I am doing things differently today. With this new voucher promo card being released, the current trend is to speak positively about it, to highlight its strengths, speculate about possibilities, minimize its flaws and rationalize the cost. I don't like this card very much, so I could offer a lukewarm analysis that might be fair and balanced, but boring, and that would be lost in the sea of positive hype... or I can absolutely trash this card. I can try to demolish this card entirely, point out each of its flaws in the harshest possible way, give it no quarter and leave it begging for mercy. That is what I intend to do, and I will see how much pushback I get, and if people come out who really like this card.
Those are brave men knocking at our door. Let's burst their bubbles!
1. This card is overpriced garbage
11500 Vouchers is what you have to pay to roll 46 copies of the card. Buying that from the exchange currently costs 360k DEC, or roughly 332$ at current market. For every gold foil you land, you can sell for about 30$ and buy a 5$ regular foil copy, allowing you to recoup 25$ from the original cost for every GF copy. And of course, landing a black foil is a jackpot, injecting the all-important "chaser" mentality in every single product that the game is now selling us. Alternatively, you can buy regular foil copies from the market and pay roughly 250$, or buy gold foils and pay roughly 34$ per bcx if you're lucky.
If we do some market analysis, we see that 250$ on the market today can get you around ten max level Conclave Arcana cards if you carefully buy at the floor. It could also get you two really elite legendary CA cards, like Inept Healer and Bren Palesworn, or it can get you a max level archon and some spare change. Is Tasoshi worth as much as this? There is no reason for it to be worth more, so therefore its not. Even Arcane Skinwalker, which is a much better card for the same mana cost, is half the price of Tasoshi on the market for a max copy.
2. Arcane Skinwalker is a better card
Tasoshi Drakamoto looks bleak when you put him side by side with Arcane Skinwalker. But I can already hear you screaming: "You can't compare them! Tasoshi is a sneak card, it's not fair!" No, it's not. Because Skinwalker is about to stomp your boy into the ground. As two eight mana back row magic damage dealers, you might come to choose between these two cards to fill a spot on your teams. These two cards are going to be played in similar circumstances, which makes them comparable. They also have similar defensive stats, with the edge going to Skinwalker with his 2 extra armor and Camouflage which increases survivability, versus slightly faster speed for Tasoshi.
Both cards bring Inspire, which is a great ability and offensive support. However, Arcane Skinwalker blows Satoshi right out of the water with his Shapeshift ability, which ensures he can be played with some amazing archons and receive tremendous abilities in addition to his kit, such as Painforged and Execute. Tasoshi, on the other hand, needs to be played with the cruddy Drakoshan archon and receive... +1 speed. Wow, color me impressed. Drakoshans really got the short end of the stick in the new meta. It's a shame because they have some pretty interesting cards in the bloodline.
Arcane Skinwalker also brings Silence, which is a mainstay ability that you want to bring as often as you can. On the other hand, Tasoshi Drakamoto gives you Stun and Spite. Stun is an average value ability, and the Spite... well, it's still just a three damage hit. This card will die easily, so if I am being cynical, I would say this probably just makes up for its early death. As we said before, Skinwalker's Camouflage will make him live longer on average, allowing him to maintain his support abilities longer. Let's have a moment of silence for the card that's going to get hit with that three damage Spite attack though. I think I'm going to cry... Moving on.
Did I mention that Arcane Skinwalker is a neutral? Neutral cards are usually weaker than their elemental counterparts, but here it is the opposite, with the Fire card being weaker. This is a terrible look for poor Tasoshi. This comparison is a knock out win for Skinwalker.
3. Other sneak cards are better, especially high end ones
Captain Fellblade is the most natural and obvious comparable to Tasoshi Drakamoto. She is an eight mana sneak card doing five damage split between melee and magic damage. The split damage makes her playable in more rulesets, and she hits harder than Tasoshi. The latter brings more support and more fluff, with a slew of abilities versus only a Strengthen for Fellblade. Defensively, Fellblade has 2 more HP and 2 more speed, versus 2 armor for Tasoshi, giving Fellblade the edge. With Tasoshi being an overpriced promo card, the fact that it is so close in power to a core rebellion card is a bad look for the old Drakoshan. Sorry old man, but even as a sneak monster you're not that great. And it's about to get much worse for you.
Here comes Nephket, and she's ready to kick your sorry behind one more time. Think you had it rough against Skinwalker and Fellblade? Nephket will give you serious complexes about that puny little Stun you're carrying. Nephket is the master of sneak and stun, and she brings her own Knock Out that she can take advantage of with a dual attack totaling five damage... for seven mana. That's one mana less than Tasoshi, and she is playable in two elements, Water and Life. Nephket is squishy, even with a Divine Shield, but she hits like a truck. If her first hit stuns the target, she hits again for eight damage with piercing. Oh wait, what was that again? Tasoshi has a Spite attack when he dies. Yeah, that's right, for three damage. Okay. Tough decision? Not really. Nephket is much better, and could still get a cool Canisan archon in the future.
Here comes the reigning champion of the sneak meta, Night Stalker. I'm not even going to bother with a comparison between the two cards, I'm just going to let this one sit. By the way, Tasoshi isn't moving anymore, I think he must have died at some point. Alright, the fight is over, time to wrap it up! I'm waiting for you guys to come back at me with your best arguments if you like Tasoshi Drakamoto. Leave them in the comments, and keep supporting me if you enjoy the content. Until next time!
