Monday, April 14, 2014

Prophetic Flamespeaker: Playing vs. Casting

Wizards really can't win with the new mythic rare slot. People get outraged when the slot gets assigned these big sloppy monsters destined to never be played competitively. People get outraged when the slot receives a playable low-cost card everyone wants to own.

Prophetic Flamespeaker is one of those cards, at least to me, that looks unabashed and uncritically good. If he didn't have double strike, there would probably be a lot of talk right now about ways to give him double strike. And he would probably be pretty awesome even then. But he already has it.
There is seriously no work to be done. Everything you need comes right in the box, including the special cord you usually always need to buy because your computer lost the last format war.

But besides being good, he brings up the playing vs. casting issue.

Does it frustrate anyone else these two terms do not mean the same thing?

A while back when Theros block came out, left and right folks were trying to cast land using Daxos of Meletis. But you can't cast land. You can only play land.

It used to be, you played everything. I was a player of things. If I drew a card, sooner or later I would play it. That's just how I rolled.

But now, most of the time you are casting it. And no matter what anyone else tells you, you can cast a land. Because they aren't spells. Magic would probably be a lot simpler if they were. Because blue would just counter your land, you would die quicker, and we could all go home early.

This Flamespeaker guy even plays land. He plays it right on the table. Costs less than Countryside Crusher, and does more. I'm never going to own 1, let alone a set.

I'm noticing Daxos isn't really selling for a lot, so maybe I'm totally wrong. Although he has to PAY for things too, and doesn't have double strike. I've been wrong before. All I know is I'm old, I almost never play Magic anymore and this card looks amazing.

What would I do? I would make a shaman deck. Because it already has double strike!

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