Troop'ed

Apparently I suck at this whole updating thing. But I haven't forgotten about you, my fellow Spikeans.



There are plenty of cards in Magic that are terrible for one reason or another. It has power that's too low, it's in the wrong color to be useful in a particular deck, it doesn't do anything useful for you, or, probably the most common, the casting cost is too high. Most of these cards will end up with the unfortunate title of "Limited Fodder", which is the ultimate kiss of death for any Constructed playability.

Sometimes, though, cards emerge that go beyond just being filler for drafts. Sometimes everything that can go wrong on a card, does, and you get a coalescence of every bad design, development, and artistic decision. The "perfect shitstorm", if you will.

Sometimes, you get Aven Trooper.

When you have a card that rivals Chimney Pimp in abilities, and Word of Command in art quality, you know you have a winner on your hands.

First off, a 1/1 flier for 4 is bad. I don't care what format you're playing in, you're never going to want that. Play Storm Crow instead if you're that desperate for a flier.

Worse, it only has one ability. And it costs 3 mana to activate. Thankfully, it doesn't involve tapping, so it can be used multiple times a turn if you real--HOLY BALLS WHY DOES THIS COST SO MUCH TO ACTIVATE? I mean, I get why they might be wary of printing another Wild Mongrel or Aquamoeba. Dudes were beasts. But nerfing this to the point of unplayability is a bit harsh. But Aquamoeba was even in the same set as the Trooper, which means they sat down and had a conversation sort of like this:

Lead: "Okay, Wild Mongrel is a pretty cool guy. We should print something similar in another color for Torment. What color should it be in?"
Subordinate: "How about white?"
Lead: "Yeah, that makes sense. We should totally do another, too."
Subordinate: "Blue?"
Lead: "I guess so. Let's make them!"
Subordinate: "Should the white one be better? I mean, blue isn't supposed to have good creatures."
Lead: "You're new here, aren't you?"

Even the art on this card is pretty godawful. It's like Greg Staples finished drawing the bird and was like "You know what? I don't get paid enough for this shit," and left, leaving the art squad to fill in the background for him.

Artist's Approximation

There are exactly zero redeeming qualities of this card. And that, my friends, makes Spike cry.