Here he is, in all his glory…. Mr. Jace the Mindsculptor! Often referred to as the best planeswalker ever, scratch that.. best Magic: The Gathering card ever.

First off, it’s not a typo: there definitely are 4 abilities on there. That should be your first clue right there that this guy means business.

 

+ 2 ability: being able to ‘fateseal’ and opponent is rather great and annoying. Of course, this depends on which side of the playing table you are on. Keep in mind, this effect can be used on yourself if you really do not want to get a dead draw, but usually you would just be Brainstorm –ing those away. Unless of course the next 3 cards are bad. Again, the usual strategy would be to let your opponent to draw lands and put anything relevant on the bottom. Some opponents will try to hold back on their fetchlands (Arid Mesa, Scalding Tarn, etc.) in order to not have to draw lands if you are jace’ing them. However, you can mind game them by leaving the nonland card on top and watch as they shuffle it away.

0 ability: *gasp* Is this for real? Yeap, this is the glue that makes the card. It’s almost always the first ability you use when you play this planeswalker. Being able to plan ahead on your next few draws greatly increases your present decision-making ability. Careful however! You do not want to use this ability first if your opponent is playing red as this will almost surely result in Jace taking 3 damage and dying.

-1 ability: Unsummon any creature. You will be using this one quite a lot as well. The less often you need it, the best shape you will be in (board-state wise). Of course, like with the +2 ability, this one is two-fold. You can bounce their guys to keep them from attacking and putting pressure on you. You will want to oftentimes use this on your 187 or ETB or enter the battlefield creatures. Basically, before Venser allowed you to always blink your guys, you had to use this guy to a similar end. He works better with cards that had a Kicker cost, such as Gatekeeper of Malakir and Goblin Ruinblaster. Also allows for cool stuff with Precursor Golem as well (gets rid of the drawback).

-12 ability: The win condition. Some opponents will not scoop after this ability resolves, but they all eventually do. Rarely have I seen anyone come back from that one. A lot of people thought it was not that awesome when it was first spoiled because Jund was a dominant deck that attacked with a bunch of hasted creatures so a control planeswalker was not that alluring. Then the face of control changed to hate more on the Jund manabase (Spreading Seas) and allowed for the Jace dream to become a reality.