302 words on hot Alara Reborn common Qasali Pridemage.
Aesthetics:
The first thing you notice is that there is no “u” in “Qasali”. Does that make Qasali Pridemage Arabic? Just putting it out there.
Qasali Pridemage is a quality two-drop.
Interesting that our boy Billy Moreno just won a PTQ for Pro Tour Honolulu. Because at the last Pro Tour Honolulu he struck a virtual Top 8 with a Zoo deck that played two different two-drops that are at least superficially comparable to Qasali Pridemage:
- Watchwolf, and
- Kami of Ancient Law
Why a Watchwolf?
The price is right — GW — for similar functionality. Watchwolf was something special when it first came out; less so today with Wild Nacatl and a string of other great creatures; on offense, Qasali Pridemage can be pretty 3/3 himself.
Why a Kami of Ancient Law?
It’s pretty obvious, right? In fact Qasali Pridemage is even more versatile although the additional mana cost is a little steep.
Where can I see this fitting in?
Really only one or two kinds of decks… small creature beatdown decks or Zoo decks, possibly with Exalted sub-themes, main deck or in the sideboard. Qasali Pridemage is harder to play and less forgiving under pressure than Kami of Ancient Law (or Ronom Unicorn); those cards were played in a fairly narrow band of decks (Boros and Zoo), with Kami of Ancient Law seeing some Orzhov play largely due to Tallowisp sub-themes only. Despite its [Watch]wolfish leanings, I don’t see Qasali Pridemage being a lot more popular across a lot more different kinds of decks.
Snap Judgment Rating: Role player; probably typically a two-of sideboard card.
LOVE
MIKE
All Alara Reborn
4 comments ↓
I would dare say Qasali Pridemage is massively exciting in the Bloom Tender Lark decks. In fact, this card and Meddling Mage are massively useful in that archetype, requiring no significant streching of the manabase and granting exceptional functionality to the deck. The idea of being able to blow up Bitterblossom, Glorious Anthem, Loxodon Warhammer, Tidehollow Sculler, or bascially any card in an Esper strategy is incredible. Did I mention he’ll come back with Lark? I mean, hasn’t Wispmare seen use in Lark decks to fight many of the aforementioned enchantments? And he has Exalted, so he contributes to combat without having to be risked (which is the difficulty with Sculler sometimes).
Anyway, with the quality that TenderLark is receiving, and with how it has been a successful fringe strategy already, I am certainly inerested, maybe even excited, about playing the deck.
Props to Star for pointing out the Sculler interaction. I still find myself baffled that Sculler is an artifact! I’m surprised Watchwolf hasn’t found itself in a Zoo list. “Exalted sub-theme”… At the end of the day most of those exalted creatures have 2 toughness. This is a good sideboard card. THAT’S IT!
This is a great card. Its going to see heavy play in block and standard (if there is a deck to support it).
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