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You Lika The Juice? – Devouring Shards of Alara

Read Bennie Smith every week... at StarCityGames.com!
Thursday, September 25th – Since the complete spoiler for Shards of Alara isn’t publicly available as I’m writing this, I’ve decided to forego a set review and instead focus on some of the themes specific Shards bring us with an eye towards Standard. What’s caught my imagination first is the Devour mechanic as offered up by the denizens of Jund, the Black-Red-Green Shard.

Since the complete spoiler for Shards of Alara isn’t publicly available as I’m writing this, I’ve decided to forego a set review and instead focus on some of the themes specific Shards bring us with an eye towards Standard (and given the upcoming $5K and State Champs). What’s caught my imagination first is the Devour mechanic as offered up by the denizens of Jund, the Black-Red-Green Shard.

On its surface, Devour seems to be one of those mechanics that falls flat when it comes to competitive tournament decks, since it requires the sacrifice of resources you’ve already likely spent cards and/or mana to put into play beforehand. Much like the problem with Auras, investing multiple cards into powering up one creature runs the risk of your opponent’s pinpoint removal giving him card advantage and likely some tempo swing. Devour appears to be a “little kid” mechanic, throwing cards to the wind in order to power up some gigantic monster just to satisfy the inner Timmy.

In a vacuum, this perception would probably be pretty accurate. But thankfully for the hungry denizens of Jund, we just had a mini-block filled with creatures that don’t stay dead when they die the first time around. Allow me to make some introductions: Devour, meet Persist. Persist, here’s your parasitic big brother, Devour. Oh, and here’s your sidekick Bag o’ Beads to help out with all the -1/-1 and +1/+1 counters.

Let’s take a quick look at the mechanic:

Devour X (As this comes into play, you may sacrifice any number of creatures. This creature comes into play with [X times] that many +1/+1 counters on it.)

I remember back in the day a card like this would have had the sacrifice be part of the casting of the spell, which tended to make it unplayable given the power of counterspells back then. So it’s nice that the Devour ability doesn’t trigger until the creature comes into play. Thanks, Wizards for coming a long way since those awful days (shudder).

So far we’ve only seen creatures with Devour 1 or 2. The higher the Devour number the more efficient the transfer of sacrificed creatures to +1/+1 counters (apparently they have more advanced digestive systems), giving a bigger bang and/or less risk for your investment. I wonder if we’ll see some larger Devour numbers when we see the full spoiler, or maybe in subsequent expansions in the block?

Let’s take a look at the Devour creatures we’ve seen so far, courtesy of our friends at MTGSalvation.com:

Tar Fiend
5B
Creature – Elemental (Rare)
Devour 2 (As this comes into play, you may sacrifice any number of creatures. This creature comes into play with twice that many +1/+1 counters on it.)
When Tar Fiend comes into play, target player discards a card for each creature it devoured.
4/4

Six mana is steep, but it has a built-in ability to recoup your Devour investment, stripping away cards from your opponent’s hand for each little dude you sacrifice. And it’s Devour 2, so not only can you potentially Mind Twist your opponent’s hand, but it will leave behind a gigantic creature for your opponent to try and deal with while he’s living off the top deck. Icing on the cake is being an elemental, so it fits in nicely alongside a variety of proven linear/tribal lines from Lorwyn block. If you see this riding the junk rare section in trade books from this weekend’s prerelease I’d pick up a couple, as I suspect he’ll be undervalued.

Caldera Hellion
3RR
Creature – Hellion (Rare)
Devour 1 (As this comes into play, you may sacrifice any number of creatures. This creature comes into play with that many +1/+1 counters on it.)
When Caldera Hellion comes into play, it deals 3 damage to each creature.
3/3

This fellow competes for deck space with Firespout, and I don’t think it comes off well in that fight; Firespout can be cast much earlier when you really need it to slow down the fast weenie beatdown. If you really need to clear away a bunch of weenies, waiting until you get to five mana is problematic. On the flip side, you can sucker weenie decks into overextending if you’ve got a few creatures in play that are vulnerable to 3 damage to everything; draw them out, drop this guy, Devour your dudes and leave a big Hellion creature on a clear board. On the balance, not overly impressive but could fill a role here or there.

Predator Dragon
3RRR
Creature – Dragon (Rare)
Devour 2 (As this comes into play, you may sacrifice any number of creatures. This creature comes into play with twice that many +1/+1 counters on it.)
Flying, haste
4/4

This efficient eating machine doesn’t offer any “extras” for the creatures you sacrifice to it other than an immediate smack upside your opponent’s head; the more creatures you toss into its maw, the harder it hits. Sacrifice three creatures and this guy hits for 10 the turn you play it – WHAP! Putting all your eggs in one basket — granted, a big flying and hasty basket — is risky, especially for a creature that can be hit with Terror, so I can certainly see that you’d want to pair this Predator with Persist dudes. Of course, keep in mind that even just sacrificing a single little dude makes this guy a very efficient 6/6 flying hasty attacker for just six mana. Thumbs up on this guy.

Mycoloth
3GG
Creature – Fungus (Rare)
Devour 2 (As this comes into play, you may sacrifice any number of creatures. This creature comes into play with twice that many +1/+1 counters on it.)
At the beginning of your upkeep, put a 1/1 green Saproling creature token into play for each +1/+1 counter on Mycoloth.
4/4

At first I thought this was a poor attempt at bringing back Verdant Force. Then I realized Mycoloth is a nice homage to Jamie Wakefield “Secret Force” deck: spend a moderate amount of mana, sacrifice a creature, and you get a large creature that spits out Saprolings. Pretty cool actually when you think about it. But dwell on Mycoloth a little more and you realize this is a pretty darn good card actually. The key is Devour 2 and the fact that it spits out creatures based on the number of +1/+1 counters; in effect, if Mycoloth lives long enough, it gives you back at least twice the number of creatures that you sacrificed initially, and given a few more upkeeps things can go crazy. The really cool thing is that this lets you feed subsequent Devour creatures — like more Mycoloths — with little real effort. So let’s walk through this: drop a Mycoloth and Devour a Llanowar Elf and two Kitchen Finks; you end up with a 10/10 beating stick that spits out six 1/1 Saprolings during each of your upkeeps. Assuming it survives, drop another Mycoloth, devour all six Saprolings and you get a 16/16 Mycoloth that’ll spit out 12 Saprolings per upkeep.

Just watch out for pesky Sowers of Temptation. Ouchy! I’ll be picking up a few Mycoloths for sure.

Skullmulcher
4G
Creature – Elemental (Rare)
Devour 1
When Skullmulcher comes into play, draw a card for each creature it devoured.
3/3

This is like the mirror elemental image of Tar Fiend, only wimpier and much less scary. Considering this card is green and Tar Fiend is black, that’s not all that surprising. You definitely don’t want to be playing this card unless you’re playing a truckload of Persist dudes or they reprint Fecundity in 11th Edition.

Mmm… Fecundity and Devour…

Say, I just noticed something… all the Devour dudes spoiled so far are rares! I’d find it hard to believe that Devour would be a “rare-only” mechanic… but maybe on Jund, the guys at the top of the food chain (i.e. the special rare critters) are the only ones who get to devour their companions.

Goblin Assault
2R
Enchantment (Rare)
At the beginning of your upkeep, put a 1/1 red Goblin creature token with haste into play.
Goblin creatures attack each turn if able.

Alright, this ain’t a Devour card but I could using this and Bitterblossom as a way to keep cranking out token food to feed to your hungry Devour dudes. It also has the added benefit of keeping your opponent’s Chameleon Colossus from staying back to block — quite useful if you want to get froggy with Nantuko Husk in the next iteration of R/B tokens.

Sarkhan Vol
2RG
Planeswalker – Sarkhan (Mythic Rare)
+1: Creatures you control get +1/+1 and gain haste until end of turn.
-2: Gain control of target creature until end of turn. Untap that creature. It gains haste until end of turn.
-6: Put five 4/4 red Dragon creature tokens with flying into play.
4

The first two abilities of Sarkhan are complementary to a Devour strategy, since Haste goes a long way towards making that basket you’re dumping your eggs into go further. The second ability is particularly crafty; since it doesn’t cost any mana to use, activate it, steal your opponent’s best creature, swing with it, then tap out to play your big Devour dude and sacrifice the stolen creature. Obviously the last ability is nuts all by itself, good luck getting there but if you do – congrats! I doubt you’d be sacrificing those dudes.

Sprouting Thrinax
BRG
Creature – Lizard (Uncommon)
When Sprouting Thrinax is put into a graveyard to play, put three 1/1 green Saproling creature tokens into play.
The vast network of predation on Jund has actually caused some strange creatures to adapt to being eaten.
3/3

If you need some additional creatures to go along with your Persist gang as Devour food, Sprouting Thrinax seems custom made for it. If your opponent kills it, you get three guys to Devour; if you opponent doesn’t kill it, it’s easy to toss this guy into the big predator’s gullet knowing you’ll get three little dudes from the deal.

The flavor text on him is perfect, too. Speaking of flavor text, whomever over at MTGSalvation made up the flavor text for Woolly Thoctar – well played, sir! Well played!

Okay, so let’s see what sort of decks we can cobble together around Devouring creatures. How about this one for starters?

The Neverending Food Supply

4 Thoughtseize
4 Safehold Elite
4 Shriekmaw
4 Kitchen Finks
4 Sprouting Thrinax
3 Heartmender
2 Sarkhan Vol
4 Cauldron of Souls
4 Mycoloth
3 Predator Dragon

4 Savage Lands
4 Reflecting Pool
4 Vivid Grove
2 Sulfurous Springs
2 Llanowar Wastes
2 Karplusan Forest
6 Swamp

Some of you may be doing a double take on that five mana artifact that popped up out of nowhere. Cauldron of Souls? People who know me well know that I love me some graveyard recursion, and this is one card I’ve been itching to find a home for. The Cauldron seems a perfect fit in a Devour deck; first, it can help keep non-Persist creatures around long enough to feed them to the big guy. Next, it can let those same creatures be used for Devour and yet still come back for more. Last, it’s the perfect device for making your Devour guys practically immortal; just give them Persist with the Cauldron, and when they die and come back with a —1/-1 counter, feed their Devour and knock those counters off, letting you give them Persist again. There’s enough non-Persist creatures outside of the Devour guys at the top of the curve to work the Cauldron magic; I’m particularly looking forward to Evoking Shriekmaw, putting its sacrifice trigger on the stack, tapping the Cauldron to bring back the Shriekmaw and killing two of my opponent’s creatures.

And giving Sprouting Thrinax Persist sounds like good times to me too! And of course we’ve got Heartmender to keep your Persist dudes around indefinitely, providing that never-ending food supply for Dragons and Fungus alike.

Okay, here’s another take:

Shaman Souls

4 Flamekin Harbinger
4 Wolf-Skull Shaman
4 Rage Forger
4 Shriekmaw
4 Fulminator Mage
3 Nantuko Husk
3 Masked Admirers
3 Caldera Hellion
4 Cauldron of Souls
1 Skullmulcher
2 Tar Fiend

4 Primal Beyond
4 Savage Lands
4 Reflecting Pool
4 Vivid Grove
2 Sulfurous Springs
2 Llanowar Wastes
2 Karplusan Forest
2 Forest

This one is built a little more heavily around Cauldron of Souls, and utilizes Rage Forger to keep everyone Persisting over and over. Of course, the core of the deck can just beat down Shaman/Elemental style, but there’s also fun stuff like Cauldron and Shriekmaw or Fulminator Mage, or Cauldron and any comes-into-play ability (like Masked Admirers) with Nantuko Husk sacrificing at whim. Even though Flamekin Harbinger will die when it Persists back into play, you’ll still get to take advantage of its comes-into-play ability to search up an Elemental. I’m not so sure Skullmulcher deserves a spot, but since you’ve got Elemental tutors I figure you could give it a try as a singleton.

Anyway, I hope you’ll take a closer look at the Devour gang, since I think there are a few of them that are certainly worth trying out. I’m really looking forward to getting my hands on some of these cards this weekend at the Prerelease; if you’re going to the Richmond “big show” prerelease held by Star City, stop by and say hello and let me know what you like in Shards of Alara!

Take care!

Bennie

starcitygeezer AT gmail DOT com