I'm sure you've heard of this card, even if
you've never seen it in action. This one card is
the entire reason people had any interest in
buying the monoblack preconstructed deck from
Kamigawa-- because it had a copy of this card.
At its peak, a single Jitte sold for $60 on the
secondary market, while the precon deck sold for
around $20 retail. Why was the Jitte so
obscenely powerful?
Well, like yesterday's card, it just needs to be
on a creature when that creature deals combat
damage for its ability to trigger-- it doesn't
actually need to stay on the creature. Its
ability gave you two charge counters on the
Jitte, which could be spent in any amount at
instant speed whether or not the Jitte was
equipped and without further mana investment.
You get a choice of three different effects, one
of which can buff the equipped creature in
response to direct damage or combat tricks, and
the other two work just as well when the Jitte
is unequipped and one of which is removal. All
that for the low, low price of two and two.
I suspect the environment into which it was
printed also had an effect on the Jitte's
power-- no card exists in a vacuum. The previous
block, Mirrodin, was heavily-focused on
artifacts and had a lot of artifact enablers,
with a very fast dominant archetype (Affinity)
and very few answers to noncreature artifacts.
The Jitte's own native block, Kamigawa, was a
much slower block with no real focus at all on
artifacts (and subsequently, no more answers to
them than any other block) and a strong emphasis
on mechanical synergy that resulted in cards
being made to compensate for the "ability" to
work in such a deck. Eye of Nowhere is a classic
example-- it's effectively Boomerang, but it
trades away Instant speed for the Arcane
subtype, which has no benefit at all unless you
have other cards that care about Arcane. The
Jitte, by contrast, does not require any such
synergy to operate, only needing a few cheap
creatures to be equipped to in order to amass
charge counters (or even a few Mirrodin cards to
place charge counters directly on it) to do its
work. As a result, the Jitte was easily slotted
into Mirrodin artifact combo decks and dominated
Standard.
Modern artifact design shows the lessons WotC
learned from the Jitte. Equipment is rarely as
cheap to equip as it was in the days of Mirrodin;
"Equip [0]" is incredibly rare. Most Equipment
is far more focused on enhancing its wielder.
Newer Equipment almost never has its own
activated ability independent of the presence of
a wielder, like the Jitte did, but plenty of it
grants its wielder new activated abilities. I
doubt we're going to see a new Jitte anytime
soon, or an environment that conspires to create
one.
In the context of Baldur's Gate II, there used
to be jokes and raised eyebrows about some of
the weapons your character could use and the
quest rewards he or she could obtain. Many
gamesmasters in Dungeons and Dragons or
Pathfinder would never let you get your hands on
a weapon like Umezawa's Jitte (though it seems
like it would fit in pretty well in Throne of
Bhaal). It's one of the few equipment cards
whose benefits are relevant against both
creature decks and control decks. It was the
sole reason that the oddest sorts of creature
decks flourished during the Kamigawa era, and
the sole reason that they packed the first
Ravnica block with a vast assortment of
"Sacrifice a creature: X" effects to prevent
combat damage. And they still had to ban it in
Modern.
Magic The Gathering Card of The Day: Umezawas
Jitte
I am not saying Jitte is the best card ever
printed, but I am not not saying that. This card
is a multi format all star and formats have been
affected by its presence since its release.
Jitte provides tons of value and is flexible in
its applications, In legacy right now this card
sees play as a part of a Stoneforge Mystic
package it murders creature based decks. It’s a
powerful card in casual and multiplayer as well
the choices offered by it and its clear sheer
power and repeatable effects and cheap mana cost
make it a recurring threat. In limited this
would be more than a bomb, a card that can
absolutely shut out games, Overall this card
sees legacy play and is without a doubt the best
equipment ever printed.
Today's card of the day is Umezawa's Jitte
which is a two mana Legendary equipment from
Betrayers of Kamigawa with an equip cost of two
that gets two charge counters whenever equipped
creature deals combat damage.
With three effects to choose from there is
always a benefit to having charge counters
available and two from every damage dealing
attack can majorly impact a game. -1/-1 on
two target creatures or -2/-2 on one, up to
+4/+4 until end of turn, four life gain, or part
of two effects is enough flexibility to get it
banned from Modern which leaves it to the Casual
and Commander decks to make use of it. In
any format this is legal in the Jitte is a
powerful and versatile threat that can
offensively or defensively, particularly on a
creature with Vigilance, shift the game's focus
to the effect has on it.
In a Limited format with this it is an easy
first pick in Booster as the value alone makes
it an obvious choice, though it is highly
playable in any color build and can often win
games with minimal support. Every Sealed
deck should include this and it gives some added
value to the already useful in format creatures
with low casting costs and combat effects like
First Strike, evasion, or Vigilance.
There's a Calvin and Hobbes cartoon strip where
the family is traveling. They come to a bridge
that has a sign displaying its weight limit.
Calvin asks his dad how they know the weight
limit of the bridge. His dad replies, "They run
bigger and bigger trucks over the bridge until
it breaks. Then they weigh the last truck and
rebuild the bridge." Mom looks at him scornfully
and says, "If you don't know, just say so!"
It's my belief that when Wizards wants to try
something new with Magic, much like Calvin's
Dad's story, they push the power level higher
and higher until it breaks - then they know the
limit. This was the case with the jitte.
Equipment were still relatively new in Magic,
and they wanted to see how far they could push
it before it was too powerful. Let's just say
they've never printed a more powerful equipment,
and I doubt they ever will.
But why is it so powerful? Costing only 2 to
cast and 2 to equip, it's not hard to cast it
and equip it all in one turn, catching an
opponent by surprise. Next, it gets TWO counters
any time the equipped creature deals combat
damage. It doesn't have to survive combat, it
just has to deal damage.
Then, with three options of how to use the
counters, it can almost always meet your need.
With the +2/+2 ability, it makes blocking very
tricky for your opponent. If they don't block,
you pump up the unblocked creature for at least
4 additional damage. If they do block, you can
use the +2/+2 ability OR the -1/-1 ability to
kill the blocker. Finally, if you are behind on
life, you can gain an additional four per turn
you use this.
Don't forget, on top of all of this, that the
counters go on the jitte, not the creature it
equips - which is unusual. This makes it even
stronger because you can attack into bigger
blockers - even if you know your creature
probably won't survive - just to get the
counters. Also, the jitte doesn't have to be
equipped to use the counters on it. Did a board
wipe just knock out all your creatures, and now
an opponent plays a hasty creature coming at
you? Just remove the counters from the
unattached jitte to give that creature -2/-2.
Is the jitte TOO powerful? There are varying
opinions on this, but in my opinion, yes. Early
on in my days of playing standard, when this
came out, I silently protested it by refusing to
run it, even when most of the competitive decks
ran it. Needless to say, I didn't win very
often. Refusing to play one of the best cards in
the format doesn't add up to wins!
The only thing that keeps this card from being a
5 across the board is the fact that so many
people view it as being over powered. In casual
formats, you can make some people really not
want to play against you if you make a habit of
playing this card.
Today's weapon: Dagger
Trivia: A jitte is a type of defensive Japanese
weapon that, similar to a sai, could catch and
trap a blade after you blocked or parried. This
could also help in disarming opponents, and was
commonly used by palace guards.
Remember how yesterday's weapon rewarded you
just for attacking your opponent? Well forget
all that, because today's card does that job
even better.
Meet Umezawa's Jitte, a legendary piece of
equipment from the way back days of Kamigawa.
Umezawa's Jitte is much more powerful than you
might think at first glance. You almost have to
see it in action to really appreciate it,
there's more than meets the eye. I think
the reason people might underestimate it is
they focus too much on the first line and not
enough on the second. Looking at the first line,
you'd see that you pay 2 mana to cast this, 2
mana to equip it, it doesn't buff the creature
in any way, and after it attacks (and maybe
dies) the jitte gets... charge counters. And
then you have to spend the charge counters for
more stuff to happen.
But take a look at just how powerful the things
you can buy with your charge counters are.
You can grant you guy +2/+2 for the turn, or you
could give an opponent's creature -1/-1 for the
turn. Or you could gain 2 life I suppose, but
let's just pretend that option isn't even there.
Oh, and you get 2 of these charge counters.
Every time an equipped creature deals combat
damage. Any kind of combat, to creature or
player. And the charge counters stay on the Jitte,
not the creature, so they persist even after the
equipped thing dies. With an equip cost of just
2, it's also pretty easy to throw onto
something to attack (or block) with.
Let's say you're able to get 2 attacks off with
this. Which is very easy to do. Get this onto
something around turn 3-4, it swings and say
takes something out but also dies, turn 4-5 you
equip it onto something else and also deal
damage somehow. All very easy to accomplish. I'd
even use this example with 3 hits because I
think that's reasonable, but let's start with
just 2. With just those two simple combats
you now have 4 charge counters on Umezawa's
Jitte. With just that, you could give one of
your guys +8/+8. Or give an opponent's creature
-4/-4, which you could also read as "Destroy
target opponent's creature with toughness equal
to or less than your charge counters." Or some
combination of both! Give your guy +2/+2 and
take out an annoying 3/3, get +6/+6 and take out
a 1/1 token that could block you. And the attack
you use your +X/+X buff on will only serve to
grant you even more charge counters for later
use. Umezawa's Jitte doesn't even need to
be EQUIPPED to something to use the -1/-1
ability, so you could hold your 4 charge
counters back, swing and lose the creature, and
use your now -6/-6 potential to kill a really
big guy. Or three 2/2's. Maybe even save some
counters if said big guy already took some
combat damage.
Umezawa's Jitte is also ripe for exploitation.
Unblockable, flying, etc can help keep your guy
alive so you don't need to worry about paying
that 2 mana equip cost every turn. But the thing
is, even if you DO have to pay it again every
once in a while, you're paying 2 for a likely
+4/+4 or -2/-2. The versatility alone adds a lot
of value. It could help keep your guy alive in
combat or against burn, deal some extra damage
when swinging in for the kill, weaken an
opponent's creature juuuust enough so that when
he blocks his guy will die but yours will
survive. So much potential, and the best part is
its reusable. No wonder they made this thing
legendary.
Really fun in casual, but even viable in
constructed I feel. Extremely powerful in
limited as well, although that advice may be
about 10 years too late.
