I'm sort of glad that this is rotating out of
Standard soon. It completely wrecks most aggro
decks, and with Momentary Blink, it can be very
hard to deal with while generating a huge life
swing. A 4/4 is quite difficult to punch
through, and 4 free life is just the extra slap
in the face. Its second ability is rarely
consequential, but if you remember it's there at
a key moment, it makes this card all the more
backbreaking.
Constructed- 4.5
Casual- 4.5
Limited- 4
Aethereal
Friday -
Loxodon Hierarch
This guy is not played as much now as he was a
year ago, but he's still played often and for
good reason. The regeneration ability might get
used occasionally, but the main reason this guy
is good is because he's a 4/4 for 4 and he gains
you 4 life when he hits play. Besides the body
and life gain being important against a red
deck, the 4/4 itself can control the board until
your opponent finds an answer. You get a nice
package at a bargain price with this guy. If
you're W/G, you play this guy unless you have
several good reasons. He's great for casual,
too.
In RRR limited, a first pick. In RGD, not as
good because you don't really want to be in
Selesnya in the first pack, but he's very worth
splashing for.
Friday -
Loxodon Hierarch
I have to say this is one card
i'm looking forward to rotating out of
standard. I really hated playing against this
guy. He's great against aggro decks. Life gain
with a 4/4 body to deal with. One of the best
multi colored rares in ravnica block. With kavu
predator being prominent in the format right now
he's not getting as much play.
Constructed: 3
Casual : 4
Limited:4
Arcane
Loxodon
Hierarch
Constructed: As good today as it was when it
first came out, it cause a bunch of players
everywhere to suddenly realize that life gain
wasn’t such a bad thing when you can pair it
alongside a big body. Add to that a regeneration
clause for all your creatures and it is easily a
tournament staple. Aggro decks (particularly red
ones) hate to see players gaining life, as that
4 life can usually mean one or two cards of
their own that they now have to use to catch
back up to where they were. And against the old
Dragonstorm decks +4 life meant that they
couldn’t kill you with just the 4 Hellkites. One
of the cards I’m going to miss when it leaves in
just over a month.
Casual/Multi: 4/4 for 4 is hard to turn down,
and in this format the ability to also save your
other creatures from an untimely death is a must
have in response to multiple wrath effects or
board sweeping spells (though not wrath itself).
Great to abuse along with creatures like Eternal
Witness with Ghostway/Astral Slide in a Loam
Slide deck. Drop this out on 3rd or 4th turn and
watch your opponents quickly shuffle through
their hand as they sweat and look for an answer.
Limited: A lot more popular in the early days of
Ravnica block drafting before the addition of
Dissention. The reason for this is that in the
world of Ravnica and the set of each set working
off different guild models most decks were 3
colors focusing on one of each color combination
in each set to create a circle. For example
drafting Boros (R/W) in Ravnica, Izzet (U/R) in
Guildpact and Azorius (U/W) creating a 3 color
circle of
W-U-R that could be drafted to balance your 3
colors. (The others being Golgari-Gruul-Rakdos
and Dimir-Orzhov-Azorius). You’ll notice in my
examples that Selesnya doesn’t fit the model as
there is no good way for a G/W player to
successfully create a three color chain. What
this meant is that while selesnya was a great
color and very tempting in the first pack of a
RGD draft it could inevitably lead to bad picks
or 4 color decks off the other two packs, making
even a great card like Loxodon Hierarch a pretty
bad pick in Ravnica limited. Best to pass it
along and set someone else up for the “Selesnya
Snare.”
The Missing
Linc
-Balding
for just over 5 years
-Playing MTG for just over 10
Loxodon
Hierarch
He's a 4/4 for four, he gains enough life to
cancel out a Char or two Seals of Fire, he saves
other characters. What's not to like about
Loxodon Hierarch? Blink loves him, Glare loves
him, Astral Slide loves him, Genesis and
Debtors' Knell love him. The Hierarch hasn't
been getting as much attention of late, with
Lorwyn on the horizon, Tarmogoyf in the last
expert-level set, and Mystic Enforcer at the
same mana cost and arguably better in many
metagames and/or decks, but he's still here and
he's still very dangerous. Aggro decks should
still fear him and be ready to face him right up
until September 30th.
Constructed: 5/5
Casual: 4/5
Limited: 4/5
Necro
nomikron
MTG Rules Advisor
Loxodon
Hierarch:
Now this is a good card. 4/4 for 2GW that gives
two decent abilities. This card is undercosted
for all that it does, and sees play in a lot of
decks, even in extended. This card has
unfortunately become the standard to which four
casting cost creatures are compared to, and has
set the bar rather high.
When Loxodon Hierarch comes into play, you gain
4 life.
GW, Sacrifice Loxodon Hierarch: Regenerate each
creature you control.
I think this card has loss a lot of power. GW
isn't as good now, as
even GW Goyf isn't top tier right now. The 4/4
body on a 4 casting cost
creature is still efficient, but it just chumps
a large Goyf or
gets countered by control. It's not aggro enough
for aggro and not
controllish enough for control. It's not a bad
card, but I can't think
of a deck right now that it can really shine in.
In casual, the elephant doesn't help much but
the Cleric should get it
somewhere.
In limited, this guy is big, efficient and
usually nets you a +1
advantage.
