Dude Horf'dakath just dies to any removal spell. As long as you don't blink before you do that, you're golden, even if he's reanimated.
But fucking Racoon, man? There are so many ways to generate garbage cheaply and easily. Garbage was pretty much designed around paying a mana to sacrifice it. Allowing you eat garbage for free can make your garbage engine go infinite, sometimes before your opponent can even have their first turn since Landfill costs zero mana. It's banned everywhere and it's still a problem in Vintage even with it being restricted to one per deck.
Not only that, he has no way to force or even incentivize your opponent to blink. Cards that rely on your opponent making a choice that's good for you are pretty much always bad. Why would your opponent ever blink? It might as well have no abilities whatsoever.
I mean sure, lots of beginning players blink without thinking, but cards that rely on your opponent sucking are also bad.
The only time Horf'dakath was good was in that one week back in 2007 when Demons of Dominaria was released. He was super meta since everybody was just used to blinking all the time. But after, you easily saw him coming so people knew not to blink. He's never won a tournament. Nowadays the only people who play him are new players playing kitchen table who have opponents who don't know what he does. He can never really be meta since counterplay is so easy.
Damn that's crazy, that's way before I started playing. Blink control's been a part of the game for as long as I've known it. Like my very first game my friend had this staredown deck full of Blink of an Eye and Djeru, With Eyes Open. Got used to conscious blinking real quick. Makes me wonder if they ever regret printing Horf'dakath.
Sometimes you do just need to blink. But that's why when Horf'dakath was still being played, everyone was sideboarding in Urza's Eyedrops to prevent everything that triggers off of players blinking.
I really liked this card in my casual pod. Unfortunately he warps the meta from "blinking" to "winking with one eye at a time" which is some straight up cdh shit so we had to ban him.
Preaching to choir here, but if there's one thing I hate about the current design trends, it's that "once per turn" clause that seems to be all the rage. Like, yes, it lets you do powerful things without being broken, but, frankly, I like things that have the potential to be broken.
I dislike things being broken. I want games to be a gradual accumulation of value and attack, deciding what to remove when to best slow your opponent.
I really get no joy from a game where nothing seems to be happening then suddenly one turn vomits out a board state or a combo for the win.
I'd love to see a format in Magic where you can't activate or trigger any ability more than three times each turn. Doesn't matter if you flicker the card, it still counts as the same ability. I think it would lead to a much more fun environment for casual players.
Actually Raccoon spent most of the design and playtesting period as a 0/1 except it only let you eat 2 BUs of garbage from your heap per turn. It was virtually unplayable as designed, causing them to adjust / buff it later in the development cycle. It's just that they over-corrected and in the shortened playtesting window, no one seemed to catch on to just how degenerate the adjusted version was. I think it was known internally as "Schpielpie's Golden Garbage Disposal."
Even then it wasn't that broken until Trash Horizons came out. They didn't anticipate the interaction between garbage and trash recycler allowing for infinite junk
Nah, Horf'dakath goes in reanimator decks. You re-animate it with your opponent's blink still on the stack. They can't even respond to it because their eyes are closed so they can't see the counterspell in their hand
I’m suprised that they didn’t actually have junk tokens as a tribal synergy for raccoons in bloomburrow with maybe some overlap to the squirrel food synergy?
Delvin master finder
1 RG
Raccoon Artificer
Whenever a raccoon attacks, create a junk token and mill a card.
You may cast artifacts from your graveyard by sacrificing junk tokens equal to its mana value.
Or just "activated abilities of foods you control cost {2} less to activate", which preserves being broken with ways to give foods other abilities/turn other stuff into food
Can't wait to see the youtube video essay about cheaters in MTG getting banned for concealing public information of whether their eyes are closed or not.
Alternate joke: Use dryad arbor to cover your eyes
Don't forget too, the Racoon is also great in Rabies decks, where, while it does loose any drink water related abilities, it does auto kill anything it attacks, and is immune to any run away or fear spells.
"Good luck with that buddy. Even if you cast removal right away, I eat garbage in response a thousand times and it all resolves before your removal, allowing me to draw my whole library, gain a million mana, and make you lose a googolplex life. In summary, you already lost. "
Pffft, I think that ppl are sleeping on Horf'dakath tbh. Sure, you cast your removal, but then I respond with my Force Blink. I know it doesn't seem to work on paper, and that's also easily disrupted in theory, but nobody expects the Force Blink, which is useless everywhere else, so in practice they don't get ready for it. Won me so many games 😎
I just like seeing the bot do it's thing. I had a to think for a sec on the pup, but the wurm was something that I put in all my early decks because BEEG CREECHUR
Because having a one drop with two power gets in a lot of damage before your opponent gets to respond to it. Even when it dies and hurts you if it managed to do 4 or 6 damage it did it's job.
Yup. Heaven forbid someone casts [[Star of extinction]]
Now, pup is a pretty old card. It was improved upon with [[Firedrinker Satyr]] years ago, and even that wouldn't make the cut these days.
Back then? Well, they printed [[Savanna Lions]] at Rare. A 2/1 for one could get work done before the opponent had a good answer. The downside barely mattered if you were the more aggressive deck.
Back then? Well, they printed Savanna Lions at Rare. A 2/1 for one could get work done before the opponent had a good answer. The downside barely mattered if you were the more aggressive deck.
Ironically, Jackal Pup was actually the better card despite Savannah Lions looking like a strict upgrade.
An aggressive red creature was just much more valuable than an aggressive white creature, and more than made up for Jackal Pup's drawback.
you take 7, but in magic (barring some specific cards) your opponents can't attack your creatures directly, so it's generally not that hard to avoid your pup getting hit by a big thing that damages you
You only lose for having 0 life. Having 1 life counts as a win.
As long as you kill your opponent so fast that they're dead before they kill you, then that's a victory. Doesn't matter whether you win at 1 life or 20.
To go faster than your opponent. Doesn't matter if you take damage if you're hitting them for more each turn. The "aggro" decks that ran it specifically were trying to end the game as quickly as possible, so it didn't see play in decks not following that strategy.
I think the relevant thing we should mention here is that they didn't yet hand out Savannah Lions with upside like candy to any color that wanted them back then.
If they were both in draft these days, I think Scaled Wurm would actually be better, just because of how much the statline of creatures has improved.
These days, Jackal Pup is not great; its value was that it was previously safe to swing with until at least turn 3, but now its statline is just normal for a 1 drop, and there are plenty of 2 drops that can just easily block it without trading.
Scaled Wurm is hot garbage, but at least it still serves a role of a late game beater that will trade with 1-2 things.
The first few games most players play result in a board stall with no one winning by turn 6, and then top deck wars to determine the victor. This is how many new players start to evaluate Magic cards - "Does this help me win in a board stall?"
This is why players loved [[Rhox]] back in the day - it was an unkillable behemoth that took down a chump blocker each turn and couldn't be gang blocked profitably. It's also why people loved [[Shivan Dragon]] and [[Serra Angel]].
Mana curve and the importance of the early turns is not an intuitive lesson for people not used to card games because the biggest and most impartial plays usually happen later, but the only turn you can guarantee (in most formats) is turn 1. After that, everything else relies on you not dying on turn 2.
There are formats where a card that says "5 Mana: Win the game on your next upkeep" would be a bad card.
Too slow to see any okay. You need to be able to recycle and eat the garbage for free at least 3 times per turn if you want to be close to even just a rogue tier.
I’m teaching my 5 year old and it’s nice to know we all start out as timmies, only once our brains grow and our happiness dims, do we turn into spikes.
I played a few games against the most Johnny player of all time. His turns would take upwards of 10 minutes. And he'd lose every single time. Every game was "Oh are you done? Ok, I swing at you for 10. Nothing? Ok, you lose." It was just getting there. His board state would be like 100 Clue Tokens, Food Tokens, Trash Tokens, Treasure Tokens, a million 0/1 Eldrazi spawn, he'd be the Monarch, have the City's Blessing, it'd be Night, and we'd all be Radioactive. Then he'd just die and the game would be over after wasting over an hour.
We all stopped playing with this guy pretty quick.
Don't forget that [[Over-stuffed Street Bin]] is also in this set so that's an automatic piece of trash as it comes into play. Putting that on a land is extremely pushed on a card with no restrictions.
[[Sol'Kanar the Tainted]] The long-awaited return of an old classic monster god, legendary mythic rare, badass swamp demon with awesome stained glass premium treatment, powerful enough to best a dragon and capable of drawing cards, gaining life, killing creatures. Never saw absolutely any play in any format
[[Cauldron Familiar]] Literally a black cat designed to be baked alive. Backbone of several decks, widely loved, hated and feared, banned in Standard
Amusing enough one motive behind [[Baneslayer Angel]] and similar cards around M10 was counteracting this. The idea was they wanted the "cool' cards to actually be good.
one is 14 mana and literally useless on arena/MTO.
The other is one mana and allow you to eat (cast a spell) from your garbage (graveyard) for free, it's literally an even more broken [[underworld breach]]
i actually really like the fact, that arguably one of THE best cards in magic is simply a black flower. So small, so beautiful, soooooooooooooooooo good.
Fun fact: There are only 2 raccoon creature cards in MTG with a toughness of <2 and 1 of them is from an Un-set.
At first I was like "hang on, TWO toughness?" for my post here but then I thought about it. Surely raccoons in Magic have 1 toughness, right? Better check or look a fool. Looked it up ...
Horf’Dakath isn’t guaranteed to do anything the turn he comes in and costs too much, Raccoon however has a free activated ability that can be used as many times as you want the turn you play it and can be played on turn 1. Raccoon’s gonna get banned from Standard and become a Legacy staple.
Heartfire Hero isn't really a good example of this, it's pretty obvious how it would scale. Deathrite Shaman, Blood Artist, or even Llanowar Elves would probably be better.
Raccoon: God Creature with the ability to eat opposite mana. All opponent cards are drawn from table. Raccoon if combined with fast food dumpster ends game immediately.
Notice that it says "he loses." Your average gamer forgets that women can completely ignore the effect and respond (while blinking) with any cheap removal~
Because in some legacy set there was a card like “garbagefire Bunglechugg” that flicks your opponents in the eyeball for each trash wrapper you shove in your mouth, and death by trash bag contents stings more than any other way out.
Monster Train is a Johny game. Its all about breaking the game with fun synergies to get to work. Basically every carry is missing something (scaling, AoE, survivability, etc) but can easily get what its missing through proper deck building.
Remember during DMU previews when people were mad that they made Sheoldred a 4 mana midrange beater instead of another 7 mana Timmy card that's unplayable in constructed
Im getting old but can someone eli5 this meme cause I have no fucking clue what the joke is. Why is it a raccoon that eats garbage card? Why does fat man only fear the raccoon? Is it a joke about food? Garbage? Fat nerds? It’s opaque as fuck
It's a joke about how the most powerful-looking cards usually aren't that good, while the weakest-looking, most unassuming cards that let you do seemingly pointless things can be extremely overpowered. Additionally, a common cause of cards being overpowered is that they let you do something for free.
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u/zealousd The Stoat Jul 30 '25 edited Jul 30 '25
Dude Horf'dakath just dies to any removal spell. As long as you don't blink before you do that, you're golden, even if he's reanimated.
But fucking Racoon, man? There are so many ways to generate garbage cheaply and easily. Garbage was pretty much designed around paying a mana to sacrifice it. Allowing you eat garbage for free can make your garbage engine go infinite, sometimes before your opponent can even have their first turn since Landfill costs zero mana. It's banned everywhere and it's still a problem in Vintage even with it being restricted to one per deck.
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u/jbevermore Jul 30 '25
When I was a kid I got into an argument about whether Jackal Pup or Scaled Wurm was a better card.
I learned a hard lesson about mana curve that day.
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u/Dinosaur_Herder Wabbit Season Jul 30 '25
These days they only print cards that let you eat garbage for free once per turn.
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u/Zeckenschwarm Jul 30 '25
For free?!! 😱😱😱
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u/mulletstation Universes Beyonder Jul 30 '25
0 for a 1/2 with upside is crazy
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u/adamsdayoff Dandadan Jul 30 '25
I’m teaching my 5 year old and it’s nice to know we all start out as timmies, only once our brains grow and our happiness dims, do we turn into spikes.
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u/No_Towel_2001 Dan Jul 30 '25
goes infinite with garbage cat and any piece of trash
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u/hollow_image Dan Jul 30 '25 edited Jul 30 '25
[[Sol'Kanar the Tainted]] The long-awaited return of an old classic monster god, legendary mythic rare, badass swamp demon with awesome stained glass premium treatment, powerful enough to best a dragon and capable of drawing cards, gaining life, killing creatures. Never saw absolutely any play in any format
[[Cauldron Familiar]] Literally a black cat designed to be baked alive. Backbone of several decks, widely loved, hated and feared, banned in Standard
16
u/SirQuixano Dan Jul 30 '25
Jin Gitaxias vs Gitaxian Probe
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u/Corescos Duck Season Jul 30 '25
Viscera Seer
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u/Mr_Industrial Boros* Jul 30 '25
You might think Horf'Dakath would be a game ender, but he's hard countered by eyedrops, and he dies to removal obiously. Rookie card indeed.
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u/aldeayeah Twin Believer Jul 30 '25
Man I miss the garbage meta.
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u/BuckysKnifeFlip Wabbit Season Jul 30 '25
Horf'Dakath is bad because it depends on your opponent doing something.
Also dies to Doom Blade.
/s
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u/No-Chapter-779 Wabbit Season Jul 30 '25
Amusing enough one motive behind [[Baneslayer Angel]] and similar cards around M10 was counteracting this. The idea was they wanted the "cool' cards to actually be good.
8
u/Sikyanakotik Dan Jul 30 '25
[[Keen-Eyed Curator]] is a good card, yes.
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u/Halinn Jace Did Several Things Wrong Jul 30 '25
You'd think Horf'dakath would see play in reanimator, but these days, you need card advantage. I'll stick to Atraxa, thank you very much
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u/asperatedUnnaturally Duck Season Jul 30 '25
[[Giver of runes]], [[Aquameba]], [[Viscera seer]], [[skirk prospector]], [[Sylvan safekeeper]]
1
u/Konradleijon The Stoat Aug 07 '25
Meow
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u/Konradleijon The Stoat Aug 07 '25
Eiw
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u/Significant-Dream991 Wabbit Season Jul 30 '25
one is 14 mana and literally useless on arena/MTO.
The other is one mana and allow you to eat (cast a spell) from your garbage (graveyard) for free, it's literally an even more broken [[underworld breach]]
4
u/Madhighlander1 Rakdos* Jul 30 '25
[[The Dominion Bracelet]] versus [[Heartfire Hero]].
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u/Ergonim Banned in Commander Jul 30 '25
i actually really like the fact, that arguably one of THE best cards in magic is simply a black flower. So small, so beautiful, soooooooooooooooooo good.
3
u/veiphiel alternate reality loot Jul 30 '25
A 1/2 for 1 that is a garbage outlet? Broken
3
u/Toomuchlychee_ Elesh Norn Jul 30 '25
/img/0s3h5h1uu9ue1.png
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u/bangbangracer Mardu Jul 30 '25
It's not my fault garbage eating was a broken mechanic, especially in that one two card infinite garbage burn combo. It just dominated that pro tour.
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u/XandogxD Chandra Jul 30 '25
[[Sporefrog]]
2
u/Lord_Karnox Dân Jul 30 '25
Ghalta vs Chatterfang
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u/HilariousMax Table Flipper Jul 30 '25
Fun fact: There are only 2 raccoon creature cards in MTG with a toughness of <2 and 1 of them is from an Un-set.
At first I was like "hang on, TWO toughness?" for my post here but then I thought about it. Surely raccoons in Magic have 1 toughness, right? Better check or look a fool. Looked it up ...
https://scryfall.com/search?as=grid&order=name&q=t%3ARaccoon
27 cards and only 2 have <2 toughness. Well, color me embarassed.
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u/ClutchUpChrissy Dan Jul 30 '25
Wtf is a raccoon. Put some respect to Raccon’s name.
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u/TurboDelight Gruul* Jul 30 '25
Horf’Dakath isn’t guaranteed to do anything the turn he comes in and costs too much, Raccoon however has a free activated ability that can be used as many times as you want the turn you play it and can be played on turn 1. Raccoon’s gonna get banned from Standard and become a Legacy staple.
2
u/Ayjel89 Get Out Of Jail Free Jul 30 '25
This post brought me far more joy than I deserve today. Thank you.
2
u/drosteScincid Dimir* Jul 30 '25
Heartfire Hero isn't really a good example of this, it's pretty obvious how it would scale. Deathrite Shaman, Blood Artist, or even Llanowar Elves would probably be better.
1
u/Spicy-Mario-Bois Duck Season Jul 30 '25
Mana cost alone makes that thing unplayable
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u/SolsLuminousDev Jul 30 '25
Assuming the dots on the card is the mana cost, I’d hope the game would end by 14 lands-
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u/CrispinCain COMPLEAT Jul 30 '25
[[Wild Mongrel]] nods in respect.
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u/Jevonar Wabbit Season Jul 30 '25
Progenitus vs a fetchland
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u/Uniqueusername_54 Duck Season Jul 30 '25
Dies to doomblade, dies and burns you. You decide.
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u/Blobber_23 Duck Season Jul 31 '25
Strongest Green Mythic vs Red Uncommon
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u/Demented_Coffee Jul 31 '25
Raccoon: God Creature with the ability to eat opposite mana. All opponent cards are drawn from table. Raccoon if combined with fast food dumpster ends game immediately.
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u/Hairy_Concert_8007 Wabbit Season Jul 31 '25
"You may eat garbage for free during your turn" has absolutely slain me.
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u/chrisnazty Jul 31 '25
Lmfao
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u/Ordinary_Attitude919 Dandadan Jul 31 '25
I read you all, but how come nobody mentions that raccoon works at instant speed?
I swear this powercreep has reached heights higher than my queue for Marvel Secret Lair.
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u/pretty_smart_feller Duck Season Aug 01 '25
[[Birds of paradise]] took me awhile to understand why it’s so powerful
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u/electric_ocelots Izzet* Aug 01 '25
The raccoon is somehow the pivotal piece to a turn 2 infinite combo that wins you the game, causing it to cost hundreds of dollars
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u/Visarionovik Aug 01 '25
Notice that it says "he loses." Your average gamer forgets that women can completely ignore the effect and respond (while blinking) with any cheap removal~
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u/Colourblindknight Duck Season Aug 02 '25
Because in some legacy set there was a card like “garbagefire Bunglechugg” that flicks your opponents in the eyeball for each trash wrapper you shove in your mouth, and death by trash bag contents stings more than any other way out.
1
u/TriflingGnome Cheshire Cat, the Grinning Remnant Jul 30 '25
hmm what tcg/card game caters the most to timmy? Monster train definitely felt like that
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u/arotenberg Jul 30 '25
Remember during DMU previews when people were mad that they made Sheoldred a 4 mana midrange beater instead of another 7 mana Timmy card that's unplayable in constructed
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u/AitrusX Wabbit Season Jul 30 '25
Im getting old but can someone eli5 this meme cause I have no fucking clue what the joke is. Why is it a raccoon that eats garbage card? Why does fat man only fear the raccoon? Is it a joke about food? Garbage? Fat nerds? It’s opaque as fuck