For a long time, and by "long time" I mean
"since Lorwyn block", there was debate over
whether or not cards should be allowed to affect
planeswalkers specifically. For example,
Rootgrapple and Oblivion Ring can destroy
planeswalkers even though they don't
specifically mention planeswalkers. And the
average spell-slinger in the multiverse doesn't
even know planeswalkers exist, much less craft
spells specifically to thwart them. And
furthermore, planeswalkers are almost all mythic
rares! They may be strong tournament options,
but any card made specifically to kill
planeswalkers would undoubtedly run into the
same issues as cards like Essence Scatter. But I
like the way they handled it with Despise. For
one, it was obviously a spell crafted by Geth,
who's been having unfavorable run-ins with
planeswalkers and unascended sparkholders since
the old days of Mirrodin. And because it works
on creatures or planeswalkers, it feels more
natural-- planeswalkers were creatures before
they ascended, after all, so making your
opponent forget about a creature or planeswalker
to summon feels like a reasonable tactic. I also
like the mirror this provides with Duress-- you
could keep one mainboard and one in the
sideboard, and adjust based on your opponent's
creature concentration. And finally, since your
opponent retains priority after his planeswalker
resolves and can therefore always get off at
least one activation from it before you can kill
it, the best way to answer a planeswalker is
before it's had a chance to hit the table, which
Despise does. I think this will see a decent
amount of play before it rotates out of
Standard.
Despise is the kind of design that usually makes
for interesting games: a powerful card with a
relatively narrow application. However, in many
metagames, including perhaps the current
Standard environment, it's easily playable in a
maindeck. You don't want to rely exclusively on
it against creatures, but it does stop
enters-the-battlefield abilities, and a
pre-emptive answer to planeswalkers is more than
welcome in the era of Jace, the Mind Sculptor.
Today's card of the day is Despise which is a
one mana Black spell that allows you to see the
opponent's hand and have them discard a creature
or planeswalker of your choice. This is a
very nice card in the early game as you see the
opponent's options and choose what to discard,
generally before they can play it.
Combined with other Black options for taking
advantage of cards in the graveyard or when
something is discarded and it can be easily
supported. This definitely helps the theme
or just promotes the option in already playable
cards and will see play in both maindecks and
sidedecks as a counter to planeswalkers and
large creatures. Overall this can handle a
problem card before it is played, if it is in
hand when used, which makes it very solid if
some
In Limited this is also an excellent pre-counter
to an opponent as long as it is drawn before the
later stages of the game when there is enough
mana to play anything that is topdecked.
For a single mana it should be played in every
Black deck and can even be splashed fairly easy
to deal with threats in Sealed. For
Booster it can be drafted as removal which would
be fairly early after the first pick depending
on the pack and be a useful tool against almost
any opponent.
Welcome to
today’s card of the day here at Pojo.com. Today
we take a look at Despise from New Phyrexia.
Despise costs just one black mana for this
sorcery. Despise allows you to look at an
opponent’s hand and choose a Planeswalker or
creature from that hand and they discard it.
This card is really impressive. The ability to force
the opponent to discard a Planeswalker before
they ever have a chance to play it could be
huge. And that is not to mention that you could
delay their creature threat. And all for only
one mana.
This card has surged in popularity, mainly due to the
low cost, and ability to force the discard of a
Planeswalker on first turn. When combined with
cards such as Liliana’s Caress or Megrim it can
even inflict some damage.
Definitely a staple for discard decks, and a high
consideration for many black decks.
