Conclusions and Additions from Core 2021

Nothing too remarkable to say here. This is very much a core set. Lots of powerful and useful cards but little in the way of theming or flavour. High power and high levels of usefulness. Power creep continues too. I could make a reasonable case for this being one of the most powerful sets much like I seem to do for most new releases. While the overall power is high there doesn't seem to be any oppressively good cards like Oko or Once Upon a Time which is exactly what you want. Lots of stuff around the bar without too much above or below. There were a few more win more or polar cards than I would like to see. Not just a load of Baneslayer Angels but actual Baneslayer as well! Beyond those minor critiques the set looks great. Core sets tend to do well in cube what with less in the way of narrow synergy cards and more in the way of direct and clean staple cards. Core 2021 feels like it follows this trend well.





Cube Additions


Teferi, Master of Time
Garruk, Unleashed
Barrin, Tolarian Archmage
Terror of the Peaks
Garruk's Harbinger
Angelic Ascension
Eliminate
Heartfire Immolator
Seasoned Hallowblade
Llanowar Visionary




Cards to test with high hopes


Elder Gargaroth
Basri Ket
Liliana, Waker of the Dead
Chandra, Heart of Fire
Discontinuity
Waker of Waves
See the Truth
Hobblefiend
Mazemind Tome
Soul Sear



Cards to test with low hopes


Subira, Tulzidi Caravanner
Fiery Emancipation
Mangara, the Diplomat
Basri's Lieutenant
Chandra's Incinerator
Liliana's Standard Bearer
Gadrak, teh Crown-Scourge
Stormwing Entity
Primal Might
Sublime Empiphany
Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose
Miscast
Chandra's Pyreling
Fungal Rebirth
Silversmote Ghoul
Sparkhunter Masticore



Cards for the constructed reserves




Pack Leader
Peer into the Abyss
Feline Soveign
Demonic Embrace
Ghostly Pilferer
Shacklegiest
Conspicuous Snoop
Kaevek the Spiteful
Joreal, Mwonvuli Recluse
Nine Lives
Transmogrify
Sporeweb Weaver
Teferi's Ageless Insight
Thieve's Guild Enforcer
Speaker of the Heavens
Archfiend's Vessel
Garruk's Uprising
Selfless Savior
Unleashed Fury
Drowsing Tyrannodon
Alpine Houndmaster (+ Alpine Watchdog and Igneous Cur)
Liliana's Steward
Village Rites
Rhada, Heart of Keld
Niabi, Esteemed Speaker
Conclave Mentor
Watcher of the Spheres
Obsessive Stitcher
Chromatic Orrery
Griffin Aerie
Light of Promise
Lofty Denial
Basri's Solidarity
Invigorating Surge

Core 2021 Preliminary Reviews Part IX

Animal Sanctuary 2

There are a surprisingly high number of these kinds of thing in cube. It is all a bit narrow and minor for it to be worth running though. Just a nice cute card that is low enough cost and useful enough in effect that it will wind up seeing play in a bunch of cool places and just add a nice little extra dimension to those games.














Rousing Read 1

Pricey for an aura but it does do a load of positive things. I might consider this in a Bogles deck.




Hooded Blightfang 2

Cool take on deathtouch empowering but a little bit too much focus on the planeswalker aspect. This card simply isn't much of a threat. If you want to kill off walkers run walker removal or more threatening evasive dorks. Sure, this blocks quite well but it is also a three mana 1/4 that has no bonus value.













Radha, Heart of Keld 4

A Courser of Kruphix, that is gold and has one less toughness and affords no lifegain. Sure, this is more aggressive but it is also less what you want when you are being aggressive. While this is a fine card and likely to make the cut in Gruul big man smash style decks those are uncommon and not all that strong. This is powerful but clunky and outclassed by mono coloured cards.




Sublime Epiphany 6

Or massive Cryptic Command! This will almost always counter, draw and bounce. Sometimes you will counter an ability rather than a spell and every now and again you will manage to counter two things and feel like a boss. At that the card is OK but a bit too late game and clunky for that sort of utility and value. If however you can also Clone something this jumps from OK to good and if you can Clone something good then the card jumps to nutty. So much so that you might just Clone, bounce and draw. Any meaty blue dork with an EtB effect is pretty significant, be it a Mesmerising Benthid, a Whirler Rogue, or a Cavalier of Gales, it should spell game over. Broadly I think this will compete with Dream Eater for a slot. This affords more utility but is a worse support card and far less reliable. Despite the higher ceiling and seemingly higher average power of the Epiphany I expect the more reliable Eater will win and keep the slot. A test level card I expect to fail if only just.


Experimental Overload 4

Interesting card with scaling potential but not the sort of thing for cube. This is gold, it is situational in game and narrow in building. The power is there though, you don't need a very big token before this looks impressive and that is pretty easy to make happen.













Nine Lives 2

A cute flavour card with three clear uses. The standard use of prolonging life and preventing a bunch of damage, with a minimum saving of 8 life and a potentially much bigger saving (assuming they only have 4 power threats then a 32 life saving!). Then there is trying to combo with Solemnity and creating a soft damage prevention lock. Lastly, and probably my favourite is to use Nine Lives with Donate effects and use it to win the game, It is only my favourite because it is cool, it does not seem like the best thing you can Donate by any means. In fact none of the modes seem that powerful. The soft lock is fairly risky given that a humble Tranquility will kill you at that point.



Shacklegeist 4

A very solid tribal support tool. I will play this in most, if not all, spirit deck. It might even creep into modern lists if the format is creature heavy. The body is cheap and reasonable and the ability is convenient and fairly useful. Sadly the ability is blank without a high spirit count and that rules this card out for draft cubes.












The Shrines 2

Are any of these playable on their own? That is the main question here. Obviously you can make a tribal deck with these and the Hondens should you wish. A themed deck will murder some things, get murdered by some other things and generally be a little dull! The red and green Shrines are things you could play on their own but they are both pretty tame without the support of others and fairly unlikely to get the love.







Barrin, Tolarian Archamge 7.5

A very impressive Man-O-War legend. Bouncing a walker or a dork is a huge buff on other creatures like this. The card draw utility is really strong too. You can go full value mode and bounce other EtB effect dorks of your own or use it as a way to recharge the loyalty on planewalkers to their starting total. This is also a passive effect allowing you to bounce other things you have with other effects for that ongoing value. Bounce lands anyone? All very powerful and versatile with a solid floor.











Ghostly Pilferer 5

Impressive little card although probably a little too mana intense for cube. This is a kind of a looter all be it a well disguised one. You discard a card to force it through and safely tap it so that you can untap and draw with it. Two mana is a bit expensive to draw cards however and this is why I think it will not perform in cube. Just play a Looter il-Kor and get those loots and unblockable attacks without spending cards or mana on it. Or a Daring Saboteur for that matter - just a more direct iteration of this that can draw faster or become unblockable without conceding card advantage. The card draw trigger on Pilferer when opponents are casting spells is nice but not really disruption or that likely to net many cards on average. It is too minor of a perk to really push this which means you just have an somewhat slow and costly looter rather than a hatebear with lots of utility. Still, a card I expect I will play in an array of blue tempo builds. It is a double tribal hit and a cheap support dork you can play for a load of valid reasons.


Unleash Fury 3

Another take on the doublestrike effects. This scales with those nicely but is otherwise weaker. I can see this getting play in a Kiln Fiend style of deck but only as redundancy.
















Track Down 2

Much as I love a card quality spell this is a bit of a one mana card stuck on a two mana spell. It is far closer in power to Adventurous Impulse than it is Grapple with the Past or Bond of Flourishing. This needed more things, probably a chunk more. I would like to see a broader range of targets, scry 4, instant speed, some free life, before this really competes. Still, I always welcome more card quality so I don't want to beat up on this card too much. I just wish it was a single mana and I could get really hyped for it.








Run Afoul and Skyway Sniper 1

Both cheap anti flyer cards that might see some very very fringe play for being cheap and effective. Run Afoul is a great answer to Emrakul!










Hobblefiend 6.5

Yet more top rate cards in the common slot which I am a big fan of. This is an impressive little card with a lot going on. Mostly it is a Carrion Feeder that lacks combo application. Not being a free outlet is a huge downside but trample and being able to block are big on the other end of things. This is a solid midrange and aggro card that will be hard to play against and scale in threat as the game goes on. It obviously gets rather better when you actively want to sacrifice things to it and conversely worse when played in dork light decks! Power wise this is fair card, perhaps below average by cube standards. However it provides so much range, support and option density that I expect it to see a chunk of play and stand up to the competition.






Witches Cauldron 1

This is a worse Vampiric Rites which itself is a card yet to see any promising action. The tap isn't a huge deal, this is a costly enough effect that you are rarely using it twice a turn. Also, while enchantments are harder to remove than artifacts the latter tends to have more synergies so it is a bit swings and roundabouts there. All told this is too much mana to be the convenience you want from such a card.









Swift Response 0

Somewhat inconvenient and unreliable removal. Probably too cheap and broad in application to not see play in standard. Doubt it ever makes the bar in cube with there being rather better options in abundance.










Daybreak Charger 3

Solid little aggressive two drop. It is just damage and is likely to linear and fair to cut it in the cube. An early burst of damage doesn't really help white to finish the game and that is what white wants from its cards. This is more of a red thing. A condensed Rimrock Knight if you will. Looks good for pauper if nothing else.

Core 2021 Preliminary Reviews Part VIII

Liliana's Devotee 1

Another three mana zombie lord to add to the fray. Three toughness is nice but only giving an attack buff to your other zombies is sub par. The ability is so so. It is nice in that it doesn't tap and can be used right away but it isn't all that powerful or assured. What ruins this is being a human and not a zombie. This is a one way synergy card and at that it isn't powerful enough outside of EDH tribal zombies.













Liliana's Standard Bearer 6.5

This is a black take on Caller of the Claw. Protection of sorts against mass removal. This is a value recovery tool rather than a tempo retention one. Even so, it does a good job of making a Wrath sting a lot less. Alternatively you can just sac off a bunch of things you own and cash them in for cards. Great with the like of Carrion Feeder and Gravecrawler. This isn't broken by any means but it is useful in a number of ways and will probably make the cut in cube as a result. Just a fair little dork, a reactive Midnight Reaper of sorts. A fine enough curve play if you can bait out removal or a trade in your turn three attack.



Brash Taunter 1

Cute. Combos with plenty of things too but for heads up cube play this is rather on the pricey side for what it will do, combo or otherwise.

















Watcher of the Spheres 3

This is a lot of card! A form of flying prowess and cost reduction while being an OK cheap beater itself. Warden of Evos Isle can step aside! Flyer themed decks are really getting support at present. This is nearly good enough to play outside of a themed deck and still looks good even with mild synergy.



Kaevek, the Spiteful 3

I don't see this becoming a thing in cube when you have options like Massacre Girl/Wurm in one direction and Plague Mare/Engineer in the other. If you really want exactly this effect then Night of Souls Betrayal is far better, what with not dying to a Shock. A 3/2 is neither sturdy nor threatening and smacks of more of a downgrade to the card than a bonus perk. While there are times you would happily play this in a draft setting they will be too few and far between what with Kaevek being symmetrical. He negates too many cards you might want to play and is subsequently very narrow. Always awkward to have an anti creature effect on a dork. Either you run other guys and this hurts you or you don't and Kaervek walks into all the removal. Nice tool to have in black for sure but fairly low in the pecking order.





Niambi, Esteemed Speaker 3

Some good utility and interesting mechanics. Overall this is too narrow and too situational to be getting any serious cube attention. It is a nice role filler and support card however and will make sense in plenty of quirky brews. This has a lot of things going on, discard, draw, flash, bounce, lifegain, etc.












Discontinuity 6.5

Time Stop but much much better on your own turn. This has several uses, or to put it another way, it has all the uses of Time Stop plus one! It can be a Time Walk effect that concedes an untap step. It can be a Counterspell, sometimes a Counterspell and False Peace. The bonus perk is that it can potentially be used to abuse some card of yours that lasts until your next end step. At just two mana you can likely do some naughty combo things. Discontinuity will actually be a pretty good Counterspell when used in your own turn too. Missing your own end step is rarely an issue. It is pretty easy to untap and draw before you need counter magic in your own turn. If you play somewhat sensibly you will not wind up missing walker activations, land drops or other opportunities. All told that makes this seem like a highly versatile and powerful card. Time Walk or Counterspell? Sign me up! Not a bomb but tricky and well suited.



Terror of the Peaks 7

This is pretty extreme. This is a personal Pandemonium on 5/4 flying legs. Untapping with this and basically anything else at all will be game ending. While this is a bit of a Baneslayer there are a couple of mitigating factors. One, you can well have this shoot right away if paired with any sort of free way to get out a dork, be that a planeswalker or an on death trigger you can use. Or indeed just having mana for this and something else together. Secondly, even if they do kill this on sight there is a reasonable chance it is costing three life which is a lot better than nothing. In a red deck that will tend to feel like a cards worth. Much as this feels a bit slow it is so much raw power I struggle to see it not making waves in cube. Untapping with this is not going to go well for opponents. This dude will make Glorybringer look softcore when going!




Silversmote Ghoul 6.5

Now this is the kind of broad support card that will see loads of play in the years to come in a wide array of exotic brews. Power wise this card isn't nuts or anything, even with good support. It is just very convenient and direct. Once you have this on the go it doesn't need you to do anything, it just helps. The help it offers covers you somewhat for either tempo or value battles and it does so directly with a body in play at no cost or cards in hand at decently fair price (which obviously isn't an issue as you are fighting value not tempo in this mode). The Ghoul needs to be able to come back from the bin, you obviously don't play this just as an overpriced animated clue! I suspect however you don't need to be some full blown life gain deck for this to have appeal. Doubly so if you have any sort of discard going on. Ghoul is at it's very best when you can discard it usefully to some Collective Brutality or Smuggler's Copter and then gain life so as to bypass ever having to pay 3 mana for a 3/1 dork. It is already a two for one at that point and a zero mana one. That is about as good a ceiling as you can ask for! The card is still low power so it isn't broken, it is just the pinnacle of efficient. Obviously you can further abuse by getting it back repeatedly for the seemingly impossible improvement to efficiency. I suspect this means this will be playable in decks that have relatively few ways of gaining life. I reckon in a deck with say 3 cards that profitably discard and 4 cards that can gain 3 or more life in on go (which could well just be a 3 or more power lifelink dork) you have a solid card worthy of inclusion in your typical cube deck. This gets better when those discard outlets are cheap and/or you have other minor lifegain effects that you can combine to reach the 3 life threshold. That might still be too tall an order for this to see consistent cube play but it is very close to there. Easily the kind of card you could support a bit more to help it over the line if you so wanted. Nice that it fits in both the main black tribes too.



Griffin Aerie 2

This is a lifegain themed deck only card. This does nothing when you are not gaining life and as such is far too dependant on support. It does scale nicely with it however and is some kind of super Bitterblossom when you can trigger it most turns! Cool card with a high potential but very narrow.















Speaker of the Heavens 3

This is a scary lifegain themed card. Churning out 4/4 flyers makes the Aerie look awful! Having +7 on your starting life total is probably easier than gaining 3 a turn all told as well when it comes to the lifegain themed decks (although a study into the spread of such things would be fascinating). Once there you don't directly need to do anything to have your card online. It shouldn't be hard to maintain in a lifegain deck either when you are spewing out 4/4 angels! In a non-lifegain themed deck however getting to 7 above your starting total is really hard and rare. So while this might be much more of a payoff than Aerie or Ghoul it remains a narrow card you can only play in themed decks.

Core 2021 Preliminary Reviews Part VII

Rambunctious Mutt 0

Rather over priced for a Disenchant on legs. Likely not even playing this in tribal. The art feels like something out of an Un set too.















Garruk Unleashed 7.5

This makes me thing of Elspeth, Knight-Errant. Make a dork or buff a dork and give it evasion. That latter part is the strength of both cards. It makes them exceptional planeswalker control cards. Not only is it hard to play a walker into these walkers, they can also both just come down and facilitate a planewalker kill there and then which is always a nasty surprise. Garruk also comes down on turn three a lot being a green card and that will make him really scary. Not the most exciting planeswalker but a rather effective one. Good tempo, control and reach.





Garruk's Harbinger 7

This seems pretty nuts. It is a 4/3 for 3. Ok. It has hexproof from black. Sure. It digs into your deck and finds Garruks or creatures when it connects. What? Come again? This is a 4/3 Ophidian with card selection? It triggers when it hits walkers? You can scale the depth of dig with power? Well, then. I guess that is a lot of card. Ohran Viper is the conservative control green Ophidian. This is the tempo one and it is quite something. It probably wins with one connection and seems really winning with two. It is a whole lot harder to handle in combat too. It trades into things well and will often force a double block which is likely a 2 for 1 at best and could easily result in a blow out with any sort of trick or removal. Certainly Viper can do this too but Viper isn't that much of a threat. It is value sure, but you can afford to let it hit you a bit if the game is not a value one. This Harbinger does 4 per hit which is murdering walkers and putting real pressure on life totals. Imagine this on turn two and Garruk on turn 3! Swing for 7 trample, kill any walker dead or start obliterating life totals all while digging 7 cards deep to find the next brutal play. Green has some very serious 3 drops in this set. Some of the weaker ones in cube might be looking a little nervous.

Subira, Tulzidi Caravanner 6.5

I like this a lot. It does a bit of something right away on curve thanks to the haste. Then it goes on to provide reach and value with the various abilities. Forcing through the small dorks for such a cheap cost is potent reach and is probably sufficiently good that you won't see the other ability used all that often. The downside to Subira is that without supporting gribblies she is just a 2/3 haste and that is reasonably well under par. Overall I would liken her closest to Pia Nalaar in power. Subira is a little higher potential but has a little more risk. One for the test pile what with red having such obscene power in the three slot.









Sporeweb Weaver 2

A good little blocker that is for sure. This won't kill much but it will hold off loads and in sufficient style that it will manage to prevent a lot of attacking all together. You would need a hell of a lot of 2/1 dorks to be attacking into this profitably. Sadly this isn't covering enough ground. There is no threat or value to be had from this. It is just mild board control. Powerful but undesirable. Potentially there is some combo with it and Rite of Passage and Goblin Bombardment for the infinite life/sized spider!




Thieve's Guild Enforcer 3

Lots of potential here, in rogue decks, milling decks, and perhaps even flash decks. Sadly even with the mill there is just very little hope of this being a 3/2 enough of the time in my cube. The decks that fill up the bin quickly tend to delve or escape it away in short order. With those sorts of cards in abundance playing a card such as this is going to wind up badly for you.











Tempered Veteran 1

You can only play this for the first ability what with the second being so laughably poor. That makes this only a card you can play in a counters themed deck. Given that this card is pretty slow and pretty low powered too I do not expect this to see much, if any action.








Conclave Mentor 4

A Selesnya take on Winding Constrictor. The power is lower with less application and lower stats. The life gain isn't exactly exciting but it is something. You play this regardless when you can though. It is obviously only viable in a counters deck but it is the equivalent of a lord in such places and is one of your main sources of synergy and scaling. Nice to have other GX options to effectively open up the archetype. Too narrow for drafting with of course.






Goremand 1

Pretty poor to play normally and a little fair to bother cheating on. Close but not getting there for cube. Demon tribal?












Feline Sovereign 4

A good lord for a tribe that is starting to look pretty impressive. A bunch of good lords, a bunch of good one drops, a companion. Cats - coming to a top 10 tribal list near you!







Miscast 6.5

This is a blend of Spell Pierce, Dispel, Mystical Dispute and Flusterstorm. The latter being the closest comparison. This isn't a hard counter but it is close to it in cube, and for it's cost. It is pretty narrow in range but not prohibitively so. I only ever see Dispel in sideboards for example. Miscast is that sort of spell but it is far closer to the realms of the generally playable. I don't expect it to make it in my cube what with hitting neither walkers nor creatures but I can fully see it in a combo cube, in sideboards, and plenty of other places. It is a cheap, efficient and effective tool. Even if it is a bit of a poor man's Flusterstorm. To be fair to it, just so long as you don't actually need it to counter spells with storm Miscast is going to be the better spell most of the time.




Liliana's Steward 5

This is an odd card. It does have some perks over Raven's Crime or Ravenous Rats but for the most part it is weaker than both. A 1/2 zombie is bad without a lot of synergy. One black and one card to force a discard, the next turn, is a poor rate. And, you never get the benefit of the body and the discard. All that aside, this will see play. It is cheap and affords utility and potential synergy. When you can easily recur cheap dorks or zombies, when you specifically want dorks in the bin, all sorts of reasons this could be superior to alternatives. No where near the power of Stitcher's Supplier but a similar card in cost, type, and general supporting/synergy roles.

Core 2021 Preliminary Reviews Part VI

Idol of Endurance 2

I like this but it is far too narrow for cube. You cannot do anything with this before you have filled up your bin with cheap dorks. Even then you are getting one card and perhaps a tiny mana saving each turn there after. It is just far too slow and situational for cube use. Give me Dusk / Dawn over this please! Or some kind of Rally the Ancestors card.












Volcanic Salvo 1

A situational win more card. Unplayable without a big board and the scaling is too extreme. It is still expensive even when you have a pretty big board. The potential on this card is there but you can only sensibly run this is unusual decks with unusual support cards that will not happen in drafts, or at all often outside them for that matter. Very like Ghalta, when it is good you are winning, when it is bad it is because you have no hope of playing it.







Obsessive Stitcher 5

A bog standard Looter meets some kind of Doomed Necromancer or Hell's Caretaker. This is an all in one recursion tool, make it turn 3, loot turn 4, recur a fatty turn 5. Powerful but slow, and being gold also reduces the playability a bit too. With a lack of combo and reanimation themes in my main drafting cube I don't think this offers enough. In my combo cube though it might cut it despite being a little slow.









Alpine Houndmaster 6

This is surprisingly good. What I like most about this is that it is a Squadron Hawk style of card that works in singleton. That will be a really refreshing thing to play with. While neither the Cur nor the Watchdog are great cards they are not blanks either. They are cheap bodies and so you are happy enough playing them to empower your Ancestral Recall Houndmaster! Make no Mistake, drawing two sub par cards is still outstanding. There are of course issues. Firstly, you can't play this in a draft. Getting all the pieces is unlikely and super narrow. If you always have 8 ppl and have a small cube that uses all or most of the cube then you can run it but otherwise this is a card for constructed. The other issue is that in 40 card decks it is likely you will draw one of the targets before you play the Houndmaster. As the cards are subpar that does start to detract rather from the value of the Houndmaster. You replace a normal draw with lower quality and you are only drawing one card with Houndmaster. It is still very good, a powerful aggressive two drop that draws an OK card is Rogue Refiner levels of good. You empower it with looting effects, or better still reshuffle from hand effects. Sadly it is rare that you get to play Brainstorm in a Boros beaters deck. There is so much value here you are happy to play in control or midrange too, much like Cawblade! Easily making any tribal decks too. Lovely card to see made. Hope to see more such things. Wish I could rate above a 6 but kind of capped for cards you can't really run in cube drafts.




Traitorous Greed 1

An odd take on Threaten/Act of Treason. It costs both one more and one less! All told I cannot see much high end use for this short of untapping your own dorks and trying to generate mana. You just play the actually cheaper versions otherwise. Threaten effects are not very interesting in cube either.









Garruk's Uprising 6

This is very pushed. It is an Elemental Bond that has range reduced slightly for loads of other powerful effects. The first perk of giving all your dorks trample is huge, it makes most things a threat and turns this card from just a value tool into a reach one as well. It kind of feels like a planeswalker with entirely passive effects! The EtB trigger just works with the plan of this card and greatly reduces the risk. It is fine early with no trigger and fine late with a trigger but little fuel to subsequently dump into it. It also greatly increases the speed of the card and the ceiling. It doesn't force you into a line of play that is awkward in order to not suck. Absolutely this will do good work in fatty decks. The things is, you don't see all that many of those in cube presently. I think the limited supply of good 4 or more power dorks in my cube presently makes this a little narrow. One to watch for sure, probably even one I could support suitably at minimal cost. Really powerful and effective at it's job and a big boost to any fatty plan. I will get to testing this one for sure.



Light of Promise 1

I'm sure there is a combo for this somewhere but short of that we are not desperate for Pridemate redundancy enough for this to get a look in. While this is a fairly heavy payoff card in a lifegain deck it likes big life rather than just triggers meaning it fails to work well with a number of the other cards. It also is all take and no give. It needs a target, it needs lifegain and it isn't even a body. It is just lots of risk.










Lofty Denial 2

Probably limited to skies decks and pretty solid there, not far off a 1U hard counter. A really nice thing to pair with the likes of Spectral Sailor. It is fairly unrealistic to expect this to work out anywhere else that well.









Leafkin Avenger 0

Far to pricey and slow for a ramp card. The scaling for it is foolishly win more as well. It is at least a mana sink too but there are many better options. When there is an infinite mana combo in an elemental tribal shell then this card can come out to play.










Conspicuous Snoop 6

Aside from the simple two card combo this has this is a solid card for a goblin deck. I would look to play it in any of the ones with more value, utility, or mana production slants. Somewhat sadly this is rather foolish as a combo tool with Kikijikki which means that is probably the vast majority of what we see this thing doing in most formats. In modern it will be Harbinger, in Legacy it will be Recruiter or Brainstorm and Ponder supporting this.









Drowsing Tyrannodon 1

Tribal curve filler potential.















Burlfist Oak 0

Nearly a combo kill card but a bit pricey and slow. Needs some protection and trample to really bother pairing this with draw 7 effects.







Frantic Inventory 0

They like to keep teasing the lack of Accumulate Knowledge in singleton. At least they gave us singleton folk Alpine Houndmaster!













Transmogrify 3

Polymorph in red. It exiles too which is a mildly relevant difference. This will see some play in combo settings but that is it. Red is becoming the colour that does this sort of thing now rather than blue so this could well end up seeing more play than Polymorph in the years to come.






Heartfire Immolator 7.5

In almost every way this is an ungraded Emberhauler. It is easier to cast, has prowess, and can scale up the damage it does to things beyond two. Fairly easily on the latter scaling point too what with the prowess. All it fails to do is go face. A trade off I am happy to make given quite how much more card this is. A bit dull but doing everything right. Cheap, versatile, scalable, option rich, widely playable. Just a good solid cube dork.








Fiery Emancipation 6

This is rather silly! A whole lot of power but rather hard to work with. It is a six mana do nothing but you win so so quickly if you make it while you have things going on, or you have gas to follow it with and manage to survive. Shockingly I think this is worth testing. I think, and somewhat hope, that this fails to last but it really is quite extreme. It turns everything there is in red into a mental mental card. This represents vast, tempo, value and reach with not all that much else. Just having a Seal of Fire in play, a Fireblast in hand and ramping out this is a legitimate plan and not all that hard to set up