It's always fun to see a red counterspell. Mages' Contest was great (fun), too.
@ZEvilMustache: If by "forced" you mean "forced choice," then yes, the cycle felt forced.
scumbling1
★☆☆☆☆ (1.3/5.0)(3 votes)
Red still falls short of the critical threshold of counterspells to make a 'draw go' deck. Unitl a time where one can assemble such a thing, Molten Influence is pretty much useless.
Once someone can make a red permission deck, Molten Influence will still be a bad card, though. The opponent will always opt to take the damage until it would kill them. Control decks don't put pressure on an opponent's life total until they are ready to tackle the whole amount with a single creature or combo -- they don't piece together twenty damage opportunisitically. Therefore, Molten Influence will never work in a way that's beneficial to it's caster.
Drewsel
★★★☆☆ (3.8/5.0)(3 votes)
Haters gonna hate. This card is awesome. It will always work no matter what, because your opponent is never smarter than you.
BlackAlbino
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.5/5.0)(1 vote)
it's either 4 damage for or a red counterspell. a RED counterspell, why isnt this not at 4+ stars for giving mono-color red some lolz?
ZestuXIII
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(2 votes)
@Drewsel: "The fatal flaw in every plan is the assumption that you know more than your enemy" -flavor text from Mana Leak
uncleistvan1111
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
I think people are being unbelievably generous with this card. This card is strictly worse than a card which did 4 to a player for 1R, and that would obviously not be worth writing home about. The only time this will ever counter a spell will be when it'd be better to simply do 4 damage. Ineffective in every capacity.
majinara
★★★★★ (5.0/5.0)(3 votes)
It's bad for the same reasons as dash hopes.
This is like a burn spell, that will never kill a player. When a player is at four life or something, they will let you just counter the spell. Any other burn spell might kill them, but this one won't.
And it's like a counterspell, that will never counter their really important spells. The oppponent is about the assemble his winning combo in some combo deck? What does he care about being dealt four damage? If the spell resolves, he wins.
It also doesn't fit into any strategy except "random junk deck". In a burn or aggro deck, you don't want to keep mana open to wait for an opponent to maybe play an instant or sorcery that is important enough to have your opponent be dealt four damage. And in a control deck, you want to be able to control what your opponent is doing. This won't let you do that.
It's like a lightning bolt, that deals 1 more damage, but can't kill creatures, can't kill players, can only be played in response to instants and sorcery. That deals damage when you don't want it to, and counters when you don't want it to.
endersblade
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
I have a casual deck that I use this in. It's basically nothing but counterspells and burn spells. Very basic, I know. It takes the place of two cards - a burn spell and a counterspell. When running two colors that are good at doing one of the other, it's always nice to save space where you can. Quite obviously, either your opponent takes 4, or you counter his spell. Simple. Sure, people always rally behind 'but giving your opponent a choice sucks!', but I actually find it rather tormenting :-)
If they take the damage, they are that much closer to to dying. If you counter the spell instead, you're one more spell away from death. Obviously you wouldn't hold out with this spell and try to counter something at some critical point in the game, where they will just take the damage and kill you that turn. If you do that, you are a retarded magic player and I feel bad for whoever plays against you. You play this on something that might not be much of a threat. THAT is when the choice matters.
LordRandomness
☆☆☆☆☆ (0.0/5.0)
There's a big difference between this and Dash Hopes: This is red. You can cast it on a powerful spell with enough burn to surprise kill them if they take the damage, which isn't that unlikely in a burn deck. Then you either win or they lose their important spell, and you'd be surprised how often you get the "win" outcome from that.
Basically: Giving the opponent choices is often bad, but forcing the opponent to make choices with incomplete information can be a viable tactic if you're good at bluffing.
Comments (13)
@ZEvilMustache: If by "forced" you mean "forced choice," then yes, the cycle felt forced.
Once someone can make a red permission deck, Molten Influence will still be a bad card, though. The opponent will always opt to take the damage until it would kill them. Control decks don't put pressure on an opponent's life total until they are ready to tackle the whole amount with a single creature or combo -- they don't piece together twenty damage opportunisitically. Therefore, Molten Influence will never work in a way that's beneficial to it's caster.
-flavor text from Mana Leak
This is like a burn spell, that will never kill a player. When a player is at four life or something, they will let you just counter the spell. Any other burn spell might kill them, but this one won't.
And it's like a counterspell, that will never counter their really important spells. The oppponent is about the assemble his winning combo in some combo deck? What does he care about being dealt four damage? If the spell resolves, he wins.
It also doesn't fit into any strategy except "random junk deck". In a burn or aggro deck, you don't want to keep mana open to wait for an opponent to maybe play an instant or sorcery that is important enough to have your opponent be dealt four damage. And in a control deck, you want to be able to control what your opponent is doing. This won't let you do that.
It's like a lightning bolt, that deals 1 more damage, but can't kill creatures, can't kill players, can only be played in response to instants and sorcery. That deals damage when you don't want it to, and counters when you don't want it to.
If they take the damage, they are that much closer to to dying. If you counter the spell instead, you're one more spell away from death. Obviously you wouldn't hold out with this spell and try to counter something at some critical point in the game, where they will just take the damage and kill you that turn. If you do that, you are a retarded magic player and I feel bad for whoever plays against you. You play this on something that might not be much of a threat. THAT is when the choice matters.
Basically: Giving the opponent choices is often bad, but forcing the opponent to make choices with incomplete information can be a viable tactic if you're good at bluffing.