This card is amazing in an old school pinger control deck. Blue pingers area pretty much all 1/1 creatures and easy to kill especially against red and black. Once you put Kira out though it changes the game. Suddenly it takes 2 abilities or spells to get rid of that pesky 1 damage pinger not to mention you should have a counter or 2 ready for the 2nd and 3rd attempt to rid you of your creature. If you need to play spell or ability on the 1/1 pinger then just have it ping itself. The ping is countered since it was the first ability played on the creature during your turn. You just need to make sure you're smart about it because doing this does open the door for your opponent to attack it with removal. A pinger with a Kira on the board and any combination of Sigil of Sleep, Curiosity, and Charisma is basically lethal lockdown against almost any deck.

  -- By Kinzu from Austin, TX on May 25, 2011

Depending on the situation, Kira can be both ridiculously good or practically worthless. While shielding up your creatures is certainly an awesome thing indeed, it's only awesome as long as your opponent has removal in his/her deck. Also, unless >something< happens, Kira is merely a color heavy Wind Drake that you paid 15 bucks for :/ Is he viable as an EDH commander? certainly, and it looks like he might also be viable in Type 1 depending on the type of deck that uses him, however I wouldn't recommend getting it for a regular 60-card casual deck.

  -- By Jens N from Denmark on April 26, 2011

merfolk's BEST FRIEND EVER!

  -- By el_chanis from Corrientes, Argentina on December 12, 2010

So first off it's 3 manna for a 2/2 blue flyer. Already not too bad. Throw in an awesome control ability and it makes this card very attractive for a typical blue control deck. The only real downside is that it makes it hard for you to target your own creatures. In my experience the most used blue spell that targets your own creatures is unsummon, and well you only do that if your creatures are targeted by a kill spell or an ability. This makes it extremely hard to target your creatures, forcing them to mass kill the board(WoG, which hopefully you have a counter saved). Even if they do manage to throw 2 spells at one of your creatures, if you do have an unsummon, you can merely unsummon as a result to the second target spell. This card is great and just adds more loops for your opponents to jump through to reach you, which isn't that the point of a control deck?

  -- By James from Indiana on October 17, 2009

3 mana for a 2/2 flyer that gives all your creatures protection from 1 target spell or ability PER TURN...that sounds pretty good to me. Won't be main decked in every case, but it sure is nice against decks with heavy creature removal. Making any opponent burn two direct creature spells to remove one is a card advantage. For its cost, I think it can be very effective in the right decks.

  -- By jim from indiana on October 16, 2009

This card is awesome, your opponents have to burn two spells just to get rid of one guy, and unless he's got an all out red burn deck, it's gonna mean wasting a lot of cards to keep the control up, and more playing time for your creatures.

  -- By Dorthy from NC on March 28, 2009

I'm not sure what's wrong with these people, but there's NO REASON to run this card in a pump deck. Why would you do that? You people are crazy saying that this card is bad! And only good as a side against a burn deck?! Are you nuts? This card keeps all your crits from being targeted from ANYTHING. A majority of decks out there in casual are running some kind of crit control, most of which is targeted. And honestly how often do you target your own guys? There are few reasons to and from experience people spend so much time killing this that 1. they've just wasted an extra card to have a change to target your crits and 2. they want it gone so it doesn't last long enough for it to be trouble to yourself and anything you may try to do to it. The simple thing to note here is that you DON'T RUN THIS IN A DECK WHERE YOU PLAN TO BE TARGETING YOUR OWN CRITS. There's no point in bashing a card when you're running it incorrectly.

  -- By David Fiorella from Philly, PA on April 13, 2007

Many have missed the point. if they have to burn 2-cards to get the job done than that is a significant advantage. great for overun, protecting easy to kill-but not worth two card utlitly creatures, and larger cards at a low cost.

  -- By steve s from Sacramento , CA on April 04, 2006

...thats exactly why you don't run this card in a pump up deck. a good white-blue or green-blue weenie deck with spells that don't target any of your creatures will own so bad... not only can't your creatures be touched by less than two spells (which is critical, because a normal player has a max of 7 cards), they get bigger too! works wonders with overrun, shared triumph, elves, all sorts of spells that include "all of your creatures" in the text.

  -- By Chris from Nowhere on May 09, 2005

i have absolutely no experience with this card but it doesn't seem like its THAT bad. for instance, what about an all flyer deck? wizards? like i said, just speculating, but it seems to have potential, especially if it gets the right synergy with other cards............

  -- By Anonymous from gainesville, FL USA on February 23, 2005

certainly not as good as it is rated

  -- By James Northcliff from Cleveleand, OH USA on February 15, 2005

Whoops wrong side meant to be 1 not 5!1This card looks cool at first but when you actually play it, it SUCKS. not to be rude though. I often got one of my kodama's mights or giant growth fizzeled because of its ability. this card only works against burn so clearly only a sideboard card. Burn-red decks have so many spells that it often gets targeted twice anyway and then you lose control of the board because your creatures are now vulnerable. I really don't think the card is worth what its rating gives.

  -- By Anonymous from KZN, Durban Anonymous on February 15, 2005

This card looks cool at first but when you actually play it, it SUCKS. not to be rude though. I often got one of my kodama's mights or giant growth fizzeled because of its ability. this card only works against burn so clearly only a sideboard card. Burn-red decks have so many spells that it often gets targeted twice anyway and then you lose control of the board because your creatures are now vulnerable. I really don't think the card is worth what its rating gives.

  -- By Anonymous from Glenmore, Durban, South Africa on February 13, 2005