Hall of Shame Nominations: Tempest

[BigBlue]

Seeing as this set should be fresh on ByoS players minds...

Abandon Hope
Advance Scout
Aftershock
Altar of Dementia
Aluren
Ancient Runes
Ancient Tomb
Angelic Protector
Anoint
Apes of Rath
Apocalypse
Armor Sliver
Armored Pegasus
Auratog
Avenging Angel
Barbed Sliver
Bayou Dragonfly
Bellowing Fiend
Benthic Behemoth
Blood Frenzy
Blood Pet
Boil
Booby Trap
Bottle Gnomes
Bounty Hunter
Broken Fall
Caldera Lake
Canopy Spider
Canyon Drake
Canyon Wildcat
Capsize
Carrionette
Chaotic Goo
Charging Rhino
Chill
Choke
Cinder Marsh
Circle of Protection: Black
Circle of Protection: Blue
Circle of Protection: Green
Circle of Protection: Red
Circle of Protection: Shadow
Circle of Protection: White
Clergy en-Vec
Clot Sliver
Cloudchaser Eagle
Coercion
Coffin Queen
Coiled Tinviper
Cold Storage
Commander Greven il-Vec
Corpse Dance
Counterspell
Crazed Armodon
Crown of Flames
Cursed Scroll
Dark Banishing
Dark Ritual
Darkling Stalker
Dauthi Embrace
Dauthi Ghoul
Dauthi Horror
Dauthi Marauder
Dauthi Mercenary
Dauthi Mindripper
Dauthi Slayer
Deadshot
Death Pits of Rath
Diabolic Edict
Dirtcowl Wurm
Disenchant
Dismiss
Disturbed Burial
Dracoplasm
Dread of Night
Dream Cache
Dregs of Sorrow
Duplicity
Earthcraft
Echo Chamber
Eladamri, Lord of Leaves
Eladamri's Vineyard
Elite Javelineer
Elven Warhounds
Elvish Fury
Emerald Medallion
Emmessi Tome
Endless Scream
Energizer
Enfeeblement
Enraging Licid
Ertai's Meddling
Escaped Shapeshifter
Essence Bottle
Evincar's Justice
Excavator
Extinction
Fevered Convulsions
Field of Souls
Fighting Drake
Firefly
Fireslinger
Flailing Drake
Flickering Ward
Flowstone Giant
Flowstone Salamander
Flowstone Sculpture
Flowstone Wyvern
Fool's Tome
Frog Tongue
Fugitive Druid
Furnace of Rath
Fylamarid
Gallantry
Gaseous Form
Gerrard's Battle Cry
Ghost Town
Giant Crab
Giant Strength
Goblin Bombardment
Gravedigger
Grindstone
Hand to Hand
Hanna's Custody
Harrow
Havoc
Heart Sliver
Heartwood Dryad
Heartwood Giant
Heartwood Treefolk
Helm of Possession
Hero's Resolve
Horned Sliver
Horned Turtle
Humility
Imps' Taunt
Insight
Interdict
Intuition
Invulnerability
Jackal Pup
Jet Medallion
Jinxed Idol
Kezzerdrix
Kindle
Knight of Dawn
Knight of Dusk
Krakilin
Leeching Licid
Legacy's Allure
Legerdemain
Light of Day
Lightning Blast
Lightning Elemental
Living Death
Lobotomy
Lotus Petal
Lowland Giant
Maddening Imp
Magmasaur
Magnetic Web
Mana Severance
Manakin
Manta Riders
Marble Titan
Marsh Lurker
Master Decoy
Mawcor
Maze of Shadows
Meditate
Metallic Sliver
Mindwhip Sliver
Minion of the Wastes
Mirri's Guile
Mnemonic Sliver
Mogg Cannon
Mogg Conscripts
Mogg Fanatic
Mogg Hollows
Mogg Raider
Mogg Squad
Mongrel Pack
Mounted Archers
Muscle Sliver
Natural Spring
Nature's Revolt
Needle Storm
No Quarter
Nurturing Licid
Opportunist
Oracle en-Vec
Orim, Samite Healer
Orim's Prayer
Overrun
Pacifism
Pallimud
Patchwork Gnomes
Pearl Medallion
Pegasus Refuge
Perish
Phyrexian Grimoire
Phyrexian Hulk
Phyrexian Splicer
Pincher Beetles
Pine Barrens
Pit Imp
Power Sink
Precognition
Propaganda
Puppet Strings
Quickening Licid
Rain of Tears
Rampant Growth
Ranger en-Vec
Rathi Dragon
Rats of Rath
Reality Anchor
Reanimate
Reap
Reckless Spite
Recycle
Reflecting Pool
Renegade Warlord
Repentance
Respite
Rolling Thunder
Root Maze
Rootbreaker Wurm
Rootwalla
Rootwater Depths
Rootwater Diver
Rootwater Hunter
Rootwater Matriarch
Rootwater Shaman
Ruby Medallion
Sacred Guide
Sadistic Glee
Safeguard
Salt Flats
Sandstone Warrior
Sapphire Medallion
Sarcomancy
Scabland
Scalding Tongs
Scorched Earth
Scragnoth
Screeching Harpy
Scroll Rack
Sea Monster
Searing Touch
Seeker of Skybreak
Segmented Wurm
Selenia, Dark Angel
Serene Offering
Servant of Volrath
Shadow Rift
Shadowstorm
Shatter
Shimmering Wings
Shocker
Sky Spirit
Skyshroud Condor
Skyshroud Elf
Skyshroud Forest
Skyshroud Ranger
Skyshroud Troll
Skyshroud Vampire
Soltari Crusader
Soltari Emissary
Soltari Foot Soldier
Soltari Guerrillas
Soltari Lancer
Soltari Monk
Soltari Priest
Soltari Trooper
Souldrinker
Spell Blast
Spike Drone
Spinal Graft
Spirit Mirror
Spontaneous Combustion
Squee's Toy
Stalking Stones
Starke of Rath
Static Orb
Staunch Defenders
Steal Enchantment
Stinging Licid
Stone Rain
Storm Front
Stun
Sudden Impact
Tahngarth's Rage
Talon Sliver
Telethopter
Thalakos Dreamsower
Thalakos Lowlands
Thalakos Mistfolk
Thalakos Seer
Thalakos Sentry
Thumbscrews
Time Ebb
Time Warp
Tooth and Claw
Torture Chamber
Tradewind Rider
Trained Armodon
Tranquility
Trumpeting Armodon
Twitch
Unstable Shapeshifter
Vec Townships
Verdant Force
Verdigris
Vhati il-Dal
Volrath's Curse
Wall of Diffusion
Warmth
Wasteland
Watchdog
Whim of Volrath
Whispers of the Muse
Wild Wurm
Wind Dancer
Wind Drake
Winds of Rath
Winged Sliver
Winter's Grasp
Wood Sage
Worthy Cause


Let's go through April Fools Day for nominations.

 

[BigBlue]

Boy, this is a tough nomination... By the time Tempest rolled around they had started making pretty decent cards...

I'm going to go with Torture Chamber - If you want to kill a 1/1 every turn, it's adequate...

Otherwise, you're taking damage to have it sit around with pain counters.

I almost went with Kezzerdrix - but with White, you can negate the damage w/ a Spirit Link rather nicely...

 

[Ransac]

Starke of Rath is pretty bad. I remember pulling him a few times and being very upset. Sure, he can kill creatures and artifacts, if you use him, then you've paid the mana to give your opponent to do the same thing. Pretty bad by my standard.


Ransac, cpa trash man

 

[Shabbaman]

Mogg Squad is pretty terrible. You can't play it in a deck with creatures or against a deck with creatures. You can only play it in a control deck against another control deck, but in that case it's in the wrong color. And it lacks evasion or any other useful ability, so even for a control deck it's a poor choice.

 

[Melkor]

Actually, several good options in my opinion, a lot of them Red

 

[Oversoul]

BigBlue brought up Torture Chamber, which I forgot about because it really is pretty bad. You don't need to be killing 1/1's with it, though. If your opponent it playing Dauthi creatures, being able to cheaply and repeatedly take them out is really helpful. I'd prefer other cards to do it, but since those guys often have a toughness of two or less, Torture Chamber works. I don't understand why this card needs to damage you. It seems like it would be a semi-viable and ultimately forgettable card even if the counters never hurt you.

Starke doesn't strike me as bad at all. Sure if you and your opponent play a game of send him back and forth, it's killing equal amounts of your stuff and his stuff, but that would be dumb. Many opponents would never want to use Starke in the first place, because their own creatures are too valuable. So they're stuck with a chump blocker or something and you got to destroy their most threatening artifact or creature. You could also kill him after passing him, preferably using something that doesn't give you card disadvantage, which red can totally do, but even if you waste a spell killing him, you still got a nice targeted removal out of the deal. Not amazing, but not the worst card in the set either.

Mogg Squad is a great nomination. It's a 0/0 creature in any realistic situation, making it arguably worse than Wood Elemental (but at least it doesn't kill your lands).

I thought about some other really bad cards in this set. Segmented Wurm is a 5/5 for 3RG and your opponent can easily make it smaller just by targeting it. In contrast, Shivan Wurm costs the same, is a 7/7 trampler with gating as the only drawback, and gating is usually exploited so that it's actually to your advantage. That, gentlemen, is how you do a red/green creature. I don't know what they were thinking with Segmented Wurm.

Excavator can make a creature temporarily unblockable, which seems nice, but you lose a land and your opponent has to be using that same type of land. Simply not worth it.

In the past, I have on occasion used the card Catalog. It's mediocre. I've never thought to myself, "if only I had a reusable version for a bit more mana." If I had, I would probably have thought that making an artifact version cost more than 3 would make it too crappy to use and making its activated ability cost more than 3 (in addition to tapping) would be out of the question. Behold: Emmessi Tome. 4 mana to play and 5 mana (in addition to tapping) for its activated ability. Sorry, but I don't hate myself enough to ever use this in any format.

But I don't think any of those cards are quite as bad as Mogg Squad. Even if they were, Mogg Squad gets bonus points for being such a slap in the face. It's a goblin, making it associated with decks that play several creatures. It's a 3/3 for 1R, just like Mogg Flunkies, which goblin decks love. But it requires you not to use other creatures, because even two other creatures in play make it a regular old 1/1. And you can't use it like Steel Golem because if your opponent uses creatures, it still dies or shrinks down to worthlessness. Mogg Squad is a card that pretends it could be good, then blocks off all possible options to ever using it in a deck.

I do think there is one card in this set that can rival Mogg Squad for sheer disappointment, and so I nominate Duplicity. I love Parallel Thoughts. And before I ever discovered it, I used the inferior artifact version, Mangara's Tome, all the time. Duplicity manages to look like it's in the same category as those cards, but taunts you at every turn. It only gets the top five cards of your library, so you're not choosing anything. Well, that's bad. Wait, there's more. You don't get to look at the cards. They're face-down. They could be absolutely useless for your purposes, but you have no way of knowing. You have to wait until your upkeep to switch your hand with the cards under Duplicity. No emptying your hand and then getting a new one right away like you might with Memory Jar. You have to wait until your upkeep. And then for some reason, regardless of whether you make this ill-advised switch, you're discarding a card from your hand at the end of your turn. Why? That last one just kills me. At the very least you could play this expensive enchantment and leave it alone until you feel like using it, but now if you do that, your hand it bleeding cards as long as Duplicity is in play. Why would they take such a cool concept and bog it down with stipulations until it's useless?

 

[BigBlue]

I think the answer to that lies in playtesting.

When they originate a card - it doesn't have all these wierd drawbacks. But, if someone breaks it while playtesting it - I think that's when they start turning it into a bad card...

That said... How do cards like Masticore NOT end up with worse drawbacks?

 

[Melkor]

I really hate Deadshot and Thumbscrews. They both kill me as Rares. I just wish Deadshot could have been an instant, would it really have been so overpowered? It would still be unusable in Constructed but at least it would be semi-Rare level in limited. I think I will nominate Thumbscrews though. It just doesn't really do anything. It doesn't go in any decks. It doesn't do something weird that just ends up not working. It is just weak and it was weak when they made it and it can never become anything but weak.

 

[BigBlue]

Last Call...

So far we have:

Duplicity - Oversoul
Mogg Squad - Shabbaman
Starke of Rath - Ransac
Thumbscrews - Melkor
Torture Chamber - BigBlue

 

[Spiderman]

I've gotta say, I think Tempest is one of my favorite sets - it's just pretty well-balanced and has lots of good spells and creatures and stuff. So I can't really see a Hall of Shame card in here for me...

 

[Melkor]

Really? I like Tempest but I think there are several really bad Rares and I remember getting several of them in packs back when I was still buying cards.

 

[Oversoul]

Yeah, Tempest is a great set and one of my favorites, no doubt. But it has some absolute junk.

 

[Spiderman]

<shrug> I just glanced through the rares. None are absolute junk; all have a niche where a deck can be built around them. None are absolutely *totally* useless, as in deserving of a "Hall of Shame".

 

[Oversoul]

I find Duplicity unplayable. I know I also found Malignant Growth to be even worse and BigBlue disagreed. Whatever. You wouldn't use it in a deck.

So from you're saying, you ignored what should probably be the front-runner because it's not a rare? Or do you think Mogg Squad is also a niche card? I mean, if you have some argument that Mogg Squad fits into some deck, please tell us. I was considering voting for it instead of my own nomination, but if someone has ever actually used Mogg Squad successfully, I want to know about it.

 

[Spiderman]

With Duplicity, I can see it being used as a way to replace your hand - you just need that artifact that lets you sac one of your permanents to get rid of Duplicity right after.

Or if you have an infinite combo and you got your deck down to the necessary cards (perhaps with that deck-thinning spell(s)), you can draw into it.

It's not unplayable. You probably aren't using your imagination.

Malignant Growth - you just prevent the dmg in some way to yourself and use either Black Vise type effects or Sudden Impact effects to hurt your opponent. And maybe "play-one-spell-a-turn" so he can't take advantage of the extra cards while you use Seismic Assault-type effects (or discard cards for effects) to help you get around it. And/or reanimator.

Mogg Squad is a niche card; you just play creature-removal to make sure it's the only creature. If you want to know who's used it successfully, you'll probably do better asking on a site with more than 10 active members.

So no, I'm not ignoring the "front-runner" because it's not a rare. I'm saying none are really Hall of Shame worthy. I guess it's a good thing you're not in charge though, because obviously those three would be already in.

 

[BigBlue]

To me, the only card with a bad enough drawback for inclusion is my own nomination...

Goblin decks have uses for 3/3 fast played creatures they can sacrifice if need be... Plus it's only an uncommon and to me, I'm all about shameful cards are crap rares... When you open a pack and you're disappointed because the rare sucked... If you open a pack of Tempest and got a Rathi Dragon, you wouldn't care if it had 3 mogg squads for uncommons...

Duplicity is fine in a deck where you want to discard - or you don't care if stuff is in your GY - like a reanimator deck... or a madness deck... Yeah, it's pretty expensive for those 5 cards... but it isn't "horrible".

 

[Melkor]

It has gotten a little contentious I must say. I am in %100 agreement with BigBlue, the rare makes the pack. I think Tempest had several rares that were obviously bad rares to begin with and didn't have sort of interesting effects that you could go casual with. They were just bad and that kills me because it is a true failure of design.

Anyway, I stand by my nomination. It is just ridiculously underpowered but it also doesn't have any ins and outs to exploit. It can only go in very few (read no) decks. Just a bad card that will never be anything but. At least with some of the other cards you can concoct a scenario where you get something good, Thumbscews best case scenario is 1 damage to your opponent a turn. Now there is a clock.

 

[Spiderman]

Hey, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying they're the best cards or even average cards. They're situational/specialized cards. But none are truly the "worst of the worst", i.e. Hall of Shame worthy, IMO.

 

[Oversoul]

With Duplicity, I can see it being used as a way to replace your hand - you just need that artifact that lets you sac one of your permanents to get rid of Duplicity right after.

It costs five mana. It gets five cards. You have to wait until your next upkeep. Sacrificing it to Claws of Gix would get rid of the annoying drawback, but you'd still be using a two card combo to not even really refill your hand.

Or if you have an infinite combo and you got your deck down to the necessary cards (perhaps with that deck-thinning spell(s)), you can draw into it.

Huh?

It's not unplayable. You probably aren't using your imagination.

I'm not pretending a terrible card is a good one.

Malignant Growth - you just prevent the dmg in some way to yourself and use either Black Vise type effects or Sudden Impact effects to hurt your opponent. And maybe "play-one-spell-a-turn" so he can't take advantage of the extra cards while you use Seismic Assault-type effects (or discard cards for effects) to help you get around it. And/or reanimator.

Malignant Growth doesn't damage you. It makes you pay for your opponent to draw cards. And yes, we can put on our imagination hats and imagine a scenario in which we've locked our opponent down and have plenty of spare mana and Malignant Growth is actually hurting him. In that situation, we should already win even without the card, so it's superfluous, just like in the scenario you're describing.

Mogg Squad is a niche card; you just play creature-removal to make sure it's the only creature.

And then your opponent plays another creature and you've got a 2/2?

If you want to know who's used it successfully, you'll probably do better asking on a site with more than 10 active members.

Why bother? People would either be confused or rightly assume it was a joke.

So no, I'm not ignoring the "front-runner" because it's not a rare. I'm saying none are really Hall of Shame worthy. I guess it's a good thing you're not in charge though, because obviously those three would be already in.

Why are you even posting in these threads anymore if you're just going to say that there are no bad cards in the set?

 

[Spiderman]

And then your opponent plays another creature and you've got a 2/2?

And then you remove it...

Why bother? People would either be confused or rightly assume it was a joke.

You underestimate people.

But saying "if someone has used Mogg Squad successfully, I want to know about it", that's where you'll find it. Not here with 10 people, which is hardly a real sampling of Magic card usage. Yeah, you might get lucky and find someone here who's used it, but NOT having anyone say they've used it and/or successfully isn't a reason to conclude that it's no good.

Why are you even posting in these threads anymore if you're just going to say that there are no bad cards in the set?

Because people are still saying stuff. Why are you posting in the thread when you've already given your reasons why you think the cards are bad?

And you misstate my position: I said I don't think there are any Hall of Shame-worthy cards in the set, not bad cards in general.