This has been one hell of a summer of Magic releases. First New Phyrexia gives us a whole bunch of grieftastic bombs, then we had the format-shaking release of the MTG: Commander precons, and then we get to finish up the summer with the one-two punch of M12 and From the Vault: Legends. That’s quite a marathon, and no small strain on one’s pursestrings. That’s another matter, though—we’re here to talk about the new hotness coming out in M12!
Overall, this is easily the strongest core set ever in terms of its EDH playability. If someone had just bought a Commander pre-con and was asking me which set they should buy a box of to spice up their deck, I would tell them M12 without blinking. You get titans, big bomby creatures with powerful effects, and the reprinting of a number of EDH staples that we haven’t seen since as far back as Mirrodin. All in all, it looks like fantastic value.
[card]Aegis Angel[/card]
Coda: Giving any permanent you control indestructibility is a really neat ability, but it suffers from being attached to an all-too-fragile creature. Decks that do play this are probably going to be GWx decks that use it to protect permanents like [card]Privileged Position[/card] that help protect the angel, itself. Note that with a kicked [card]Rite of Replication[/card] you can get a circle of five indestructible angels, each protecting the next one in line. Granted, you probably have better things to do with a kicked Rite, but it is a neat interaction.
Candy: Awesome flavor, great ability, but as Coda noted, it’s attached to a fairly fragile creature. [card]Darksteel Plate[/card] and shroud mechanics will go a long way towards making her better, and while not really an auto-include, most mono-white, GW or UW decks will probably be able to make use of her effectively.
[card]Angelic Destiny[/card]
Coda: Build-a-Baneslayer. [card]Rancor[/card] is remembered as one of the best auras of all time, and this is pretty much [card]Rancor[/card]’s big brother. Able to turn even the tiniest creature into a credible threat, this should be a fine inclusion in all kinds of voltron and enchantress-based strategies. Keep a sacrifice outlet around to ensure that it gets recurred to your hand, though. You don’t want your snazzy enchantment getting [card]Naturalize[/card]d.
Candy: It’s almost as good as [card]Rancor[/card]…but not quite. You can’t really play it on your general unless you’re certain you’re going to be able to recur the general from the graveyard, because Angelic Destiny bounces back to hand only when the creature it enchants hits the graveyard. [card]Zur the Enchanter[/card] can’t tutor it up. And as Coda has already noted, if somebody kills Angelic Destiny itself, it doesn’t bounce back to hand. On the other hand, you do get insanely great value for the mana cost, and the bounce-to-hand ability can be really handy, making it more akin to equipment than an actual enchantment. Not something I’d toss into every white deck, but I certainly wouldn’t blame anyone for running it.
[card]Archon of Justice[/card]
Coda: It’s a reprint, but it’s an awesome reprint. A solid rattlesnake in just about any white deck, it truly shines in Karador and Teneb decks that abuse sacrifice and reanimation.
Candy: One of my favorite white creatures. Equip it with [card]Nim Deathmantle[/card] and combine it with an instant-speed sac outlet (preferably one that produces mana, like [card]Ashnod’s Altar[/card]) if you’re feeling mean.
[card]Auramancer[/card]
Candy: White doesn’t have too much targeted non-creature, non-artifact graveyard recovery, so having something that’ll retrieve a key enchantment for you is pretty nice. Plus Auramancer is [card]Reveillark[/card]-able. Not the best card in the world, not too shabby either.
[card]Day of Judgment[/card]
Coda: The definitive white removal spell, now that [card]Wrath of God[/card] is no longer being printed. Yes, Wrath is strictly better, but I have shiny full-art DoJs, so I play those. If you’re in white, then you really ought to have a very good reason for not playing this card.
Candy: Oddly enough, I don’t include DoJ in most of my white decks. I tend to run other wrath effects—WoG is an auto-include in every white deck I build, and I generally include broad-spectrum sweepers like [card]Akroma’s Vengeance[/card], spells that allow me more flexibility, like [card]Austere Command[/card], or those that give me critters as well as wipe the board ([card]Martial Coup[/card], [card]Phyrexian Rebirth[/card]). Once I tally up all the wrath effects in a deck, I usually find that I don’t have room for DoJ. That said, it’s a solid, solid inclusion in just about every white deck, because those “oh shit” reset buttons are invaluable in the game.
[card]Gideon Jura[/card]
Coda: Gideon is an awesome anti-aggro card in Standard, but he loses a bit of his luster in EDH. The fact that a whole table full of people are out there trying to kill you makes his first ability mostly irrelevant, but being able to snipe creatures and swing for 6 is pretty nice. I wouldn’t run him, personally, but I wouldn’t blink if I came up against someone who decided to give him some time at the big tables.
Candy: Gideon is one of the most mediocre planeswalkers for multi-player EDH, in my opinion. First of all, using his +2 will usually guarantee horrible screaming death for him since EDH tends to run a lot beefy guys, unless you have a bunch of dudes you can throw under the bus to keep him alive for the next activation. And Coda’s right: there are going to be 2 to 3 other people gunning for your ass, and saving you from one combat step isn’t going to do much unless you’re trying to prevent a token deck from overrunning the board. His -2 [card]Royal Assassin[/card] ability is pretty sweet, though, I’ll give you that. And his 0 ability is pretty nice, but he doesn’t have trample, which means people can chump block him all day long. But by far the biggest downfall: you can only run 1 of him, and he’s pretty hard to recur if you’re not playing green. Being able to play another Gideon when one dies makes his +2 and -2 abilities much, much more valuable. As far as I’m concerned, he only truly shines in 1-on-1 duels in a non-singleton format. I certainly don’t fault people for including him in an EDH deck, it’s just that the card and board advantage he generates isn’t quite on par with most of the other planeswalkers.
[card]Gideon’s Avenger[/card]
Coda: This guy has the potential to get pretty huge, but given that he’s essentially a vanilla guy I doubt he’ll see much play.
Candy: Reminds me of [card]Wake Thrasher[/card]. Could be good in an aggro build, and I can see him being one of those cards that people leave alone for a while because they’re not bothered by the gigantic vanilla fatty in the corner, but then he comes out and kills out of nowhere because of [card]Loxodon Warhammer[/card] or [card]Whispersilk Cloak[/card].
[card]Grand Abolisher[/card]
Coda: Pretty sweet little hatebear, here. Kind of like a tiny little baby [card]Teferi, Mage of Zhalfir[/card]. That said, I don’t think he’s really right for EDH. While you’re not going to have your opponents screwing with your turns with this guy out, he’s not going to do a thing about your opponents casting spells and such at you during each other’s turns. While he’s cheap at just two mana, the effect is too specific to really get any kind of mileage in multiplayer.
Candy: Seeing this card made me want to build a hatebear deck. It wouldn’t be effective, but it sure would piss people off. [card]Yixlid Jailer[/card], [card]Melira, Sylvok Outcast[/card], [card]Leonin Arbiter[/card], [card]Aven Mindcensor[/card], etc. Grand Abolisher is great for preventing counterspells and other fuckery on your turn, and that might be all you need to pull of some kind of crazy combo or winning move. And hey, if nothing else, it prevents people from [card]Fog[/card]ging the crap out of you when you’re trying to make an alpha strike. It’s just that you’ll need to choose exactly the right moment to play him, and that’s a lot harder to finagle in multi-player EDH.
[card]Guardians’ Pledge[/card]
Coda: Kind of an oddly-named card for something so blatantly offensive in its design. Regardless, white token decks will like having a way to pump their team and oneshot someone out of nowhere.
Candy: It’s not quite as sweet as [card]Overrun[/card] and not even close to being as sweet as [card]Overwhelming Stampede[/card], but it’s still respectable. And hell, if you have [card]True Conviction[/card], [card]Concerted Effort[/card] and/or [card]Victory’s Herald[/card] out, this card can be a fabulous finisher.
[card]Honor of the Pure[/card]
Coda: I’m not particularly sold on the effectiveness of anthem effects in EDH. You’re throwing away a card to give your team a small boost – a card that could have been a titan or planeswalker. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t run pump effects, but the ones that you should be running need to be worth more than a piddly little +1/+1. [card]Mirror Entity[/card] and [card]Crescendo of War[/card] come to mind.
Candy: Honor of the Pure is pretty sweet, but a good chunk of its power comes from having more than one out on the battlefield. And for only one more mana, [card]Glorious Anthem[/card] gives ALL your dudes a pump, and for a bit more than that, [card]Light from Within[/card] gives all of your non-token white dudes an even more significant pump (especially if you’re running angels, which tend to run a lot of colored mana symbols). In short: pumping your dudes is awesome, and it’s really cheap to cast, but card slots in EDH are at a premium and you might want to look for more powerful effects to take up that slot unless you’re going all-out aggro and run a bunch of anthem effects that stack.
[card]Mesa Enchantress[/card]
Coda: Enchantment-based decks will want this, and everyone else will just shrug and move on.
Candy: Now, if you could draw a card every time an enchantment entered the battlefield under your control, then we’d be talking, because she’d be hilariously abusable with [card]Enchanted Evening[/card].
[card]Oblivion Ring[/card]
Coda: After a Standard format fraught with bannings and other drama, Wizards has finally realized that O-ring really, really needs to be a core set card. It’s a great answer for just about anything, so I imagine we’ll have O-rings dropped on our planeswalkers, creatures, artifacts, and enchantments for years to come.
Candy: Flexible, affordable, recurrable removal? Yes please. And yes, there are a multitude of ways to take care of O-rings, but good lord they’re annoying until you can get to your answers.
[card]Personal Sanctuary[/card]
Coda: Kind of neat in that it protects you from red’s multitude of symmetrical damage effects. Given that red and white aren’t the strongest of colors when paired together, I wouldn’t start losing sleep over it just yet.
Candy: I guess you could just keep casting spells like [card]Earthquake[/card] or [card]Hurricane[/card] over and over, or keep kersploding [card]Ashling, the Pilgrim[/card] or [card]Heartless Hidetsugu[/card] on your turn while cackling maniacally because you’re unscathed. Wait…that actually sounds kind of fun. A deck that’s nothing but damage prevention and lifegain effects for yourself while packing a ton of global damage effects. Hmmmm…. If somebody actually makes this work, let me know. I’m kind of intrigued.
[card]Spirit Mantle[/card]
Coda: Uril decks will love it, everyone else will ignore it.
Candy: Aww, look, now your critter can be [card]Commander Eesha[/card], too. It’s not too shabby, honestly, and a decent inclusion if you’re looking to swing through for General damage in white (especially if you have [card]Concerted Effort[/card] out).
[card]Stonehorn Dignitary[/card]
Coda: Kind of hilarious, actually. If you have a way of reliably blinking this every turn, you can pretty much just shut down the creature-based offense of the opponent of your choice.
Candy: Can you dig it? I can dig it. It’s a really powerful effect attached to a decently sturdy body. Even if it doesn’t shut down all combat damage, it at the very least gives you some breathing room if you can [card]flicker[/card] it or recur it reliably.
[card]Sun Titan[/card]
Coda: While not as format-defining as [card]Primeval Titan[/card], [card]Sun Titan[/card] nevertheless has become a staple in white decks of all descriptions. You’d be hard pressed to find a white deck that doesn’t run it, and those that don’t are probably doing something wrong.
Candy: Probably my favorite titan after the Primeval. Sun Titan brings back so many key things: important lands, [card]Eternal Witness[/card], [card]Dauntless Escort[/card], [card]Oblivion Stone[/card], any of the swords from Darksteel or the Scars of Mirrodin cycle…. He’s good. If you’re playing white, you should probably have him in your deck. If you’re playing green and white, you should definitely include him in your deck, if only because Eternal Witness is such a wonderful target, or because you can perform all kinds of wacky shenanigans with [card]Dauntless Escort[/card].
[card]Azure Mage[/card]
Coda: Repeatable card draw is always a good thing, but the awesomeness here is tempered by the fact that its on a very vulnerable 2/1 body. This card is going to be tearing up limited something fierce, but at the big tables you might want to stick to the slightly more durable [card]Treasure Trove[/card].
Candy: Given the huge number of other card draw effects EDH has access to, 3U for one card isn’t super-great value. Give me a [card]Sphinx of Magosi[/card], [card]Jushi Apprentice[/card] or [card]Arcanis the Omnipotent[/card] any day. [card]Training Grounds[/card] makes it a bit better, but you can still find better value for your mana.
[card]Djinn of Wishes[/card]
Coda: An underappreciated card from M10, the Djinn is extremely powerful in a deck that can manipulate the top card of its library. [card]Scroll Rack[/card] and [card]Sensei’s Divining Top[/card] say hi.
Candy: I’ve seen the Djinn wreck games when played right. It’s especially good if you have a way to keep proliferating its counters.
[card]Frost Titan[/card]
Coda: Easily the worst titan in EDH, weak spot removal doesn’t really shine when facing down a table full of opponents. I’d skip it in favor of something that generates genuine card advantage.
Candy: A bomb in limited, not too shabby in other constructed formats, fairly terrible for EDH unless you can reliably copy it en masse with something like [card]Rite of Replication[/card]. But really, just run [card]Opposition[/card] instead of this and call it good, eh?
[card]Jace’s Archivist[/card]
Coda: [card]Windfall[/card] on a stick. Repeatable [card]Windfall[/card] on a stick. While as the blue deck you’re likely to have the most cards in hand, this guy can enable all sorts of card-draw powered shenanigans. [card]Psychosis Crawler[/card] loves him, [card]Underworld Dreams[/card] starts looking like a genuine clock, [card]Megrim[/card] looks terrifying, and [card]Cerebral Vortex[/card] becomes something that can just nuke someone into oblivion out of nowhere. If you see this guy hit the table, don’t stop to consider the benefit of dumping your hand for a fresh hand of cards, just nuke him as soon as you can.
Candy: Oh dear. It’s not like Niv-Mizzet or [card]Circu, Dimir Lobotomist[/card] decks needed more enablers, but here we are. As soon as he hits the board, brace yourself for shenanigans.
[card]Jace, Memory Adept[/card]
Coda: Sadly Jace #3 doesn’t measure up to the towering reputation of #2, but overall he’s a powerful draw and mill engine that somehow doesn’t feel evil enough to focus everyone’s attention on him. BUG reanimation strategies will love dumping cards into their graveyards, mill decks will relish having such a fast clock, and everyone else will just have fun drawing cards.
Candy: Holy hell! A free [card]Glimpse the Unthinkable[/card] every turn? WTF? Jace 3.0 isn’t nearly as overpowered as Jace the Wallet Sculptor, but oh boy, the decks that can abuse the hell out of him sure are going to abuse the hell out of him.
[card]Lord of the Unreal[/card]
Coda: I love the whole Illusion theme in M12, but sadly I doubt there’s really a home for this guy in EDH.
Candy: It’d be pretty awesome if somebody could make an Illusion tribal deck work for EDH, but I fear that day is still far in our future. But hey, when that day comes, this would be an aut0-include.
[card]Master Thief[/card]
Coda: An artifact [card]Sower of Temptation[/card]. I’ve never been too fond of the Sower, as it tends to be more of a 1-on-1 card than anything. Stealing something is great and all, but making it contingent on a 2/2 body is just begging to get blown out. That said, this could be good fun in a Riku deck. Stealing two artifacts for 5 mana is quite a deal.
Candy: Steal effects are really fun in blue, and this guy’s a great way to do it if you don’t have access to cards like [card]Steal Artifact[/card], [card]Blatant Thievery[/card], or [card]Acquire[/card].
[card]Mind Unbound[/card]
Coda: [card]Braid of Fire[/card] for card draw instead of mana. A fabulous EDH card, this has the possibility to fuel all kinds of brokenness. Just watch out and try not to let it die before your first upkeep so you can draw at least one card off it.
Candy: This card is just sick, and if you can find a way to protect it, it’s going to draw you a ton of cards. Just make sure you don’t deck yourself.
[card]Phantasmal Image[/card]
Coda: Given that most targeted effects tend to be removal of one sort of another, [card]Phantasmal Image[/card] is basically a 2-mana [card]Clone[/card]. Which is pretty stellar, especially considering that allows it to get returned from the graveyard by a [card]Sun Titan[/card]. A fine inclusion in any deck.
Candy: Pretty tasty, and its sacrifice trigger means that exile effects won’t work on it since the sacrifice trigger will resolve before the spell targeting it does. Fun times! However, those trying to abuse enters-the-battlefield triggers with flicker effects like [card]Mistmeadow Witch[/card] or [card]Venser, the Sojourner[/card] will need to look to other clones to be their enablers.
[card]Redirect[/card]
Coda: On its surface this looks like a total blowout, but in practice there are surprisingly few relevant spells that this card can affect. Removal spells are fair game, sure, but aside from that you’re probably going to be staring forlornly at your opponents’ [card]Genesis Wave[/card]s, [card]Rite of Replication[/card]s, and such while it rots in your hand. I’d rather have a counterspell almost all the time.
Candy: Oh, but Redirecting a Rite of Replication can be funny as hell. Instead of getting 5 [card]Woodfall Primus[/card]es or [card]Bogardan Hellkite[/card]s or whatever, here, have 5 1/1 Saproling tokens. I should know. I’ve had my Rite of Replication redirected. I just about tore my hair out. It’s not as good as [card]Wild Ricochet[/card], but it’s a decent inclusion.
[card]Sphinx of Uthuun[/card]
Coda: [card]Fact or Fiction[/card] on a big body, as an ETB trigger. Blue decks will love this, and blink decks (like my Jenara list) are going to get some incredibly insane value off of it. Definitely in the top 5 EDH sphinxes.
Candy: I’ve so far managed to play this card once during a pre-release draft, and it’s EVEN MORE FUN THAN I EXPECTED. If you’re playing blue and you’re not being all creatureless-lockdown-y or tribal shenanigans-y, then you need to have this guy in your deck.
[card]Time Reversal[/card]
Coda: It’s actually kind of disappointing that this card is blue, as the effect feels much more red to me. I mean, it’s basically a [card]Wheel of Fortune[/card] with a graveyard shuffle clause added. Now, if it was red I would play it in a heartbeat, but as a blue card it comes off as very mediocre. Unless you’re trying to nug your opponents with [card]Psychosis Crawler[/card] and [card]Megrim[/card] or something similar, I’d pass.
Candy: Good in a Niv deck that kills people via direct damage for drawing cards, but not all that great in any other build.
[card]Turn to Frog[/card]
Candy: Given my love of goofy blue removal cards that turn big things into little things with no abilities ([card]Pongify[/card], [card]Ovinize[/card], and [card]Snakeform[/card] being prominent examples), how could I not love Turn to Frog? Every time I play this card, I want to sing “Rainbow Connection.” I would totally run this card in an EDH deck, not necessarily because it’s efficient, but because it’s funny and flavorful.
[card]Visions of Beyond[/card]
Coda: It’s not difficult to get 20 cards in your graveyard in EDH, so this card is going to be an [card]Ancestral Recall[/card] a good deal of the time when you cast it. Even if it’s not, you can cycle it for the low cost of one blue mana. Not every blue deck will run this, but the ones that do are going to love it.
Candy: Blue mages have gotten some serious card draw love in the past few sets. [card]Consecrated Sphinx[/card], [card]Recurring Insight[/card], [card]Mind Unbound[/card], and now [card]Visions of Beyond[/card]? Nutty.
[card]Bloodlord of Vaasgoth[/card]
Coda: Definitely not the Twilight sort of vampire here. Vampire tribal has been approaching the necessary critical mass ever since M10, and while I don’t think it’s quite there yet, this cheery fellow is going to be a fine inclusion in the deck when it does.
Candy: Delicious AND nutritious! And vampire tribal is in fact possible—you just need to accept that you’re going to include a few mediocre vampires like [card]Child of Night[/card] if you want to reach the appropriate critical mass. In any case, the Bloodlord is an auto-include in any vampire deck, but not all that great for anything else.
[card]Call to the Grave[/card]
Coda: A sweet reprint for zombie tribal decks, but not really that great anywhere else.
Candy: Could be really sweet in a [card]Savra, Queen of the Golgari[/card] or [card]Shirei, Shizo’s Caretaker[/card] deck as a way of controlling the board, and could also be really flavorful in a [card]Thraximundar[/card] deck. Not much good otherwise.
[card]Cemetery Reaper[/card]
Coda: Another excellent card for tribal decks, but one that also has a little extra utility as graveyard hate.
Candy: Targeted graveyard hate that gives you dudes while giving your copious zombies a little buff? Why, yes please.
[card]Grave Titan[/card]
Coda: Probably tied with [card]Sun Titan[/card] for the title of “Second-Best EDH Titan,” this titan provides a neverending stream of zombies for chump blocking, sacrifice fodder, or beatdowns. Deathtouch is a little cute on a 6/6 fatty, but in a world filled with cards like [card]Lord of Extinction[/card], it’s actually relevant more often than you think.
Candy: [card]Eldrazi Monument[/card] + Grave Titan = lolz forever.
[card]Monomania[/card]
Coda: So you get to keep one card…I’m not sure if that’s better or worse than just discarding your whole hand. Black has a bunch of other discard spells that are probably stronger than this, but when it comes down to it, card advantage is card advantage. Just make sure to save it for the guy who just drew a ton of cards off of [card]Recurring Insight[/card]. That, and pray that the card they keep isn’t [card]Praetor’s Counsel[/card].
Candy: Given how big hands can get in EDH, this is probably going to be one of the most efficient discard spells for the format barring [card]Myojin of Night’s Reach[/card]. If you’re running a heavy discard theme, you could do a lot worse than include this one.
[card]Onyx Mage[/card]
Candy: Honestly, if you’re playing black aggro, this guy could be a decent rattlesnake, especially if you run a bunch of dudes with or equipment that give first strike.
[card]Reassembling Skeleton[/card]
Coda: The definitive sacrifice outlet, and a champion chump blocker.
Candy: If you have cards like [card]Fallen Angel[/card] or [card]Nantuko Husk[/card], Reassembling Skeleton basically gives those guys “1B: Get bigger.” If you have [card]Perilous Forays[/card] out, it becomes “2B: Search your library for a land with a basic land type and put it on the battlefield tapped.” I tend to toss him into any of my black decks that like killing my own dudes for fun and profit because he’s just so good.
[card]Royal Assassin[/card]
Candy: He seems like he’d be pretty mediocre in EDH a lot of the time, except nobody really wants to waste a removal spell on him and then he just SITS THERE, taunting you, daring you to tap your creature to activate an ability or to attack with a big dude. If nothing else, he’ll kill something and then eat a removal spell, and that’s not a terrible value at all for 1BB.
[card]Rune-Scarred Demon[/card]
Coda: Given black’s penchant for recurring creatures from the graveyard, having a repeatable [card]Demonic Tutor[/card] on a very large stick is going to make this demon a staple for years to come. Kaalia, in particular, is going to like getting a free tutor during her attack step, and Esper blink decks are going to have all sorts of fun with him.
Candy: One of the best demons for the format, ever. If I ever hit anyone with [card]Praetor’s Grasp[/card] and somebody has that in their deck, I am totally grabbing that like whoa and like mon dieu.
[card]Sorin Markov[/card]
Coda: I wish I could like Sorin, but he’s just downright dickish in EDH. The only mode of his that ever really matters is his second one, and it essentially reads “target player loses the game.” Not really much fun for anyone.
Candy: He’s not quite as backbreaking if his -3 is modified to 15 or 20 life, but then what would the fun be in that, eh?
[card]Sorin’s Vengeance[/card]
Coda: While it’s a pretty underwhelming card, it does take the card for the most badass flavor text in the set. If you’re putting together a flavor text themed deck, then go for it. Otherwise, I’d stick with Exsanguinate.
Candy: Not too bad, but those card slots are at a premium. I’d much rather run something with the potential to deal a lot more life loss, like [card]Corrupt[/card], [card]Consume Spirit[/card] or [card]Profane Command[/car].
[card]Sutured Ghoul[/card]
Coda: This zombie can get pretty large, but he’s kind of a nonbo in most graveyard decks. You need to exile a bunch of creatures from your graveyard in order to get any mileage out of him, and if you’re spending all that effort to get a big graveyard you might as well run a bunch of spells like [card]Victimize[/card] and [card]Corpse Dance[/card] as well as creatures that don’t nuke the rest of your graveyard.
Candy: At the end of the day, he’s a vanilla fatty with a disproportionately big cost. I’d much rather run something like [card]Mortivore[/card] or [card]The Mimeoplasm[/card].
[card]Vengeful Pharaoh[/card]
Coda: A pretty neat [card]No Mercy[/card] effect that triggers from your graveyard, I expect that this could see inclusion in some graveyard decks. If you have an instant-speed discard outlet, then you can surprise your opponents by tossing the pharaoh in the graveyard right before your opponents creatures connect. The fact that it comes back on top of your library is pretty annoying, though, since it’s not really big enough to have that much use save as a blocker. Still a neat card, though.
Candy: Especially good if you have [card]Phyrexian Arena[/card] out. This guy is a pretty sweet inclusion in most black decks.
[card]Zombie Infestation[/card]
Candy: A classic graveyard deck enabler. You can toss your fatties into your graveyard early game for cheap cheap reanimation later, or [card]Filth[/card] to give all your guys swampwalk, or you can turn your late-game land drops into dudes. Not too shabby at all.
[card]Chandra’s Phoenix[/card]
Coda: Well, if you ever wanted to find a way to make [card]Chandra Ablaze[/card] work, then repeatedly discarding this to nug your opponent for 4 damage is a pretty good way to start. A 2/2 body really isn’t big enough to do much work in EDH, though, so unless you have combotastic intentions I’d leave this one on the sidelines.
Candy: My favorite red-dude-who-never-dies for EDH is [card]Magma Phoenix[/card]—equip it with [card]Basilisk Collar[/card] for extra lolz. That said, Chandra’s Phoenix really isn’t too bad. A guy that returns to chump for you over and over gain ain’t shabby, and I wouldn’t look askance at anyone who chose to include this in their deck.
[card]Flameblast Dragon[/card]
Coda: A big, solid, evasive body that lets you [card]Fireball something every turn. If you were to ever compile a list of reasons to play red in EDH, this dragon would have to be on it.
Candy: I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again: He’s a flying fireball. If that’s not dragonliness defined, I don’t know what is. If you can include only one dragon in your red deck, this should probably be it.
[card]Furyborn Hellkite[/card]
Coda: A 12/12 flier. It’s hard to get much bigger than that in a flier, but honestly there’s not much to recommend this aside from its size. Kresh decks will probably like this, but I usually don’t have much room in my decks for vanilla creatures, no matter how big they are.
Candy: He’s huge, and if you have either [card]Rage Reflection[/card] or [card]Gratuitous Violence[/card] out, he’s downright terrifying. But Coda’s right: he’s otherwise a vanilla dude. By all means toss him in if you’re building a dragon tribal deck, but he’s not by any means an auto-include.
[card]Chandra, the Firebrand[/card]
Coda: The first planeswalker ever printed with only one colored mana in her mana cost. So that’s cool. Pinging people or creatures for one isn’t that stellar, but her second ability opens the door to all sorts of crazy shenanigans. Think of the possibilities of doubling up on [card]Tooth and Nail[/card], [card]Rite of Replication[/card], [card]Genesis Wave[/card], or god forbid [card]Time Stretch[/card]. Unfortunately, her ultimate is pretty mediocre, so as far as most EDHers are concerned Chandra is pretty much just going to be a spell-copying machine.
Candy: A free [card]Reverberate[/card] every couple turns? Sure! Sounds good.
[card]Fling[/card]
Coda: A surprisingly powerful card in EDH, given the huge number of gigantic fatties running around. Best paired with something like a [card]Lord of Extinction[/card] or [card]Serra Avatar[/card], although garden-variety [card]Terastodon[/card]s and Multani will do the trick as well. After all, if you’re going to play burn in EDH, you might as well go big or go home.
Candy: The definitive combo for this is to [card]Act of Treason[/card] your opponent’s best guy, then fling it after combat. It definitely has a place in red EDH decks, particularly in decks like [card]Brion Stoutarm[/card].
[card]Grim Lavamancer[/card]
Coda: One of the best red creatures ever printed…but really, really terrible in EDH. The vast majority of creatures you’ll see won’t register this as anything more than a little tickle, and 2 damage to a player is almost laughable. Kind of a microcosm of all the ways that red tends to fall short in EDH.
Candy: Having a [card]shock[/card] on legs is pretty damn sweet, but Shocks don’t quite cut it in this format, especially ones that come with an exile-cards-from-graveyard cost. If you’re looking for repeatable burn, you’re almost certainly better off looking elsewhere, like a dragon—[card]Flameblast Dragon[/card] and [card]Scourge of Kher Ridges[/card], for example.
[card]Inferno Titan[/card]
Coda: Red does, however, have an extremely threatening titan. Most of the time its ETB/attack ability is going to be used to just nug players, but on occasion it can also take out a utility creature or some tokens. Definitely not a card you want to let hang around on the battlefield unanswered.
Candy: You know what’s better than Grim Lavamancer? This here card. It kills any number of utility guys, and his firebreathing ability is pretty sweet, too, especially if you can give him first or double-strike.
[card]Manabarbs[/card]
Coda: Monored EDH decks typically need a way to just get as much damage through as they possibly can, and Manabarbs is one of the best ways to do it. Also, [card]Personal Sanctuary[/card] is in this set, too. Just sayin.’
Candy: Oh, Manabarbs. As if red didn’t have enough ways to convert mana into pain. Especially good in red decks that can afford to run a lot of artifact or ritual ramp.
[card]Reverberate[/card]
Coda: [card]Redirect[/card] may be lackluster, but there’s something deeply hilarious about copying your opponent’s gamebreaking spell. You can even use it to copy ramp spells in the early game, which is quite tasty. Sure, [card]Reiterate[/card] and [card]Wild Ricochet[/card] are pretty much just better, but if you’re running one why not run them all, I say!
Candy: I’m a big fan of Reverberate, and I toss it into just about every red deck I have. If nothing else, it’s good for copying a counterspell when you’re trying to resolve something important.
[card]Scrambleverse[/card]
Coda: The obligatory big red chaos card. There are people that love these, and the rest of us just cross our fingers and hope we never have to play against someone that annoying.
Candy: You know what would be especially hilarious? Having [card]Hive Mind[/card] out while this is cast.
[card]Warstorm Surge[/card]
Coda: A one-sided [card]Pandemonium[/card], I doubt this will see all that much play. After all, if you’re building your deck around this kind of effect, wouldn’t you rather just have the original article that costs half as much?
Candy: Could actually be really, really good in a Mayael or other big fatty McFat deck that’s seeking to maximize damage by hook or by crook.
[card]Acidic Slime[/card]
Coda: Still one of the best utility creatures green has in its arsenal. If you’re playing green, then you should be playing the slime. No exceptions.
Candy: It blows things up, it’s Reveillark-able, it has deathtouch, and you can fetch it with [card]Green Sun’s Zenith[/card]. Nothing much I can say about it other than the fact that it’s one of the tastiest utility guys in EDH.
[card]Arachnus Spinner[/card]
Coda: It’s a freaking huge spider, but that’s not necessarily new in Magic. The neat bit is that it comes with removal that it can keep calling back from the graveyard even if your opponent destroys it. Granted, with all the fatties running around in Magic it’s not particularly stellar removal, but you can keep a problem general locked down irrespective of its power if you just keep tapping spiders. It’s not high on my list of cards I’m looking to put in my decks, but if [card]Arachnus Web[/card] turns out to be sweet than I might reconsider.
Candy: If your meta is rampant with big flying dudes, you can certainly do worse than to include Arachnus Spinner. And if you do, then Arachnus Web is definitely worth running.
[card]Arachnus Web[/card]
Coda: Green doesn’t get removal very often, and this should be a fine way to deal with annoying utility creatures that it can’t beat in the red zone.
Candy: Not as fun or as effective as [card]Lignify[/card], but on the other hand, it’s recurrable. It’s not too shabby if you’re looking for a way to neutralize a dangerous utility creature.
[card]Birds of Paradise[/card]
Coda: A classic card, sure, but I have never been a fan of mana dorks in EDH. Sure, they tend to be a little faster than land search, but the minute someone sweeps the board you’re back to square one. Still if you’re going to run a dork, you might as well run one of the best.
Candy: The best one-drop mana dork ever printed. Awesome not just for the ramp it offers, but for the fact that it fixes your mana for you. I don’t run birds any more, but I certainly don’t think running one is a bad choice.
[card]Doubling Chant[/card]
Coda: I wanted this to be [card]Doubling Season[/card] so bad, and sadly we get a card that’s all but useless in EDH.
Candy: We already get the almost-brokenly-good [card]Wild Pair[/card] for EDH, so I can’t fault WotC for not going in that direction, but I’m still a bit sad that we didn’t get something we could use for EDH. As it is, it’ll be a fun inclusion in a casual green stompy deck.
[card]Dungrove Elder[/card]
Coda: A big, dumb, hexproof beater for monogreen. It’s a fine card, but I imagine its just going to get chumped, wrathed, or ignored unless you manage to help it along with some equipment that gives trample or indestructibility.
Candy: Big vanilla beaters have a place in EDH only if they get comically large, like, say, [card]Hamletback Goliath[/card], [card]Mossbridge Troll[/card] or [card]Chameleon Colossus[/card]. Dungrove Elder doesn’t qualify, and isn’t particularly interesting other than the fact that he’s naturally hexproof. A big, fat “meh” from me.
[card]Elvish Archdruid[/card]
Coda: A mandatory inclusion for elf tribal decks, and a must-deal with creature for everyone else.
Candy: He’s amazing in elf tribal. The only guys that can even come close to the amount of green mana he can barf out are [card]Wirewood channeler[/card] and [card]Priest of Titania[/card], but they don’t give your elves buffs.
[card]Garruk, Primal Hunter[/card]
Coda: Whoa. This guy is a beast. That makes beasts. And draws you absolutely ridiculous amounts of cards. He costs 5 and is only playable in extremely green-heavy decks, which means he’s probably not going to see widespread play in Standard, so you might want to wait a while for the initial frenzy to pass and his price to drop, then snap up as many copies as you can. Garruk is going to be an EDH staple for a long time to come.
Candy: Not quite as flexible as Garruk the Elder, but his token-creating abilities, coupled with his [card]Soul’s Majesty[/card] effect, makes him an auto-include in any mono-green or token-creating deck.
[card]Garruk’s Horde[/card]
Coda: Big, trampley, and it lets you play creatures off the top of your library. While not as useful as [card]Oracle of Mul Daya[/card]’s ability to play lands off the top, the two of them together should make a pretty fantastic card advantage engine.
Candy: If you have a [card]Momir Vig, Simic Visionary[/card] deck, this guy needs to be in there. Also a must-include in any creature-only EDH build. This guy is card advantage in big beatyface form.
[card]Hunter’s Insight[/card]
Coda: A must-include for any monogreen deck. Massive card draw for only 3 mana? Sounds good to me. Just make sure your opponents aren’t in a position to kill whatever you’re trying to draw off of, or you’re going to be one sad panda.
Candy: This card just single-handedly made trample decks a whole lot better.
[card]Jade Mage[/card]
Coda: A mini-bomb in limited, and a relatively efficient saproling maker in EDH. An extremely solid choice for saproling tribal decks.
Candy: If you’re running some kind of a token deck, you could certainly do a lot worse than include this card.
[card]Primeval Titan[/card]
Coda: Prime Time. The Jolly Green Giant. The most important creature in all of EDH, hands down. Games revolve around Primeval Titan. Wars are fought over him. If you’re playing green, then you’re playing Primeval Titan or you’re making a mistake. If you cast a creature tutor, you’re finding Primeval Titan or you’re making a mistake. If you’re casting a kill spell, you’re targeting Primeval Titan or you’re making a mistake. The fact that this guy is getting reprinted is a very good thing for EDH as a whole, since it means that his price should come down from the stratosphere to a somewhat affordable point.
Candy: Coda’s pretty much said it all. P-tits is one of the most important green creatures in this format. He fixes your mana, gets you the land combo pieces that you need, and will pretty much trample through anything your opponents can muster up to block if you play him in early game. Every green deck should probably include him.
[card]Primordial Hydra[/card]
Coda: It starts as big as you want it to be and just gets bigger from there. Trample means that this guy should be able to close out games in a hurry once he gets up in the 10+ counter range.
Candy: Remember my comment about hilariously large but otherwise vanilla creatures being worthy of inclusion in EDH decks? This guy would be one of them. I’m probably going to toss him into my [card]Stonebrow, Krosan Hero[/card] deck.
[card]Rampant Growth[/card]
Coda: Some people like this card in EDH, but I never run it. [card]Sakura-Tribe Elder[/card] is a much better option at the same mana cost, but even then I prefer to stick with slightly more expensive but more potent ramp spells like [card]Cultivate[/card] and [card]Explosive Vegetation[/card].
Candy: You know, a ramp spell is a ramp spell. I’m with Coda, and tend to run the more expensive but more powerful ramp spells just for the increased density of lands I can fetch with each card, but Rampant Growth is still decent.
[card]Rites of Flourishing[/card]
Coda: A group hug staple for years now, but not really that great for decks that aren’t in the business of giving their opponents cards.
Candy: Group hug loves it, but it’s really going to generate disproportionately more advantage for your opponents than it ever can for you.
[card]Skinshifter[/card]
Coda: A pretty sweet card in limited, for sure, and maybe even constructed, but conditional 4/4 tramplers don’t really set my heart afire.
Candy: He’s not too bad, but I’d much rather run something like [card]Thornling[/card], if only because indestructibility and trample are way more useful in EDH than the Skinshifter’s abilities. He could be a good inclusion in an [card]Experiment Kraj[/card] deck, because I hear Kraj likes activated abilities, but the fact that he can only activate them once a term makes us a sad panda.
[card]Stingerfling Spider[/card]
Candy: You know, this guy could be worth including in some decks, if only because he kills pains in the ass like [card]Linvala, Keeper of Silence[/card] or [card]Admonition Angel[/card]. And as a bonus, he’s [card]Reveillark[/card]-able, and his relatively high toughness means he can chump pretty effectively for you.
[card]Adaptive Automaton[/card]
Coda: Pick a tribe, any tribe! As far as lords go, it’s pretty unimpressive, but the fact that it goes with anything is pretty darn cool.
Candy: It’s cheap, it’s playable in any color, and it’s playable for any tribe. Why not include it?
[card]Crown of Empires[/card]
Coda: Tapping creatures is pretty mediocre, but if you get this powered up, well, that’s pretty sweet. With all the tutors available in EDH, it’s definitely possible to get all three on the board. The only problem is keeping them there. Artifacts are pretty vulnerable, what with all the [card]Krosan Grip[/card]s and [card]Terastodon[/card]s running around. Given that each of the cards is uncommon, I think it’s best to leave this to limited, where it was meant to be.
Candy: A hilarious card if you can get the combo out, but let’s face it, what are the odds that anyone is going to allow you to get all three of them out and active at the same time? Save your artifact control spots for cards that are much more of a sure thing than this particular trio.
[card]Druidic Satchel[/card]
Coda: A cute little card advantage engine for limited, but it pales in comparison to the other options available in EDH.
Candy: Not too bad if you’re trying to ramp up to lands in non-green and you have a way to manipulate the top several cards of your deck.
[card]Elixir of Immortality[/card]
Candy: I don’t run this in any of my EDH decks, but I see it in a lot of EDH decks, especially Niv-Mizzet or mono-blue decks that have difficulty with graveyard recovery. As far as it goes, it’s pretty good; the only way someone can kill it without you sacrificing it is to [card]Krosan Grip[/card] it, but honestly, who would want to Krosan Grip an Elixir?
[card]Greatsword[/card]
Candy: Not so much a Greatsword as I-guess-it’s-kind-of-OKsword. Not worth including in any EDH deck, in my opinion—lots of other equipment that give you more bang for your mana.
[card]Manalith[/card]
Coda: Strictly better than Alara’s obelisks, strictly worse than [card]Coalition Relic[/card] and [card]Darksteel Ingot[/card]. I wouldn’t fault you for running this, but [card]Darksteel Ingot[/card] is extremely cheap.
Candy: A completely boring addition. Good if you’re going for metalcraft or if you’re one of those blue artifact decks that run every artifact mana source imaginable just so you can hit people with a massive dose of [card]Prosperity[/card] in late game, but I’d run any number of other mana artifacts before this one.
[card]Pentavus[/card]
Coda: A limited bomb, for sure, but unless you’ve got some [card]Grave Pact[/card] or +1/+1 counter themes to exploit then you can probably do a lot better than a 5/5 for 7.
Candy: Good in dedicated artifact decks or in decks that exploit proliferate shenanigans, but honestly not for much else.
[card]Quicksilver Amulet[/card]
Coda: A classic, for sure, but not really that spectacular most of the time in EDH. Definitely at its best in a 5 color focused on just cheating ridiculously powerful creatures into play, or as a way to cheat stuff in your hand into play in a Mayael deck.
Candy: One of my favorite cards for EDH, especially if you have cards like [card]Scroll Rack[/card], [card]Seedborn Muse[/card], [card]Unwinding Clock[/card] or [card]Consecrated Sphinx[/card] to synergize with it.
[card]Scepter of Empires[/card]
Coda: Even powered up when you’ve got all 3 pieces of the combo in play, this is pretty lackluster.
Candy: A bolt to the face for free. Not bad, but also not especially good.
[card]Solemn Simulacrum[/card]
Coda: On the short list of “must play” cards in EDH, the reprinting of Sad Robot is easily some of the most exciting news to come out of this set. The art also has the advantage of looking really sweet, instead of like a busker doing a fake statue routine.
Candy: Sad robot is back! All rejoice for the return of the sad robot! And hey, if you’re crazy enough to try and build golem tribal for EDH, he sure is a golem.
[card]Sundial of the Infinite[/card]
Coda: The is a weird one. Straight up, the most direct use I can see for it is using it to stop creatures from coming back into play after you’ve bounced them with a [card]Mistmeadow Witch[/card] or similar effect. It should also let you cheat out undercosted creatures like [card]Sky Swallower[/card], [card]Leveler[/card], and [card]Eater of Days[/card], but vanilla fatties usually aren’t the best way to end EDH games, so I doubt you’ll see it used in such a manner. I suppose it can also protect your board from disruption on your turn, but it’s pretty easy to play around. No doubt someone will come up with some kind of crazy broken way to use it, but aside from comboliciousness this is something I’d leave out of your 99.
[card]Swiftfoot Boots[/card]
Coda: Basically a fixed version of [card]Lightning Greaves[/card]. These should see a healthy amount of play in EDH, although they don’t allow nearly as much brokenness as the greaves do. Voltron strategies in particular will want them, although must-kill generals like Riku, Damia, Thrax, and Zur are probably going to want another cheap way to shroud up, just for redundancy’s sake.
Candy: In many contexts and for many applications, Swiftfoot Boots is a better version of Lightning Greaves, but that delicious 0 equip cost means Greaves are not going to shoved out of the top spot any time soon.
[card]Throne of Empires[/card]
Coda: One mana for a token isn’t bad at all. It’s not spectacular, but it’s pretty solid. On the other hand, five tokens for a single mana is pretty freaking fabulous, provided you get all three pieces of the Empiretron combo going. That’s way out there in Magical Christmasland, though, so unless you’re dead set on jumping through hoops to get three otherwise mediocre artifacts into play I’d leave this one in the trade binder.
Candy: You know what’s way more fun and way more flavorful if you want a 1/1 token for 1 mana? [card]Acorn Catapult[/card], bitches.
[card]Worldslayer[/card]
Coda: Easily one of my most hated EDH cards, ever. If I learn that you are playing a [card]Worldslayer[/card] combo in your deck, I am going to do everything in my power to absolutely destroy you. No joking – I am going to burn your creatures, grind your lands to dust, and spit on the ashes. I will destroy every permanent you own, and only then will I deign to kill you.
Candy: No, come on, tell us how you REALLY feel, Coda.
[card]Buried Ruin[/card]
Coda: This land is really fantastic value, and is completely colorless on top of that! Sure, the effect from the similar [card]Academy Ruins[/card] is repeatable, but it forces you to sacrifice a draw step. I rarely use Academy Ruins more than once or twice in a game, so being able to just ditch a land and get my artifact back right away means that I’m almost certainly going to put this in most, if not all of my EDH decks.
Candy: An excellent inclusion in any deck that cares about artifacts, and if you have a way to recur your lands, like, say, [card]Life from the Loam[/card] or [card]Crucible of Worlds[/card], then this card is even better.