![]() I’m not going to claim that those people were wrong, but I will say that at least in old Standard Jund, Farseek was the best card and I wanted to draw it every game. A deck that wants this kind of effect will usually want it at any cost, much like Jund, which people have said is a completely different deck when it has Farseek. If this is the case, then Sylvan Caryatid is certainly a worse card, though still quite playable. One thing that worries me, and this may or may not ever become reality, is the possibility that most or all of the control decks in the format focus their removal suit around cards like Devour Flesh and Far // Away, which can ignore hexproof. Part of the allure of Farseek was fixing all three of your colors and giving you a shockland to help with Woodland Cemetary or Rootbound Crag. For this reason, if you play Sylvan Caryatid, the most common build will be two colors. Now if you want to fix your mana you will be forced to play with Guildgates, which makes the idea of playing three colors really unappealing. I think the Caryatid will not be as popular as Farseek simply because there won’t be nearly as many three-color decks in the new Standard format without the Innistrad or M13 lands for fixing. It’s also usually a very good idea to Counterspell a Farseek or to Duress it before it gets cast-I know this is a strategy I’ve used in Jund mirror matches-this should just illustrate that mana-ramp is incredibly powerful and if you can disrupt it you should. It’s not that your main goal is to win by mana-screw, but when the situation comes up, you now have the option to turn your card into a one-casting-cost, instant-speed Sinkhole, which is usually too good a deal to pass up. I have to say, I abide by it more often than not, and it’s very hard to be wrong using a cheap removal spell on a mana-producing creature, because there is a reasonable chance that you can just win by mana screw. So what does hexproof do for us here? Remember the old saying, “always Bolt the Bird”? That’s been a universally recognized correct play for years and years now. I can’t imagine the creators of the game intended for hexproof to be used by having Butcher’s Cleaver land on Invisible Stalker, frustrating opponents for as long as that format was drafted. You can even see the Bogle deck in Modern making very good use of the hexproof ability. I just recently went 3-0 in an M14 draft with 3 Gladecover Scout and 3 Lightning Talons, doing nothing else of consequence except assembling my combo. Hexproof has proven to be one of the most incredible keywords in magic for its ability to completely eliminate interaction and make it impossible for your opponent to make decisions. ![]() The biggest comparison I see people making is to Farseek, to which my immediate response is “not quite.” Anyone can look at it and know what it’s going to do-we’ve all cast Manaweft Sliver in draft and had good draws with it. It’s funny that each person I talk to gives me a new insight on it, and to properly build good decks with the Caryatid you must understand exactly what it is and what it does. My opinion of it changes just about everyday, and even as I write this I don’t know exactly how to feel. The moment I saw Sylvan Caryatid, my mind has been racing with possibilities.
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