So here we have the newest member of the prestigious “Planeswalker Club” and a very unique one in many ways. The first thing that you will realize is Sarkhan’s inability to gain loyality. Doomed to die eventually as sacrificial lamb for his devious master Nicol Bolas he comes with a whopping 7 Loyality though. This makes him also the first Planeswalker that can use his ultimate right away.
But how good are his abilities?
The first one reminds very much of Dark Confidant but instead of punishing you for the card draw he sucks his own life force dry. So if you have a possibility to stack the top cards he might do that for a bit actually. Cards like Senseis Divining Top or Jace, the Mind Sculptor work very well with him (Jace is even involved in his storyline…)
The second ability basically turns any creature on your side into a 5/5 Dragon. Not to bad if you happen to have a Khalni Garden token lying around or other very unimpressive creatures that have become useless. Note that he can do that 3 times and still live to use ability #1.
His third and ultimate ability depends on dragons on the board but can deal hefty damage. It works very well together with his second ability. For example: Sacrifice token to make 5/5 Dragon, attack with Dragon next round and then bash with Ultimate for a total of 10 damage. If you are a casual player that likes Dragon deck then he is a must I guess, but for tournament decks?
Top or Flop? Let us know what you think in the comments.
Quirky. The most agrravating thing about him is the he can’t kill himself. What you really want to do is use him to drop several dragons (over a few turns) and then die and play another copy for lethal.
He also plays well with Chameleon Colossus, though that interaction probably has to be casual/singleton.
While converting creatures into 5/5 tokens isn’t too shabby (sprouting Thrinax anyone?) this is not one of the planeswalkers that you want to top deck if you are already in a board position hole.
Seems good, gives Jund some card draw and a new win condition, i think “Crazy Sarkhan” goes VERY well with broodmate dragon. It’s no Jace the Mind sculptor, but it may see some play.
Reminds me of Chandra Ablaze- nifty n’ narrow!
Although ability #2 has cool interactions with Unearth… :]
Also, this guy reminds me of Kiss the Amesha! Possibly a good card in Control Mirrors or versus Control?
He’s like opposite of Elspeth. Poor guy…
Mirror vs. Mirror control? Maybe in block, but control decks tend to have cards that hurt to draw via the dark confidant ability… after all his “natural” control slot would be a revival of Cruel Control – but 7 mana = 7 damage. Of course UBR brings Jace and Ponder into the picture, so who knows.
He just seems alright to me. He could be decent in Jund with all the Thrinaxes and tokens to sacrifice, but beyond that, he’s just a one-trick pony. In Limited, on the other hand, I’ve never met a 5/5 flier I didn’t like.
He is definitively a limited bomb. Turning all your small dudes into 5/5 flyers should end the game quickly. I was also thinking about Jund for this one. Maybe he works in some lists that pack Broodmate Dragons…
@ronin I think you think it damages you, he deals damage to himself when you “draw”.
Indeed – thanks for pointing that out. That is actually much much worse in aggro and much better in control. With 27 land decks you probably can get pretty good use out of him even sans Jace/Ponder/Halimar Depths, but with those three he becomes crazy (no pun intended).
I think it is a pretty cool card. I don’t think it really fits in any constructed deck right now. It does provide another sacrifice outlet for persecutor. We’ll see if they will team up together. This Sarkhan may have the same fate as his previous incarnation.
I’m not sold for constructed, but the artwork is pretty sweet.