This is obviously a good card - it gives you the
value of at least two spells for the price of
one - but when it comes to tournament play, that
doesn't always translate into widespread usage.
It really should in this case, especially for
smaller card pools where it'll kill a bunch of
stuff and you're not going to be facing down a
turn two Primeval Titan, and where there are
just enough card-drawing and hand-sculpting
tools to make sure you're always casting exactly
what you want for free. The expertise cycle
reminds me a lot of cascade, and it has much the
same types of applications.
This is basically a 3-mana spell stapled to a
slightly-weakened Languish. Languish was already
a pretty acceptable board wipe from Origins, and
being able to add another spell on top of that
is really potentially scary.
The entire Expertise cycle plays surprisingly
well overall; while the effects benefit from
being able to, say, chain a spell into it, they
can work in a vacuum. Being able to put Yahenni
out on the back of this spell is also cool, and
they might be able to get through your
opponent's defenses rather cleanly.
The value of this spell is tied up in how
powerful black winds up being as a color in this
format, but I think this is easily one of the
more powerful spells of the set.
