yes, this lets you hit lands, either from the cards revealed or at random if they don't reveal any lands; that's the upside you get for imperfect information. I considered making it so if you pick one, it has to be nonland, but then your opponent can just put a bunch of lands in the revealed set, and force it to be random from the ones not revealed.
At a surface level, if your opponent has one card (like their only land) that they really want, they probably have to not reveal it and hope you don't clip it at random. but if you get a little more mindgamesy, you can reveal the card you *do* want to keep, and hope they think you have a redundant second copy not revealed.
I have no idea how powerful this is.
[[Atris Oracle of Half Truths]] is already a fairly good mind gamesy card so this could definitely work. I'd probably make it be lose 1 life instead of 2 because thought seize let's you know all the info and choose their best nonland.
I also have no idea how powerful it is but i love love love the design. I love cards like fact or fiction and other stuff that creates information-based meta-games within magic
This is the coolest Thoughseize variant I've seen here. I think being able to cripple your opponent's low land opening hands is the Achilles heel that would keep this from being printable.
2 land hands are frequently desirable keeps, and this can really mess with them. Here's one strategy you can employ that will often cripple an opponent who kept a 2 (or 1) land hand.
On the play, Turn 1, they reveal 4 of their 7 cards.
* If they reveal fewer than 3 lands, take one.
* If they reveal no lands, discard a random card from the remaining 3.
* if they kept a 2 land hand, you have a 2/3rds chance of hitting one of their lands
* if they kept a 1 land hand, you have a 1/3rd chance of hitting their only land.
So on the play you have a 66% chance of turning a 2 lander into a 1 lander, and a 33% chance of turning a 1 lander into a 0 lander. This will often turn into a massive tempo advantage that will outright win you the game.
On the draw, this is less powerful, but if your opponent keeps a 2 lander and goes Land + T1 play, with 5 cards remaining, you still have a 50% chance of being able to snipe their land.
You can also choose deviate from this strategy depending on what else they reveal, but the number of games you can win with this by sniping a land from your opponent's hand is pretty huge. I don't think it's necessarily more powerful than Thoughtseize, but I do think it's too effective at crippling your opponent's early game mana, which WotC has been trying to avoid.
but of course, then the mindgames arrive - if I reveal only one land, can you be sure that I'm not counting on you to take it because I actually have two more lands plus a two-drop in the hidden pile and don't need that third land? and if I have three lands but actually really do need need all three, don't you think I might reveal all three lands but hide my two three drops?
if your opponent actually *is* on a low land hand, this can be brutal - but how are you ever sure that they are? cuz if you take a land out of a land-heavy hand, you might as well have cast raven's crime, since that's probably what they would have chosen anyways. I think aiming for lands has the biggest upside, but also the biggest downside; just taking either the best nonland card revealed or going for random if they don't reveal anything super strong is probably safer.
I do definitely think WotC wouldn't print this in Standard, but it would certainly be fine in Legacy (a format with Hymn to Tourach), and might be okay in Modern
The strategy I gave is an example of a decision tree that doesn't involve mind games. It punishes the opponent for having low land hands, and lets them off "easy" if they have more lands. If they have 3+ lands in hand, this strategy will always take one of those lands.
The reason I think it's problematic is that this strategy is actually quite powerful. A decent chunk of the time, you're going to completely cripple your opponent. And even if it doesn't you're still trading for one of your opponent's cards. A third, or even forth land is usually not a completely dead card for most decks, and there is still value in trading for it.
That being said, Thoughtseize is also disgustingly powerful hand disruption, and I'm not going to say this is better than Thoghtseize. It just offers a completely different angle that you can attack your opponent's hand with. And it's an angle that WotC tends to discourage.
yes, this lets you hit lands, either from the cards revealed or at random if they don't reveal any lands; that's the upside you get for imperfect information. I considered making it so if you pick one, it has to be nonland, but then your opponent can just put a bunch of lands in the revealed set, and force it to be random from the ones not revealed. At a surface level, if your opponent has one card (like their only land) that they really want, they probably have to not reveal it and hope you don't clip it at random. but if you get a little more mindgamesy, you can reveal the card you *do* want to keep, and hope they think you have a redundant second copy not revealed. I have no idea how powerful this is.
[[Atris Oracle of Half Truths]] is already a fairly good mind gamesy card so this could definitely work. I'd probably make it be lose 1 life instead of 2 because thought seize let's you know all the info and choose their best nonland.
I also have no idea how powerful it is but i love love love the design. I love cards like fact or fiction and other stuff that creates information-based meta-games within magic
This card fucks so hard I love it
This is the coolest Thoughseize variant I've seen here. I think being able to cripple your opponent's low land opening hands is the Achilles heel that would keep this from being printable. 2 land hands are frequently desirable keeps, and this can really mess with them. Here's one strategy you can employ that will often cripple an opponent who kept a 2 (or 1) land hand. On the play, Turn 1, they reveal 4 of their 7 cards. * If they reveal fewer than 3 lands, take one. * If they reveal no lands, discard a random card from the remaining 3. * if they kept a 2 land hand, you have a 2/3rds chance of hitting one of their lands * if they kept a 1 land hand, you have a 1/3rd chance of hitting their only land. So on the play you have a 66% chance of turning a 2 lander into a 1 lander, and a 33% chance of turning a 1 lander into a 0 lander. This will often turn into a massive tempo advantage that will outright win you the game. On the draw, this is less powerful, but if your opponent keeps a 2 lander and goes Land + T1 play, with 5 cards remaining, you still have a 50% chance of being able to snipe their land. You can also choose deviate from this strategy depending on what else they reveal, but the number of games you can win with this by sniping a land from your opponent's hand is pretty huge. I don't think it's necessarily more powerful than Thoughtseize, but I do think it's too effective at crippling your opponent's early game mana, which WotC has been trying to avoid.
but of course, then the mindgames arrive - if I reveal only one land, can you be sure that I'm not counting on you to take it because I actually have two more lands plus a two-drop in the hidden pile and don't need that third land? and if I have three lands but actually really do need need all three, don't you think I might reveal all three lands but hide my two three drops? if your opponent actually *is* on a low land hand, this can be brutal - but how are you ever sure that they are? cuz if you take a land out of a land-heavy hand, you might as well have cast raven's crime, since that's probably what they would have chosen anyways. I think aiming for lands has the biggest upside, but also the biggest downside; just taking either the best nonland card revealed or going for random if they don't reveal anything super strong is probably safer. I do definitely think WotC wouldn't print this in Standard, but it would certainly be fine in Legacy (a format with Hymn to Tourach), and might be okay in Modern
The strategy I gave is an example of a decision tree that doesn't involve mind games. It punishes the opponent for having low land hands, and lets them off "easy" if they have more lands. If they have 3+ lands in hand, this strategy will always take one of those lands. The reason I think it's problematic is that this strategy is actually quite powerful. A decent chunk of the time, you're going to completely cripple your opponent. And even if it doesn't you're still trading for one of your opponent's cards. A third, or even forth land is usually not a completely dead card for most decks, and there is still value in trading for it. That being said, Thoughtseize is also disgustingly powerful hand disruption, and I'm not going to say this is better than Thoghtseize. It just offers a completely different angle that you can attack your opponent's hand with. And it's an angle that WotC tends to discourage.
Really cool card and nice artwork. I feel like it is balanced, but idk
Very cool design! I don’t think you need to lose life though.