With all my excessive gushing about Charms and
the like, you'd think that I wouldn't like a
guild like Selesnya that seems like it does
relatively fewer things. But if you're going to
do fewer things, you should do them well, and
nobody could argue that Selesnya does tokens
well. Eyes in the Skies compares pretty well to
the cards it riffs on (cf. Raise the Alarm,
Spectral Procession) despite its cost ratio for
one simple reason: there are times when you get
not three birds but two birds plus an elephant
or a wurm or an Eternal Witness (cf. Cackling
Counterpart). Oh, and did I mention that
Doubling Season is still a thing?
Welcome back readers todays card of the day
probably has the best named of any Selesnya card
in in the set. In standard making this is
trumped by Lingering Souls who not having the
populate mechanic sees much more play and
provide a powerful option this card is just not
what you want when opponents are dropping Jaces
and Thragtusks. In modern this card is also
several outclassed and populate just isn’t the
best thing to do. In casual and multiplayer this
card pales in comparison to the other populate
cards but still can provide a small useful
flying creature and a density of populate cards
for a casual selesyna deck but its not one of
the top proliferate choices but has some use. In
limited its decent giving you flying bodies and
populate a playable card. Overall a card with
small applications in various formats and
unexciting.
Today's card of the day is Eyes in the Skies
which is a four mana White instant that puts a
1/1 White bird token with Flying into play then
Populates. While this isn't overly
impressive by itself, at best an instant speed
set of blockers with Flying or additional
evasive attackers on the following turn,
Populate does offer other options in a token
build that can be copied instead. The
problem is that historically four mana for two
tokens often comes with another effect that is
not dependent on what is in play. As
recently as Dark Ascension there is Lingering
Souls which is cheaper by one and has Flashback
for two, though with Black mana. Eyes in
the Skies isn't a bad card, just one that works
best in a fairly dedicated design and is average
by itself with a mana cost just slightly too
high to stand out. Overall it may see some
play, though not as much had it been three mana
instead.
In Limited where Populate and tokens can be a
dangerous deck design, particularly when the
Grove of the Guardian is included. Tokens
and evasion are huge benefits in the format and
two from one card, in the worst case scenario,
still makes this an automatic inclusion in any
Sealed deck using White mana. The single
colored symbol in the cost allows flexibility
and it works well as an early pick in Booster
after major bombs.
Welcome to another day here at the Pojo.com card of the day
section. We are looking at Eyes in the Skies
from Return to Ravnica. Eyes in the Skies is a
common white instant that costs three generic
and one white mana. Eyes in the Skies says put a
1/1 white bird creature token with Flying onto
the battlefield, and then Populate.
While not the best card ever printed, I find that it is very
good. You can get a pair of 1/1 Fliers, or a 1/1
Flier and Populate a token you've already made.
This comes in handy when you need to stall a
Flying attacker, and then bolster your attack
force for next turn.
Outside of that, Eyes in the Skies is what it is.
