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By: one million words, Pete Jahn
Sep 08 2011 1:11pm
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Innistrad is coming!

I could go on and on about the set, and it's mechanics, and all the rest, but that is not what you are waiting for.

It's this:

Let's look at what we have.

First off, this seems just fine for limited.   As a 5/3 for five mana, it passes the vanilla test just fine.  It has evasion, which is a plus.  In limited, this falls into the "dragon" category.  

The toughness is a bit weak, but not bad.   I don't think Innistrad has a Lightning Bolt or Incinerate, so we are only really vulnerable to Doom Blade effects and being blocked by large fliers - and that is in the Angel's weakened state.  The Overseer gets a lot better when you control a human. 

Indestructible is good, provided your creature does not get Exiled, or stuck with a Pacifism effect.  Hexproof has your back there.  Very, very few things can kill an indestructible, hexproof creature - a whooping huge Black Sun's Zenith or Hallowed Burial could, but those effects are pretty scarce - and almost always rare or mythic.  It appears that, provided you can get some humans, this will be extremely strong.

That raises the next question - can you get humans, and how easily.  We are still working with only part of the set, but humans appear to be pretty thick on the ground, and concentrated in white.  Moreover, many of them appear to be highly playable.  From what I have seen of the set so far, this looks to be a windmill slam first pick pack one.  Pack three - well, it might be worth changing colors, provided you have at least a few humans in your other colors.

Moving over to constructed, this becomes more questionable.  A hard hitting white flier that is really hard to kill is exactly what a classic UW control  is looking for - but such decks don't always want to play a bunch of humans.  However, Trinket Mage and (Treasure  Mage) are both humans, as are cards like Mirran Crusader and Blade Splicer, which see play in current Caw-Blade decks.  Caw-Blade will lose Squadron Hawk, so this could be a replacement.  

Another plus - while the format will still have Titans and Wurmcoil Engine, Angelic Overseer does cost just five.  Having it in play a turn earlier can win races, especially since the other Titans will not be doing much to stop a flying, hexproof creature.  Sure, Frost Titan could tap the human, but Angelic Overseer will have hit for five before the Titan hits the board, and that's enough lead to win the race.

Angelic Overseer is not Baneslayer Angel, but it also has the potential to fill that slot in a Zoo deck like the one Brian Kibler used to take down Pro Tour a format or two ago.  Maybe - that will depend on whether the format has a Knight of the Reliquary type of utility card to build the deck around.   It could even work in a very aggressive build:  Hero of Bladehold is a human.

Magic is not played in a vacuum - you have to look for synergies and be aware of what your opponents might do.   Angelic Overseer will only be constructed playable if it can serve as a top end in a deck that uses humans in powerful ways.  However, the humans in this set, and in Scars, are pretty good cards.  The tools look to be there.  Once we have the entire card pool, it will be time to brew. 

Constructed might be one more reason to cheer if you open Angelic Overseer in you prerelease pool.  Over and above the fact that it is a limited bomb, that is.

Here's hoping you open one - unless you are playing me, of course.

 

PRJ

"one million words" on MTGO

9 Comments

Looks like it plays pretty by char49d at Thu, 09/08/2011 - 14:25
char49d's picture

Looks like it plays pretty well with the best constructed card revealed so far, Snapcaster Mage. Flashing in a human in response to a spell targeting your Angel is pretty spicy. If this card sees constructed play, I would expect that to be a common occurrence.

preview card! by unspeakable at Thu, 09/08/2011 - 15:13
unspeakable's picture

Very cool to see a preview card at PureMTGO. I think this card will be very strong in limited, but probably won't see constructed play, as a board sweeper will also take out the humans and you tend not to see too many creatures in play at once in constructed due to the ready availability of removal. Still, a clever card, with a nice description by Mr. Jahn.

Combine this with Angelic by Paul Leicht at Thu, 09/08/2011 - 16:49
Paul Leicht's picture
5

Combine this with Angelic Destiny and some humans of note (Bladehold etc) and you have a very casual deck. I am fairly impressed by the amount of synergy between the different colors flavorwise. Even if the effective cards are less strong than we hope for individually they tell a great story and seem to be mesh well together.

Making this card human adds by AJ_Impy at Fri, 09/09/2011 - 10:59
AJ_Impy's picture

Making this card human adds extra style points.

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