Outlaws of Thunder Junction: Hammer Review

With Outlaws hitting the format, I wanted to do a dive into every card that I thought could be reasonable in and/or against the deck. The following cards will receive my quick assessment, then additional information where appropriate.

As a quick refresher, the lens that I review cards through follows as such:

1. What problem does this card solve?

2. What do we cut for this card?

Lavaspur Boots

Overall Rating: Good, would play

This card is quite good. I was initially unimpressed, but the more I thought about it, the more it convinced me that it would be very good.

What problem does this card solve?

• This card does a lot for very little (both mana-wise as well as deck-building cost)

  • Haste is far and away the most relevant line of text. It enables us to immediately swing with both Saga constructs (7 damage with solely both constructs and the boots). Additionally, it allows us to turn any creature off the top into a threat.

  • Ward 1 is seemingly innocuous, but the ability to tax the OP's mana further is a nice bonus.

  • +1 power is easily the least significant bonus, but it's a nice addition to the first 2 abilities at no additional cost.

  • Note that this card also plays very nicely with Cryptic Coat, as they present a stream of 4-power unblockable, hasted creatures with BOTH ward 1 and ward 2.

What do we cut for this card?

• In the current meta, there are a few slots I am looking to potentially slot this into.

  • As Gingerbrute has been looking worse and worse recently, this would be the first place I look. While boots don't provide the evasion that Cookie does, they are a much better card to naturally draw, and generally play better with the rest of the deck.

  • If you have more than 4 0-drops, I would look to cutting one of them.

  • The non-Cryptic Coat fair equipment, as this provides a unique tool for the deck to leverage.

Fomori Vault

Overall Rating: Unsure, but likely worth playing as an additional land.

This card is very interesting. It is a colorless land which has its obvious downsides, but in any game that goes long this lets you discard a dead card and look at 3+ cards and pick the best option.

What problem does this card solve?

• As discussed above, this card is a fantastic mana sink later in the game, and enables a solid tool at little deck building cost.

• I'm inclined to play more lands, not fewer, because casting spells on time is really powerful.

What do we cut for this card?

• Since it's a colorless land, we won't be cutting a white source.

• Once again, I would look towards the flex slots of:

  • Excess 0 drops.

  • Third Springleaf Drum effect, since both are mana sources, and I do not count drums when accounting for colored courses in deck construction.

  • An extra Steelshaper's Gift if you are lower on utility equipment.

Assimilation Aegis

Overall Rating: Unsure, but likely closer to "good" than it is "bad". Situational.

This card is very interesting. It is a tutorable Journey to Nowhere with upside, and even has flash if you have SFM or Aid in play. The downsides are predominantly that it costs 3 mana, and being an artifact means that your opponents likely have the ability to answer it and get their threat back.

What problem does this card solve?

• Obviously the ability to have access to removal is a powerful effect, and it's ability to transform our creatures could be very powerful.

• Aegis'ing a Yawgmoth, then turning your creature into a Yawgmoth that they can't target with their Yawgmoth (due to protection from Humans). Stealing a Titan, Dryad, or any other number of creatures can also be an interesting upside.

What do we cut for this card?

• Once again, I would look towards the flex slots of:

  • Excess 0 drops.

  • An extra Steelshaper's Gift if you are lower on utility equipment.

Lost Jitte

Overall Rating: Card is likely fine in other archetypes, but bad in Hammer.

This card is a fine utility piece in some decks, but ultimately unimpactful and worse than basically every other equipment already in the deck. If you are casting SFM or Gift, then Hammer, Spear, Boots, or Coat are all better options.

If Saga is popping, this likely be worse to grab than any of your other options (Hammer, Spear, Boots, Drum, Thopter, Needle, Graveyard hate)

Bad Cards (Don’t Play These)

-The Key to the Vault - Card is leagues worse than The Reality Chip; it isn't a body on its own, only does anything when you are already dealing damage with an equipped creature, and does nothing.

-Lotus Ring - At least this effect is unique. +3/+3 and vigilance is cool, but we aren't in the market for a big mana rock.

-Sword of Wealth and Power - This card is likely worse than every other "Sword of X and Y" already printed, and we already don't play any.

-Simulacrum Synthesizer - We have almost no cards that trigger this thing, and it's another 3-drop.

Hateful Monsters:

-Pest Control

Yeah, no way around it, this card is a beating. The only good news with this card is that it's almost certainly a sideboard card, there aren't many white black decks in modern at the moment, and very few decks will want to play this over Engineered Explosives.

-Final Showdown

This card is highly flexible, but Dress Down it is not. Since it doesn't stay in play, the card won't kill constructs that come in after it resolved, and it can't reasonably prevent your Paladin from equipping, or your Stoneforge from triggering on ETB.

tl;dr - The Boots are good, the Vault and Aegis are interesting, and everything else is medium or bad. Also, Pest Control is a personal insult from WotC.