KrazyCaley's Top 10 Planeswalkers

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KrazyCaley

23 August 2009

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10- Tezzeret the Seeker

Sorry, Tezzeret, but you’re definitely a niche player. Artifact-based abilities are well and good, but it’s really rough to make TOO much beneficial use of your +1, and your –X is far too costly to you to use reliably. Your -5 can be devastating in, for instance, a Time Sieve deck, but even then you’re just a mere means to an end, Tezzy, baby. And at a CMC of 5, you are really nothing but a pretty cool role-player; no one drafts you and thinks “sweet, now I’ll win!”

9- Sarkhan Vol

It is a testament to how powerful planeswalkers really are that the aptonymically named Mr. Vol here comes in at #9. He’s highly versatile, has a solid +1, a decent (although hardly flabbergasting) -2, and a sufficiently impressive ultimate. It’s the -2 that really disappoints. Threaten? Really? I mean, sure, devastating perhaps in the right circumstances, but for a -2, it seems a bit underpowered. But despite being at #9, Vol is certainly not to be messed with; he comes in at a solid 4 loyalty and only takes 3 turns to give you 5 4/4 fliers.

8- Jace Beleren

Jace, like Tezzeret, is also a bit of a role player because of his milling ultimate, but he’s also got an extremely useful +2 and -1 abilities that any blue deck can make good use of. Jace is an extremely annoying presence for your opponent; he’s a renewable card-advantage engine, where you can draw 5 cards to your opponent’s 1 and still keep Jace alive. And with a +2, he’s easy to keep alive even with the starting loyalty of 3, especially since you can get him out fairly early at 1UU. Certainly not a super-impressive ‘walker, but not a joke, either.

7- Ajani Goldmane

He of the B/W token menace comes in at a relatively low #7. Let’s face it, though, the only reason he’s even this high is because of that -1. Gaining 2 life for +1 is nice, but not great. Creating a giant avatar could be good, depending on your opponent, or it could just suck a terminate/doom blade/basically any non-damage removal spell and die. But PERMANENTLY giving +1/+1 to ALL your creatures and making them vigilant until end of turn, now hot damn, THAT’S an ability. Even a non-token white deck is loving that ability. And in token/weenie aggro decks, it’s an AMAZING ability. But because the other abilities are meh at best, Goldmane stays, over your agonized protests, at #7.

6- Chandra Nalaar

Chandra wins the award for “most consistently underrated planeswalker.” Yes, she costs 5. Yes, her +1 is a piddling 1 damage to an opponent. But look at her –X and her -8. Her –X turns her into a possibly-renewable source of removal; or at least a kill spell for your opponent’s baddest dude. However, if you can back her up and keep her safe for three turns (impressive starting loyalty of 6), she will unleash one of the meanest ultimates there is- 10 to your opponent and all of their creatures, non-targeted. If you have any kind of board presence relative to your opponent (and you should be able to, with doubtless at least a few burn spells in your Chandra deck), that’s a threat that MUST be dealt with, and not easily. Thus I will stand by Chandra as the #6, despite the fact that many of you would like to put her at 9 or worse, doubtless.

5- Liliana Vess

The top 5 planeswalkers are distinguished from the bottom 5 planeswalkers by this fact- the top 5 all have three abilities which are all excellent in any situation. The bottom 5 either have situational abilities, or underpowered abilities. Not true of these top 5, and we start with Liliana, who keeps cards out of your opponent’s hands for +1, tutors for -2, and possibly four turns after she’s cast, gets EVERY SINGLE CREATURE OUT OF EVERY SINGLE GRAVEYARD for -8. In duels, scoop time in the late game for most decks. In 2 headed giant, scoop time and a half. Liliana will have a giant target on her as soon as she comes out; she is a royal pain and a looming threat for any opponent.

4- Ajani Vengeant

Here’s some Ajani numbers for you. Ajani starts at 3. His +1 ability is a handy little trick that can keep your opponent’s best tappin’ permanent neutralized, or at least keep a land tapped to slow them down. At -2, he’ll cast Lightning Helix for you. At -7, you win the game. All right, sorry, actually you destroy all your opponent’s lands, but if your deck has had a halfway-decent run, that reads “you win the game.” Vengeant can protect himself with his no-untap ability and Helix ability, and with backup from you in the form of meat shields, white or red creature control spells, etc., he will wipe your opponent’s lands clean. Impressive.

3- Elspeth, Knight-Errant

Our top three planeswalkers are flat. out. nasty. Elspeth is a never-ending source of chop-blockers in a worst-case scenario. Swing with your giant Naya death beast all you want; Ms. Tirel commands a loyal, limitless army of selfless 1/1 soldier tokens, which gives her +1 to create, mind you. And if you ever fail to keep up the pressure, she can (ALSO for +1) turn one of those 1/1s into a flying 4/4 until end of turn, which is great for weenie aggro. And your opponent is in for a world of frustration if she ever resolves her ultimate- your artifacts, your lands, and above all your creatures are INDESTRUCTIBLE for the rest of the game. That 1/1 soldier token can now chop block FOREVER without dying. Kill spells are rendered useless unless they are sacrifice-based. Even Wrath of God or its apparent soon-to-be-successor, Day of Judgment, won’t deal with all those indestructible creatures. So good luck with that, Elspeth’s opponent.

2- Garruk Wildspeaker

Hey, it’s Friday Night Magic! You open a fresh pack of M10, and oh look, there’s Garruk Wildspeaker! Guess what? A- Your draft just got a LOT easier to manage, and B- You probably just won. Garruk Wildspeaker is an incredibly versatile and powerful walker. His ultimate is not the most devastating, his +1 not the most annoying, and so forth, but he’s an all around nasty gentleman. His +1 is incredible ramping; it basically allows you to play as though you have two extra reflecting pools in play each turn. His -1 creates big, thick, 3/3 meat shields, which you don’t usually need in a deck that runs Garruk, but hey, just in case. And of course, his ultimate ability, which I remind you can be cast THE TURN AFTER HE COMES INTO PLAY, is to cast friggin’ Overrun. And FRIGGIN’ Overrun is a lot better than regular Overrun because Garruk has already ramped you into something more horrible than you would have been able to cast the turn before because of his +1 ability. All this and more for only 2GG. That, my friends, is some scary planeswalker action.

1- Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker

But not as scary as Nicol Bolas. “Waaaah, Garruk Wildspeaker is WAY better than Bolas; he costs less,” Bolas can hear you whining. But Bolas blows you up. And Bolas blows Garruk Wildspeaker up. And he does it for PLUS THREE. Quite honestly, I can’t even hear your protests in my head because the words “plus three” are echoing in it over and over. That is totally worth eight hard-to-get mana (and honestly, if you’re up to eight mana in a Grixis deck, surely you’ll have UBBR by then, no?). That ALONE is horrifying, and makes Bolas almost impossible to kill except with things like Maelstrom Pulse, etc. Deal with anything that isn’t a creature for +3 (and he starts at five). And deal with anything that IS a creature for -2 by stealing it forever. STEALING it, not blowing it up. Now you too can be the proud owner of Baneslayer Angel, Hellkite Overlord, Thraximundar, and all the other friggin’ huge nasty beaters out there. Nicol Bolas, ladies and gents, is a bad, bad man. And of course, lest we forget, there is the game-ending -9 ability. Sac 7 permanents. Discard 7 cards. Lose 7 life. It’s like pulling the lever on a Vegas slot machine and seeing three different beautiful 7’s come up. Only instead of money, the casino pays you in pwn. Quite frankly I don’t care if Garruk, et. al. are more competitive cards because of the mana costs. With other planeswalkers, it’s often scoop time if you let them activate their ultimate. With Bolas, it’s essentially scoop time once he hits the board. And blows up whoever YOUR favorite planeswalker is. For plus three.