This is an awesome card, great versatility since you can use it on one of your own creatures.
Shuya
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(3 votes)
This is such an awesome card. Like Bant Charm or Condemn it lets you send someone's General to their deck, but also gives you the option of sacking one of your own creatures to draw cards!
And if that wasn't enough, it says nonland permanent! That's right; shuffle any Planeswalker, Artifact, Enchantment, or just down right annoying creature creature right back into it's owner's deck. If your opponent's not running a lot of tutors you may not see it for the rest of the game.
Cheza
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.5/5.0)(3 votes)
QUOTE: >>> This seems way more Blue than White. <<<
I don't think so. This card is my best hope that white gains more draw spells (next to Survival Cache). In my opinion, draw is defensive, slow and random. And third one should make it obvious that it shouldn't be blue and give a hint, what is the right color.
Blue should rather have search spells (see Diabolic Tutor // Transmute). If blue is REALLY meant to be the control color, it should control what it is drawing. And search spells are the best way to control what you draw and what you have in your hand.
White on the other hand would profit from draw spells. Drawing means "wasting mana" to replace the card in your hand and have a random extra card. Therefore it is a peaceful, constructive, slow way to win the game on the long run.
If white would also have more cards like Prosperity or Rites of Flourishing, it could fulfill the "peaceful support" role in games with teammates. A Pursuit of Knowledge (renamed into Hope for Salvation) would be wonderful reprint for .
'White shouldn't get Draw' is a dumb argument. RED should get draw, but doesn't. Oh, not in the same league as anybody else, but Scry on Magma Jet was beautiful.
Magic is a game, and games work on resources. The Color Pie adds a lot of definition and balance to this game, but some things are just plain necessary to have, or you lose. Mana is #1, Cards are #2. Or the other way around. Either way, every color needs access to Mana and Cards or it loses.
No, not all 'draw spells' should be templated the way Blue ones are- but they should definitely be there, in every color. Squadron Hawk was an excercise in experimentation- turns out that's not the best execution of the idea for fairness, but the fundamental theory is sound: 'Card Advantage' is not 'Blue's Share of the Color Pie'. That would be the same thing as saying 'Winning' is 'Blue's Share of the Color Pie' (In the old Time Walk/Ancestral Recall days, it was. Do we really want that?)
sincleanser
★★☆☆☆ (2.9/5.0)(6 votes)
"I rated it a bit lower due to Color Pie strangeness."
If anything, a card should be rated HIGHER due to it's access in abilities out of it's normal color pie section.
NeoKoda
★★★☆☆ (3.9/5.0)(5 votes)
This seems way more Blue than White. But it is a pretty nice card. I rated it a bit lower due to Color Pie strangeness.
EDIT: Let me explain my controversial (apparently, it's rated five stars, yet two people disagree with me) comment. I rated it lower because I don't like color pie bleeds, I think it's poor design to allow two colors to do things equally well, except sparingly. However, I can't recall why I felt this was Blue. I support draw in all colors, but I think only Blue should get it straight up. So, to conclude, I rate cards not just on playability but design, and I now think this is White, since it pretty much banishes the creature, but makes amends. White likes to give stuff in return for your permanent (Path to Exile and Swords to Plowshares for outstanding examples).
About the "draw is random" type comments. Yeah, it is. Yes, it's Blue. Blue lives for knowledge and learning. When you research things, you don't JUST learn what you set out to. You get more than that, for example, if you researched bananas, then you'd learn about the climate of the countries in which they live. Blue can't tutor, but it can manipulate the draw. It can say "Hmm...out of this available material, (cards in the library reveal by Ponder, Preordain or the like) I want to study this (whatever card). But this seems interesting too, I should read that next." This differs from Black's tutoring because Black doesn't really want to learn. It wants to win. It doesn't care about the climate, it cares about bananas, because bananas will kill it's opponent, and empower Black. (Bananas work pretty poorly as an example here, I know.) Black only wants that which will help it directly, so it gets little draw. It does pay life for knowledge, however, because it doesn't really think of life as mattering very much, except that final point. So to Black, it's trading something of almost no value for something potentially helpful. Black drains life because it's selfish and it wants everything of yours for itself.
...I got a little off-topic, but still.
Goatllama
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(1 vote)
Don't listen to em' Neokoda, even the designers have expressed their distaste at the oddity of this card's ability.
srae
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
This is also a very good card to use in Commander to get rid of their general.
RakdosRiot
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Pretty good and always useful, but giving your opponent cards is usually a bad idea and easy to underestimate. I often make opponents draw something nasty with this.
Interesting quirk: Because of the effect order, this has a small chance of only bouncing the permanent! It's happened to me in Commander... Their shuffled general ended up topdeck and went right back into their hand with an extra card. D:
GordonFreechmen
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Well this is certainly a pretty useful card. And I don't feel as bad about using it. If I am going to tuck someones general, I don't want to completely screw them over. This does that. They get two cards. It's not the best trade, but at least they get something out of it. In EDH I like to be competitive, but I like to also end up liked. As politics unfortunately do play a part.
And Sincleanser. I do think that a card having abilities outside it's pool should be taken on an individual basis. If white gain something like lose two life and draw two cards. Or if Red got a straight up counter target spell card. Well that wouldn't really feel right, and I would probably consider rating it lower. This though is rather fitting, it is in a similar vein to Path. Where normally searching for a land isn't a white ability. So I consider it perfectly okay.
mdakw576
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
This is a deceptively powerful card. Tucking generals is one of the strongest things to do, but being able to hit basically anything at such a cheap mana cost is great.
car2n
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
Wow, I never realised how strong this card is! I'm totally going to stock up on these for my white assault decks.
Comments (12)
And if that wasn't enough, it says nonland permanent!
That's right; shuffle any Planeswalker, Artifact, Enchantment, or just down right annoying creature creature right back into it's owner's deck. If your opponent's not running a lot of tutors you may not see it for the rest of the game.
I don't think so. This card is my best hope that white gains more draw spells (next to Survival Cache). In my opinion, draw is defensive, slow and random. And third one should make it obvious that it shouldn't be blue and give a hint, what is the right color.
Blue should rather have search spells (see Diabolic Tutor // Transmute). If blue is REALLY meant to be the control color, it should control what it is drawing. And search spells are the best way to control what you draw and what you have in your hand.
White on the other hand would profit from draw spells. Drawing means "wasting mana" to replace the card in your hand and have a random extra card. Therefore it is a peaceful, constructive, slow way to win the game on the long run.
If white would also have more cards like Prosperity or Rites of Flourishing, it could fulfill the "peaceful support" role in games with teammates. A Pursuit of Knowledge (renamed into Hope for Salvation) would be wonderful reprint for
Last but not least, I would really like to see a white Overbeing of Myth or a knight version of Kiyomaro, First to Stand finally returning Empyrial Armor's ability to it's true home - white!
Magic is a game, and games work on resources. The Color Pie adds a lot of definition and balance to this game, but some things are just plain necessary to have, or you lose. Mana is #1, Cards are #2. Or the other way around. Either way, every color needs access to Mana and Cards or it loses.
No, not all 'draw spells' should be templated the way Blue ones are- but they should definitely be there, in every color. Squadron Hawk was an excercise in experimentation- turns out that's not the best execution of the idea for fairness, but the fundamental theory is sound: 'Card Advantage' is not 'Blue's Share of the Color Pie'. That would be the same thing as saying 'Winning' is 'Blue's Share of the Color Pie'
(In the old Time Walk/Ancestral Recall days, it was. Do we really want that?)
If anything, a card should be rated HIGHER due to it's access in abilities out of it's normal color pie section.
EDIT: Let me explain my controversial (apparently, it's rated five stars, yet two people disagree with me) comment. I rated it lower because I don't like color pie bleeds, I think it's poor design to allow two colors to do things equally well, except sparingly. However, I can't recall why I felt this was Blue. I support draw in all colors, but I think only Blue should get it straight up. So, to conclude, I rate cards not just on playability but design, and I now think this is White, since it pretty much banishes the creature, but makes amends. White likes to give stuff in return for your permanent (Path to Exile and Swords to Plowshares for outstanding examples).
About the "draw is random" type comments. Yeah, it is. Yes, it's Blue. Blue lives for knowledge and learning. When you research things, you don't JUST learn what you set out to. You get more than that, for example, if you researched bananas, then you'd learn about the climate of the countries in which they live. Blue can't tutor, but it can manipulate the draw. It can say "Hmm...out of this available material, (cards in the library reveal by Ponder, Preordain or the like) I want to study this (whatever card). But this seems interesting too, I should read that next." This differs from Black's tutoring because Black doesn't really want to learn. It wants to win. It doesn't care about the climate, it cares about bananas, because bananas will kill it's opponent, and empower Black. (Bananas work pretty poorly as an example here, I know.) Black only wants that which will help it directly, so it gets little draw. It does pay life for knowledge, however, because it doesn't really think of life as mattering very much, except that final point. So to Black, it's trading something of almost no value for something potentially helpful. Black drains life because it's selfish and it wants everything of yours for itself.
...I got a little off-topic, but still.
Interesting quirk: Because of the effect order, this has a small chance of only bouncing the permanent! It's happened to me in Commander... Their shuffled general ended up topdeck and went right back into their hand with an extra card. D:
And Sincleanser. I do think that a card having abilities outside it's pool should be taken on an individual basis. If white gain something like lose two life and draw two cards. Or if Red got a straight up counter target spell card. Well that wouldn't really feel right, and I would probably consider rating it lower. This though is rather fitting, it is in a similar vein to Path. Where normally searching for a land isn't a white ability. So I consider it perfectly okay.