I'm so glad to see this come back. Colorless
means of fixing your mana are always in high
demand, and the Simulacrum not only color fixes,
but accelerates. His giving you a card when he
dies is also a very nice touch, though I'm sorry
it isn't when he "leaves play", otherwise he'd
make an excellent combo with flickering effects.
He still does, mind you, but no more so than any
other creature with an ETB ability. All in all,
Solemn Simulacrum makes an excellent example of
card advantage. You play him, and you get two
cards. Your opponent kills him, and you get
another card, plus your opponent possibly loses
a card. There are very few decks that couldn't
benefit from a copy or three of this card.
I love the new art for this card - it looks even
more solemn than the old version, despite (or
perhaps as the result of) not having a face.
Much like Grim Lavamancer, this card has
identical game text to its lats printing and is
likely to have identical appeal for constructed
as it did the last time. It has something to
offer every kind of deck - creature decks love
it when a Doom Blade type spell comes out as
two-to-one card advantage in their favor, and
control decks love getting extra lands without
having to dip into green. And have you tried
this thing with Esperzoa or Grim Harvest? It
gets scary. If you're lucky to have one or more
of these, play it early and often.
Today's card of the day is Solemn Simulacrum
which is a four mana 2/2 golem that allows you
to search your library for a basic land and put
it into play tapped and when the creature goes
to the graveyard you may draw a card. This
is a very nice source of card advantage that
gives you a creature, land, and often another
card as well all in one. Two for one is
usually good, but a three for one and costing
four mana that can be played in any deck is
something that will definitely see play and not
just in golem decks.
In Limited the format almost requires multicolor
decks which makes artifact creatures quite
effective and card advantage is a step towards
winning any particular game you may find
yourself in. The acceleration from the
extra land and the card drawn from sacrificing
the golem in any favorable manner just can't be
ignored. While not a powerhouse or removal
like other rares it helps you get and play them
earlier and is flexible enough to be played in
any build. Those traits allow you to pick
it first in Booster and play it in regardless of
what later or earlier packs contain which means
this is almost never a bad choice. In
Sealed there is no reason to not include this in
every single deck regardless of the color scheme
as the more colors you have the easier this is
to run and even one color benefits from card
advantage.
