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By: Psychobabble, PB
Sep 25 2014 12:00pm
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Last week I kicked the Khans of Tarkir block constructed set review off with a high level overview of the set, including mechanics and fixing, as well as looking at individual cards from white, blue and black. This week I round out the mono-coloured cards in red and green and then get into the real meat of the set review by looking at the gold cards. As I noted last week, the vast majority of the power in the set is in the gold cards, so this is going to be a big one...

Red

Red looks like one of the deepest single colours in Khans block. Two nice burn spells, a couple of build aroun me-s, a format-defining planeswalker and the shell of the aggro creature deck, if it exists. Nothing here veers wildly out of red's usual colour identity, but there's some solid options here.

Arc Lightning / Crater's Claws

The playable red burn in a set is always worth keeping an eye on, as it can often define what creatures are acceptable to play. Assuming the format's creatures aren't entirely mono-big stuff, Arc Lightning seems like one such defining card. its presence makes any one-toughness creature instantly worse (I expect this to kill a LOT of Rattleclaw Mystics), as it won't be hard to ping the one- toughness guy and then take something else out like a morph creature or even a Sorin that's -2ed or something. It should also help keep the Mardu token deck under control, so I expect it to be heavily played at least from the board. Crater's Claws seems very likely to see play, it's flexible and quite reasonably costed even without triggering Ferocious, and if you do then it becomes the most aggressively costed single-target Fireball in Magic's history which is certainly something to take notice of.

Ashcloud Phoenix

People seem quite excited by this for constructed, and it's certainly got the ability to give a red deck inevitability in a long game (like most phoenixes), although the life loss will theoretically prevent you from doing it an infinite number of times. There's two reasonable cards in the format which can permanently deal with a flipped Phoenix, Utter End and Abzan Charm (when face up), both of which seem likely to see a good amount of play. The fact that it dies to 1/3 of Arc Lightning also means that you may not lose value by killing it after putting it back in its shell the first time, either. I'm not positive that this is what the format will want. Trading for a Sorin token, or part of an Arc Lightning and then maybe another removal spell isn't super value, the permanent answers are likely to be fairly common and this doesn't block the massive monsters of the format particularly well (especially the ones with trample). I dunno, but I wouldn't be rushing to buy a playset of these on day one.

Goblinslide

The name feels like a riff on Astral Slide, but this has shades of Lightning Rift or Burning Vengeance. The former two cards were powerhouses in Extended and Onslaught Block constructed, while latter made some waves in the initial stages of Innistrad block constructed. These kind of cards allow a spell-based control deck to generate incremental advantage over the course of a long game, and this seems like a potential cornerstone card for a heavy-spell Jeskai deck, playing perhaps a few choice prowess creatures. I'm not sure whether this also goes in the mardu token deck - I lean towards no - but between those two decks, this seems to have potential as a build-around me card.

Horde Ambusher / Jeering Instigator / Valley Dasher / War-Name Aspirant

If a mono red aggressive deck exist in the format, this is the core. The deck certainly has some fundamental attraction in a format that's going to be full of greedy mana bases, come into play tapped lands and a bunch of high cost creatures which don't stabilise well against Act of Treason. Overall though, the creature core looks pretty underwhelming. Coming off blocks with multiple 2-power one drops, the absence of a red one in this set is VERY noticeable. In fact there's only one red one-drop in the format, Monastry Swiftspear and it's not even playable in the creature-heavy red aggressive deck. Valley Dasher is also hilariously worse than Ash Zealot (though still decent in the deck), War-Name Aspirant is actively poor without a bunch of one drops and the other two are just bears/pikers with late game mana sink abilities, when you really just want more cards that are ahead of the curve in power. Arc Lightning is also a serious problem for this deck, as is the fact that even the greedy mana decks will be playing colourless three drop morphs to give them some roadblocks. I'm going to guess that this deck won't be there, but the budget-conscious crowd on MTGO is sure to test it out anyway.

Hordeling Outburst

It's no Spectral Procession, but it's not a completely silly comparison. Three bodies for three mana is a big deal, this looks like a seriously good card for the Mardu token deck and has real potential. The double red cost hurts a bit in a three colour deck though, it's pretty unlikely to be played on turn three - except in the mono red deck Trumpet Blast deck.

Sarkhan, the Dragonspeaker

Well, this IS the card you're going to be wanting to go out and buy a playset of on day 1 of the format, because it this doesn't see heavy play there's something very strange going on. Planeswalkers dominated Theros block, and that had Hero's Downfall in 70%+ of decks as an instant speed answer. Outside of burn, Khans has only one non-combat answer to a resolved planeswalker, Utter End, (Despise works before it resolves, which is important to note), so both Sarkhan and Sorin seem very likely to define the format. The nice thing about Sarkhan too is that haste creatures are going to be one of the best answers to opposing planeswalkers, and if you're the one casting Sarkhan second you have a decent chance of winning the battle. Anyway, indestructible 4-power haste flyers for 5 seem pretty good, Flametongue Kavu is pretty good, both in the same card is pretty insane. The format will build itself around this, with haste creatures and burn and the like, but virtually every deck that plays red is going to run this and it's going to be one of the best cards in those decks.

Trumpet Blast

I mentioned it last week, but the instant speed win out of nowhere potential here means trumpet blast is likely to be the finisher of choice in your mardu token deck. It may even rate a mention in the mono red aggro deck if such a thing exists. Don't forget that this card exists in the format, like Dynacharge in RtR block it's something you may well need to keep in mind when you make blocking and removal decisions.

Green

I'm only going to be reviewing two mono-green cards. While it's possible that a couple of others get there (eg. Alpine Grizzly is a cheap way to turn on ferocious, albeit one which dies to pretty much anything) I'm highly underwhelmed by (mono) green in this set. The issue is that a huge number of cards like Hardened Scales and Incremental Growth are devoted to a +1/+1 counters theme that I just can't see getting there in constructed. We'll see if I'm proved wrong, but the mono green cards look like mostly limited-format filler to me.

Hooded Hydra

Even the colour's flagship mythic suffers from an attempt to play to the +1/+1 counter theme. Still, this is a decent enough value play. It's not terrible as a 5/5 for 8-mana over two installments that has a reasonable Deathrattle ability. And if you have a spare 8 mana to pay straight up, you get a 6/6 out of the deal. Overall though, I'm just not sure that "decent enough" and "not terrible" add up to a card you really want to play and I can't shake the feeling that the only reason I feel I need to review this is that it's got an orange rarity symbol. Polukranos dominated Theros block because it was a 4 mana 5/5, not because you could do cool things with it when you had lots of mana (though that helped). This is missing the "cheap and still good" part of that equation I think.

See the Unwritten

This is something I'm much more excited to be casting if I have oodles of mana, and oodles in this case is only six. While this obviously isn't getting played as a full playset - expensive, random and dilutes itself - but you're digging deep enough that it has combo-ish applications, and the prospect of getting a double-trigger AND filling up your graveyard for the Sultai deck give this some extra value. You can't build a whole deck around it, but it's a pretty nice spell to ramp into with Rattleclaw Mystic on turn 4.

Multicoloured

I'll begin this part of the review by looking at the two named five-Khan cycles and then go through individual cards. I have had to be somewhat more selective in this section than others, the sheer volume of potentially playable gold cards here is fairly overwhelming. Hopefully I've managed to hit on the main cards which will shape the format though! As a general comment, I will note that the mana here isn't good enough that having three colours in the casting cost will be painless. I would expect a three mana, three colour, spell to be rarely cast before turn 4, and possibly turn 5 will be more normal. The benefit of many of those CCC cards is that they are so overpowered for their cost, and quite a bit of that will be lost here I expect dropping their power down a notch and meaning they might be more comparable to a 4 or 5 drop with less restrictive colour requirements.

The Ascendancy cycle

This is an interesting cycle, many of which have a reasonable chance of seeing play in block constructed. Global enchantments as a card type often have a tough time getting there given how reliant they are on being drawn in the right situation (usually when you already have some sort of reasonable board state), but some these are pushed enough that they're at least worth looking at. I'll give some quick thoughts on each.

  • Abzan: The first one up, and also one of the strongest. The counter effect compares interestingly to a normal anthem effect given that it survives the enchantment being removed, but doesn't work on creatures you draw subsequently. Which makes it nice that the card also has a longer lasting effect for such creatures, giving you great resilience to wrath or just a whole lot of chump blocking if that's what you need. The card works well in multiples too, with additional copies buffing any sprit tokens that you triggered off the first and turning your dying minions into spirit-making machines.
  • Jeskai: Another card that is reliant on an aggressive Jeskai/prowess deck being a thing, and I'm still not convinced so I'm out on this. You want to pair blue and white in this set for the combination of Treasure Cruise and End Hostilities as far as I'm concerned, pseudo antheming or trying to do something funky with untapping your creatures is not what you want to be working towards.
  • Mardu: I'm somewhat more high on the chances of the Mardu token theme getting there though, so I'm much more interested in this. The sacrifice clause doesn't save you from any mass removal (I very much doubt Death Frenzy or Barrage of Boulders will see play), but the goblin-making effect can synergise with the rest of the deck quite well. It's a shame the additional tokens aren't warriors, but you can't win them all.
  • Sultai: For some reason I think of Sylvan Library when I read this effect but, well, not exactly. This is one of the best repeatable ways to fuel your delve deck, I'm just not sure you want to use an entire card to do it. I'm also pretty sure you don't play a card that just says "scry 2 every turn", so I doubt the combination of these effects will get there. If you really, really need to be filling your graveyard (and Taigam's Scheming doesn't do it for you) then you might think about this, but it seems too slow and too expensive for my liking.
  • Temur: Fires of Yavimaya was a good card back in the day, and this seems quite analogous. Rather than a face-beating overrun mode, you get more incremental advantage by paying the blue mana, I quite like that effect particularly against the End Hostilities deck that's no doubt out there. The Rattleclaw Mystic-fueled Temur deck is probably real, and will play a lot of 4+ power creatures that like smashing face more quickly and drawing cards, so this should slot in quite nicely.

The Charm cycle

First of all, I highly recommend that you check out PVR's recent article on each of these. While it's from a standard format perspective, many of the fundamental card evaluations there are applicable to block constructed, and I won't be going into anywhere near that level of detail obviously. I will quickly go through these in alphabetical order.

  • Abzan: The best charm is up first. The first mode alone makes the card very playable, exiling Sarkhan or any number of multi-colour bombs is excellent. The draw effect is fairly costed for being instant speed (Weave Fate costs one more, albeit it doesn't cost you life) and the final mode doesn't need to be ever relevant for this to be a very strong card. Think very carefully before not including 4 copies of this in any deck which can cast it.
  • Jeskai: Paulo correctly noted that this is only playable if you're interested in the second mode, ie you're aggro (4 damage doesn't match up well against either of the walkers in block) - the first mode isn't good enough on its own as a removal spell for a control deck, and the third wants you to have creatures out which means you're probably not a control deck either. So the playability of this charm will strictly depend on whether there's an aggressive prowess-based jeskai deck in the format. I don't think there is, but this is a card you want if you're trying to build that deck.
  • Mardu: This all comes down to how many relevant targets there are for the first mode. I'm guessing quite a few - Butcher of the Horde, Savage Knuckleblade, most of the Khan leaders, so I think it should get there. If the first mode kills many relevant threats, the other two are gravy. The third ability won't come up that often, but it'll be great against the decks which don't have any creature targets for the first so you can take their End Hostilities or Sorin or whatever. And with the second ability, the tokens are warriors which is nice with the warrior tribal sub-theme, and two bodies at instant speed are just generally good with the Mardu token strategy. I definitely think this sees a good amount of play.
  • Sultai: Again, this comes down to how many relevant mono-coloured creatures you can kill with this. I'm guessing not many. Un-flipped morph's aren't mono-coloured and the only really strong mono-coloured creatures in the block - Wingmate Roc and Sarkhan +1 - still get value or are immune to this. The other two modes aren't worth playing this for, so I think this one stays in the binder.
  • Temur: This is probably the hardest charm to evaluate. My gut feel is that the first mode isn't playable, fighting is too risky in constructed with the amount of instant speed removal going around, and mana leak is best when you can reliably cast it in the early game after setting up a cheap threat, which doesn't seem that likely given the colour requirements. It will be good, no doubt, but better on a card that you'd be playing already. And given that you're also certainly not playing this for the third mode (Falters are conditional enough, without letting them still block with their big creatures as well), I'm not sure you're playing it at all.

Anafenz, the Foremost

If you could always cast it on turn 3, this would be playable as a vanilla creature. As it is, it will have to lean somewhat on its attack ability to be playable - as it effectively gives you 5 power and toughness for your three mana, that seems enough to me. It's a shame there aren't many utility/tap cards in Abzan colours, as it'd be nice to get a +1/+1 counter incidentally on those. Still, even if you're in a deck with no +1/+1 counter synergy (which is pretty likely) there's enough value here that this deserves consideration.

Butcher of the Horde

There's not much "value" here, just pure face-smashing power. You'd kind of expect a 5 power flying demon for four mana to have some drawback, but apart from the fact that this dies to Mardu Charm, it's all upside. You don't need to be playing the token deck to want to play this, but if you are then having a few random 1/1s lying around (perhaps ones that were forced to suicide attack with Mardu Ascendancy), then that's some sweet synergy. Synergy nor not, 5 power flyers for 4 are great, so this gets the nod.

Chief of the Edge / Scale

These are the most relevant constructed warrior tribal synergy cards in the set, particularly Chief of the Edge because everyone likes beating down and there's no playable toughness-based sweeper in the format. Chief of the edge also has nice stats in an aggro deck, and may incentivize you to try and play a more aggressive and consistent two-colour version of the token deck if such a thing is possible.

Crackling Doom

This is pretty close to a 3-mana unconditional kill spell with minor upside, seeing as there is a pretty decent chance that their biggest creature is the one you wanted to remove. The fact that this is an edict has some upside too, seeing as it can take out Sarkhan, Zurgom, Sagu Mauler and Narset (although she may sometimes not be the highest power creature) who wouldn't die to straight Murder. All of that adds up to a highly playable removal spell in my book, sure it'll annoy you when you really want to kill that pesky flyer when you've stabilised the ground or something but most of the time it'll get the job done. It also clears all of a Sorin that -2ed on an empty board which is certainly worth noting.

Icefeather Aven

I'm always on the lookout for the blue tempo/aggressive deck even if it never seems to work out. Could it work here? Two mana wind drake backed up with stuff like Temur Charm, Trap Essence, Mindswipe, Disdainful Stroke and Cancel seem like the best bet. The two toughness (over one on something like Vaporkin) is relevant in a format with Arc Lightning, and there's a bit of late game morph upside if you have the mana to spend. It probably won't get there, mostly because of the hideous mana, but might be worth a shot.

Mantis Rider

This matches up much better against Arc Lightning in block than it does against Lightning Strike in standard, so it probably has more of a shot here than there. This is a nice way to punch your opponent in the face while they're durdling around with their mana base and expensive spells, unfortunately in playing the colours to cast this you're probably durdling yourself which seems to be the fundamental weakness of the theoretical Jeskai aggro deck. Still, this just works on its own unlike all of the Prowess cards which have the awkward non-synergy of needing a bunch of non-creature spells to trigger your creature spells and, again, backed up with Mindswipe this could be a decent way to beat down in a tempo-oriented midrange deck.

Narset, Enlightened Master

Unlike Mantis Rider, Narset does share the Jeskai/prowess tension between creature and non-creature spells, but at least there seems to be a pretty obvious game plan here - hit Dig Through Time off Narset in your creature-less control deck. That would be sweet. Sarkhan seems like a decent backup plan, and while End Hostilities will feel a little silly, you're getting the additional spells for free, so you do what you have to do. Add Suppression Field, Arc Lightning and a counterspell or two (not so good for flipping off Narset, but still) and it feels like there's a deck of some sort. Six mana is pretty huge, and this is competing with Pearl Lake Ancient in the finisher slot, but this could certainly be an interesting addition to a Jeskai coloured control deck.

Rakshasa Vizier

In the deck this goes in, it shouldn't be hard to delve for 4+ on the turn after you cast this, so is a vanilla 8/8+ for five worth it? I've often wondered what would happen if WoTC just printed a 100/100 vanilla creature for five mana, there comes a point where it doesn't matter how much extra power and toughness a creature has, it's going to win the game if your opponents can't answer or chump it, and be terrible if they can spend 2 mana to kill it or just attack past it ftw (see: Kalonian Hydra for a case study, a 16/16 trampling attacker for 5 with extra synergy upside still isn't good enough). I think this has almost no chance of seeing play in standard, Block is obviously a lower powered format but I still feel like you probably don't want to be playing five drops that die to Mardu Charm or Suppression Field or Sarkhan's minus ability, leaving no value behind.

Savage Knuckleblade

BAM! This hits hard, fast and has a bunch of utility. You can't possibly ask for more out of your three drop, this is relevant at every stage of the game, has game against creature decks, game against control decks and can hit for four on turn three when following up a Rattleclaw Mystic. This is a reason to play Temur colours, and if that deck exists (which I think it will), this is an auto 4-of in it.

Sidisi, Brood Tyrant

The analogy with Huntmaster of the Fells here is growing on me. In any normal deck, this gives you a similar rate of power and toughness spread over two bodies for your mana, and then has the potential to take over the game if allowed to do so. This is a fantastic reason to try and make the Sultai graveyard deck work, it will give control decks nightmares and at the very least jam up the ground on defence against other midrange decks.

Siege Rhino

This is a sweet value creature for Abzan, although strangely enough I feel slightly underwhelmed by the rate here given that I played a fair bit of Alms Beast in RtR block constructed. I'm not sure there's an aggro deck in the format that you will really be wanting the body and life swing to stabilise against, if there is then this is obviously bananas. In midrange battles with Savage Knuckleblades and Mantis Riders and Surrak's and the like, this might get outclassed too easily, but it's got the right amount of toughness, hits pretty hard and gives a decent life swing even if it dies that this should definitely see play in any Abzan midrange decks out there.

Sorin, Solemn Visitor

I am very excited by our new Sorin, even if the bizarre vertebrae-clouds hovering behind him don't quite do it for me. Walkers have a habit of dominating block, perhaps because creature stalls are more common and answers less frequent, either way Sorin helps you win those sort of creature on creature battles very nicely. The +1 isn't fantastic, but it starts out not far from a very relevant emblem which can lock players completely out of a game, and the -2 is extremely nice. This is a great card to try out in a Mardu token deck, as well as Abzan midrange and general four-colour goodstuff.

Surrak Dragonclaw

The anti-counterspell clause may not be that relevant, but surprise trample lets you get value from him the turn you play it against planeswalkers and opponents on low life totals, so this isn't just a vanilla beater by any measure. Surrak is an obvious inclusion in your Temur midrange deck, legendary status probably keeps him from the full playset but he's one of the biggest creatures in the format and should be quite good at filling out your top end.

Utter End

This is going to be a pretty essential card in the format, and might prompt the hypothetical Jeskai control deck to try and splash some black (as noted last week, with ally-colour fetchlands, the cost of going four colour over three is significantly lessened). This is the only non-burn/creature way to answer a planeswalker in the format, incidentally takes out Suspension Fields and kills almost any creature including Sarkhan - if you aren't playing this, you want to be finding a way to do so if at all possible.

Zurgo Helmsmasher

This hits pretty darn hard the turn it comes down, unfortunately there's a fair bit of removal that either could only answer it at sorcery speed anyway or still removes it despite indestructability, so you're not guaranteed your seven damage (or token chump block) by any means. Being immune to a Rattleclaw Mystic block is certainly nice though, and in a more aggro-focused Mardu token deck you might want to toss a couple of these in as a top end, although Butcher of the Horde might fill that role adequately.

Conclusion

And that's it! I hope you've enjoyed the reviews and are as excited for the set as I am. I can't wait to break open a new single set format and find out how many sweet gold cards I can jam into a single deck before someone playing a budget mono red deck beats me down. Good luck and happy brewing!

1 Comments

@matthew, thankfully we now by Psychobabble at Thu, 09/25/2014 - 20:36
Psychobabble's picture

@matthew, thankfully we now definitely know that block (dailies, queues etc.) are returning:

http://magic.wizards.com/en/MTGO/articles/archive/magic-online-announcem...

The format wasn't losing its support, it's just that interest drops off so much in the period after the core set is released.