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Elricity » Wed Apr 30, 2014 11:34 am"]Burn doesn't have room for narrow cards like Titan's strength to support a specific card. It either has to function with the other spells in the deck that we are already running or not.
I think everyone knows flamespeaker 1) draws cards and 2) card draw is good in the control role. I believe their disagreement is over these beliefs: a) it can't kill big creatures therefore it can't draw cards and b) even if it can draw cards, that they wouldn't be helpful because you have to cast them this turn.
In regards to a), we've had an entire season to demonstrate why burn +x damage from a permanent to kill opposing creatures is so exploitable in the form of YP's elemental tokens, ash zealot, and Chandra. I'm not sure the source of the objection in this specific
case. The stated arguments have always been comparing the power/toughness of the card vs its opponents. My counterargument remains that against x/4 or less, this isn't an issue with 18 spells in the deck that already are "titan's strength" and another 6 that remove attackers and 2 that remove blockers. Against x/5+, mortars is a dead card while flamespeaker is not.
When Smiter is used as an example of a card flamespeaker interacts poorly with, I understand that they mean "you won't always have lightning strike in hand". However, when frostburn weird is used as an example card, then I suspect I haven't done a good enough job of pointing out that flamespeaker + shock kills frostburn in at worst a 1-1 with our weakest spell while leaving a threat on the table. And with smiter, comparing the interaction of 2-1 a smiter and then drawing 2 cards with a permanent in play is more profitable than 1-1 a smiter with no permanent in play.
Then again, maybe the point is that the magic
number of spells is 20 and that 18 is too low.
Hexproof makes the burn strategy bad and if people were just saying "Sylvan Carytid", then sure. Not all green decks run Carytid but I understand the shorthand "bad in Gxx" meant "bad in monsters/dredge". I'm already adjusting my sideboard plan to include BO, maybe keep a couple of charms against enchant removal or to kill carytid, or I might do a 1/1 mortar flame split in the sideboard. I'm not exactly excited with mortars against dredge either though so we're really talking about mortaring stormbreath or courser or dragging the game on until 6 lands. Or the argument is that there is a statistically significant chance that 24 removal over 26 will lose games.
I understand this is experimental and I'm certainly not recommending running it in a GP without playtesting the card. It has some complexity to it.
I don't understand the argument that the draw card portion is bad in burn. Would someone be able to clarify that?[/
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I respectfully disagree. When I ran Ash Zealot, I main boarded 3 Titan's Str. It's not a dead card at all in the burn deck. You have AZ, Chandra's Phonix, Mutavault, YP, tokens etc. It's effectively a Lightning Bolt (situational). Now all that being said, I no longer play them. I personally, have found more effective cards for my build. I certainly wouldn't call it a dead card, nor would I say it doesn't belong in the deck. It depends on your build, play style and meta. When I used it, Sylvan Caryatids were flooding my LGS. TS pushed damage through and after I played with it for a while, I snuck in some free damage.