Look at this guy:
I want you to look at his stupid face.
I want you to look at his stupid casting cost.
I want you to look at his stupid power and toughness.
I want you to look at the fact that they practically put a Lightning Helix on a 4/5 creature.
Now I want you to look at this guy:
I want you to look at his stupid face.
I want you to look at his stupid casting cost.
I want you to look at his stupid power and toughness.
I want you to look at the fact that they practically put a Flame Jab on a 5/5 creature.
One of these complaints is not like the other.
I want to take you on a little time traveling trip with me. We’re going to go all the way back to 2006 to a time when regional prereleases exited and
people rarely knew the contents of a new set before it came out. WoTC, before their website became the most ridiculously complicated thing since Avril
Lavigne’s song of the same namesake, used to have these massive tournaments that started Friday at midnight and didn’t end until sometime in the late
evening of Sunday. Drafts and Sealed pods as far as the eye could see, and the fun never stopped until product ran out or a judge couldn’t keep themselves
from dying of starvation any longer.
These were the halcyon days.
The talk of this particular Prerelease, however, was Gruul. A couple cards had been spoiled, particularly Giant Solifuge, Burning-Tree Shaman, and a
heavy-hitting number by the name of Rumbling Slum. Ravnica had just brought us Birds of Paradise (now in sexy black bordering), and the world was on fire
at the possibility of a nigh-unbeatable R/G deck that the block seemed to be spewing forth. Not only was this guy freaking huge, but he triggered
bloodthirst on your turn. We were just coming off of a block where Iwamori of the Open Fist was just played, so this card felt like a massive upgrade.
The forums at the time, which were filled with far less trolls than they are today, went wild at the prospect of this creature. Sure, Solifuge was a 4/1
with haste and couldn’t be targeted, and sure, Burning-Tree Shaman was a 3/4 that pinged greedy Sensei’s Divining Top players, but boy howdy you were
looking at a 5/5 potentially on turn 3 that Lightning Helix couldn’t kill and only Putrefy was an answer for.
Things looked grim for anyone not playing Gruul.
The trading floors were awash with people trying to get their sets of Slum and Shaman, with Shaman commanding a pretty penny and Rumbling Slum sets going
for around $35-40 dollars. Back then that was actually pretty ridiculous. Remember, this was coming off a time where Dark Confidant was scoffed at firstly,
and folks only seemed to care about shocklands.
Obtaining them was an ordeal, but once I had them I felt like I could take on anyone anytime anyplace.
Of course, history remembers things differently as Rumbling Slum went on to be a less-than-stellar addition to Standard, and other decks were pushed to the
forefront. One of the only places he ever seemed to show up was Pro Tour Charleston, but that can probably be accredited to it being Team Constructed,
meaning a far shallower pool to draw from.
So why the trip down memory lane?
Because I was looking through my high school year book and I was feeling nostalgic, so get off my back.
…
…
Alright not really.
Without question Siege Rhino has lived up to the freakish expectations we placed on it when it was printed. People were afraid of this card the same way
they were afraid of Rumbling Slum, but at the end of the day one of them was worth the hype and the other one wasn’t. Sometimes the hysteria is warranted.
But the reason I wanted to write about Siege Rhino today was because I spent the entire weekend watching MTG coverage, from the individual World
Championship to Team Worlds to SCG’s Standard Open to Legacy and hell–I even did some drafting in between.
One of the biggest constants I, and I’m sure many of you, ran into was the various comments people made about how heavily played Siege Rhino was.
Was it in Modern? Yes.
Was it in tons of Standard decks? Yes.
Is it going to be the defining card of block? Barring a miracle if I shook the Magic Eight Ball it’d probably say “almost certainly.”
Fact is Siege Rhino is one of the most powerful creatures WoTC has ever printed.
Read that again.
Siege Rhino is one of the most powerful creatures WoTC has ever printed.
For a hot minute people thought it was because of the cast of characters surrounding it: Sylvan Caryatid provided a way to power it out, Courser of Kruphix
made sure it could be cast on time, and once in play the 4/5 body was pretty tough to remove without a two-for-one or playing fringe cards like Fated
Conflagration that aren’t necessarily great in other matches. In a way, Rhino was warping the metagame.
Then Abzan Pod players realized that you could Birthing Pod a Kitchen Finks into Siege Rhino, gaining even more life, draining for three, and putting a
massive body on the battlefield.
Funny enough, there were more copies of Siege Rhino in the Top 8 of Grand Prix Madrid than there were Treasure Cruise, Dig Through Time, or Jeskai
Ascendancy, and those three cards are being talked about for potential Modern bannings!
It seemed no matter where you turned, this card was everywhere.
Nicknamed a “resident sleeper” by Twitch chat, mirror matches featuring dueling Rhinos were met with sighs, groans, and complaints. When SCG made the giant
changes to their Open Series events, the most read comment I saw on all my social media feeds was “great–nothing but Siege Rhino mirror matches.” This
card is singlehandedly responsible for people saying they don’t like Standard being the focus of a 20K series! Can you even fathom that?
Now I want you to look at these:
Creatures (12)
Planeswalkers (6)
Lands (25)
Spells (17)
Creatures (23)
- 3 Hornet Queen
- 1 Elvish Mystic
- 4 Sylvan Caryatid
- 4 Courser of Kruphix
- 4 Satyr Wayfinder
- 2 Doomwake Giant
- 1 Reclamation Sage
- 4 Siege Rhino
Lands (24)
Spells (13)
The first is Sheldon “Not Menery” Freerksen’s winning list from Portland.
Sheldon was on a tear this weekend that consisted of him winning the Standard portion and then almost winning the Legacy event with Guru lands that somehow
did not belong to eventual champion David McDarby.
The second is the Abzan Reanimator list thatGlenn Jones wrote about and I touched on last week. Glenn deserved this finish for all the hard work he’s put
in to this deck, and clearly it was good enough because a lot of the best players in the room were battling with it, including Gerry Thompson who finished
in the Top 4 as well.
While I am 100% that had Glenn drawn better he’d have gone on to the finals, one thing is very apparent just by looking at both of these decks:
They both play four copies of Siege Rhino.
The entire point of this article, if you haven’t caught on yet, is to get you to understand that I think this is the single best card in the format.
No, not Hordeling Outburst.
No, not Jeskai Ascendancy.
No, not Dig Through Time.
This week I played Glenn’s Abzan Reanimator deck both online and at live events, and if you’re friends with me on Facebook you probably already know how I
feel about it, but for those of you that aren’t, let me just give you the synopsis:
The matches I played with it weren’t particularly close and it felt like every single thing I was doing against my opponents was incredibly unfair. Games
where I’d be behind were easily caught up on the back of Rhino, Whip, and Hornet Queen. Rhino was often the glue that held the deck together, giving you
the time to bridge the early and midgame until your ridiculously strong threats took over. Often, you’d land a Soul of Innistrad and the game would be way
over.
But I’m not here to tout the merits of Glenn’s deck because Glenn did a fine job of that this weekend with his finish.
What I’m here to do is show you why if you’re not playing this card, you are practically handicapping yourself. Sound extreme? Stay tuned.
At first I was just like you in my dislike for Mr. Rhinopopolus. I didn’t like the way it dragged games along. I didn’t like that it felt like you were
just jamming powerful cards instead of working on some kind of coherent strategy. I hated that they printed this thing.
Then we got to know each other. Went out to dinner. Had some drinks. Went back to my place.
You know.
What I found out was that Siege Rhino is not only good when you draw a single one, but in multiples it is completely unreal.
Did you manage to watch the finals of the SCG Open this weekend?
Prior to the match Patrick Sullivan, made the comment “This Abzan Reanimator deck might be the solution to the metagame, but it’s possible this Jeskai
Tokens deck is just the best deck in the format.”
I chuckled to myself. As much as I agree with 99% of the things Patrick says, this was the 1% I didn’t agree with.
The Rhino’s power was put on display as a turn 3 Rhino followed by a turn 4 Rhino prompted a concession from Brad Nelson in their game 1 before Brad even
untapped for his turn 4. There is no other card in the format that can boast that kind of claim: Siege Rhino in multiples is practically unbeatable.
You look at other cards in their respective clans:
Mantis Rider is a 3/3, and although it has haste it can be dealt with by a number of answers, among them the rampantly played Lightning Strike, essentially
allowing a two mana removal spell to trade up against the Jeskai three-drop.
Rakshasa Vizier or Kheru Lich Lord is lololololololololololol I’m sorry.
Butcher of the Horde is very powerful, but unless you’re playing Four-Color Midrange, powering it out before turn 4 isn’t happening any time soon, and
haste is dependent on having other creatures in play, which doesn’t always occur.
Savage Knuckleblade has shown a lot of promise, but unless you’re Brian Kibler this card hasn’t paid many dividends. It’s still incredible, but only time
will tell if Knuckleblade reaches great heights.
At the end of this road is the beginning and the end: the Abzan clan’s entry. Siege Rhino.
You have to understand that while people thought Abzan Midrange was starting to lose ground in the de facto “best deck of the format” race, it was doing
anything but that. Patrick Chapin battled with it all weekend to a finals performance at Worlds. The World Cup winners Denmark showcased the power of Abzan
Reanimator, and Sheldon took down the whole thing at Portland.
Again, Siege Rhino went sickhouse on the competition.
You are faced with a serious choice going forward until the new set comes out:
You can either play a deck that plays the best card in Standard, or you can choose to play something else with some other cards that may get you
there. If your intentions are to win a tournament, give yourself the best odds and sleeve up four of the Rhino.
I’ve already made my position abundantly clear to my friends participating in the Invitational coming up: if you’re not joining them, they are beating you.
At the end of the day it doesn’t matter if you hate Siege Rhino.
Siege Rhino just doesn’t care.
Because whether you like it or not, this card is here to stay. I’d stop complaining about it now.
It’s pretty much futile.