I feel they left it underwhelming intentionally, because a good inspire minion is a minion that costs two more mana than its printed cost and is a card that has, at least, strength that is about equal to a battlecry minion and it also has the ability to snowball VERY heavily, making it extremely iffy to balance, I feel.
All in all, I'm kinda glad they didn't print good neutral inspire minions.
But discover on the otherhand, is a mechanic that was both designed and balanced for competitive-play from the get-go, which is why I really love it as a mechanic.
Part of this is true. Inspire made a ton of sense for the set flavor wise but you are correct when you say the mechanic translates pretty directly to very snowball-y games when it works. Cards like Kodorider are cool, but I don't think anyone is excited about a world where Kodorider is A+ tier and the control meta hinges on who can stick their Kodorider first.
There are more fun ways to do this, like Nexus Champ or Savage Combatant. Those cards don't always translate into snowballing the board in a way that feels too hard to come back from, but the upsides are still exciting. All that said, Inspire itself is probably the most powerful mechanic in the game just translating what it does into value. Gaining resources permanently for 'free' is pretty bonkers. All new sets bring back old cards that didn't used to see play. I wouldn't count Inspire out just yet, there's a long future ahead!
Iksar
Mike is my boss! We all work together :D.
Iksar
Part of this is true. Inspire made a ton of sense for the set flavor wise but you are correct when you say the mechanic translates pretty directly to very snowball-y games when it works. Cards like Kodorider are cool, but I don't think anyone is excited about a world where Kodorider is A+ tier and the control meta hinges on who can stick their Kodorider first. There are more fun ways to do this, like Nexus Champ or Savage Combatant. Those cards don't always translate into snowballing the board in a way that feels too hard to come back from, but the upsides are still exciting. All that said, Inspire itself is probably the most powerful mechanic in the game just translating what it does into value. Gaining resources permanently for 'free' is pretty bonkers. All new sets bring back old cards that didn't used to see play. I wouldn't count Inspire out just yet, there's a long future ahead!