Also, Egotist does what it's designed to do. In Scourge "cmc matters" was a theme of the set. And Egotist is designed to be a card looks completely terrible but is actually suited for its environment. It's designed to make the player say "an 8 mana 1/1?!?!?" before thinking about why that might ever be beneficial. It's still not good, mind you, but it was printed with a purpose, so it's at least justified. tl;dr it's right to leave it off this list.
As a card with Morph, it cannot truly be one of the worst ever since even if for some reason you can't abuse the CMC, you can still drop it down as a 2/2 chump for 3
Indeed, Scornful Egotist was arguably one of the only cards that actually worked as part of that theme, because the rest of them "synergised" with CMC matters by just being overpriced.
You could play Scornful Egotist in a deck with Birthing Pod or Prime Speaker Vannifar and grab something powerful after morphing it on the cheap. That easily makes it more useful than anything on this list.
@@astuteanansi4935 Nevermind it itself is a shell game - which 2/2 do I blow up hoping it's the Exalted Angel? Even if you can't abuse the CMC right now, it's still a target your opponent must worry about as being potentially something stronger. The unknown is dangerous.
I'm surprised there weren't any "Islandhome" cards, the creatures that can't attack unless an opponent has an island and are buried if you don't have one. Most of the time they were inefficient creatures with nothing to balance the downside too, so it wasn't even worth turning an opponent's land into an island.
The passably efficient Islandhome creatures would do better than Wu Admiral. The "good" Islandhome creatures usually got a decent power/toughness for their casting cost (Dandan) or fit into a deck archetype (Vodalian Knights and Seasinger in a Merfolk deck) or came with a useable ability (Marjhan). And most of them did have big power/toughness despite their inefficiency, capable of quickly reducing an opponent's life if given the chance to attack, That said, I don't disagree with the idea that Islandhome creatures are bad, and that's even in the context of old school MtG. Although, I wouldn't mind seeing new Islandhome creatures with more modern design sensibilities (that is to say more powerful compared to their old school counterparts).
Most of the Islandhome creatures are decent stat-wise, not the best but not terrible. 4/3 for 3U is far better than a 0/6 for 5U in almost every scenario. I actually use a few of the Islandhome creatures in my sea monsters deck even if most of time their just blocking.
Scornful Egotist was 1 of the "best" cards in 1 of my first decks ever. Back then our play group would cut our decks n the highest mana cost went first. So this guy's huge mana cost meant I was very likely to be going first if I cut him but could still have a "Grey Ogre" when time came to cast it, n I had a lot of morph cards so the psychological aspect of any morph card was impactful
I dunno, I feel like that 6 mana 0/6 that has to be recast over and over again should be higher on the list. That's 3 less mana than the #1. At least the #1 does something once in a while.
6 mana 0/6 that can't block trample and has no flying? I think it's easy number 1 on this list because it's just bad beyond believe. You don't even want it in your High Toughness decks as you can have much better stats for much less. Turning off Islandwalk is at least good in very narrow scenario and Dichotomancy at least is a sorcery with very high mana cost and there are cards that care about instants and sorceries having high mana cost. Zephyr Spirit is the worst of them all.
Agreed. Realistically, this should be a 3 mana card AND have flying, and even then it would probably have not been good enough for limited. Being 6 mana is just baffling. It it was a card from the golden age, then maybe it'd get a pass, but from Kamigawa, there is no reason to be that bad.
Though expensive for what it does, I saw Zephyr Spirit played before. As memory serves, it was used with cards that paid you off for when a spirit comes into play. So the idea was if someone attacks, you block, then recur the spirit. Not terribly efficient though. As for using it to block a big creature forever...go get yourself a copy of Gossamer Chains.
For Red, Break open has to be on it. Even against morph, its basically a worse shock or lightning strike. If it could hit your own, it could be neat, but as is, its awful even if playing against morph.
That card was actually #1 on one of his other worst lists. What an absolute travesty of a card. It could be fun if they made some bad cards that have downsides when they get flipped to at least maybe do shit with Harmless Offering and the like. But nope, nothing. It's a train wreck of a card, but in a way, that at least makes it notable. It's up there with One with Nothing in the "absolute abysmal shit" category that many cards strive for.
There are a lot of dreadful red cards to compete with it. Crazed Goblin and Viashino Skeleton come to mind. Although Break Open is probably more useless still. It became slightly less useless in theory after Manifest became a thing, but I don't think anyone has ever bothered to try it out for that narrow case.
Yeah, I maintain that Break Open is the absolute worst card in the game, bar none. You can't even use it to up your storm count. And when you do have a target, all it does is actively help your opponent's morph deck. I'd rather run playsets of Great Wall and Wood Elemental then ever put a Break Open in my deck.
I thought Zephyr Spirit at #6 was a 6/6 then I thought "well, it isn't that bad, since you want to beat down with it anyway". Then I saw it was a 0/6 and went "...oh"
Not saying it's a good card but when I got started I had a magical Christmas land blue deck that used dichotomancy. I would suspend it and the turn before it would resolve I would Sleep my opponents board.
I think a good general rule for these sort of lists would be "if it can attack or block, it's probably not one of the worst cards ever." Stuff like Zephyr Spirit obviously doesn't count for that rule, but I have a hard time saying that a 1U 1/1 with a basically useless upside is worse than, like, Pale Moon or Snowfall .
@@crovax1375 In mono blue, assuming Just land being used to cast it, it's turn 3 cast, then turn 4 you have 9 Mana. Plus 2 for instants and abilities during upkeep. That doesn't sound too bad to me. And that's assuming No other Mana sources. I could definitely see myself running it in some high cost mono blue commanders.
@@calemr the extra mana from Snowfall can only be used to pay Culminative upkeep cost. Besides Mystic Remora I'm not sure what else you would be playing, besides feeding Snowfall your mana
@@crovax1375 I... Stand corrected. Yeah, no, that's really not great. Trying to find uses... Still leaves the issue of "But what if you Don't draw Snowfall? Then those cards mostly suck." Of the good cumulative upkeeps aside from the obvious remora: Breath of dreams maybe, if you know your play group has some green token decks? Reality Twist/naked singularity can be nasty if it limits/stops people's casting for a few turns. 'bout it. Not worth running it for them, really. And going out of blue/colorless means you're not going to be running mostly snow covered islands.
I feel like Cephalid Snitch is a bit high on the list. Sure, it's activate ability is worthless, but a vanilla 2 mana 1/1 is... stilll awful, but not the kind of awful that belongs on this list. I'd be way less upset about having that in a random deck than Zephyr Spirit.
Back when Stronghold came out, I remember InQuest printed an article saying that 'Dream Halls' was the worst blue card ever printed. And I was like "Huh?!? You guys have no idea what you are talking about because that card is a totally broken game crushing bomb". And not long after that was published... 'Dream Halls' was totally banned.
@@isaoblack987 I vaguely remember that issue and I believe they said 'Elkin Bottle' was the worst card in Ice Age. (which ironically, is another card I horribly abused back in the day LoL) They did have a top ten list that did not include Necro though.
Spy Kit equipped on a tapped creature you control + donate that creature to an opponent with Zedruu + Dichotomancy = Stealing every creature in their deck. Yes, it's a lot of set-up, but the hilarity of pulling it off stops Dichotomancy being the top one on my list, even in EDH!
Mystic Might could kind of work in a deck that also has a theme moving auras around, then if you had 4 land then you could give a creature +8/+8 for a turn for U, at a total cost of 5U, or for two turns for 7U.
Maybe it is nostalgia speaking here, but while their effect is mostly a mild annoyance, I don't think that Erosion and Power Leak deserves to be on a top 10 worst of all time list: they still do something aligned with the colour pie and gameplay (control decks planning to prolong the game can still benefit of some little damage adding up) and are decently costed, especially Power Leak. But most importantly, they can give you something to exile to play Force of Will.
That is such a silly argument -- it's blue and can be exiled. Why not have a GOOD blue card that can be used when it's necessary that also can be exiled...
Yeah I mean, let's be honest, 99% of the time, you'll let the land with Erosion on it go, since most lands provide one mana, and costing 1 mana and 1 life to keep it around isn't a great deal. Now obviously if you need that color, or it's a Gaea's Cradle or something, then Nizzahon has a point. But if you target a regular old land, it's basically a blue Stone Rain. I was surprised, given his logic on the card, he didn't also mention psychic venom.
Wait until we get the island version of urborg and or an island version of blood moon in a dominaria or modern horizons set and undertow will be in everyone's sideboard against merfolk matchups in any format it is legal in.
They already made a blue Blood Moon, Back to Basics, but it makes non-basics not untap instead of turning them into islands. Urborg for Islands would probably be the last one if they ever decided to complete that cycle. Also, Undertow will likely never be reprinted so it is only legal in Vintage and Legacy. I just don't see merfolk ever being good enough in Legacy for Undertow to make it to a sideboard.
Dichotomancy has Suspend precisely because your opponent can see it coming. If they don't want you to steal their things, they won't tap their nonland permanents (namely, attacking you with creatures). In other words, it's a bad fog. Yes, it's still bad, but that's the rationale behind it having Suspend.
@@flabberjiggles4825 Blue has enough stuff to force opponents to tap and keep tapped (sleep for example) that it´s not that unlikely that you can force the effect. It´s probably still not good, but its not number 1 worst by a long shot I think. Not even top 10.
I was looking for a card that I was using in a deck that was terrible, just fit the theme, and I found Teferi's Curse is a card. 2 mana to give a creature or artifact phasing on an enchantment
Tbf that's not terrible. Yes it's way worse than all the Pacifism-style auras that will nullify a creature permanently rather than just every other turn, but it's at least better than all the other cards from Mirage that had phasing tacked onto them directly. The art though.... Is that meant to be Teferi?!
Suspend Dichotomancy, then, when it goes onto the stack, overload Blustersquall, then go sit in the corner and think about all the time you wasted for a mediocre combo
#8 Wu Admiral: "And, sure, there are some cards that make lands into Islands, but going to that trouble just to make this a 4/4 just isn't worth it." Not to mention that if you _were_ going to turn an opponent's lands into Islands, there are much better cards that could take advantage of that.
Y'know, mystic might seems really bad if you think about paying the upkeep, but what about not paying it? Then it's just 2 mana give a creature +2/+2 until end of turn! (Also you can pay one of that mana on the previous turn) Still bad, but probably not top 10 bad. Maybe.
Honestly, if Dichotomancy just made a token that was a copy of each tapped nonland permanent that your opponent controls, that wouldn't be overpowered for 9 mana, and the card would actually consistently do something.
I actually run Power Leak in my blue EDH decks when I can mostly because I have a Beta copy (who doesn't love to flex old cards?). I can't deny it's a bad card but I use it to target Mystic Remora, Rhystic Study, Smothering Tithe, etc. until I can destroy them. Just call it minor payback for all the "Can I draw?" or "Are you gonna pay the 1?" questions.
Watching the “worst red cards” video reminded me of a bad blue card: Evermind. They used to give you a booklet with bundles and this card was advertised in it with “and you thought Mudhole was unplayable.” Evermind doesn’t have a casting cost, you can only splice it onto an arcane spell. The splice costs 1U, and adds “draw a card” to the arcane spell you cast. It’s a terrible card.
I can kinda see a case for mystic might; if you only plan to use it once, it's a less-powerful giant growth that the opponent can see coming (still bad, but could at least throw off their combat calculations), if you pay the upkeep for one turn you get two uses for three mana (still not great, but something blue doesn't get a lot of) yeah, it's still bad
Imagine if we ended up living in a world where Wotc sets F.I.R.E to the merfolk tribal decks to such a degree that folks would have to pull out undertow as a sideboard option…. That would probably be a sign of the end times
I'm confused, dichotomancy looks actually good? like, doesn't blue have sorceries that do things like tapping all minions and making them skip their untap? you can just suspend that and tap them all before it triggers and you're basically getting a copy of their board if they play multiple copies of their cards (which... doesn't everyone does that? like, "the card does nothing if the opponent plays a bad deck" doesn't sound like a worrying prospec). It might not be competitively viable but there is no way it makes a "worst card" list, the card has a very clear use case with a powerful payoff.
Dichotomancy was a 2 of in my Stasis deck. Worse part is, it never resolves because after being tapped out for 4 or so turns my opponents scoop before it hits.
Mystic Might is notable for being a critical part of the one of the worst possible 3-card blind decks: Mystic Might, Icatian Store, and Springjack Pasture. It takes 471 turns to goldfish its opponent.
About the best case scenario I can think of for Dichotomancy in EDH is to maybe suspend it, then before it goes off give your opponent a creature equipped with Spy Kit, or give the creature then hard cast it. Then Dichotomancy would let you search their deck for any non-legendary creature to snatch. Would still be either too finicky or too pricy for the effect, though, as I'm pretty sure there are other cards that do similar effects for not nearly so much hassle.
Cephalid Snitch made me think if there are enough cards for some sort of "Top 10 weirdest / most narrowly specific creature abilities" list. The first examples that came to mind were Tresserhorn Skyknight (prevent all damage dealt to it by... creatures with first strike) and Vindictive Mob (can't be blocked by Saprolings). Not that the creatures would have to necessarily be completely awful, just... strange. 🤔
You should rank the color pairings, like the guild combos. Idk if this would be data based, i.e. total up the points from cards in each pair, or decks points ranked. It could also be opinion. I just think this would be cool.
In its defense, Erosion wasn't the worst thing you could do in Shandalar early on. With starting life totals at 9-11ish and constant aggressive pressure from stuff like Unstable Mutation on a 1-2 drop, 'ping your opponent each upkeep' in blue was pretty decent. And by pretty decent I mean I beat up a lot of elves with it until I could get something better.
I love watching all your content but the worst lists I like the most because I get to hear about cards I've never seen before, and probably wouldn't have without the video
I think Mistyc might is not THAT bad. Don't get me wrong, it is a bad card, but not the worst. I think the problem is that you judge the card based on someone actually wanting to keep the card in play. Mechanically, it's works almost like a sorcery that, for 1U, gives +2/+2 to a creature. So, it would be similar to a sorcery that had "1U: Target creature gets +2/+2. During the upkeep of your next turn, you may pay 2U to cast a copy of this spell in your graveyard. Choose new targets for that copy" Then you see how many +2/+2 BLUE spells are and you see it's not that common
Fun Fact: My friend had an EDH game where someone tried to Cephalid Snitch a Progenitus and kill it with Deadly Rollick. You can probably guess how that went
I'm relieved you didn't put Sea Serpent on here, or any of the other shockingly bad cards I played when I had a tiny card pool. Erosion is indeed awful, I tried to make it work with Psychic Venom, and while Venom did a tiny amount of work, Erosion was almost never worth the cardboard it was printed on. It has niche interest if you want Blue Devotion, but it has the big downside of people being able to remove it by sacrificing the land, AKA you played a really bad Sinkhole in Blue, a colour with access to gems like Mana Vortex. Anyways, the deck eventually got a 1 of Mana Web, so once I had that Erosion did become much worse Sinkhole, which was still bad but at least wasn't as embarrassing. So, long story short, even Erosion has some secret utility, you just need to use cards that are borderline broken in laughably suboptimal ways.
Mystic Might is basically 2 mana for +2/+2 till end of turn, with the possibility of paying effectively 3 mana the next turn for +2/+2(and you would definitely sac it after that). This is not good, and I would never play it, but I think calling it top 10 worst is an exaggeration.
Hmm, I wonder... Mystic Might is not great (if I had one I'd keep it in a safe place as it's one of those odd cards that might get better with future card releases) but it could be compared to a 2 mana +2+2 sorcery buff, albeit slightly better because you cast it prior to combat but don't have to choose who will be buffed until later. I'd easily take it over any other cards on the list for sure and I think that there are much worse cards out there, like, Merchant Ship (from Homelands) for example =)
I said it last time you featured it (Although I think it was higher on the list) I think Mystic Might _might_ be a bit better than you think. Especially in Blue, it's basically just a worse punp spell. Not even a bad one, just one right outside the fringes of good. It's not even the worst pump spell in Blue. I think it might even be playable in a blue aggro deck if it were reprinted in Draft
Say you get 2 pumps out of it, you spent 5 Mana throughout 2 turns on 4 damage. Not a bad calculation. You play it for 1, you tap the land you enchant. 2 mana for +2/+2. Then, you untap, pay upkeep, and tap again for 3 mana spent. In a format like draft where sometimes you need to find sources to spend your mana on to push damage, I could see this really shaking out in a way that works in your favor. Now, disclaimer, this card isn't good. It's a D- at best. But the math behind it is sound, and especially back then Blue didn't really have that many good instant speed pump effects. The worst part about this card is the telecasting of your pump before combat
@@MyDj56 You basically never want to go down cards for damage alone in Limited. That's why Lava Axe and the like are terrible. You are basically describing a really conditional Lava Axe. It would be an F in Limited, no question.
@@MyDj56 The thing is, pump effects like this are usually good because of the combat trick utility. The fact it does broadcast you're going to pump makes it vastly worse, because it gives your opponent tons of opportunity to play around it with their blocks, which they wouldn't be able to do with a Giant Growth or similar actually good pump spell. And +2/+2 isn't strong enough to force your opponent into making bad trades anyway, at least, not in most metas.
Baki's curse sucks. IT just shows that red does burn better than blue. Aura barbs is a red instant arcane for 2R that does the exact same thing as Baki's curse but also makes each enchantment deal 2 damage to their controller
Scornful egotist was purpose design to get a high converted mana cost card for cheaper than its actual cost. You only have to spend 4 mana to get an 8cmc permanent on the field. There are better cards that can get you a high cmc for cheap. But scornful egotist works. It was meant for cards that care about cmc. Draco is the best card for decks that care about cmc. Flame javelin is other good one that only cost 3 red but has a cmc of 6,
It would only work against decks that have multiples, like Persistent Petitioners,Shadowborn Apostle, or Relentless Rats. Unless you're in a playgroup that runs one of the few "play as many as you like creatures" you probably never will get any value off this dichotomancy. Against those decks you could have a blow out if you managed get them with it early, but there's better cards that punish redundancy in magic than it.
For me the worst blue card will always be Moonlace. Why? Cos it's the first rare I ever cracked open at a limited event. I'll never forgive it for that. I love your subjective takes on these cards and the glimpses we get into your own personal playing history at times.
Power Leak is one of those cards whose art I wish could be recycled onto a better card. Or maybe they should use it for an art card. Hell, I would pay a few bucks for a set of Drew Tucker art cards...
Well as to Elder Spawn not looking Lovecraftian, it actually kinda does as far as I'm concerned: it looks like the deformed offspring of one of the Elder Things from At the Mountains of Madness. The ones that look like tubes with tentacles with a hole for a mouth on top and appendages around it. It's not a perfect match (maybe an Elder Thing+shoggoth hybrid somehow?), but that's where my mind went when I saw the art and read the name.
@@NizzahonMagic But by that logic, a two mana 1/1 is better than Hydroblast because of the situation needed on the Hydro. Realistically, if Dichotomy were 4 or 5 mana, it would be considerably more playable.
Scornful Egotist looks like it's the Morph mechanic equivalent of One With Nothing. Which would be a *sort of* compliment if Morph was anything even close to an evergreen mechanic.
I don't remember how much Protection from Black existed in Torment (Chephalid Snitch's set) but for a Limited game I don't know if it was almost assumed you were splashing Black for that (bizarre game design's) set. Still an F-, if that exists XD
I feel that you could make an entire top-10 of bad Blue cards from most spells from Ice Age and before, as Blue certainly has some of THE WORST cards from that era. The only problem with this is that there have since been printed cards that are apparently specifically made to be terrible on their own but absolutely game-breaking when combined with equally terrible cards from 10 years ago. Way to go blue...
Couldn’t you suspend Dichotomancy and then use a spell to tap all of controller’s creatures, like Sleep (4 mana)? To potentially get a good haul at a lower mana price? Then you’re tapping all of your opponent’s creatures, getting copies of whatever ones he has duplicates of, and taking advantage of all enter the battlefield effects that his creatures create for 7 mana split over 2 turns. I can see a world where that combo is potentially game changing in many games, and where it’s not too hard to assemble. I know that doesn’t make the card “good” or even “not bad,” but surely it makes it better than at least one other blue - especially given that you can often guess at least some of the cards in your opponent’s deck based on what they’ve played.
For the worst green cards, I suggest Floral Spuzzem gets an honorable mention because it was the worst card prior to the oracle text change. On a related note, that game from prior to the oracle text still goes on...
I'm disappointed my favorite card didn't make the list, tolarian serpent, it's a powerful card, but at 7 mana I rarely got it in play to take advantage hehe. 7 mana for a powerful self miller is a bit much.
Nothing feels better than Erratic Explosion that Egotist. anyway, i believe theres worst blue cards than #1... after all, blue is expert on tapping permanents and that suspend cost and time is pretty low for a decent effect
Worst blue spell? The non errata’d version of extinguish. For anyone curious portal 2 had some weird rules making a sorcery speed counter spell actually work.
#2 is a solid creature lol, like that is so much better than a 2 mana 2/2, because just having the ability to sacrifice at will is such a great upside, still a terrible creature but like in commander that is not a useless body
It blows that Dichotomancy is such a terrible card, because the actual effect is cool. It would be an interesting card if it was much cheaper to cast or a little cheaper but didn't have the stupid tapped permanent condition. Kinda like a mass cloning effect, which are fun, but you're actually stealing stuff.
wait, isnt dichotomancy op if opponent has a tapped creature equipped with spy kit? You get all their creatures from deck for only 9 mana with such a small and minor condition! /s
That's hilarious! Is it actually possible to force this condition on your opponent? Because that would be the greatest combo victory in the history of magic if you could pull it off.
@@AlteredNova04 Alas, even this doesn't actually work like this - even if the creature has every single name, it's still just one permanent, so you're just getting one creature off of it, not all of them.
Omg poor guy who gets Dichotomancy in the booster, i maybe counts for the memes, but really, get the worst blue card in existance must feel really bad XD
