Planechase 2: The Spoilage Continues

More official spoilers for Planechase 2 have appeared on the interbutts. Yippee!

Somewhat let down, as this was originally rumored to tap for any color mana (and cost 3 mana to cast). Still, seems like an awesome card. Gonna want a few of these I can have lying around to slot into my EDH decks for when we play Planechase EDH.
Anyway, I wish this did tap for colored mana, but the reduction in cost to two mana is a very compelling trade off.
Obviosly this is pretty much a do-nothing outside of Planechase, but it's an excellent card within it's intended format. Rolling the Planar die is what PC is all about, right?

My, aren't you a big one? Just so we're clear on the math here, if you Devour five creatures with Thromok, he will be a 25/25. Now all he needs is Trample and Haste! Seems pretty cool, I guess. I usually don't like big vanilla beaters, but this guy just gets SO big for so little mana, he might be worthwhile in a handful of decks. Clearly he's going to have a home on many a Kresh the Bloodbraided deck, and he'll likely be an interesting general, at least until someone tunes his deck to the point where they just one-shot somebody on turn 5 every single time.
I like him. He's cool. I'm just not sure I have a use for him.

This is pretty neat. You get to actually chose which plane you want to 'walk to, which is more like how Planeswalkers really work. Pick the plane that is most advantageous to you, or the one most likely to screw over your opponents. Fun. Much, much better than that stupid "reverse the turn order" phenomenon.

Well that's pretty bonkers. We get to 'walk to two planes at the same time, and get the effects of both. Sweet. Okay, I am now officially excited about the Phenomenon cards. That first one the previewed was apparently just a terrible choice to lead off with, but these two more recend Phenomena show vastly more promise of wacky fun than that one did.

Meh. Good design work here. I like how it auto-walks away once the someone runs out of creatures to sacrifice to it. I also like the way the Chaos ability interacts, but it shouldn't be optional, that way you can accidentally get stuck here longer by trying to roll to planeswalk, but end up giving everyone zombie fodder to keep the auto-walk trigger at bay.

Again, cool design, but I'm not sure this is actually going to be a fun-inducing plane or not. I'll certainly give it a chance before I make a verdict.

Well. That's a Doubling Season. I am really, really hoping to see them reprint Doubling Season in one of these decks (most likely the Devour deck). I can't tell if this Plane makes it more likely or less likely that it'll happen now. We've pretty much all played with Doubling Season before, and are well aware of it's explosive potential in the right decks. However, seeing it replicated yet again in Planar card form noticeably weakens it's impact and cool-factor. For some, this will likely be the most exciting plane in the set, but for me it's just a "yawn, another reprint". Oh, sure, I'll be more than happy to see it when I'm playing Rith, but it's just hard to get excited over an effect we've seen before, even if it is cool and powerful.

EDIT: One more to add!

Well, this is pretty neat I guess. Seems like a solid addition to Rafiq decks, for starters. Thanks to his cost reduction effect, he curves nicely into an Eldrazi Conscription for 6 the next turn. Or any other big, ridiculous Enchantment. Also, Rite of Replication targeting this guy costs 7 instead of 9. Might of Oaks, Stonewood Invocation or Revenge of the Hunted all seem like very reasonable one-shot pump effects you might want to use with him. The painfully obvious place to start, of course, is Shield of the Oversoul.

Overall, he seems pretty cool, but not overly powerful (which isn't necessarily a bad thing!).

That brings us up to speed for now. Enjoy!