantment removal since white or green tends to show up). Cards that can dominate the board and are difficult to remove kind of aren't fun.

in EDH, some of the most powerful engines are artifacts and enchantments. If you build your deck even slightly around aura shards, this card literally says "only my engine cards stay in play".

This card + Mycosynth Lattice + Shrine of Loyal Legions.

Play the Shrine turn two (or one I'd you're equipped), ramp to six for the Lattice then drop this and sac your shrine...take that you dirty commies!

Over the top in any EDH deck that uses it. I tried it in Derevi and developed PTSD.
I killed a lot of people that day.

In a Commander tournament I was facing an Animar deck that used mostly artifact creatures. I got this out T3 in a Ghave deck and proceeded to wreck their face. They were mana screwed most of the game, so they couldn't get their commander out. I felt evil in a way but it was also really fun just sitting back and waiting to win.