My Take on Limited Resources' Ixalan Common and Uncommon Set Review

To immerse myself in a new Limited format, I usually read through the full spoiler once or twice and then wait for the Limited Resources set review. It's very well-done and is a strong foundation for the draft format. (If you've found this article but not listening to Limited Resources, you are doing it wrong.)

I usually find myself disagreeing on a few parts. At the risk of my first post here seeming overly critical of Marshall & LSV -- it's not intended to be, I recognize the unattainability of getting every narrow detail perfect during an epic first take and that nitpicking pieces after the fact is way easier -- here's where I found myself disagreeing with the LR set review and the tweaks I'm making for my Week 0 baseline:

• Call to the Feast -- LR had this at B. My gut is that it's closer to C+; there was an assumption that W/B vampires will be a classic "go wide" strategy, but I think the payoffs are too thin. No pumping Vampire lords, just Sanctum Seeker and the one-shot of Bishop of the Bloodstained. No persistent anthem effects beyond Bellowing Aegisaur {EDIT: missed Vanquisher's Banner, which seems like a great thing for Vampires to wave}, and the only other mass pump is weak (Rallying Roar & Encampment Keeper). A sideways lord in Deathless Ancient, which may be the best combo with this.
• LR made a few instances of contextual card evaluation based on Vampires having a theme of life payments for effects, but there are only two such cards in the set, both at uncommon (Adanto Vanguard, Glorifier of Dusk).
• Raging Swordtooth -- Notably overlooked is that it hits all your Enrage creatures (and opponents' Enrage creatures, too). B+ still seems right, but this synergy seems substantial for many R/G decks.
• Dual Shot -- They also missed the Enrage synergy here. I think this will be an important part of Dual Shot's playability. They called it just for sideboard but I think I'll be actively wanting a maindeck copy in decks with one great Enrage target (e.g. Ranging Raptors) and a few other good targets. I haven't taken a hard look at the set's one-toughness density yet, so it could be even better. I'll start at C-.
• Emergent Growth -- D is probably right, but there's a small pocket of cards in R/G that might notch it up to C in some decks, with Raptor Hatchling as a particularly spicy Turn 4 target amongst the Enragers, plus natural synergy of this effect with tramplers (Dinosaur tokens, Thrash of Raptors and Colossal Dreadmaw). I'll be looking to try it when I've got those.
• Ixalli's Diviner -- I like where they're at overall on Explore, but Diviner at C+ could prove a notch or two too high. 1G 0/3 draw a card or 1G 1/4 Scry can never get too bad, but I can imagine formats where these bodies are too low-impact. In a vacuum, I might prefer Elvish Visionary to this, for example. So I'd start it at C.
• Bright Reprisal -- They're on C-, I think it's closer to C, albeit with a lot of matchup dependency. I think I'll start off as happy maindecking one in most decks. The downsides are real, but there are are some big creatures in this set and not a ton of ways to kill them, so even conditional removal should pull its weight. Minor note that every other color has exactly one other instant 5-drop to pair it with at common or uncommon (Wind Strider, Dark Nourishment, Unfriendly Fire, Snapping Sailback).
• Sheltering Light -- Given a knowingly-ambitious grade of B-. I think it might just be a flat C, but I'll go C+ for now. Gods Willing had a lot of format-specific synergy, so I think that's too high a comparison.
• Headwater Sentries -- No beef with the grade, but they mention that you might end up playing this because of its creature type. I don't think that's likely, as there are very few Merfolk payoff cards that reward going hard linear on tribal.
• Blight Keeper -- They gave it a D+, but I like it at C- and wouldn't be shocked to notch it up to C. The rate is good, it threatens a big amount of drain which self-synergizes with the Flying Men side of the card. Treasure will help some Black decks spike 8 mana, so the 1/1 could serve as a Flagbearer at the 7-mana mark in some lategames. I will feel fine including one or maybe two in my aggressive black decks. They also noted that it doesn't have Vampire synergy, but I don't think that matters too much, as there are very few payoffs for Vampire synergy.
• Grim Captain's Call -- They said that this will only work in decks that "give up on tribal", but, having not done the math, I suspect that the median normal deck will be able to hit 2 things with this fairly reliably, with a 5-10% chance of hitting 3. Just my intuition.
• Fiery Cannonade -- LSV missed the "Pirateclasm" pun that Design clearly seeded.
• Firecannon Blast -- Given a straight B, I'm way less excited about it than LR was. I'm closer to C+ than B-. The non-raid floor is clearly a playable rate, but after thinking about it, the raid part could be clunkier than it first looks. In a deck without evasive creatures to trigger Raid (not a lot of evasion in red), in order to turn on the Raid, you'll either have to wait for a clean attack past their big creature (making this closer to Assassinate) or often chump-attack a creature into the freshly-cast target (in which case the extra Raid damage might be moot). The biggest format-specific uncertainty there is on the "often", and I'll be paying close attention. It looks like both U/R and B/R could have enough density evasive creatures to enable Raid in some aggressive builds, which is what I expect will be necessary to make this card play completely categorically differently than the above. Double-red could also prove to be a substantial drawback given that the two red tribes are the 3-color tribes.
• Nest Robber - It was given a D, I'd put it at C-. The low-curve aggro deck seems supported in R/W and the Dino creature type matters at least a little bit there (Tilonalli's Knight, Imperial Lancer, Pterodon Knight). I think this will slot in fine.
• And then there are always a handful of cards given an unwarranted F grade, possibly for soapbox/pedantic reasons to hammer it home to less-experienced players. That probably serves the bigger audience well, but it's a pet peeve of mine. From biggest to smallest miss, here are the Fs that I yelled at my podcast about:
• Gilded Sentinel -- Many of the Fs I disagree with are because they are clear definitional Ds; F is supposed to be strictly unplayable, which is different from a below-replacement playable that will sometimes begrudgingly make the cut when a deck doesn't quite come together. This is blatantly the latter. 
• Elaborate Firecannon -- The rate is not atrocious, it has some flexibility in how it affects the board, and it has a slow Lava Axe mode. I think it's a D minimum that could prove to have sideboard applications, e.g. in a midrange/control deck with good ground defenses vs. a deck with a few unblockable small creatures.
• Encampment Keeper -- The body could have applications in a one-drop format, and the ability is one of the few mass pump effects to supplement the depth of token-making among the White cards. Those decks don't look like they should often have a lot of treasure or ramp, but it's no less than a D.
• Swashbuckling -- Again, it could be a one-drop format, and LSV's noted and maligned "combo" with Fire Shrine Keeper could actually be pretty legit if so. This could be a weak playable in those decks. D.
• Pillar of Origins -- Clearly playable in decks with enough Dinosaur density, particularly if splashing the 3rd color of dino. I think many Dinosaur-based decks will not be too upset to have to include one. D
• Hierophant's Chalice -- Rate is not that bad. Should have fallback application as a mediocre ramp piece in a deck that missed on the better options (likely including Pillar of Origins). D-
• Ritual of Rejuvenation -- No love for Reviving Quatro?? OK, it has no particular synergies or applications, maybe to swing some small creature races, but it's not unplayable. Definitely a D- and I'll probably cast it in some trainwreck drafts. But, then again, I'm continually biased by my love of all Invasion cantrips... (oh yes, we will be Opting)

My big macro-take is that LR is presupposing more hard linearity on tribal than I think the set dictates (see above: Headwater Sentries, Grim Captain's Call, Blight Keeper, somewhat Call to the Feast). There do not appear to be a lot of big payoffs for pushing hard for many of one's creatures to be of the same tribe, particularly in the two-color tribes. There are many more "Threshold 1" tribal abilities. On tribal synergy, I think Ixalan looks closer to Innistrad than to Lorwyn. 

So, going into prerelease weekend, I'd recommend we be careful to not blindly assume that we should stretch to play creatures of a certain tribe unless we actually have the big, scalable payoffs.

A deeper dig on the tribal support coming soon.