The original go-to card for throwing damage
around wantonly. Casual players love it for the
chaotic effect, but can it stand up in
Constructed and Limited, where cards are
expected to have predictable effects? I think
so. In many ways, an aggresive deck could use it
like a psuedo-Armageddon: if you're wining the
damage race, this card assures that your
opponent can't play anything that could inhibit
your damaging capacity without damaging himself
enough so that you'll still win the damage race.
A card that I've always wanted to use but never
could find a good way to abuse it. The best way
I see around this is having a lot of mana
producers such as elves or artifact mana
producers.
Constructed: 3
Casual: 2
Limited: 1
David Fanany
Player since
1995
Manabarbs
Manabarbs punishes people who like to play big
spells - but unfortunately, it also punishes
you. If you're an aggressive red deck, you
shouldn't be worrying about that. Instead, you
should be worrying about the cost; four mana is
a little expensive for some decks, and many
times when you're playing red you won't be
reaching four mana or don't care whether or not
you do. In spite of that, though, I think
Manabarbs could be a sleeper hit of the new Core
Set, especially against control decks that rely
on their big expensive spells to either keep
them alive (like Wrath of God) or win the game
(like Korlash). Most decks don't have
enchantment removal maindeck, and taking four to
the face for playing Wrath of God makes the red
deck's job much easier.
Constructed: 3/5 (I'm betting on this card!)
Casual: 3/5
Limited: 2/5 (I have to admit I had a hard time
rating Manabarbs for limited)
Arcane
Manabarbs
Constructed: Every time I hear/think about this
card I get all excited until I read the card
again and it pulls me back down to earth about
just how bad it can really be. First off it
hurts you as well so it’s a double edged, er…barb.
Second, the four mana cost means it’s not coming
out too early, which means that aggro decks will
already have a few creatures out and take a lead
and have lower casting costs meaning that
they’ll probably win the damage race against you
and control decks generally spend less mana on
disruption (removal or countermagic) than you
pay for your threats which means that you
probably won’t win that race either. Now the
plus side I see to this is running this in a G/R
deck using all 3 mana producers in green
post-tenth (Birds, Llanowar elves and Coldsnap’s
boreal druid) to get around the damage and still
play threats.
Casual/Multi: Cards like this almost never seem
to work around the multiplayer table. Cards with
effects that damage everyone, while seeming
fair, just send signals of one thing: I’m trying
to make the game un-fun by denying you something
you like to do; in this case tapping lands. What
it means is that everyone at the table will
either try and kill you before your barbs kill
them, or clamor for a disenchant effect then
hold their low life total against you the rest
of the game as they think they’re at a
disadvantage. Now having said that I have
thought about ideas for a deck around this using
things like Aether vial, or the Future Sight
Pacts (along with the ever-so handy and
Multiplayer friendly Angel’s Grace) and things
like signets and fellwar stones, etc to keep
your lands from being tapped. I could also see
this being used in a deck with lots of walls to
prevent your opponents from getting through with
the creatures they have, solidifying a defense,
then slapping this down to punish people after
you’re all bunkered down.
Limited: A card like this requires a very tight
low mana curve to make an aggressive surge out
of the games, and then slap down the barbs. If
you can get out a few early creatures against a
slow player, the barbs keep them from really
coming back into the game costing them life for
every removal spell they want to cast. Another
cheap aggro deck though is going to put the
pressure on you, meaning that if they can beat
you out of the gates, your barbs are probably
useless in the end making Manabarbs really a
win-more card, helping to solidify positions
you’re already favored in, but not really doing
much to help you if you’re losing.
Constructed: 2
Casual: 2
Limited: 2
PsychoAnime
#1
Magic Noob in Canada since 2002
Manabarbs has a symmetrical effect, so how can the
symmetry be broken?
Aggressive burning in early game to deny
opponent mana? Run non-land
mana sources? I'm not sure how these ideas will
fare so I'll just give
this a 3/5 in constructed just because I think
it has great potential.
In casual, I'm pretty sure this can be part of
some combo. In limited,
this doesn't immediately kill your opponent and
it's harder to break
the symmetry here.
