So the deckbuilder's Competition has got me thinking about this card...
When I started theorycrafting, I started by adding a full set, then when I got to actually playing the decks, I started cutting copies and I'm now at a point where its been cut altogether.
The problem: It tends to sit in your hand at the start, only being used, when you've got nothing to do on your turn, just to counter some random card. Then, when you get to a point where countering a key spell becomes relevant, your opponent can pretty often pay the 3.

So I get the idea this is one of those cards that looks interesting in theory, but in practise is kind of weak. Especially since the Artifact deck it should be useful in is kind of durdly.

Any different experience or opinions?

Nope. Pretty much the same experience for me. I've been liking Reverse Engineer a lot better.

It's bad... subtlety bad, but bad all the same. The reason it's bad, is that we don't have ways to really take advantage of it, without making a bad deck that can take advantage of it. Unfortunately, I think it will never be good, because by the time we get the cards we would need, it won't even be in the same galaxy as the powerful cards.

Analysis: it is completely contradictory to the deck that wants it. It requires permanents to be cheap, but heavy counter decks with dynavolt tower, just barely prefer it to other options (and don't want a bunch of permanents). There is no artifact combo deck, yet, so it's not needed there. And finally, the best artifact decks don't even have a splash of blue.

Too bad though, I like the card. :-/

without moxen and ornithopters and artifact lands there isn't enough ways to turn it into early spell pierce

Ive never played with it, but have found it to be effective when it's played against me. Not sure how many games opp could have been chilling with copies in hand that they just never played because I could pay the cost - only experienced it when I couldn't and it was a 1 mana counter spell that made me groan.

I think part of the problem is that we don't have any artifacts with Flash in Duels, so if you're tapping 2 mana to play your first artifact T3, you don't have enough mana/improvise to cast it on opps turn. Because you need to tap out to play artifacts, it doesn't gel well with draw-go decks that run lots of counterspells - meaning that it's often your ONLY counter spell. Because Dimir artifacts is durdley, your opps will get their extra mana out and make copies drawn later effectively useless, while early turns you're trying to play artifacts to improvise with - leaving only a smallish sweet spot in the middle game where it's good stuff. And with a sweet spot window that small, it's probably better to run Push for a 1 mana answer (or spot removal in general for answers). If we had gotten Ornathopter, I imagine it would be much more attractive.

Anyone who plays counter decks could have told you this already

More or less confirms what I already suspected. Its a dud.

I've been kind of liking it in more assertive strategies; being able to Mana Leak something early is good and will likely make sure you're ahead on tempo.

It is a bad topdeck in the lategame though, thus it shouldn't be in control decks.

It helps if you have a Turn 0-1 artifact out and you're on the draw to counter a relevant spell early on, but other than that; it's aight.

The cards you need to run in order to make it Mana Leak suck TBH, and even then it isn't the most consistent thing in the world. If you're often using this turn 3+ you're just better off with Spell Shrivel. Not even sure it's worth it in more aggressive decks either if you're tapping your artifact creatures to swing (and 1x Heart is hardly a recipe for consistency).

Fwiw... it has no synergy with those cards at all - well ornithopter somewhat. Improvise isn't affinity, if it were, the spell would be fantastic. But there's no point using it with moxen, because you could also just tap them for actual mana. :-/

I've found that while it doesn't work as the turn 2 counter we were looking for (renegade map is the only serviceable artifact for that, and even that's sketchy) but it's still pretty powerful when you can hold it up one blue with 2 actually decent artifacts. Like going turn 2 Alchemist vial, turn 3 caravan/another vial and still being able to leave up metallic rebuke is still pretty potent

You see there's the problem, the amount of setup wouldn't be justified for other cards, why this one?

So, in order for it to work, I have to do absolutely **** that affects the board state for my first 3 turns. Sounds legit in the current meta. I guess I'd at least still have a hand full of cards, that's worth something, right?

Yeah i wouldn't run those artifacts just for the role of rebuke, but they did just give us a set with a bunch of artifact synergy, i'd definitly run at least 3 in the aggro version of U/B with tezz touch and whirler rogues ect and i'd also run them in the improvise control version, in those deck i think they're improvements over the 3 mana unconditionals we have.

@Sixty, too be fair i just named 3 cards in that deck to show the potential, i think a fleshed out version might find some room for removal somehow (stuff like battle of the bridge, unlicenced disintergration or Yahenni's expertise are are much stronger and work better in this kind of deck then a more standard control deck)

You don't have to set up your deck to use this card, but you use this card in a deck that is set up for it. I use it only in my artifact deck with Maps, Vials, Key. It's not always a turn 2 Mana Leak, but this is not what my deck wants or needs. It is very good in the situations Hawk cited, when you improve your board and leave a 1cmc counter. Not really worth it in other archetypes for the reason you said.

Double post.

Turn five kiran and pia with sweeper protection does sound pretty good .

Turn 5 Pia & Kiran with an extra relevant card in my hand sounds even better.

ah but what if you have mox opal but don't have enough artifacts to activate metalcraft

for real though you only need 1 artifact for rebuke to be "good enough" it just happens that 1 artifact + 2 mana open is not gonna happen in the early game