Pointed Discussion

I saw a 1-drop skeleton and got really excited. Then I saw his ability, and I shook my fist with such conviction Mark Rosewater stirred from his slumber and said, "Suck it, skeleton tribal!" before rolling back over and going back to sleep.

Sick art, though. I'll get one in foil since it'll only be 15 cents anyway.

This isn't good in Standard, this isn't good in Limited. You'd think it might be and I can appreciate that. But three mana to regenerate your 1/1 just isn't going to be doing much for you. And if you have that kind of mana to spend on regenerating this little guy, it's likely you don't have much else to cast so you're probably going to lose anyhow. On a related note, I wonder why there haven't been any zero-mana regeneration costs on a creature yet.

Theoretically: play it on turn one, attack a few times if you are lucky, have it lying around until late game, and use it as a blocker or durable target for enchantments or whatnot.

All in all it pretty much sucks though. A 1/1 without powerful abilities will rarely matter, and the regeneration ability is very expensive.

@Eternal_Blue: Clergy of the Holy Nimbus

The difference between 2 mana and 3 mana for regeneration is just too big...

Right, I forgot: Dutiful Thrull broke the metagame in ways you couldn't imagine.

The regeneration is still more competitively costed than Selesnya Sentry...

If you want a Regenerating skeleton for one mana, look no further than Rimebound Dead (just make sure that you have enough Snow lands). This guy is a poor substitute.

I've played with Augur of Skulls a lot in pauper and the grindy games where you have to pay 2 mana to regenerate him really limits your resources beyond just brickwalling an opponent. Regenerate for 3 is worse, and you should feel bad for even playing this guy in limited.

I'd personally like to see a one mana regenerator with a small life cost to regenerate, one or two life. It presents interesting play, without dragging the game to a halt.

When is Wizards going to give us decent skeletons to create a decent skeleton tribal?

@Eternal_Blue:
Also, Mossbridge Troll

A vanilla 1/1? I thought Wizards stopped making those.

I dunno, I can think of many worse options than this card. It's a 1/1 for 1, gives 1 devotion, not a bad turn 1 play if you don't grab a thoughtseize, can act as a mediocre defender if you have excess mana, and otherwise acts as a decent devotion enabler. I don't think it's GOOD good, but it's definitely not as bad as everyone makes it sound. I've used it quite a bit in my mono-black devotion and it's served me pretty well as a budget card.

comboes with devotion to black, bestow effects, enchantments.

Definitely a playable, but not a first choice. He protects you from cards like Bronze Sable, and is a nice target for an ordeal.

Not really strong enough to put into an aggressive standard deck but if you do, here are your benefits:
1. you are putting a permanent on the board turn 1 rather than thoughtseizing/duressing. This is good against aggressive decks who don't really care if you know their hand or discard anything.
2. nobody knows what you are doing, so it will likely eat a removal faster than a pack rat would against a bad player.
3. he provides devotion to black, and is essentially indestructible in terms of experienced people are not going to bother targetting him alone.
4. starting on turn 4, he can start being a good target to enchant, put tokens on, as few want to spend two kill spells or an exile spell on this dreg.

All in all, he is basically a crippled monoblack lotleth troll that can be played turn 1, and unable to grow by himself. If he lives to midgame, he can be a reliable target for growth effects.

It's a card without a drawback, and that's hard to say for many cards nowadays.