Dies to Removal

Dragon Whisperer [mana]RR[/mana]

Human Shaman

[mana]R[/mana]: Dragon Whisperer gains flying until end of turn

[mana]1R[/mana]: Dragon Whisperer gets +1/+0 until end of turn

Formidable - [mana]4RR[/mana]: put a 4/4 red Dragon creature into the battlefield. Activate this ability only if creatures you control have total power 8 or greater.

2/2

Bit of a weird card, eh? Not sure how mythic these past few mythics really are.

Seems decently powerful, but it would have to be a pretty perfect Standard for this to see much competitive play. I'm not really sure who this card is supposed to appeal to. Monored devotion?

This card is OP.

It's a red two drop that's a manasink, gets around courser, caryatid, and rhino, and adds 2 red devotion.

This is a nice mana sink but I'm not sure the power level is there to be a mythic standalone. It's a good card, can trade up with better creatures and has evasion, but dies to everything and demands an all-in approach. It will be busted in the right deck, but mediocre as just a creature.

If you have 6 mana and 8 power on board, you may already be winning.

I'll buy a set for my Modern Devotion / Mana Sink deck. It was lacking in the 2-drops, so this will be nice as a curve filler.

the dies to everything is a non-starter argument because by virtue of being a two-drop, your coming out even or ahead on most mana exchanges, plus whatever damage it dealt before that. Just being able to pay R and gives this thing flying is already huge for any red aggressive deck and it also lets you justify playing more lands and/or outpost siege.

Yeah, I'm already a fan, just listing the downsides (there are few).

I looked at the mono-red lists from this weekend's GP and there's nothing I would take out for this.
That's not the be-all, end-all of evaluating a card, but it would mean there needs to be a new deck that this would fit in. Looking at devotion lists from the weekend, I'm not sure that's it either, but that's certainly a better starting place than the top 8 lists.

The thing that really miffs me is how absurdly win more its formidable ability is. You have 8 power in mono red so the obvious out is that you need additional 4/4 bodies. That's a really cool effect, but after you get over the glitz and glam of infinite 4/4 dragons, you realize that you've already won if you're activating it.

This is definitely among the better 2-drops monored has ever seen, but 2-drops are not usually what monored is hurting for. I don't know what the current lists look like, but it certainly won't see play outside monored, and even there it might be a tight fit.

That said, it does remind me of Kargan Dragonlord which did see respectable amounts of play. If the meta is right, this will too. But the meta has to be there.

Formidable is a win-more mechanic as a whole and I wouldn't expect it to matter on any of the cards with formidable.

The only case where it's not would probably be with this card specifically since the payoff you're getting is in the form of flying bodies as I can only imagine you getting a ton of power in play via board stalls. Either way, that is by far the least important part of the card.

I'd also throw out there that there are now 12 2 mana double Red creatures for the purpose of nykthos shenanigans.

I guess I'll also throw out that this has been reds worst block for 2 drops since mardu scout is the only maindeckable one up to this point(eidolon matches up poorly with against siege rhino) and for that reason alone, this card was sorely needed.

This might not be the card for the current mono red lists, and it's most likely not the card for G/R or R/G devotion, but it could be a nice card for a return to Mono-Red Devotion with Nykthos and Fanatic of Mogis, a card that hasn't seen play in a while.

Stardust, you might not think that red decks need another 2-drop right now, but there certainly has been an absence of good cards in that slot since Ash Zealot rotated out.

Stardust, you might not think that red decks need another 2-drop right now, but there certainly has been an absence of good cards in that slot since Ash Zealot rotated out.

Fair enough, maybe I'm wrong there. I haven't played Standard in a while and didn't realise things have gotten so bad. Doesn't change the fact that this card won't see play elsewhere and so is dependant on the viability of monored decks in particular.

Shhh, nobody tell him about the
siege rhino

I mean yeah hahaha Standard is pretty ok right now!

Eidelon did a lot of work at the GP this weekend.

Formidable is the way to break stalemates in devotion mirrors like the ones that happened last night. When there's nowhere left to go but over, you win when you can pour all of your mana into making/pumping flying dudes.

Not thrilled about this card in Standard atm but it's fine

It's certainly getting the hype treatment at the moment...I was too tired when it debuted on SCG and missed it, now it's sitting at $8...

That's a low price for mythics in this set

A bunch of cards are tanking now tanking in sales after the initial run...I got notification from SCG on a bunch of price-drop triggers today because people are starting to sit back on all these cards coming out so pricey from the start.