Good morning all. Welcome back to the column that explores the casual. Today I want to do my normal set review of the latest set.
For years, I have reviewed sets from the perspective of Five Color. I have also recently begun to use my set review for more generic casual formats as well, such as multiplayer and Peasant. However, Five Color still dominates my thoughts when I look at a new card.
What is Five Color? Five Color is a casual format with a minimum of 250 cards, 20 cards of each color, Type One legal sets, and then the quirkiness of the format leads to some special rules like its own B&R list and generous mulligans. You can find all of the gory details here.
Normally, I do my set review by color, but in this set, that is no longer possible. However, Wizards has conveniently separated the set into several subsets in their visual spoiler, so I will follow suit here.
Gold cards can count as any color that they make up, but only once for each card. I cannot count Conflux as every color, but I could count it as Red or Green or White, whichever I preferred. You can flesh out a color easily with this set.
Like much of this block, this set continues the “Really Great Big Creature” theme of the block and has a ton more options for your inner Timmy. This block makes Spiritmonger look underpowered, and this theme continues through Alara Reborn. All of this beef is good for multiplayer and casual Magic.
What I like to do with my set reviews is just hit the highlights, and talk about them for Five Color, Peasant, Multiplayer, Pauper-Prismatic-Singleton or whatever else hits my fancy. It’s simple and straightforward, so let’s do it.
Blue/White
We begin with the color combinations assigned by Wizards at U/W.
Aven Mimeomancer — I would have loved it if the feather counter also made the creature a bird. Note this is a may effect and the Mimeomancer is a strong 3/1 flyer for three mana. Therefore, this bird can swing and dole out some decent damage on the curve while also helping your early aggro army. Turning that Savannah Lion or Jackal Pup into a 3/1 flyer is not bad at all. In multiplayer, it can be used to drop the power of things like Akroma and Darksteel Colossus or even Serra Angel or Mahamoti Djinn. Simply put, this card does not suck.
Filigree Angel — This is way too expensive to ever see play outside of a Haddix deck. A Haddix deck is one with Forge[/author]“]Darksteel [author name="Forge"]Forge[/author] and Mycosynth Lattice and Leonin Abunas and Roar of Reclamation and many other artifact friendly cards typically played by either Don Haddix or Sean Haddix at my multiplayer table. I swear, they must have a brotherly pact to see who can build the most decks around Forge[/author]“]Darksteel [author name="Forge"]Forge[/author]. This card is for them, not for the rest of us.
Meddling Mage — OMG it is getting reprinted!! Wow, who… um… cares? I guess this is massive mega-shattering tournament news but it is met with a giant “meh” from my casual group. At multiplayer, it’s not that good, and in casual world, you never really know what a person’s deck holds. The only real use it has is with bounce. Bounce something, then seal it off by playing a Meddling Mage. There are better aggro creatures for U/W and better cards to get you wins. If you open it, sell or trade it for the good cards, unless you play some serious tournaments and didn’t already have four.
Sanctum Plowbeast — I am only putting the land cyclers here, under this first one, instead of elsewhere. I like the landcyclers because they can get you a duel land which allows them to take care of many mana needs. You can also get Murmuring Bosk or the special lands with land type. I really like these, because for budget minded players, they add diversity, and for Five Color purposes, they can count as more colors. I like them a lot as a result.
Sovereigns of Lost Alara – This ain’t bad. It can be card advantage if you get something like Rancor that is reusable. Even if the only auras in your deck are Flight of Fancy, you can get some serious distance with this card. Work great with many auras. I really like it a lot.
Blue/Black
We have arrived at the next section of the gold cards. Here we go.
Architects of Will — All of the hybrid cyclers for one mana are playable in Pauper-Prismatic-Singleton online, where card advantage is vitally important, as well as card sifting. The Architects are also good as a creature in that format. I might not play the Sigil however, it’s not that good.
Deny Reality — Cascade may also make the cut in such a card advantage sensitive environment, and if so, cards like this may raise their head in PPS.
Illusory Demon — It really likes Standstill, especially in multiplayer when no one ever wants to break a Standstill (See: The Standstill Dilemma.) . Otherwise, this may not have much value in casual play.
Lich Lord of Unx — It’s not a bad finisher in U/B zombie decks that may be built around cards like Vodalian Zombie and Shepherd of Rot. Its ability to pump out 1/1 every turn with mana and tapping is not that great in casual land, because there are many other creatures that do the same cheaper or more regularly, or both (like Verdant Force). The ability to strip some life and mill some cards is nice and repeatable, so there is value there, but it’s obvious that you need a lot of zombies for that too work, and I just think your basic multiplayer table is not going to let you set up over the course of five or six full turns.
Mistvein Borderpost — This is my general comment for all Borderposts. They are not mana acceleration if you play them with the alternate cost, and if you do not, then they cost too much. I would have preferred this cost for them: 2H where H is hybrid. That way, you can play it for 2 and White and tap it for Blue to smooth your mana. As it is, they will not help a two color deck with color screw unless you bounce a land, so I think a more helpful mana cost would have been useful. I do think these were a very clever design.
Soul Manipulation — This will get played in PPS decks. Card advantage rules the format, and this is not only card advantage but proactive creature kill card advantage.
Soulquake — Someone is going to abuse this is multiplayer. I don’t even need to say any more. Some of you get it, and those will love it. Some of you will not get, and you can move on to the next card.
Time Sieve — Just what every multiplayer table wanted, more cards for the Haddix deck.
Black/Red
Anathemancer — Price of Progress is a powerful, powerful, powerful card in Five Color. This does half the damage, on a creature, but doesn’t hit you. It does not have the surprise factor of PoP, but it’s free damage attached to a 2/2 creature for 3 mana. I have to believe that many Five Color players will try this out to see if it is good enough to make the cut in their tournament decks.
Bituminous Blast — I like this cascade spell because it’s card advantage already, no matter what you get off the cascade.
Breath of Malfegor — No matter what it looks like, this is not a good card for multiplayer. Neither was Sizzle. It got played a lot, but it was NOT A GOOD CARD. It pisses people off, it doesn’t do anything, it’s card disadvantage, and many players pay too much attention to life totals anyway. This is not a good card.
Deathbringer Thoctar — It’s not annoying enough to get auto-killed but good enough to do some damage. (Literally and figuratively) Perhaps it does cost a bit too much though, so I wouldn’t advise you to pack a bunch of them. Once you get up to the 6 and higher casting cost zone, you can rock Kaervek the Merciless, and this is nowhere near the death level of Kaervek. Kaervek shows you what you can get for just one more mana, so don’t overload your Deathbringers, but a couple may be really nice.
Defiler of Souls — I really enjoy the concept of this card a lot. It has all of the value of Woebringer Demon with one of the down side. It’s easy to build around it and keep yourself from sending creatures to Defiler’s Abyss. Meanwhile, it chomps on your opponents. The farther we get from Alara block and its goldenness, the more powerful, it will become.
Lightning Reaver —This reminds me of cards like Diseased Vermin or The Fallen.
Sanity Gnawers — These are not Ravenous Rats and they are not going to get the play that Ravenous Rats do. Ravenous Rats gave you a nice two drop that removed a card while also giving you something to use and abuse for some decks and a nice early body. This is Specter’s Wail on a 1/1 for three mana with two colors to play it. It is not an easy early drop, instead competing with strong three drops in its colors. It is not one color to play. Although the discard is better, the card is worse.
Thought Hemorrhage — Cranial Extraction gets played in some competitive Five Color decks. I don’t see any reason why this would not join them. It is a pretty strong card at stripping things away, and it can be used as burn to the dome in a pinch if you know a card in their hand.
Red/Green
Blitz Hellion — There’s probably a combo here somewhere if you can find it. I don’t want to look that hard. It’s still a 7/7 trampler, haster for 5 mana and just one turn of beating. There’s value in that.
Bloodbraid Elf — It’s too bad this isn’t common. It would have been great in Peasant decks. As it is, it competes with too many uncommons for the precious 5 uncommon slots in Peasant.
Deadshot Minotaur — This card would have been a lot better if it had cost another mana but killed a flyer Wing Snare style. As it is, you often miss the creatures you want to kill. This won’t take down a Shivan Dragon or an Akroma the Red. It would take down Commander Eesha or Malfgor with the Wing Snare version. I wonder how much a Wing Snare CIP creature would cost, because it’d be awesome to see that someday. The closest we have right now is Sunscape Battlemage.
Dragon Broodmother — Have you ever noticed how WotC finds something that works, and then tries to hit it over and over again? That’s why we had the underwhelming Maro cycle in Saviors of Kamigawa. 2/5s of the Lhurgoyf cycle(Odyssey) was sucky as can be, but that’s common in cycles where they stretch the concept too thinly. Verdant Force is loved by many. So let’s add Verdant Embrace and other cards like Luminous Angel and now Dragon Broodmother. It feels like they are trying to catch lightning again in that theoretical bottle. They admitted as much in an article, but the design feels that way. There are ways you could do it so it would not feel that way, like this:
Out of Control Ooze
2GGG
1/1
During each player’s upkeep, put an Ooze token into play that is */* where * is equal to the power of the last token put into play this way + 1. When you put a 10/10 Ooze into play this way, you lose the game.
Last one out gets eaten by the Ooze.
Now that’d be something different. You get a 1/1, then a 2/2, then a 3/3, etc, but eventually, you lose. That does not feel like Verdant Force. Here’s another example.
Mirror Monkey
4GG
2/2
When Mirror Monkey comes into play choose a color and creature type. Mirror Monkey becomes that color and type. During each player’s upkeep, put a 2/2 token creature of the chosen type and color into play.
I’m a monkey! I’m a mirror!
Again, that doesn’t feel like Verdant Force. It feels like something else.
How about this:
Splintering Elemental
10/10
Trample
7GGG
During each player’s upkeep, put a 0/1 elemental wall token into play with defender.
It shatters as it moves
Again, the feel is much different. But no, all we have to get various Verdant Forces. It’s like the various reboots of comics we get. Dragon Broodmother is Verdant Force from the Franklin-verse.
Mage Slayer — This is a lot of fun. This is a piece of equipment I can really get behind. It also triggers a lot of “When this creature deals damage” effects. Hypnotic Specter, for example, is a fan. He likes to Slay Mages. There are many others and I’m sure you will find some tasty treats. It also looks good when wielded by a player killer. These PK creatures have a scalable P/T and can kill players, but rarely are evasive. A good example is Copperhoof Vorrac. The Vorrac can swing, then deal 45 damage to that player’s face and she dies before chump blocking your Vorrac. This is a good card that I would put up there with, oh, say, Surestrike Trident, only better because it can also be basically double strike in combat for one of your creatures, and can be used with double strike to deal even more damage.
Spellbreaker Behemoth – It’s big, it’s cheap to play, and it’s good. There is very little not to like about this beast. In Abe’s Deck of Happiness and Joy, I now would have uncounterable Akroma, uncounterable Copperhoof Vorrac, uncounterable Wilderness Elemental, and more. This is a great tool for decks. In Five Color, I suspect Rumbling Slum gets more play in the aggro decks since there are going to be few to no creatures in the 5 power spot.
Vengeful Rebirth —This card is never going to get restricted or banned because of its similarity to Regrowth. It can kill a creature or go to someone’s head, and it is a nice unabusable Regrowth variant. I like the design here.
Vithian Renegades — This is obviously a bigger Uktabi Orangutan but not as big as Keldon Vandals. It’s solid, but does not have a creature type that obviously plays well with others, unlike a certain elf.
Green/White
Behemoth Sledge — It’s Armadillo Cloak on a hammer. There are many who will really like this I’ll play it, but I’m not all that happy with it. It doesn’t make me smile or anything. Put it on my Watchwolf, and then I might smile. A bit.
Dauntless Escort — This is yet another entry in the G/W beater section of your card collection. I make special note of these guys because I have a fun Tolsimir Wolfblood Commander deck online (which is a long rant for another day, entitled What is Wrong With All Of You Commander Players?). I also note them because you never know when the next creature is ideal for Equinaut. It’s a fine beater for aggro decks like Five Color, although a bit short on the evasion. The three drop is for Serendib Efreet type creatures, not Watchwolf with an ability. Still, he plays a nice role for your casual decks.
Myconid Shepherd — Well, it’s a 5/4 for four. That’s about it really. See my note about life totals from Breath of Malfegor above.
Qasali Pridemage — This could make the cut in some aggro Five Color decks, Peasant decks, and maybe even PPS. It works in a lot of places, because it is a solid tool. I think you will find it to be a solid role-player in your decks for a long time to come. It compares favorably to Ronom Unicorn and Kami of Ancient Law, which I regularly use in my decks.
Enemy Color Pairs
Identity Crisis — This is a multiplayer bomb. Not only does it Mind Twist a person, but it also Tormod’s Crypts them as well. It just really nails a person playing with buyback, recursion, dredge, etc. I wish it had added one little phrase to remove the top card of their library too. Then it would have been perfect. That would prevent someone hiding a card on the top of their library with Academy Ruins, Volrath’s Stronghold, Scroll Rack, etc. As it is, this is still a great big ol’ house to the head in casual and multiplayer. Expect to see these soon and often.
Necromancer’s Covenant — Here is another graveyard hoser. It can take out all of the pretty little creatures in someone’s graveyard, which can get quite tasty. Then you get a bunch of 2/2 with lifelink for your effort. It sets you up for Living Death or similar recursion later, while giving you an army now. That looks pretty tasty to me.
Zealous Persecution — This is a nice trick to pull out of the bag. I like Steal Strength type effects and this is a really big one. You can always just use it as a Holy Light for opposing creatures or a small pump spell for all of yours, but occasionally both will have significant value and it will make everything pretty and flowery and butterfly-y.
Spellbound Dragon – I find the rattlesnake effect of cards that have variable but unknown abilities to be quite high. Your opponent had to assume you could successfully use that Harsh Deceiver even when you couldn’t. They have to assume the Spellbound Dragon will be a 10/5 or something ridiculous, which means it basically is. That makes this very powerful.
Lord of Extinction — I mentioned earlier that there are a few creatures, like Copperhoof Vorrac, that are Player Killers, big enough in multiplayer to outright kill people. You never even need to count to see what its power and toughness truly is, you just know that it is enough to win. That is the same with the Lord of Extinction. It has no evasion, but it will easily be a 74/74 or somesuch. Grab these, they are going to win you games.
Maelstrom Pulse — This does two things at my table. It is almost a Desert Twister, and it takes out all of the tokens someone has in play off something like a Decree of Justice or Myr Incubator. It will very rarely actually take out multiple non-token permanents because of the vast variety of cards in Magic and therefore in decks. It’s still a strong 1 for 1 with that same backup Echoing Truth has against tokens, but don’t play it expecting to be taking out 2 or 3 things on a regular basis. This is not going to be a source of card advantage in casual land where decklists often have one or two of each card and no one is playing the same deck at the table.
Fight to the Death — There are some powerful cards in this set for multiplayer. There are some nice tricks, some strong creatures and powerful spells. However, this is the most powerful multiplayer card in the set, period, end of discussion, we can all go home. It’s just two mana and it tears through people’s creatures with ease. Bob attack Jimmy, Jimmy blocks, and you send all of the creatures to take a long nap. You can use it to kill a creature or creatures you just chump blocked, giving a purpose to that Wall of Blossoms. Wall of Glare blocks everything, then kills them all. At a table with split attacks allowed, you can devastate many forces. Attack willy nilly with small tokens into giant creatures expecting them to block so that you can Fight to the Death. This is just a powerful card that would be impossible for me to overhype. This is immediately one of the best multiplayer instants of all time (not the best, obviously, but really top of the line).
Sages of the Anima — There are some decks that would love this, especially after they set up. This is a nice Johnny tool.
Vedalken Heretic — Did this need to be a rare? Seriously? Does this feel like a rare to any casual player reading this article? Anyone? It’s a good card and one worth playing, but I actually prefer mine to be 1/3 than 1/1 at my table. 1/1 is just too fragile.
Three or More Colors
Enigma Sphinx — I think the third from the top ability is cute. I also like its size and its flying manner, and it is really big so the cascade can be quite big too. It is a bit pricey for a 5/4 flyer, and creatures with the Avenging Angel ability (which this is a variant of) can sometimes be annoying. However, its cascade makes it very interesting. I’m sure many of you will try it out and have success.
Sen Triplets — This is an interesting card. You can seal off a player’s cards, which is great, and you can play them yourself, which is double great. Unlike many other similar abilities, you must pay costs yourself. I suspect that this card will become so annoyingly powerful that it will get auto-killed at every multiplayer table ever.
Sphinx of the Steel Wind — Okay, let’s talk about the “New Akroma”. First of all, it has been sold to us as immune to most artifact destruction, but is that so? Perhaps in Block or Type Two that is true. In real Magic we have Disenchant, Divine Offering, Dust to Dust, Altar of Light, Orim’s Thunder, Dismantling Blow, and tons of other options for artifact removal. We also have the normal slate of White removal from Path to Exile to Crib Swap to Swords to Plowshares. Black can use Rend Flesh, Eyeblight’s Ending, Chill to the Bone, etc.
Now, it’s still good, no question. You can summon it out of your deck with both artifact summoning (Tinker, Reshape, Transmute artifact, etc) or creature summoning (Tooth and Nail, Defense of the Heart, etc). You can get it when you need it. However, I would have preferred this Sphinx of the Steel Wind:
Flying, First Strike, Vigilance, Fear, protection from sorceries and instants
They’ve said that Blue gets protection from non-colors, and this was a perfect place to put it. Now it can still be offed by an Uktabi Orangutan, but its protection would really help to keep it alive.
Anybody notice that its abilities are all White? What is Black adding to this creature? How about we remove lifelink and replace with fear? Now it has evasiveness like Akroma the first, protection from its Blue aspect instead of its White, first strike, vigilance, and flying. It’s a great blocker and a great server.
It is still good, and I do like it, it just feels underwhelming and it could have used some amping up, especially considering its fragility as an artifact creature.
Drastic Revelation — This is not a bad card when your hand is low. It’s seems a little clunky the way it does it (why not just draw you four cards post discard?) but it is fine for when you need more cards. I do not like Blue in here though, because if you are playing Blue anyway, then you have access to better and more reliable card drawing. Why play this over Tidings or tons of other card drawing spells? I think it might have been better as Black/Red/Green.
Thraximundar — It has no subtlety at all. It just wants to attack and force sacrifices and get bigger. It is one of the many big creatures from this block that are just very powerful. It’s solid, and you should pay him in your casual decks .
Karrthus, Tyrant of Jund — Awesome! Mark Rosewater said many players don’t get this, but I don’t know who. I love it! It’s beefy, it’s what’s for dinner. Not only does it steal all dragons – RAR – but it also does something I really, really like. Recently I have introduced my playgroup to the power of Dragonstorm from a 1400 card highlander deck (Abe’s Deck of Happiness and Joy). You’d be surprised at how often I can get a storm count of 4-6 off a Dragonstorm in my deck. Now I can get Karrthus and not only steal opposing dragons and not only get a nice 7/7 haste-y dragon, but he also makes my horde hasted as well. I can get him, and then swing with all of my big dragons for a massive faceful of dragonfire.
Lavalanche — This is a strong card because it targets just one player. Like any X spell, you can use it to finish a player off. You can just use it as a Savage Twister for just that player. This is not a Wrath of God and it will not save you from a deadly board state where everyone but you are rocking Magic’s greatest hits and all you have is a Grim Lavamancer and a Basking Rootwalla. This is not salvation. Instead, it is persecution.
Madrush Cyclops — I always was fond of Fires of Yavimaya or Fervor type effects going back to Concordant Crossroads. I love it on a stick even more. This is a great card, expect to see it played soon, especially if you play at my table.
Mayael’s Aria — This is what Ben Bleiweiss said about this card: “This card is totally, totally cool, and generally not playable. If you have a twenty-power creature, you should have already won the game, and you’re just TRYING to win with this card instead.”
That may be true in duels, but it is not true in multiplayer. It combos with all of the Player Killer creatures like Mortivore, Copperhoof Vorrac, and Lord of Extinction. It will trigger during your upkeep with the first size creature (or the second size) and then you can flash out one of these creatures and win right there. You say, “Oh, I can’t win with the Aria out, all I have is this Spellbreaker Behemoth” and then you tap some mana for Winding Canyons and drop Lord of Extinction for the win (uncounterable). That’s very nicely done. It is easy to have a big creature in multiplayer and not always easy to win with them. This is the second easiest alternate win condition in the game (after Battle of Wits) with Coalition Victory coming in third.
Retaliator Griffin — For the record, this is not Vulturous Zombie. That card was awesome. This card is not.
Jenara, Asura of War — This is yet another large creature, and the perma-pump is a nice boost. I’d rather a creature have the right abilities than the right size though. Akroma is better than a 12/12 flying french vanilla creature, if that makes sense. Although I’d play them both, Akroma is still better.
Wargate — This is a card that has long been missing from Magic. What is the best way to use this? Summon a Planeswalker to your side, whichever one best suits the current situation, then use it? Perhaps use it for zero mana and get a needed land? Maybe use it for an enchantment that will win you the game, like Battle of Wits? You can use it for the perfect creature, the perfect artifact, or the perfect enchantment. It’s great!
Maelstrom Nexus — This is hot. If you use deck manipulation like Sensei’s Diving Top, you can set yourself up very nicely each turn. You go expensive spell, then land, then cheaper spell. Draw and play the expensive one, cascade through the land to the cheaper one, get all three off the top of your deck. It is very difficult to play, and if you can play it, you can play more powerful things, so I wonder how good it will truly be.
Hybrid Multicolored
Here is the final section. I’m ready!
Thopter Foundry — I may find a use for this in a few of my decks as a nice engine.
Slave of Bolas — This is a fine card for getting a hit in, then killing the creature. Both fit very nicely. An article was written on it, and I cannot do better, but everything works here — art, concept, mana cost, ability. It is a great card.
Trace of Abundance — I love the shroud giving aspect of this land enchantment. However, it just is not that good at fixing mana because you need two colors already to play it, so as a Fertile Ground, it is not as good as it would need to be in order to be really playable.
…
And that brings us to the end of another article. Whew!
I hope you enjoyed this trek through Alara Reborn. I love bringing you a quick casual review of the cards of the latest set. There are some great cards in here, but as always, make sure you steer clear of the hype from writers (including myself) and other players. Make your own decisions about the cards and you will be on your way to success.
Hopefully, I’ll see you next week when I start making decks out of Alara Reborn cards.
Until later…