Moving the discussion over here. Now All the Gods are Spoiled, and since we're bound to get them, which is your most and least favourite?

LINKS:
Oketra - http://mythicspoiler.com/akh/cards/oketrathetrue1.jpg
Kefnet - http://mythicspoiler.com/akh/cards/kefn ... ndful1.jpg
Bontu - http://mythicspoiler.com/akh/cards/bont ... rified.jpg
Hazoret - http://mythicspoiler.com/akh/cards/hazo ... rvent1.jpg
Rhonas - http://mythicspoiler.com/akh/cards/rhon ... itable.jpg

My take of most impactful to least...

1) Rhonas: The easiest condition to meet and maintain, the most flexible ability for any Green deck using creatures, and a 5/5 body that can swing on T4 very consistently.

2) Oketra: Nowhere near as narrow as the lower 3, white based aggro decks and token strategies should love her, works well with buffs and her ability can rebuild the board state (albeit slowly) after a sweeper whilst still being a body herself.

3) Hazoret: Narrow, but faster than the next 2. Although she eats Black removal like Languish and Grasp, the deck that wants her should be finishing too quick to care about them. Outside of Rhonas, I think she's the God with the best payoff for meeting her clause.

4) Kefnet: I really want to love this guy, but I've got serious doubts. His clause is actually fairly easy to interact with for your opponent just by playing cards, when its already hard to meet and maintain. Even then, his payoff is consistently being a 5/5 flyer much later in the game than the other Gods come online. Fine in a Control deck, and maybe something usable in Simic Ramp.

5) Bontu: One deck wants this, and its a deck that lacks support against the current champs, even with what we've seen in AHK. The cost to swing doesn't really payoff quite like some of the other options crats has to lose on presence. Requiring an exile to destroy one of your engines is annoying, but its not their best engine for the cost.

I'll quickly repost my take on it:

1) Hazoret. Most red-based aggressive decks want 5 damage turn 4, and she can be used to Turn Lands into damage or enable Madness. Great topend, only small gripe is that she dies to Grasp unlike the other gods.

2) Rhonas. Easiest god to activate as any deck that wants him will run 4-power creatures. My main gripe with him is that he absolutely needs another creature to do anything, and he can be fogged by just killing said other creature during Begin Combat. Still, great beatdown card that works well with the other gods.

3) Kefnet. His abilities are powerful for a blue-based control deck; as he provides that deck with both carddraw as well as a hard to answer lategame threat. This main problem is that he faces stiff competition for his spot in these decks.

4) Oketra. I actually think she's way more narrow than people give her credit for. For her to attack the deck has to not mind overextending, and even then she doesn't offer these decks enough. Being the most expensice god in Terms of CMC and ability doesn't help either.

5) Bontu. The only god that has to actively be enabled each turn, and the one with the lowest power (Menace helps not getting chumped, though). Still, a creature (even a token) dying on your side is a real cost.


However, I think the gods are really close in power level overall.

I'm reasonably confident in the power scaling order. I was closer on the Gearhulk one than a lot of others here were. I remember Gem hyping Cataclysmic up something chronic.

Oketra sucks. Evasion alone makes Bontu better than her. At first glance, I'd rank them, from best to worst, Rhonas-Hazoret-Kefnet-Bontu-Oketra, although Kefnet might be worse than I think. I do think you guys are undervaluating Bontu, though.

Bottom line, they all look kind of "eh".

Rhonas-Hazoret-Oketra-Kefnet-Bontu.

I think it's like this

Rhonas
Oketra
Hazoret
Kefnet
Bontu

To me the most overrated god is keftnet, I think he will prove either unreliable or clumky as a blocker since most decks that want him are control.

Rhonas just curbs out nicely into any mid range deck, we will be active just by playing your creatures on curb.

Oketra goes right into any weenie deck. She will be online just by playing your strategy as normal. Don't underestimate double strike, a pump can be devastating and she is very resilient.

Hazoret should be online just by playing super aggressively which is nothing new. Just keep the deck low to the curb and kick someone's face in.

Bontu needs more help than the others, he could fit on a steal deck, aristocrats. Killing things is what black does but you can't always do it every turn and it forces you to play proactively if you want to attack with him.

So, here is my metric for ranking the gods; Cost, combat ability?, ease of enabling, and relevance of their last abilities.

Rhonas - THE BEST GOD. Being able to surprise block your opponent via pump spell or other means is great. The cast cost is cheap, the special is also efficient and self enables to attack making it playable in many decks. Also, its G, and Nissa is gearing up to be the 2nd best walker of this set. Great card!

Kefnet - This was the best god in terms of synergy with its special, cost, evasion, and resilience to Grasp/Languish...until I saw Rhonas. This does have a similarly difficult draw back of not being likely to attack as often like Harozet though. But, considering that it cannot attack, it does effectively synergy with lands and cost 3 instead of 4 providing you did not make a land drop that turn. Firm 2nd place.

Harozet - Having haste with 5 power in a R deck is very powerful. The only way I see this god being relevant is in a Mono R or BR Madness deck with Ravenous Bloodseeker/Furyblade Vampire. It also compliments Bloodhall Priest/Avaricous Dragon as both cards card about having no handsize. Her special is great in 2HG but meh in 1v1. Applicable but doesn't survive the Grasp/Languish test. Not the best, but makes 3rd place.

Oketra - With her special ability costing 4 for a minimal effect, its easily the worst of the bunch and quite neglectible. And while her double striking ability does encourage you to grant her evasion via and aura while also having the indestructibility effect, she still cannot attack unless your playing her in a token strategy. The most explosive token/human strategy we're got is currently WR Valor in Akros. Oketra, does not really add to that strategy. Her 6 toughness does pass the Grasp/Languish test though. Oketra makes 4th place.

Bontu - Very easy to enable but his special is minimal. It does a bit more work in 2HG but can still be relevant in 1v1. He passes the Grasp/Languish test. I'm not very interested in him as we've lost Perilous Myr and crats is no longer a deck. He makes 5th place.

As a weenie player/lover, Oketra does not just go into 'any' weenie deck, I'm not even sure Master Trinketeer is playable in tokens - same deal with Hanweir Militia Captain. I mention these cards, because they are both cheaper than Oketra, and questionable for the same reason. We don't need a repeatable 4 mana token producer for 4, and the rest is not how tokens win. Tokens win by flooding the board, not attacking with some big threat. At least the doubling season card actually fits in a token deck, I'm not sure Oketra does (despite all of the people claiming the god will be good in tokens). Maybe it's a scion of the wild quality card in tokens, maybe (i.e. Not that great). Bottom line, tokens are a real deck - so good for Oketra - but I doubt they want him - very bad sign.

As a long time crats player, I can tell you the black god might not be playable. I really do believe free is the price I want to pay to sac, either that or I want a card back every time I sac. The fact that the god drains when he sacs is a big deal though. It just feels bad to me, but maybe. It's too bad it doesn't drain when any creature I control dies (i.e. No matter how it happens), it would have been great.

The red god has haste, and fits right into the game plan of any red deck that wants to empty its hand. Definition of a playable card achieved.

The blue god is better than the red, simply because it's more needed - e.g. Card that fits into a controlish deck, which is hard to remove, and helps the deck do its thing while being a legitimate win con. Whether blue is better than red, or vice versa is purely a question of whether there is a blue based control deck that's actually good this season. I always think it's at least possible, so blue edges out red, purely because blue has very little current competition for that slot.

Green is obviously the best. I could literally just throw it into basically any deck I've ever built with green in it.

So green, red/blue, blue/red, black/white, white/black imo.

The languish/grasp argument is also legit, btw. But they all get the axe to exile effects.

Rhonas
Hazoret
Bontu
Oketra
Kefnet

Hmmm... I've got to know how Control players could possibly not want a 3 mana flying indestructible win con? Is it just that we already have better options? Or am I missing something? From what I can tell, you basically always have a full hand by the time you want to make the turn and go aggressive.

If nothing else, explain how 4 mana draw a card could ever be worse than 4 mana make a 1/1 token, which is each card's respective bottom.

The big downside is how easy it is for a smart opponent to turn him off just by playing cards. He'd be horrible against a Grapple deck for example, where you'd be very hard pressed to keep your hand full. On the flip side, against aggro you've probably already won by the time he's come online. I'm not a betting man, but playing a 3 mana "do nothing" probably didn't factor into you staving off aggro, and chances are you didn't waste 4 mana drawing 1 card either. Average hand size in my games with Blue based control is 2 to 4 depending on the opponent and their deck, if I'm stomping them it still takes a few turns to hit 7 cards. That's time enough for the opponent to hit Dec in Stone, Blessed Alliance or some other answer I expect will gain value in all decks on release.

What Blue wants is reliable, resilient wincons. 2x Manly Sphinx is better than 1x Kefnet.

I don't see most of their activated abilities very useful, but they are still good mana sink. So in my list i mostly consider in which deck they could actually see play and, if green and red have obvious good shells, black has not a good one, blue apparently has but i don't think it will be better than other cards in control. Oketra is very good in a tokens deck, double strike is relevant if you can also pump it somehow, so for me she is in third position.

It's a win more card imo. If tokens reliably has 4 tokens in play, oketra is basically irrelevant.

@bbb, doesn't your opponent emptying their hand play into your sweeper game plan though? Literally over commit in order to stop the god, causing themselves to lose to your CA engines. Blue god, rather conveniently survives all sweepers you're likely to be playing. The sphinx does not, btw.

Only Outburst catches the worst of them though, and not all counter/removal worthy threats are creatures. If its worth running 4x sweepers (it isn't in this meta) then sure, sweeper is a "game plan", then maybe Kefnet improves. They're playing cards that you'll have to answer sooner or later, otherwise your 5/5 do nothing looks dumb when it finally comes online for blocking on 5 life or less. Also, why am I playing the Sphinx into sweepers? Also it does DJ, read the card where it says "embalm"

I think it is not a winmore card. Having 4 tokens in play doesn't make you win, you still need something that let you use such advantage, like anthems or idk. Well this card deals lot of damage or card advantage anyway.

You're bigging up Captain "Full Hand" and calling Oketra a win more?

Hmmm... all you guys are doing is convincing me of my initial (unstated) thought, which is that only the green god is actually playable at all. I guess we'll see.

The Green god is the only one that isn't winmore, yes. Well, Bontu as well. Bontu isn't win anything lol.

I agree. The red one has some chance imo, but essentially only the green one is playable.

Your core problem is that this just isn't true at all. We have 7 cards if we've already taken with Jace/Sorin/Ob or something, but that point, what the hell is Kefnet adding? I'm not eager to pay 7 mana to draw a card. Otherwise he basically just sits on the battlefield. If I want to try to slam a 3 mana bomb for control from Amonkhet, right now it's Nissa at 1UG.