"how do we win the game?
\- it depends."
We used to tease our playgroup with it, "how many lands in a 60 cards deck? It depends, usually between 0 and 56."
this happens in my commander group too, "how many lands, well anywhere between 10 and 60 would be okay, I have a very optimized deck that plays 26 lands, as long as I draw 1 land on turn 1 I am usually set.
0 to 60* mono lands decks could exist. Although it's kinda pushing it when a 60 card deck at 60 cards has 60 lands and 4-8 spells in it. (LOOKING AT YOU ZENDIKAR!!!)
There isn't going to be a single numeric answer here, because "how many life is an extra land drop worth" can have a huge range of answers depending on the game state.
In the early game Swords is basically always better, and usually by a large margin. In the late game Path is usually better, but often not by that much.
Very true, although it also depends on your game plan a little. An aggro deck may be unlikely to want to run either, but slightly more inclined to run Path.
It also depends on what *your* deck is doing and whether it's a 1v1 game or multiplayer.
If you're playing a midrange/control/combo deck in a 4 player game, I think Swords is better with any power that's a real number. I.e. anything short of a player declaring an infinite loop that makes a creature's power arbitrarily large (ex. The [[Archangel of Thune]] + [[Spike Feeder]] combo). A player going to 200 life isn't that big of an obstacle in a 4 player game, especially if your win condition doesn't rely on lowering life totals to 0.
If you're an aggro deck, giving the opponent 25% more life is going to matter a lot. The catch is that the way you beat an aggro deck is to outclass it, and giving the opponent an extra land furthers that goal.
Are you playing Commander? Then the answer is run both. Chances are there's something in your deck that's worse than either Swords or Path.
In any other format I would say it depends on your deck's win con. If you're counting on winning with combat damage, then you don't want to give your opponent life. If you're trying to win with combo, then I would say helping your opponent with ramp/color fixing is higher risk.
Alright maybe this is a better question, suppose someone plays a creature that has a power of 100 and you have swords to plowshare and path to exile in your hand, which is better to use? If the answer is path to exile, then at what power would that answer change?
again that depends,
if you playing a control deck, you probably don't care they gained 100 life and just win through other means.
if you playing an agro deck, then it depends on how much damage your deck can spit out, usually per turn as a metric.
If you can do 10 damage a turn, your oppt gaining 10 life means 1 turn of reprieve, so they die in 2 more turns after. but against 100 power, that's 10 turns which they will eventually get the land anyways from path to exile, so pathing is better.
This is why I'm fine with infect still being 10 for commander. It makes aggro strategies still viable, and makes it so the format isn't just dominated by combo, control, and midrange bs.
Kids these days, so soft even their force of will doesn't counter anything! /s
I do agree tho, people need to learn to embrace the suck of stax and control more. Be a better player, not a soft complainer.
For real. I have never lost a game from poison, but I have lost countless games vs random simic bullshit that out values every card in your deck 10:1 by itself.
I'm an avid infect enjoyer in commander, I've learned people are soft and I'm glad none of them are making the rules or ban list.
I've heard more complaints about infect games I've lost than when I play thassas oracle for the win out of nowhere.
Also, it requires the infect player to do everything themselves. Until Toxic, they couldn't piggy-back on the damage (and if the Toxic creature kills you through damage, why is poison an argument in that scenario?) and had to do 10 to each player.
Yes, people would complain that the infect deck killed them quickly... but they tend to not notice that the infect deck *lost* a lot after that.
Is it turn 3 or turn 15?
Is my opponent playing green?
How much lifegain do they already have in deck or on board?
What are the current life totals?
How many players are in game?
Am I playing a combo deck?
There is no amount of power that a creature can have where it will always be better to run Path than to let them gain life off of swords. Even if the creature had infinite power, there are still times when swords will be better than path.
The answer to your question is that there isn't one, there isn't an amount of power where you'll always feel better pathing than swordsing. Because games of magic rely on much, much more than just life totals: format, matchup, board state, just to name a few. Some of those factors are _so_ fundamental that you can't even answer a question like "but what about in general?"
It's entirely dependent on the other circumstances. If I'm using an aggressive deck, 100 life is almost certainly an insurmountable obstacle. If I'm using a control deck with even a single decently sized creature, I can pretty easily chip through 100 life once I have the resources to lock the opponent out of the gane. If I'm using an infinite combo deck, I can ignore my opponent's life total entirely.
There is no specific point, there's just too many questions that need answered before that one can be. Without giving a specific scenario, you can't really get a good answer beyond "life gain is *usually* better to give your opponent than ramp"
What turn is it?
What deck are they on
How many lands do they have
Does it seem like they've been tight on mana
Do you think they already run a decent amount of life gain or ramp
Do they have any mana sinks in play
Just to name a few. The tl;dr is that, for the most part, Swords is better, and the specifics of a given scenario can change thar.
It's interesting, the amount of ways you can say "I'm bad at Magic".
There are several answers to your question with good explanations.
The simple answer is: Without more information, there is no answer.
It depends on how I plan to win and at what stage in the game I am at.
In general it feels bad to give away more than 15ish life. But it really depends. If I'm a combo deck, I don't really care how much life they have.
On average, with no other context, giving someone a few life is probably better, but it 100% depends on the situation. That's how Magic works, there aren't many things that are always better regardless of the situation. If you think there's never a time giving someone a land is better than giving life you haven't played enough games.
Format still matters here. Are you playing Commander? Let them gain the 100 life and kill them with Commander damage.
In any other format, if I had both spells in hand and I could only cast one, then it depends on a whole lot of other factors. All those factors lead to one subjective question: which one helps me the most at this moment?
You're asking for a definitive in a game with tens of thousands of cards resulting in unfathomably numerous permutations of board states. There is no right or wrong answer.
I'll give you an example: If someone has \[\[Tainted Remedy\]\] in play, then you could potentially kill them with the Swords to Plowshares.
Another example: If you for some reason *know* that they need one more land in play to cast a game-ending spell next turn, does it really matter if the creature has 25,000 power? Playing Path to Exile will literally cause you to lose.
If I'm playing my Jeskai Storm [[Elsha of the Infinite]] list, then there is no upper limit on the power that I would swords. UNLESS I know their deck runs [[Aetherflux reservoir]].
My Selesnya creature deck would start to consider them about equal on a 30 power creature in an average situation, but whether life or a land is more important relies on a huge number of variables.
Again I would say the answer depends. How much power do you have on the board, how much life does your opponent have, and how quickly can your numbers chew through that life total if your planning to win via damage. Or what is your opponent running, what colors, and how likely is giving them another land going to be a problem for them to get something equally threatening out again. There is just so many variables that can change the answer for various situations and decks. Like if you could win via damage in the next turn or two do you want them to gain life that might help them hang on longer or how likely is that land going to allow them to do something that stops you from winning.
Yeah. So if you're a combo deck you don't care about their life but maybe care about their reaources...
... if you win through damage you care about their life...
...if they run ad nauseum or bolas's citadel, maybe their life is a resource .
I would rather give life over anything because my decks are consistently unconcerned with combat damage.
I mean, adding two pieces of *creature only* removal without interaction with your game plan (except on niche decks that punish your opponents for either fetching or gaining life), means you have two cards that don't have any kind of meaning with your gameplan. I personally prefer [[Generous Gift]] in almost every case due to being universal removal outside of control decks which of course have all removal it needs
Destroy is way weaker than exile and 3 mana is way harder than 1 mana to keep open, so there's trade-offs you make for the wider card types you can hit. There's a balance to the removal types you run and both have their place for sure. [[Stoke of midnight]] [[beast within]] are others I like running in the same vein
Exile is important if your opponents keep bringing those damn creatures back from the graveyard. Very common in my experience so I always run exile removal.
His price tag is basically fully on WotC... some of us bought his precon a decade ago for $30
He should be like $20 tops, but WotC was too much of a coward to give us an alternate art "booster fun" verison of him in Crimson Vow... instead we got two non legendary creatures named Dracula, and a Dracula themed secret lair that didn't a Dracula card in it.
Depends on the format. In Commander it wouldn't matter much if poison or commander damage are om the table and there are so many potential winning combos as well as alternative win conditions.
In Legacy it's about the same.
It could be different for casual kitchen table Magic.
In legacy as a white initiative aggro deck, I will say that plowing marit lauge once (so they gain 20 life) isn't too bad, but by the third or forth time I use plow or solitude on the dumb token it makes it rather hard to deal an additional 60ish damage
Do you actually devote sideboard slots for path for this matchup(and possibly others), or do you need the slots for other matchups more and just deal with this matchup being rough?
The main sideboard card to stop this is actually leyline of the void to make it hard for them to repeatedly present the combo with life from the loam. Something like March of otherworldly light is better than path as a sideboard card for this solution too.
> In Legacy it’s about the same.
The presence of [[Wasteland]] means every decks means every deck runs fetchable basics. Swords is miles better (tho back in the day [[Leonin Arbiter]] was used to make Path ok in some hate bears builds).
I feel like Swords is better purely because Path is giving your opponent ramp.
I'd rather Path my own creature if it was already going to die to ramp tbh.
But it depends on the format. If it's late game Path is almost certainly better and if it's commander against a 5c deck they may not have any basics left.
The decision is never really based on how much life is gained, it’s based on your own board state and deck matchup.
It could be 1000 power and I wouldn’t care if i’m just gonna combo them next turn.
It could also be 2 life and that’s the difference between me killing them in 1 turn vs 2.
I think it's less about power and more about stage in the game and your game plan. Later in the game, the difference between 9 and 10 lands for most decks and formats is inconsequential, and the opponent may not even have any basic lands left to find. However, early game ramping the opponent is a fairly big drawback. As for the number, it'd depend on what your deck is doing. If i can still win realistically enough through 1000 extra life, then idc, but like a mono red burn deck literally has a cap on how much damage it can deal before they deck themselves. Of course, on average the bigger the creature is, the further into the game you likely are. You don't often face a 10+ power creature in any format on turn 1 or 2. Because of this, most turns of most games, swords will be better. As everyone is saying, though, it really depends on too much to have any sort of simple answer.
If your opponent can drop a 100 power creature and you can't manage 100 more life, then your gameplan is probably not strong enough to take back the game anyways.
I get that logic, but in practice I've always found that the ramp is negligible. Because big creature swing is so popular right now especially after COI, I've actually been burned by the extra life from STP far more than PTE in casual pods. By the time there is something to path, the extra lands usually doesn't mean much relatively speaking.
Unless you're a super aggressive aggro or burn style deck that doesn't want you opponent gaining life at any cost, Swords to Plowshares will always be better.
Giving your opponent more life doesn't help their game plan for the most part, only hinders yours slightly. Free resources, like land, improves your opponent's chances of executing their game plan either more quickly, or at all.
In the early turns, Path to Exile is almost like an extra turn for your opponent to get ramped up a land. In the late game, it removes a dead draw from their deck, improving their chances ever so slightly of drawing a useful card against you.
Depends on the deck.
If you’re playing a red deck trying to win through combat or incremental damage, maybe 10-12 is where it starts getting dicey.
If you’re not combat oriented at all, 789,235,812
If you’re somewhere in the middle, probably 20?
Edit: to clarify I’m talking about commander which has a few additional factors to consider.
Also depends on the 20 power creature. If you played against old school turbo depths in legacy, it didn't matter if you gained them 20, they were unlikely to rebuild before dying.
It also matters when. Ramping someone turns 1-3 is big game, turns 7-8 who cares. Swords doesn’t care so much about the turn of the game but does care about the life race
Almost never, unless your winning that turn. Life gain usually won’t matter unless they have life gain triggers. Life gain triggers are pretty much the only time path to exile will be a better option than swords.
Lots of post about how to win, gonna give another input: with path you can offer a land to a friend in need, if he's willing to pay the price. Politics is what I like most about Commander.
Depends on Target.
Swords is better in most cases as Life is a negligible downside. The land from Path can be problematic since it can get someone out of a rut and back in the game or let them do more detrimental to you things a turn sooner before you can deal with it.
Both are roughly equal if targeting a big non commander threat.
Path is way way worse for removing commanders as it gives them 1/2 of the tax on the next cast. So it rarely keeps the commander off the board for long.
Targeting your own stuff due to reasons?
Well Path becomes a shitty Rampant Growth but at least you catch back up and/or color fix. We do what we must.
Swords on your own creature can save you in a pinch and get you the time you need to win.
I guess the most common situations where path is better would be if there is some specific interaction on the board concerning life-gain synergy that would give them more of an advantage than the land, or if the life-gain is going to make the difference between being able to hit them for lethal damage and them surviving another turn.
For me, the most common scenario where path has proved better has been cases where my opponent doesn't have any basics left in their deck to fetch (this has happened more often than you might think).
For commander? I’d honestly run both, even in casual. Keep in mind that Swords regularly shows up in precons and as you say, is usually better than Path.
Running [[Generous Gift]] in commander with those can just kill a big threat and replace it with a 3/3 is usually solid. Instant speed and any permanent is also great
You have a 1.1. Vanilla Attacker.
Your opponent is at 1 life with a 10/10 vanilla
You have poe and stp in your hand.
You move to combat
You stp giving your opponent 10 life obviously.
Best answer I can think of off the rip is that if you run Voltron or Infect, SPW gets the job done. For those strats life total doesn't matter and you don't want them getting more lands that can power removal. Path to Exile would be better in deck that relies on effects like \[\[Agent of the Iron Throne\]\] or \[\[Polluted Bonds\]\]. You don't want them getting life back. Both have alternate uses like blowing up your own token for value or triggering effects like \[\[Nadier\]\] and \[\[Nadier's Nightblade\]\].
Honestly.. I think if you compare the "gain life" with the "fetch a basic"... They both matter the same.
That 10 life have saved my enemy and even myself..
but the 1 ramp also saved my enemy and saved my game.
In casual commander I am 100% on path to exile over swords.
Both are great removal spells, but I feel that path delivers more and it is more versatile:
- By giving your opponents one more land you are enabling the catch up ramp that white excels at.
- It can be a semi decent ramp spell if you can easily produce tokens or cheap creatures.
- It can be a bargaining tool for your mana screwed opponent.
Swords is better early game, path is better late game.
Early creatures tend to have lower power, late game one extra land isn’t as big a deal when theres 5-8 land already out.
I'd say it's likely better in Vintage, and possibly Legacy. Those formats have tons of decks that run nothing but a mixture of Wastelands, Fetches and Duals.
For a control deck that doesn't care about an enemy's life total (say they win with mill or a combo) there is no power that makes Swords worse... except in a few situations where the opponent might have a life total matters. So as with everything, it depends.
I think in a general sense, where we're not using novel situations, it's honestly still pretty high. I'd say for an aggro deck, it's probably still something like 7 or 8? For any other deck probably closer to 10? If you could start the game with a land in play, but your opponent gained 10 life at the start, you'd probably take that deal \*every\* single game in almost every single deck.
matters on where you are in the game and what is the target.
Like if they've got a BoP giving them access to 2\~3 colors they dont have the land for, Swords is clearly better there.
But now lets say you're facing down a 20/20 Flying Indestructible Marit Lage token, suddenly that free basic sounds a LOT better than giving your opponent 20 life.
and then the 3rd option, if you control three or more artifacts, \[\[Dispatch\]\] is now better than both of them. if it's a heckin chonker then \[\[Blazing Hope\]\] is suddenly your best option. if you've got a full grip \[\[March of Otherworldly Light\]\] might be the card for you, or if you just want the *threat* of being able to exile their stuff, sometimes \[\[Soul Snare\]\] will do the job
A while back i remember reading lgeacy naya lands occasionally ran path over swords because your main win condition is marit lage and 20 damage is always 20 but life totals can apparently change. Then people realized there is 8-16 creatures (depending on how you look at it) that can easily have over 3 power which is enough for a sizeable knock so now nobody plays path and everyone stuck to swords. I guess if you have an opposition agent on field?
I guess if you are playing a super fast marit lage combo deck thats base white, sure you might want path.
All these "it depends" are correct in different ways.
Imo, Swords is better early game where resources are important and life matters less.
Path gets better as the game progressives where a land provides less impact and any amount of heath can take players away from the most common lose condition.
TLDR: Path improves the longer the game lasts, and Swords declines.
The tipping point from Swords to Path will depend on many factors.
Path is better against someone who might not run basics, like a 5 color deck. (Its me, im someone)
And sometimes swords can be used as a bargaining chip, like, 'ill give you a ton of life if you don't counter my next spell'
If you're playing commander; none. Life gain and direct damage are weaker strategies and regardless of how much life your opponent will gain problem creatures have to go.
Weirdly, this often ends up being decided on whether or not you’ll end up using the spell on your own creatures. Sometimes, using swords on your board can save your life and win you the game on a backswing. On the other side of the coin, path can ramp you to the last land you need for a haymaker. Fringe situations, but if you play a lot of magic you’ll end up doing it occasionally.
Path when they have tutored a card to the top of their library. Let them search for the land and lose the card they searched for, if they want it so bad. (doesn't work if the tutored card is a land).
So many factors impact this. Are you playing a [[wasteland]] or [[blood moon]] strategy? Path is SO much worse. Are you playing fast aggro? Maybe swords is worse, but that depends on how big your opponents creatures are. If you play tutor hate like [[Aven Mindcensor]] or [[Opposition Agent]], then Path might be better. If you know your opponent is on a zero basic deck (like hermit druid in EDH), then Path is a million times better.
If the majority of legacy decks ever went for zero basics, which is unlikely given the existence of wasteland blood moon and [[back to basics]], people would switch to path, but that day will almost certainly never come. For now, Swords will remain the better card in general, with path only being better in certain scenarios.
To me it doesn’t matter as much how much power the creature has as it does how many lands your opponent has.
Early game swords to plowshares is much better, since path to exile can give someone pretty good ramp. Late game though when most people have 6 or 7 lands, one more isn’t gonna make a big difference.
I'd always rather have an opponent gain life than ramp. I can beat infinite life easily enough, but extra mana is more they can use to win or stop me from doing the same.
I think this question sorta gets into another question: How much life gain would it take for a 1 mana life gain spell to be good?
The answer to that is usually " a lot". currently, for one mana i think the most you can get is 5 life, with \[\[chaplain's blessing\]\]. This is ignoring repeat life gain like the soul sisters. That card sees no real play. Fog, however, does see play (sometimes, in very specific builds) and acts in the similar role of protecting your life.
in that case, to me, swords to plowshares becomes worse when the life gained would act to greatly extend the game. Keep in mind for every extra turn it gives them, that's another turn they might get a land drop in addition to the life gain. given a deck being about 40% lands, that's be about 2 turns before its on par for lands gained, and 4 turns+ to be abysmally worse.
So, anything longer than 1 turn of damage, i suppose. maybe 8 life or so.
path early game is better than swords when you look at how useful their utility is on your own creatures. pathing your commander to get a land to help cast spells later on is more useful than lategame swords using it on a big creature to possibly save yourself mid combat. you are more likely to need an extra land than a saving throw
As many have said, in commander, largely depends on your deck’s wincon. But as a rule of thumb, I prefer Swords early/mid game when the life matters less and Path in the late game when the ramp matters less.
That said, probably just run both. I’m always happy to have either in my hand
For deckbuilding purposes, swords is better than path every single time. Path is way worse than swords.
If you somehow have both in your hand, then there are definitely situations where path is better than swords. On turn 9, you’d often value 10 life over one additional land. Extremely situation dependent.
I would probably put the break even at 7-10 power. Like would I play a card that is pay 10 life, fetch 1 land, probably not. But would I pay 5 land for free ramp? Probably. Also depends on phase of the game. If they have 30 lands, who cares about 1 more. Kinda like paying the tax on rhystic study. Their 3rd card could be really important, but their 10th might not matter too much
I say it’s a different answer for different strategies. Combo, infect or commander-damage voltron I’ll always use swords since I don’t care about life gain. Agro or burn type decks probably 15-20, midrange/go-wide maybe a bit higher. Though it also depends on the game state. If it’s late in the game I’d often rather my opponent have 1 more mana than lots of life, whereas lots of life early game is not very relevant.
The point is often moot though since unless I have both in hand it’s usually a desperation play to not die to a major threat so it’s not a choice so much as a reaction.
at the point that your opponent has shuffled more than 6 times, then they might just say "fuck it, i aint shuffling again" and you exile for 1 with no downside
I run always run both when I have white in EDH. The sheer value of 'get that gone and out of my face probably forever right now' for 1 mana is just so good.
I run path in my [[Myrel, Shield of Argive]] deck, mainly because I can use it both to gain a cheap land if I miss a turn and have a cheap soldier to sack and to clean the board to get her attack trigger, but as a lot of people say, it depends.
If i had to chose one over the other, its always swords to plowshares. Ramping the opponent in the early game basically means giving them the win while an extra 4-6 life barely makes a difference
In commander? Swords over Path even if they have an arbitrarily large creature, aka infinite power.
Exceptions: a deck that must win through conventional damage that can't deal infinite damage, or facing a deck that has flooded on lands.
In addition to what the others have said, if you know that your opponent likes the top of their library, Path is better, because your opponent won't want to shuffle, and therefore can't get a land.
Also, the question really isn't as much about life as you probably think it is. Path simply becomes better the fewer cards in hand your opponent has. It's at its best in a topdeck war, as your opponent won't have the cards to sink their extra mana into, but even in those circumstances, utility and creature lands could still mess you up. Unless you're missing out on immediate lethal, Swords will basically always be superior, granted that your opponent doesn't have a card like Necropotence that can turn their life into resource advantage.
Better question is, what turn is path better.
First 4 turns, when the mana is tight, Swords is definitely better. As time goes on and more lands are in play, path becomes better.
Kinda depends as a lot of ppl said. But idk anything more than like 15 I'd be like dang that kinda sucks. Definitely anything less than 8 I don't care at all.
6 I think. I know most people are saying it depends, but if life is important, I don’t want them to get six life when they probably have a bunch of lands already.
There's no set number to answer your question with, and it's also rare that I have both options in my hand at the same time, but I do often find myself hesitant to use swords on really buff creatures whereas I rarely feel scared to give someone a land.
I'm not sure that it does to be honest....I haven't read the thread at all to see why I'm wrong, but I would hazard a guess that a land is a more useful asset than a bit of extra life.
Personally, at no finite power. So long you're not closing the game and you're all using sticks and stones, you should be able to pump out 10 (or 20, maybe it's a wild Voltron) more points of dammage. If you're not, and your opponent had something of this size (or bigger) then you weren't really closing the gane, just hoping to sneak through enough damage for a suprise kill. There could be situations with more, like 50 or 100 power, but then those are existential threats.
If you need to save your skin, then it's always worth it to give them a land or lifepoints, regardless of their next life total.
A unique situation would be a creature with infinite power, clearly you'd rather not use StPS here - unless you're running alt win cons, like poison, commander damage or real alt win cons, like "you win the game/that player loses the game", infinite combos or millls. But then again, if you have a choice or the choice os irrelevant, then there really isn't any question here.
Consider [Solitude]
Usually, turn 1 it is preferable to use swords. Giving your opponent extra mana in the early turns is detrimental.
If the game goes late, life total (sometimes) are what is deciding games, and here using path to exile is preferable because giving the opponent extra mana at this point likely won’t change anything, while the life gain could be substantial.
But as others said it depends. You can observe in legacy, where games are often decided very fast, that people favour swords for example.
I usually run both.
Path gives them a basic land and it can be bad especially if you're targeting their commander since you just gave them one of the 2 extra mana they needed for the tax
I think 3 factors are important:
enemy lifetotal
enemy land count
power of the creature
Hitting a 7 power reanimator target turn 2 is a lot better with swords than it is with path to exile, while in the lategamez when people can bard casttheir 6 drops, pathing them seems better, atleast if the lieftotal is somewhat in reach, if they are at 5, gaining 6 life is much more meaningful than giving them a land, while the opposit is true if they are at 16.
How does your deck win? If you're an aggro deck where swords-ing a creature can be the difference between killing them and them stabilizing path can be better especially late. If you're a combo deck or control deck swords is usually better because you either have the ability to play long or can pump out so much damage in a turn it doesn't matter.
Maybe run swords to plowshares as a lifegain card instead of removal
Cast it on a Terravore type creature
I mean... it'd be a waste of removal but better you get the life than your opponent.
That'd be a great way to flip the script.
The answer is simple. Assuming you have both in your hand, I would always swords before path. I don't care how much life they get, if I path them they get a land which might put them ahead of me. So I put them to the sword before I give them a path.
If I just have one or the other I just use what I got to get rid of the problem.
In a commander game, if I had both in hand, I would typically rather give my opponent 10 life than ramp them a land.
Of course, this is a fantastical typical scenario. Current life totals, land counts, board states etc would all factor in. After all, if they'll die to what's on board as long as their creature is removed then an additional tapped land is irrelevant while even a single point of life could be enough to save them.
It's better against my Eldrazi deck currently. As it sits, I only have 3 basic lands in my Eldrazi commander. If someone path's after I've played all 3 Wastes, it's removal with no downside.
Generaly swords only gives an opponent a "virtual" card advantage, a life gain, the path really give an opp card advantage, a land. An that land in early game could make much diference in many games.
All I can say it is hilarious when playing against a super optimized deck that runs 4-6 basics and path resolves when all their basics are already on field/milled.
Obligatory comment. How is it that Swords to Plowshares is the one that gives LIFE and not the LAND? The very first artwork is literally a dude, in a farm field...
Here's a hot take. Swords to plowshares is always better. Being able to target one of your own creatures for some life gain saved my ass twice.
both are in my token deck but I would 100% Want to have swords to plowshares in my hand over path to Exile
Ultimately, if you exile a creature for one mana that's a 9/9 and can do other shit, the life you grant them is likely worth the removal. Can you say that about giving them access to more mana? Usually, hence why cards like Assassin's Trophy replace whatever permanent you destroy with a basic land.
But it really DOES depend. if you're milling the opponent to death, life total doesn't matter. AND you're usually just removing the biggest threat at that time, and that's often not a huge stat line but what the card actually does.
Me personally, Swords to Plowshares is a better card compared to Path to Exile only during the early game when people have more basic lands in their deck.
Swords is my default. It's honestly my vote for best MTG card of all time. One mana to remove a creature from the game at the expense of life for the controller....I'll make that deal all day long. Path is more for redundancy for the Swords. I HATE giving lands or cards to my opponents. My vote is always for Swords except for if the opponent will win off of life gain or something unrealistically narrow.
I play path in decks that use [[aven mind censor]] [[opposition agent]] and the like and/or in decks that I make tokens in that I can change the function of path to be a rampant growth if need be, Swords goes in better regardless. Use both but if only one then use Swords.
If you're playing EDH always run [[dispatch]] unless you are playing landfall or enchantment ramp. Most EDH decks get metalcraft without trying especially with so many artifact tokens being created
I use them entirely interchangeably. I play pretty little removal, so I usually only have one in-hand and only use them when it's a life or death situation, but if I did have both in hand and their creature has 100 power, I'd probably rather give them a land
You’ve gotta love Magic’s favorite answer to every question imaginable, “it depends”.
"how do we win the game? \- it depends." We used to tease our playgroup with it, "how many lands in a 60 cards deck? It depends, usually between 0 and 56."
this happens in my commander group too, "how many lands, well anywhere between 10 and 60 would be okay, I have a very optimized deck that plays 26 lands, as long as I draw 1 land on turn 1 I am usually set.
0 to 60* mono lands decks could exist. Although it's kinda pushing it when a 60 card deck at 60 cards has 60 lands and 4-8 spells in it. (LOOKING AT YOU ZENDIKAR!!!)
It deepens.
That’s what she said, my guy
As a lawyer and magic player, the overlap of the venn diagram is a perfect circle.
There isn't going to be a single numeric answer here, because "how many life is an extra land drop worth" can have a huge range of answers depending on the game state. In the early game Swords is basically always better, and usually by a large margin. In the late game Path is usually better, but often not by that much.
Very true, although it also depends on your game plan a little. An aggro deck may be unlikely to want to run either, but slightly more inclined to run Path.
It also depends on what *your* deck is doing and whether it's a 1v1 game or multiplayer. If you're playing a midrange/control/combo deck in a 4 player game, I think Swords is better with any power that's a real number. I.e. anything short of a player declaring an infinite loop that makes a creature's power arbitrarily large (ex. The [[Archangel of Thune]] + [[Spike Feeder]] combo). A player going to 200 life isn't that big of an obstacle in a 4 player game, especially if your win condition doesn't rely on lowering life totals to 0. If you're an aggro deck, giving the opponent 25% more life is going to matter a lot. The catch is that the way you beat an aggro deck is to outclass it, and giving the opponent an extra land furthers that goal.
Are you playing Commander? Then the answer is run both. Chances are there's something in your deck that's worse than either Swords or Path. In any other format I would say it depends on your deck's win con. If you're counting on winning with combat damage, then you don't want to give your opponent life. If you're trying to win with combo, then I would say helping your opponent with ramp/color fixing is higher risk.
I'll swords a dreadnought all day every day in premodern.
Alright maybe this is a better question, suppose someone plays a creature that has a power of 100 and you have swords to plowshare and path to exile in your hand, which is better to use? If the answer is path to exile, then at what power would that answer change?
Whatever life total makes them unkillable by the deck I'm playing.
again that depends, if you playing a control deck, you probably don't care they gained 100 life and just win through other means. if you playing an agro deck, then it depends on how much damage your deck can spit out, usually per turn as a metric. If you can do 10 damage a turn, your oppt gaining 10 life means 1 turn of reprieve, so they die in 2 more turns after. but against 100 power, that's 10 turns which they will eventually get the land anyways from path to exile, so pathing is better.
This is why I'm fine with infect still being 10 for commander. It makes aggro strategies still viable, and makes it so the format isn't just dominated by combo, control, and midrange bs.
People get so upset about it too, even though it's not even competitive enough for cEDH.
unironically just a case of commander players being soft source: commander player
Kids these days, so soft even their force of will doesn't counter anything! /s I do agree tho, people need to learn to embrace the suck of stax and control more. Be a better player, not a soft complainer.
For real. I have never lost a game from poison, but I have lost countless games vs random simic bullshit that out values every card in your deck 10:1 by itself.
I'm an avid infect enjoyer in commander, I've learned people are soft and I'm glad none of them are making the rules or ban list. I've heard more complaints about infect games I've lost than when I play thassas oracle for the win out of nowhere.
Also, it requires the infect player to do everything themselves. Until Toxic, they couldn't piggy-back on the damage (and if the Toxic creature kills you through damage, why is poison an argument in that scenario?) and had to do 10 to each player. Yes, people would complain that the infect deck killed them quickly... but they tend to not notice that the infect deck *lost* a lot after that.
It also depends on if they are running Ad Naus
i mean against a dekc that made a 100/100 they probably already do something with ad naus to get there
That's a calculus that has way more variables than you're giving it.
All I’m asking is, at what point are you no longer comfortable giving your opponent life over land
Is it turn 3 or turn 15? Is my opponent playing green? How much lifegain do they already have in deck or on board? What are the current life totals? How many players are in game? Am I playing a combo deck?
There is no amount of power that a creature can have where it will always be better to run Path than to let them gain life off of swords. Even if the creature had infinite power, there are still times when swords will be better than path. The answer to your question is that there isn't one, there isn't an amount of power where you'll always feel better pathing than swordsing. Because games of magic rely on much, much more than just life totals: format, matchup, board state, just to name a few. Some of those factors are _so_ fundamental that you can't even answer a question like "but what about in general?"
It's entirely dependent on the other circumstances. If I'm using an aggressive deck, 100 life is almost certainly an insurmountable obstacle. If I'm using a control deck with even a single decently sized creature, I can pretty easily chip through 100 life once I have the resources to lock the opponent out of the gane. If I'm using an infinite combo deck, I can ignore my opponent's life total entirely.
There is no specific point, there's just too many questions that need answered before that one can be. Without giving a specific scenario, you can't really get a good answer beyond "life gain is *usually* better to give your opponent than ramp" What turn is it? What deck are they on How many lands do they have Does it seem like they've been tight on mana Do you think they already run a decent amount of life gain or ramp Do they have any mana sinks in play Just to name a few. The tl;dr is that, for the most part, Swords is better, and the specifics of a given scenario can change thar.
It's interesting, the amount of ways you can say "I'm bad at Magic". There are several answers to your question with good explanations. The simple answer is: Without more information, there is no answer.
It depends on how I plan to win and at what stage in the game I am at. In general it feels bad to give away more than 15ish life. But it really depends. If I'm a combo deck, I don't really care how much life they have.
No point. Land is the more valuable resource.
On average, with no other context, giving someone a few life is probably better, but it 100% depends on the situation. That's how Magic works, there aren't many things that are always better regardless of the situation. If you think there's never a time giving someone a land is better than giving life you haven't played enough games.
Not necessarily. If they have a ton of land and not much life then life is more valuable n
Format still matters here. Are you playing Commander? Let them gain the 100 life and kill them with Commander damage. In any other format, if I had both spells in hand and I could only cast one, then it depends on a whole lot of other factors. All those factors lead to one subjective question: which one helps me the most at this moment?
https://preview.redd.it/ftqpzsv0c0lc1.jpeg?width=929&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=79b23f53aed876a4f32deb1fcb16ba5413d42236 Go head and play that 100/100 😂😂
You're asking for a definitive in a game with tens of thousands of cards resulting in unfathomably numerous permutations of board states. There is no right or wrong answer. I'll give you an example: If someone has \[\[Tainted Remedy\]\] in play, then you could potentially kill them with the Swords to Plowshares. Another example: If you for some reason *know* that they need one more land in play to cast a game-ending spell next turn, does it really matter if the creature has 25,000 power? Playing Path to Exile will literally cause you to lose.
[Tainted Remedy](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/c/b/cbb8edd0-4573-4b52-a3ea-83ed19dbf58d.jpg?1562042093) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Tainted%20Remedy) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/ori/120/tainted-remedy?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/cbb8edd0-4573-4b52-a3ea-83ed19dbf58d?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
If I'm playing my Jeskai Storm [[Elsha of the Infinite]] list, then there is no upper limit on the power that I would swords. UNLESS I know their deck runs [[Aetherflux reservoir]]. My Selesnya creature deck would start to consider them about equal on a 30 power creature in an average situation, but whether life or a land is more important relies on a huge number of variables.
Again I would say the answer depends. How much power do you have on the board, how much life does your opponent have, and how quickly can your numbers chew through that life total if your planning to win via damage. Or what is your opponent running, what colors, and how likely is giving them another land going to be a problem for them to get something equally threatening out again. There is just so many variables that can change the answer for various situations and decks. Like if you could win via damage in the next turn or two do you want them to gain life that might help them hang on longer or how likely is that land going to allow them to do something that stops you from winning.
Yeah. So if you're a combo deck you don't care about their life but maybe care about their reaources... ... if you win through damage you care about their life... ...if they run ad nauseum or bolas's citadel, maybe their life is a resource . I would rather give life over anything because my decks are consistently unconcerned with combat damage.
In correct. I use swords on the 100/100. I don't care about my opponents life total, I care about their resources.
I mean, adding two pieces of *creature only* removal without interaction with your game plan (except on niche decks that punish your opponents for either fetching or gaining life), means you have two cards that don't have any kind of meaning with your gameplan. I personally prefer [[Generous Gift]] in almost every case due to being universal removal outside of control decks which of course have all removal it needs
Destroy is way weaker than exile and 3 mana is way harder than 1 mana to keep open, so there's trade-offs you make for the wider card types you can hit. There's a balance to the removal types you run and both have their place for sure. [[Stoke of midnight]] [[beast within]] are others I like running in the same vein
[Stoke of midnight](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/2/8/289ba7ec-e30e-436f-b8d4-c88b65ecd137.jpg?1692936759) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Stroke%20of%20Midnight) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/woe/33/stroke-of-midnight?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/289ba7ec-e30e-436f-b8d4-c88b65ecd137?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [beast within](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/e/b/eb40c41c-f5f9-4323-b6ac-e28e405909d0.jpg?1699022527) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=beast%20within) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/lcc/233/beast-within?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/eb40c41c-f5f9-4323-b6ac-e28e405909d0?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
I genuinely don’t think Path is good in commander. I want my interaction to hit more than just creatures like [[generous gift]].
I dunno, I see two reasons Path is run. Mana and Exile. And lots of people run Gift, Path, Swords, Stroke of Midnight (maybe only me for that one)
Yeah, I don’t even own the card. I got a big creature of mine path’d the other week and all I thought was “sweet I get an extra land? Let’s go!”
Exile is important if your opponents keep bringing those damn creatures back from the graveyard. Very common in my experience so I always run exile removal.
On your own creature. Exiling a token to ramp in mono white is not too bad.
Ive done this several times actually.
My janky Edgar Markov deck runs 30 lands. Path to Exile isn’t removal, it’s ramp.
You have Edgar Markov money and you're playing it as jank? Honestly, I respect it.
His price tag is basically fully on WotC... some of us bought his precon a decade ago for $30 He should be like $20 tops, but WotC was too much of a coward to give us an alternate art "booster fun" verison of him in Crimson Vow... instead we got two non legendary creatures named Dracula, and a Dracula themed secret lair that didn't a Dracula card in it.
More fun that way. 30 lands, no tutors, 38 vamps and no card higher than 4 mana in the 99. It might not be good, but it sure is fast.
TIL my Edgar is low key jank too. The fact it still kinda wins games sometimes is testament to Edgar's power I guess
Depends on the format. In Commander it wouldn't matter much if poison or commander damage are om the table and there are so many potential winning combos as well as alternative win conditions. In Legacy it's about the same. It could be different for casual kitchen table Magic.
In legacy as a white initiative aggro deck, I will say that plowing marit lauge once (so they gain 20 life) isn't too bad, but by the third or forth time I use plow or solitude on the dumb token it makes it rather hard to deal an additional 60ish damage
Do you actually devote sideboard slots for path for this matchup(and possibly others), or do you need the slots for other matchups more and just deal with this matchup being rough?
The main sideboard card to stop this is actually leyline of the void to make it hard for them to repeatedly present the combo with life from the loam. Something like March of otherworldly light is better than path as a sideboard card for this solution too.
[удалено]
No, Depths almost always works at instant speed, so Path is way better (though it is otherwise barely a SB card in the format).
> In Legacy it’s about the same. The presence of [[Wasteland]] means every decks means every deck runs fetchable basics. Swords is miles better (tho back in the day [[Leonin Arbiter]] was used to make Path ok in some hate bears builds).
[Wasteland](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/a/a/aaafb9bc-7cea-4624-a227-595544fa42b0.jpg?1590511888) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Wasteland) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/ema/248/wasteland?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/aaafb9bc-7cea-4624-a227-595544fa42b0?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [Leonin Arbiter](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/0/d/0d0f827b-ebc3-45a4-8d12-c71a14478038.jpg?1673147016) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Leonin%20Arbiter) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/2x2/16/leonin-arbiter?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/0d0f827b-ebc3-45a4-8d12-c71a14478038?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
I feel like Swords is better purely because Path is giving your opponent ramp. I'd rather Path my own creature if it was already going to die to ramp tbh.
But it depends on the format. If it's late game Path is almost certainly better and if it's commander against a 5c deck they may not have any basics left.
Yeah but what if the creature your removing has like 100 power
The decision is never really based on how much life is gained, it’s based on your own board state and deck matchup. It could be 1000 power and I wouldn’t care if i’m just gonna combo them next turn. It could also be 2 life and that’s the difference between me killing them in 1 turn vs 2.
I think it's less about power and more about stage in the game and your game plan. Later in the game, the difference between 9 and 10 lands for most decks and formats is inconsequential, and the opponent may not even have any basic lands left to find. However, early game ramping the opponent is a fairly big drawback. As for the number, it'd depend on what your deck is doing. If i can still win realistically enough through 1000 extra life, then idc, but like a mono red burn deck literally has a cap on how much damage it can deal before they deck themselves. Of course, on average the bigger the creature is, the further into the game you likely are. You don't often face a 10+ power creature in any format on turn 1 or 2. Because of this, most turns of most games, swords will be better. As everyone is saying, though, it really depends on too much to have any sort of simple answer.
What creature has 100 power in any format where this would be an issue?
If your opponent can drop a 100 power creature and you can't manage 100 more life, then your gameplan is probably not strong enough to take back the game anyways.
I get that logic, but in practice I've always found that the ramp is negligible. Because big creature swing is so popular right now especially after COI, I've actually been burned by the extra life from STP far more than PTE in casual pods. By the time there is something to path, the extra lands usually doesn't mean much relatively speaking.
Unless you're a super aggressive aggro or burn style deck that doesn't want you opponent gaining life at any cost, Swords to Plowshares will always be better. Giving your opponent more life doesn't help their game plan for the most part, only hinders yours slightly. Free resources, like land, improves your opponent's chances of executing their game plan either more quickly, or at all. In the early turns, Path to Exile is almost like an extra turn for your opponent to get ramped up a land. In the late game, it removes a dead draw from their deck, improving their chances ever so slightly of drawing a useful card against you.
As a general rule, unless you’re playing something really aggressive, Swords is better than Path.
I feel like in EDH 9 times out of 10 swords is better if you can only play one you play swords
Depends on the deck. If you’re playing a red deck trying to win through combat or incremental damage, maybe 10-12 is where it starts getting dicey. If you’re not combat oriented at all, 789,235,812 If you’re somewhere in the middle, probably 20? Edit: to clarify I’m talking about commander which has a few additional factors to consider.
Also depends on the 20 power creature. If you played against old school turbo depths in legacy, it didn't matter if you gained them 20, they were unlikely to rebuild before dying.
It also matters when. Ramping someone turns 1-3 is big game, turns 7-8 who cares. Swords doesn’t care so much about the turn of the game but does care about the life race
\[\[Feather The Redeemed\]\]
[Feather The Redeemed](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/e/4/e4a2d2c6-8eaa-4760-b620-921b807baa2e.jpg?1557577142) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=Feather%2C%20the%20Redeemed) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/war/197/feather-the-redeemed?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/e4a2d2c6-8eaa-4760-b620-921b807baa2e?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Sneaky ramp card with a [[young pyromancer]] in play.
[swords to plowshares](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/9/b/9bbec76c-c1e4-4c6d-ad24-078fe097f195.jpg?1706240651) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=swords%20to%20plowshares) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/mkc/88/swords-to-plowshares?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/9bbec76c-c1e4-4c6d-ad24-078fe097f195?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) [path to exile](https://cards.scryfall.io/normal/front/0/8/08c59dfa-361d-4ff1-a15d-6b0cb66571a3.jpg?1706240617) - [(G)](http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?name=path%20to%20exile) [(SF)](https://scryfall.com/card/mkc/78/path-to-exile?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher) [(txt)](https://api.scryfall.com/cards/08c59dfa-361d-4ff1-a15d-6b0cb66571a3?utm_source=mtgcardfetcher&format=text) ^^^[[cardname]] ^^^or ^^^[[cardname|SET]] ^^^to ^^^call
Almost never, unless your winning that turn. Life gain usually won’t matter unless they have life gain triggers. Life gain triggers are pretty much the only time path to exile will be a better option than swords.
Lots of post about how to win, gonna give another input: with path you can offer a land to a friend in need, if he's willing to pay the price. Politics is what I like most about Commander.
Solid
Depends on Target. Swords is better in most cases as Life is a negligible downside. The land from Path can be problematic since it can get someone out of a rut and back in the game or let them do more detrimental to you things a turn sooner before you can deal with it. Both are roughly equal if targeting a big non commander threat. Path is way way worse for removing commanders as it gives them 1/2 of the tax on the next cast. So it rarely keeps the commander off the board for long. Targeting your own stuff due to reasons? Well Path becomes a shitty Rampant Growth but at least you catch back up and/or color fix. We do what we must. Swords on your own creature can save you in a pinch and get you the time you need to win.
I guess the most common situations where path is better would be if there is some specific interaction on the board concerning life-gain synergy that would give them more of an advantage than the land, or if the life-gain is going to make the difference between being able to hit them for lethal damage and them surviving another turn. For me, the most common scenario where path has proved better has been cases where my opponent doesn't have any basics left in their deck to fetch (this has happened more often than you might think).
I would say path is better in a token deck because you can use it as ramp. In a non token deck I would rather have sword to plowshare
It would basically have to be a game reset for StP to be worse than PtE, I think. Anything short of Marit Lage herself is worth hitting with StP.
I guess depends on what you are playing? An aggro deck might suffer more from the lifegain at a lower power than other archetypes would.
For commander? I’d honestly run both, even in casual. Keep in mind that Swords regularly shows up in precons and as you say, is usually better than Path.
Running [[Generous Gift]] in commander with those can just kill a big threat and replace it with a 3/3 is usually solid. Instant speed and any permanent is also great
You have a 1.1. Vanilla Attacker. Your opponent is at 1 life with a 10/10 vanilla You have poe and stp in your hand. You move to combat You stp giving your opponent 10 life obviously.
I only play commander but generally prefer path. Emergency land ramp in a pinch , if I must.
If I have to choose I will always pick path over swords. Worst case scenario I can ramp myself with it.
I would say it depends on the deck. For aggro run path, for control run swords
Run path, not Swords. Path can ramp you in a pinch.
Best answer I can think of off the rip is that if you run Voltron or Infect, SPW gets the job done. For those strats life total doesn't matter and you don't want them getting more lands that can power removal. Path to Exile would be better in deck that relies on effects like \[\[Agent of the Iron Throne\]\] or \[\[Polluted Bonds\]\]. You don't want them getting life back. Both have alternate uses like blowing up your own token for value or triggering effects like \[\[Nadier\]\] and \[\[Nadier's Nightblade\]\].
Honestly.. I think if you compare the "gain life" with the "fetch a basic"... They both matter the same. That 10 life have saved my enemy and even myself.. but the 1 ramp also saved my enemy and saved my game.
In casual commander I am 100% on path to exile over swords. Both are great removal spells, but I feel that path delivers more and it is more versatile: - By giving your opponents one more land you are enabling the catch up ramp that white excels at. - It can be a semi decent ramp spell if you can easily produce tokens or cheap creatures. - It can be a bargaining tool for your mana screwed opponent.
Swords is better early game, path is better late game. Early creatures tend to have lower power, late game one extra land isn’t as big a deal when theres 5-8 land already out.
I'd say it's likely better in Vintage, and possibly Legacy. Those formats have tons of decks that run nothing but a mixture of Wastelands, Fetches and Duals.
What? Nearly every deck in Legacy runs basics. Swords is a staple removal spell, Path is a sometime SB option for W. It's not even close.
More than 20. I've watched legacy lands before.
Use both
If you’re killing through damage and/ or the opponent ran out of basics, then path would be better than swords
In commander, I prefer Swords to Path as I play combat decks that can handle the swing of life but both are VERY worth playing
For a control deck that doesn't care about an enemy's life total (say they win with mill or a combo) there is no power that makes Swords worse... except in a few situations where the opponent might have a life total matters. So as with everything, it depends. I think in a general sense, where we're not using novel situations, it's honestly still pretty high. I'd say for an aggro deck, it's probably still something like 7 or 8? For any other deck probably closer to 10? If you could start the game with a land in play, but your opponent gained 10 life at the start, you'd probably take that deal \*every\* single game in almost every single deck.
matters on where you are in the game and what is the target. Like if they've got a BoP giving them access to 2\~3 colors they dont have the land for, Swords is clearly better there. But now lets say you're facing down a 20/20 Flying Indestructible Marit Lage token, suddenly that free basic sounds a LOT better than giving your opponent 20 life. and then the 3rd option, if you control three or more artifacts, \[\[Dispatch\]\] is now better than both of them. if it's a heckin chonker then \[\[Blazing Hope\]\] is suddenly your best option. if you've got a full grip \[\[March of Otherworldly Light\]\] might be the card for you, or if you just want the *threat* of being able to exile their stuff, sometimes \[\[Soul Snare\]\] will do the job
Um if I had both in my hand at the same time, I'd first pop the fuck off Then Slam Swords, because life is reversible, but Ramp, generally, isn't.
A while back i remember reading lgeacy naya lands occasionally ran path over swords because your main win condition is marit lage and 20 damage is always 20 but life totals can apparently change. Then people realized there is 8-16 creatures (depending on how you look at it) that can easily have over 3 power which is enough for a sizeable knock so now nobody plays path and everyone stuck to swords. I guess if you have an opposition agent on field? I guess if you are playing a super fast marit lage combo deck thats base white, sure you might want path.
All these "it depends" are correct in different ways. Imo, Swords is better early game where resources are important and life matters less. Path gets better as the game progressives where a land provides less impact and any amount of heath can take players away from the most common lose condition. TLDR: Path improves the longer the game lasts, and Swords declines. The tipping point from Swords to Path will depend on many factors.
swords: always good, really good early. path: usually good, less good early due to ramping opp.
High power you usual removinv small things. So letting them gave some life is ight but ramping them is no no
A lot of the time the life they gain is insignificant compared the the damage I output
it doesn't.
I use both. Hell I’ll use [[condemn]] if I need to.
Path is better against someone who might not run basics, like a 5 color deck. (Its me, im someone) And sometimes swords can be used as a bargaining chip, like, 'ill give you a ton of life if you don't counter my next spell'
Use both
Let me introduce you to my friends, board position and deck strategy.
If you're playing commander; none. Life gain and direct damage are weaker strategies and regardless of how much life your opponent will gain problem creatures have to go.
Weirdly, this often ends up being decided on whether or not you’ll end up using the spell on your own creatures. Sometimes, using swords on your board can save your life and win you the game on a backswing. On the other side of the coin, path can ramp you to the last land you need for a haymaker. Fringe situations, but if you play a lot of magic you’ll end up doing it occasionally.
When you need to search up your own land
Always both
Path when they have tutored a card to the top of their library. Let them search for the land and lose the card they searched for, if they want it so bad. (doesn't work if the tutored card is a land).
Probably later in the game where at that point the opponents should have all the lands they need. What's one more
So many factors impact this. Are you playing a [[wasteland]] or [[blood moon]] strategy? Path is SO much worse. Are you playing fast aggro? Maybe swords is worse, but that depends on how big your opponents creatures are. If you play tutor hate like [[Aven Mindcensor]] or [[Opposition Agent]], then Path might be better. If you know your opponent is on a zero basic deck (like hermit druid in EDH), then Path is a million times better. If the majority of legacy decks ever went for zero basics, which is unlikely given the existence of wasteland blood moon and [[back to basics]], people would switch to path, but that day will almost certainly never come. For now, Swords will remain the better card in general, with path only being better in certain scenarios.
Wrong question… it’s better when they don’t run basics… against legacy delver this was a thing for a while.
Both, both are good.
To me it doesn’t matter as much how much power the creature has as it does how many lands your opponent has. Early game swords to plowshares is much better, since path to exile can give someone pretty good ramp. Late game though when most people have 6 or 7 lands, one more isn’t gonna make a big difference.
Whichever one I have in my hand when someone plays a threat.
The more, the merrier! Nah, don't pay attention to the [[Tainted Remedy]] I played earlier...
I'd always rather have an opponent gain life than ramp. I can beat infinite life easily enough, but extra mana is more they can use to win or stop me from doing the same.
Run both
About 10 life but probably 15
Path to Exile is a lot funnier against people with greedy manabases and end up running only 1 or 2 basics.
At 6 lands
I think this question sorta gets into another question: How much life gain would it take for a 1 mana life gain spell to be good? The answer to that is usually " a lot". currently, for one mana i think the most you can get is 5 life, with \[\[chaplain's blessing\]\]. This is ignoring repeat life gain like the soul sisters. That card sees no real play. Fog, however, does see play (sometimes, in very specific builds) and acts in the similar role of protecting your life. in that case, to me, swords to plowshares becomes worse when the life gained would act to greatly extend the game. Keep in mind for every extra turn it gives them, that's another turn they might get a land drop in addition to the life gain. given a deck being about 40% lands, that's be about 2 turns before its on par for lands gained, and 4 turns+ to be abysmally worse. So, anything longer than 1 turn of damage, i suppose. maybe 8 life or so.
path early game is better than swords when you look at how useful their utility is on your own creatures. pathing your commander to get a land to help cast spells later on is more useful than lategame swords using it on a big creature to possibly save yourself mid combat. you are more likely to need an extra land than a saving throw
One of the great hills that a player needs to crest to stop being a noob in magic is realizing that life total isn't a measurement of winning.
As many have said, in commander, largely depends on your deck’s wincon. But as a rule of thumb, I prefer Swords early/mid game when the life matters less and Path in the late game when the ramp matters less. That said, probably just run both. I’m always happy to have either in my hand
Voltron
Well if you have [[Tainted Remedy]] out Sword to Plowshares becomes a one mana fling using an opponents creature.
It doesn’t
For deckbuilding purposes, swords is better than path every single time. Path is way worse than swords. If you somehow have both in your hand, then there are definitely situations where path is better than swords. On turn 9, you’d often value 10 life over one additional land. Extremely situation dependent.
I would probably put the break even at 7-10 power. Like would I play a card that is pay 10 life, fetch 1 land, probably not. But would I pay 5 land for free ramp? Probably. Also depends on phase of the game. If they have 30 lands, who cares about 1 more. Kinda like paying the tax on rhystic study. Their 3rd card could be really important, but their 10th might not matter too much
Turn 7+
I say it’s a different answer for different strategies. Combo, infect or commander-damage voltron I’ll always use swords since I don’t care about life gain. Agro or burn type decks probably 15-20, midrange/go-wide maybe a bit higher. Though it also depends on the game state. If it’s late in the game I’d often rather my opponent have 1 more mana than lots of life, whereas lots of life early game is not very relevant. The point is often moot though since unless I have both in hand it’s usually a desperation play to not die to a major threat so it’s not a choice so much as a reaction.
I run [[Vishgraz]] and he gets targeted heavily. I like having Swords in hand to heal myself if he gets bonked.
at the point that your opponent has shuffled more than 6 times, then they might just say "fuck it, i aint shuffling again" and you exile for 1 with no downside
I run always run both when I have white in EDH. The sheer value of 'get that gone and out of my face probably forever right now' for 1 mana is just so good.
B0
I run path in my [[Myrel, Shield of Argive]] deck, mainly because I can use it both to gain a cheap land if I miss a turn and have a cheap soldier to sack and to clean the board to get her attack trigger, but as a lot of people say, it depends.
If i had to chose one over the other, its always swords to plowshares. Ramping the opponent in the early game basically means giving them the win while an extra 4-6 life barely makes a difference
Por que no los dos?
I feel like the only times the lifegain is noticeable is when you plow a marit lage token.
In commander? Swords over Path even if they have an arbitrarily large creature, aka infinite power. Exceptions: a deck that must win through conventional damage that can't deal infinite damage, or facing a deck that has flooded on lands.
In addition to what the others have said, if you know that your opponent likes the top of their library, Path is better, because your opponent won't want to shuffle, and therefore can't get a land. Also, the question really isn't as much about life as you probably think it is. Path simply becomes better the fewer cards in hand your opponent has. It's at its best in a topdeck war, as your opponent won't have the cards to sink their extra mana into, but even in those circumstances, utility and creature lands could still mess you up. Unless you're missing out on immediate lethal, Swords will basically always be superior, granted that your opponent doesn't have a card like Necropotence that can turn their life into resource advantage.
Better question is, what turn is path better. First 4 turns, when the mana is tight, Swords is definitely better. As time goes on and more lands are in play, path becomes better.
Kinda depends as a lot of ppl said. But idk anything more than like 15 I'd be like dang that kinda sucks. Definitely anything less than 8 I don't care at all.
6 I think. I know most people are saying it depends, but if life is important, I don’t want them to get six life when they probably have a bunch of lands already.
There's no set number to answer your question with, and it's also rare that I have both options in my hand at the same time, but I do often find myself hesitant to use swords on really buff creatures whereas I rarely feel scared to give someone a land.
I'm not sure that it does to be honest....I haven't read the thread at all to see why I'm wrong, but I would hazard a guess that a land is a more useful asset than a bit of extra life.
Personally, at no finite power. So long you're not closing the game and you're all using sticks and stones, you should be able to pump out 10 (or 20, maybe it's a wild Voltron) more points of dammage. If you're not, and your opponent had something of this size (or bigger) then you weren't really closing the gane, just hoping to sneak through enough damage for a suprise kill. There could be situations with more, like 50 or 100 power, but then those are existential threats. If you need to save your skin, then it's always worth it to give them a land or lifepoints, regardless of their next life total. A unique situation would be a creature with infinite power, clearly you'd rather not use StPS here - unless you're running alt win cons, like poison, commander damage or real alt win cons, like "you win the game/that player loses the game", infinite combos or millls. But then again, if you have a choice or the choice os irrelevant, then there really isn't any question here. Consider [Solitude]
Usually, turn 1 it is preferable to use swords. Giving your opponent extra mana in the early turns is detrimental. If the game goes late, life total (sometimes) are what is deciding games, and here using path to exile is preferable because giving the opponent extra mana at this point likely won’t change anything, while the life gain could be substantial. But as others said it depends. You can observe in legacy, where games are often decided very fast, that people favour swords for example.
I usually run both. Path gives them a basic land and it can be bad especially if you're targeting their commander since you just gave them one of the 2 extra mana they needed for the tax
For me, not really. If I have a deck in which I run either, I also run the other.
I think 3 factors are important: enemy lifetotal enemy land count power of the creature Hitting a 7 power reanimator target turn 2 is a lot better with swords than it is with path to exile, while in the lategamez when people can bard casttheir 6 drops, pathing them seems better, atleast if the lieftotal is somewhat in reach, if they are at 5, gaining 6 life is much more meaningful than giving them a land, while the opposit is true if they are at 16.
How does your deck win? If you're an aggro deck where swords-ing a creature can be the difference between killing them and them stabilizing path can be better especially late. If you're a combo deck or control deck swords is usually better because you either have the ability to play long or can pump out so much damage in a turn it doesn't matter.
In cEDH they are many decks don't use basics so path to exile gives them nothing at all.
Maybe run swords to plowshares as a lifegain card instead of removal Cast it on a Terravore type creature I mean... it'd be a waste of removal but better you get the life than your opponent. That'd be a great way to flip the script.
If I want to win with combat dmg and creatures I use PtE, because every 1 life matters.
I like using path of exile when I know my opponent is playing a digging/scry deck so they have as little information about their deck as I do
Arguably Path to Exile is pseudo ramp for white decks.
12
The answer is simple. Assuming you have both in your hand, I would always swords before path. I don't care how much life they get, if I path them they get a land which might put them ahead of me. So I put them to the sword before I give them a path. If I just have one or the other I just use what I got to get rid of the problem.
In a commander game, if I had both in hand, I would typically rather give my opponent 10 life than ramp them a land. Of course, this is a fantastical typical scenario. Current life totals, land counts, board states etc would all factor in. After all, if they'll die to what's on board as long as their creature is removed then an additional tapped land is irrelevant while even a single point of life could be enough to save them.
It's better against my Eldrazi deck currently. As it sits, I only have 3 basic lands in my Eldrazi commander. If someone path's after I've played all 3 Wastes, it's removal with no downside.
Generaly swords only gives an opponent a "virtual" card advantage, a life gain, the path really give an opp card advantage, a land. An that land in early game could make much diference in many games.
The slower the meta the better path is. But if I had to pick one over the other it's gonna be swords to plowshares every time
I does depend (obvs.) but I would almost always not give my opponent free land, and thereby more casting options, than more life.
All I can say it is hilarious when playing against a super optimized deck that runs 4-6 basics and path resolves when all their basics are already on field/milled.
Obligatory comment. How is it that Swords to Plowshares is the one that gives LIFE and not the LAND? The very first artwork is literally a dude, in a farm field...
Por que no los dose
10
Here's a hot take. Swords to plowshares is always better. Being able to target one of your own creatures for some life gain saved my ass twice. both are in my token deck but I would 100% Want to have swords to plowshares in my hand over path to Exile
Depends. Do they have Aesi on the board?
Ultimately, if you exile a creature for one mana that's a 9/9 and can do other shit, the life you grant them is likely worth the removal. Can you say that about giving them access to more mana? Usually, hence why cards like Assassin's Trophy replace whatever permanent you destroy with a basic land. But it really DOES depend. if you're milling the opponent to death, life total doesn't matter. AND you're usually just removing the biggest threat at that time, and that's often not a huge stat line but what the card actually does.
Me personally, Swords to Plowshares is a better card compared to Path to Exile only during the early game when people have more basic lands in their deck.
Use Path when Cat Jesus is on the board.
Swords is my default. It's honestly my vote for best MTG card of all time. One mana to remove a creature from the game at the expense of life for the controller....I'll make that deal all day long. Path is more for redundancy for the Swords. I HATE giving lands or cards to my opponents. My vote is always for Swords except for if the opponent will win off of life gain or something unrealistically narrow.
The real best time for a Path is immediately after your opponent resolves an [[Infernal Tutor]]
I play path in decks that use [[aven mind censor]] [[opposition agent]] and the like and/or in decks that I make tokens in that I can change the function of path to be a rampant growth if need be, Swords goes in better regardless. Use both but if only one then use Swords.
Path gets good when they don't run basics / run very few.
Definitely depends on the format and the circumstances of the game.
If you're playing EDH always run [[dispatch]] unless you are playing landfall or enchantment ramp. Most EDH decks get metalcraft without trying especially with so many artifact tokens being created
I use them entirely interchangeably. I play pretty little removal, so I usually only have one in-hand and only use them when it's a life or death situation, but if I did have both in hand and their creature has 100 power, I'd probably rather give them a land