The new "lord" of the Slivers, after they
received their M15 makeover. Slivers of the new
generation no longer grant abilities to
opponents' Slivers, so the new Lord can't quite
push the power limits like it used to. Honestly,
I think this is a good place to settle.
Indestructible has always been a power for all
five colors to tentatively share, owing to its
origins as an artifact-based ability. It's also
just the kind of thing a Sliver deck wants to
grant all its creatures, since it wins entirely
by amassing a wide variety of Slivers on the
board and most opponents know very well that
they need to kill those Slivers. I am a little
disappointed that the Hivelord is a 5/5 instead
of a 7/7 like its predecessors, but then again,
WUBRG has been getting progressively easier to
pay over the years.
If the other legendary Slivers make you win the
game, the Hivelord takes it to the next level by
making you not able to lose the game either.
There's nothing Sliver decks hate more than mass
destruction effects, and turning them off
invalidates a lot of the ideas people go to when
they metagame against Slivers. You still have to
be careful of exile effects (because Freyalise
forbid that modern sets not be full of "removal
plus card drawing" decks), but that's a
relatively minor wrinkle compared to his upside
- it doesn't come up against most red decks, it
doesn't come up against most green decks, and if
they're relying on temporary effects like
Banishing Light, well, most casual decks should
be maindecking Disenchant effects anyway.
In fact, my only complaint about this guy is
that he's 5/5 and not 7/7, to have symmetry with
the other legendary Slivers. I know Slivers are
all about evolution, but it would have been
nice.
Constructed: 3/5
Casual: 5/5
Limited: 2/5 (effect is amazing, casting him is
hard)
Multiplayer: 3/5
Michael "Maikeruu" Pierno
Today's card of the day is Sliver Hivelord
which is a five mana and five color 5/5 that
gives slivers you control Indestructible.
This is a very strong effect and can more or
less end a game when it hits play if the
opponent doesn't have non-destruction forms of
removal or an alternate win condition. It
doesn't help build up a sliver force like the
Queen or Overlord, so it is unlikely to take
slots in a deck before them. As something
for the Overlord to search out and to help
support a swarm of tokens this is quite nice and
a worthwhile addition to an existing five color
sliver build.
In a Limited format with this it is a very
difficult card to utilize as it has five colors,
though a 5/5 Indestructible for five is solid it
needs other abilities to really stand out with
the mana requirement. In Sealed it can be
built around if there is enough support, but
running is problematic at best with anything
less than an excellent draw. For Booster
it has value as a rare draft, though slivers are
popular and drawing a pool for it depends on the
pod.
Unlike yesterday's sliver lord, today's has a
much more useful ability, and if I were to build
a sliver deck, I would probably include the
Hivelord. One of the weaknesses of a sliver deck
is that it is made up of a bunch of creatures,
and creatures are fragile. One untimely Doom
Blade can weaken all your remaining Slivers,
turning a favorable combat step into a disaster
in a hurry. Sliver Hivelord greatly reduces the
risk of that scenario.
It still requires that you find ways to make all
5 colors in your deck, but unlike the Legion, I
think the work to make that happen is worth it.
Not much is more difficult to get around than a
horde of indestructible creatures across the
table from you.
