Invasion of Ravnica

This is a 5-mana removal spell that can deal with most creatures. There will occasionally be something it can’t deal with, but that’s fine. Especially because removing something might also enable you to attack the Invasion right away, which means sometimes this will feel like a 5-mana 5/5 that removes something on ETB, and it even has some additional upside! You probably won’t trigger the creature’s effect all that often, but you’re getting a good deal even if this is vanilla. It won’t always work that way of course, but the floor here is some nice removal, and the ceiling is amazing.

Aerial Boost

This is the kind of trick you always need to keep in mind, because your opponent will be able to cast this even with no lands untapped! It offers a reasonable boost and the upside of sometimes just letting a creature get in there because of Flying.

Alabaster Host Intercessor

This is a large version of Banisher Priest, and while it isn’t the most efficient thing ever, that’s still a strong effect. What makes it especially nice, though, is that it has Plainscycling. This means if you draw this early when you are really far from casting it, you can get rid of it and search up a land. This really offsets the downside of this being a 6-mana card. Basically, this gets a land when you need it, and if you have the mana to cast it, it is going to have a big impact on the board. I think this is one of White’s best Commons.

Alabaster Host Sanctifier

We have seen quite a few two mana 2/2s with Lifelink at this point, and they’re always fine. The set almost prominently features a +1/+1 mechanic in White, which might even make it a little better than usual.

Angelic Intervention

Two mana for a counter and protection gives your creature the ability to both dodge removal spells and succeed in combat more often.

Archangel Elspeth

I’ve seen people be pretty down on this card for constructed, but don’t let that cloud your mind for Limited – this is a bomb. The +1 creates a great body to protect Elspeth, and the -2 offers a huge boost to one of your creatures, and is capable of making any creature into a threat. Elspeth, use that -2 and then she dies, you’re going to come out ahead. If she sticks around and can pump out a token army until she gets to her ultimate, you’ll also be really happy.

Attentive Skywarden

This has passable base stats, and sometimes it will let you transform an incubator for free.

Bola Slinger

This type of creature is always nice in an aggro deck, since getting blockers out of the way really changes how well you can attack. So, this is either a 4-mana 3/3 with this ability, or a 4-mana 2/2 that puts a counter on something else and gives it that ability right away.

Boon-Bringer Valkyrie

A 5-mana 4/4 with these keywords is already pretty close to a bomb, so the fact that you get to put a counter on something and give it those same keywords until end of turn really means this is a bomb. It gives you some serious value up front, so even if it goes down, you’re going to be coming out ahead most of the time, and if it doesn’t go down – you’re just going to win.

Cut Short

This is decent removal, especially because it can show up out of nowhere when you’re tapped out. It is restrictive enough that I do think it falls a bit short of premium

Dusk Legion Duelist

There’s enough +1/+1 counter stuff in White for this to be an excellent card, especially because at worst you’re getting a two mana 2/2 with Vigilance

Elesh Norn

A 4-mana ⅗ with Vigilance would usually make the cut, and Elesh Norn of course brings a lot more than that to the table. Taxing your opponent for doing damage to you or your stuff is great upside, and if you manage to transform her it is going to be very hard for your opponent to win. Chapter I effectively gives you 5 2/2 tokens, and that means that chapter II and III are going to be even more insane. Her front side isn’t quite a bomb on its own, but her transformation is quite doable

Elspeth's Smite

This offers a pretty amazing rate, and even shuts down death triggers and other graveyard shenanigans. It is situational of course, but I think the efficiency makes up for that enough for this to sneak into “premium removal” range.

Enduring Bondwarden

A one mana ½ that puts its counter somewhere when it dies is playable in this format because there are so many nice payoffs for doing things with counters. The ability to put the counter elsewhere is good too, and you can even get away with attacking into a trade if you have Backed up the creature, because if your opponent blocks you’re going to come out ahead since you keep all those counters

Golden-Scale Aeronaut

A 5-mana ¾ with Flying is acceptable, and that’s the floor here. The ability to put the counter on something else and give it flying for a turn will usually be what you want to do

Guardian of Ghirapur

A three mana 3/3 with flying is still a very good rate, and sometimes this will even flicker something for value. You can even use this to get a blocker out of the way temporarily, so it will almost always do something.

Heliod, the Radiant Dawn

For the front side to be worth it on its own, you’re going to need to have some Enchantments in your graveyard, and that is not a foregone conclusion. The good news is, any deck is going to be able to transform Heliod, which basically makes it a 4-mana 4/4 with big upside – which makes for a great card! Giving all your spells Flash and making them cost at least 1 less during your opponent’s turn is incredible!

Infected Defector

This has some pretty bad stats for the cost, but getting an Incubator when it dies makes this a solid playable.

Inspired Charge

We see this all the time, and its always a build around-type card that works great in decks that can go wide, and pretty bad everywhere else. The good news is, both Red/White and Blue/White look like they’ll be interested in this.

Invasion of Belenon

This Battle makes you overpay a bit for a 2/2 with Vigilance, but that is a body that can help you pressure your opponent and transform this into an Anthem, which is a powerful thing.

Invasion of Dominaria

Three mana for 4 life and a card isn’t the worst deal ever, and you have the potential to get a Serra Angel. Obviously that’s insane value for the investment, but I do think it will take some work to transform this.

Invasion of Gobakhan

The effect this has on the front side does tend to have diminishing returns the longer the game goes on, as the extra tax matters less and less. Furthermore, it ultimately doesn’t even give you a 1-for-1 trade, since your opponent likely gets the spell back later Still, in the early game this can really derail your opponent and in an indirect sort of way this can allow you transform this a little more easily – but I think that’s a little too indirect. This does only have 3 defense, and once transformed it is pretty insane, allowing your board to get massive in a hurry. I think the low defense and the power of this once transformed do enough to balance the card out so that it’s actually pretty good.

Invasion of Theros

This doesn’t seem very good for Limited. Tutoring for three mana is a hugely underwhelming effect, and this isn’t exactly a format where you’ll have tons of things you can grab with this effect anyway. Obviously Ephara can be very powerful if you get there, but again, this isn’t really a Theros set where this would be completely insane. Instead, it just seems okay. What you get to start with isn’t great, and the payoff for transforming this is pretty medium.

Kithkin Billyrider

A three mana 1/3 with Double Strike is actually a pretty nice rate. It is incredibly hard to attack through or block in the early game, and it is a great place to put all your +1/+1 counters.

Knight of the New Coalition

4-mana for two 2/2s with Vigilance is an excellent rate – this helps you go wide like the RW deck wants you to do, while also producing two bodies with a very useful creature type. I think this looks like a very good Common.

Knight-Errant of Eos

It feels like you’ll be able to draw at least one card with this often enough for this to be pretty good. What’s great is you can tap all your creatures when you play this, and as long as you have a lot of mana left over, you’re likely going to be able to cast at least one creature you draw with the ETB ability. This makes the risk of Convoking a lot lower! The only downside here is you won’t always have the bodies in play to really go to town with this, but I think you’ll be able to do it often enough that it looks quite good to me.

Kor Halberd

I like the efficiency here. +1/+1 and Vigilance isn’t a boost that set’s the world on fire, but when you can get it with a one mana Equip cost, I’m definitely interested.

Monastery Mentor

If you’re casting non-creature spells, this will build a Prowess army that is very difficult to overcome. That said, it does start out as fairly inefficient, and if you don’t get this down before you cast your spells, it doesn’t feel great.

Norn's Inquisitor

This looks really good. It is sort of a 4-mana 1/1 that gives you a 3/3, and still has the additional upside of helping anything that transforms into a Phyrexian. Note this works not only with the Incubator tokens but also all the cards that transform using Phyrexian mana, so there are a wide swath of cards this makes better, and it already has a great baseline.

Phyrexian Awakening

On its own, you get a 5-mana 4/4 with Vigilance, and you can pay for it in installments. That’s not a bad deal, especially when this can also give some of your other creatures Vigilance. Vigilance seems pretty well positioned in the format too, because creatures with it can attack battles and defend them at the same time.

Phyrexian Censor

This has decent base stats, and you’ll be able to make this effect one-sided enough, especially in Black-White, that this seems like a solid card.

Progenitor Exarch

Even if you just pay three total mana for this, it is really good, and obviously it can scale the longer the game goes on. This is basically a one man army, and it does a great job of making it easier to transform your Incubators.

Realmbreaker's Grasp

White’s usual premium Common removal spell Is here! It shuts down most creatures entirely, though as usual cards with static ability, sacrifice effects, and bounce effects hurt when you play this card – and those things are in this set, of course.

Scrollshift

There’s definitely some nice stuff you can flicker in the format, and adding “Draw a card” here helps offset the times where this doesn’t really do anything. Still, this is a build around. You shouldn’t really be playing this if your deck doesn’t have some ETBs to abuse, because only utilizing this as a card that can save a creature from removal is a little too narrow.

Seal from Existence

Wow this is a good Oblivion Ring variant. It is harder to cast than Oblivion Ring, but the Ward 3 upside is very, very nice. It always stinks when your opponent manages to have the removal to hit your Enchantment, but this makes it a lot less likely they’ll be able to do that in the early game, and even in the late game that 3 mana tax can really soften the blow.

Seraph of New Capenna

A three mana 2/2 Flyer isn’t what it used to be, but when it is the baseline for a card with big upside, it still feels pretty good – and that’s certainly what we have here! The Seraph of New Phyrexia can attack really hard.

Sigiled Sentinel

A three mana 3/3 with Vigilance is something you usually play, especially when the creature has a useful creature type – so the upside of putting the counter elsewhere and giving something vigilance for a turn makes this quite attractive.

Sun-Blessed Guardian

A two mana 2/2 is underwhelming these days, but this transforms into a creature who can be a major problem, and the fact it requires Phyrexian mana means you can end up only paying 5 for it – and you can do it even if you never have Red. The base form of the card is underwhelming enough that this isn’t amazing, but it isn’t really a two drop you’ll ever cut either.

Sunder the Gateway

So at worst, this is a two mana 2/2, and sometimes you’ll have another Incubator around who is bigger, and you’ll choose to turn that one into a creature. That’s probably usually what this will do, because there aren’t a boatload of targets for this in the format. When you do get to kill an artifact or Enchantment with this it will feel like a pretty sweet 2-for-1, and I think the baseline is solid. Having Artifact and Enchantment hate in your main deck is nice too.

Sunfall

A removal spell that makes sure you’re ahead when the dust clears is always good, and that’s certainly what we have here, as you’re likely to end up with a fairly large creature. It even exiles the creatures, so pesky death triggers and recursion aren’t things you need to worry about. One thing you do need to worry about: Whether or not your opponent has some incubator tokens lying around, since this won’t hit those if they haven’t transformed. Still, this seems like a bomb.

Surge of Salvation

Granting hexproof to your creatures can be a good way to combat removal for sure, but when we’ve seen similar one mana cards actually be worth playing, they have also granted indestructibility. So you really need a card like this to also save a creature in combat consistently – not just save it from removal – and it looks like this will only do that against black or red creatures. In short, the floor is quite low, low enough that I don’t think I want to start with this in my main deck.

Swordsworn Cavalier

A two mana 3/1 is usually a borderline playable in Limited, and this will have First Strike a big chunk of the time. If you play this on turn two, and a knight on turn three, your opponent really has no hope of blocking effectively.

Tarkir Duneshaper

A one mana ½ isn’t very good on its own, but the fact this can become a 4/3 trampler later in the game does mean it tends to have relevance most of the time.

Tiller of Flesh

The stats aren’t great, but the trigger is pretty good. However, I’m not sure you’ll be targeting things enough in this format for this to really go wild. Notably, it only counts spells that target, and not abilities like Backup. If you have a critical mass of removal and combat tricks this can do a pretty good job, but the floor is pretty bad.

Zhalfirin Lancer

This will often be able to attack as a 4/4 with Vigilance which is pretty nice. Lots of cards make Knight tokens too, so it may get buffed more than once! It has a very reasonable floor too, so it is a quality card.

Artistic Refusal

Paying six for this is in no way worth it, but with Convoke around you can really discount this – heck, if your board is wide enough this can effectively be a free counterspell that gives you some card selection! Still, the set up cost is real – this is pretty bad in the early stages of the game when you can’t get your board set up, and counterspells are inherently quite narrow in Limited. Still, the option to make the cost much lower and the fact you can even just choose the draw two discard 1 option in a pinch makes it at least a solid card.

Assimilate Essence

This is kind of a cool design. Early it can counter the majority of cards in your opponent’s deck, and fairly efficiently too – and then later in the game if they can pay it, you at least get a consolation prize. Obviously the better mode is actually countering the thing, but at least it isn’t utterly useless in other situations.

Astral Wingspan

Auras can be really dangerous to use when they don’t give you some sort of value like that, because if your opponent can deal with the creature you put it on, you just got 2-for-1’d and there’s a good chance you’re going to lose. Now, you still have to be careful about when you use this, since they can still respond by removing the creature you target, but as long as you pick the right spot, this is going to feel pretty nice. +2/+2 and Flying is a boost that makes almost any creature into a problem, and Convoke makes casting this even easier.

Captive Weird

This looks good. A one mana ⅓ with Defender isn’t exactly impressive, but this transforms quite easily. You can play it on turn one and block a little bit, and you effectively get to draw a card when it transforms. Because of Phyrexian Mana, in the later part of the game you can look at this as a 4-mana 3/3 you pay 2 life for that draws you that card, which is also great. So yeah, this is good whether you do it all at once or in installments.

Change the Equation

The base level of this card isn’t very good, since most opponents won’t really have enough spells this can counter. Obviously, against Red and/or Green opponents it is great, but the floor is pretty bad.

Chrome Host Seedshark

This has great base stats and has the ability to give you a whole lot of creature tokens, and is certainly a must-kill threat as a result. Obviously it is best suited to Blue-Red, but it is going to be really good in any deck that plays it. I think this is a bomb.

Complete the Circuit

This asks for a lot of things to go right for it to be effective. You need to be able to convoke it, because if you just pay the usual 6 mana for it, you’re unlikely to also be able to play a spell. The good news is that it its an Instant, so using it at the end of your opponent’s turn and casting a spell – even a Sorcery, isn’t a stretch. Basically, If you have enough spells worth copying, this is something you’ll probably play. Problem is, I don’t think it is a foregone conclusion that every Blue deck in the format will be able to use this card, so I think it probably needs a build around. If you’re in Blue-Red – the deck that’s about spells and Convoke – this fits your deck perfectly. If you’re not, you probably won’t be playing it.

Corruption of Towashi

This looks like a very strong payoff for transforming things, and it comes with a built-in way to draw you that first card. On its own, that makes this a 7-mana 4/4 that draws you a card. That isn’t…amazing, but it is a passable baseline! Plus, as with all of these, you pay in installments and it offers some extra upside. That said, if you aren’t in a deck that really got there on transforming creatures, this probably isn’t very good.

Disturbing Conversion

Blue-Black is interested in milling both players, so this seems like a decent card for that type of deck. Only lowering a creature’s power is pretty far from actually removing that creature, but this does enable your other graveyard stuff reasonably well.

Ephara's Dispersal

One mana to bounce an attacking creature and Surveil 2 is quite the deal, so the fact you can also target non attacking creatures for 3 mana is nice. Most of the time you don’t get an actual trade, but the card selection and tempo are nice, and the times where you do cast this in response to a trick or something will feel truly amazing.

Expedition Lookout

This is a two drop that lots of creatures can’t attack through, and eventually it becomes an unblockable 2/3. That’s pretty nice, because it might take awhile before you get there – since it can’t be blocked, it will be relevant on any board.

Eyes of Gitaxias

You can sort of look at this as a 5-mana 3/3 that draws you a card, and you can pay for it in installments. That’s not too bad, but it isn’t exactly something special either.

Faerie Mastermind

A two mana 2/1 with Flash and Flying is a great spot to start, and if you use the activated ability on your opponent’s turn, it basically reads “Draw two cards, your opponent draws one card” and that’s pretty strong. Should your opponent decide to draw extra cards by other means, you’ll also punish them for it.

Furtive Analyst

Paying 2 to loot is kind of a lot – it is hard to have that kind of mana available consistently, and while a three mana ¼ with Vigilance is acceptable, the whole package here seems a little overcosted.

Halo-Charged Skaab

This has some bad stats, and I don’t love the ETB ability either. Blue-Black is definitely interested in milling both players and getting value out of it, and this certainly does that, but putting a card on top of your library is always worse than it seems at first.

Invasion of Arcavios

A 5 mana tutor is awful, and while this does became quite powerful if you manage to defeat it, the fact it doesn’t do much up front to help you get there is a problem, especially because it has 7 defense.

Invasion of Kamigawa

Stunning something for a turn is a nice effect, especially when it can help you more quickly get Rooftop Saboteurs on the battlefield. Once you’ve done that, you have a great creature that will net you impressive card advantage.

Invasion of Segovia

Three mana for two 1/1s isn’t the worst rate, especially because there is a lot of Blue Convoke in the set, and they can help you attack this battle and get a very nice creature.

Invasion of Vryn

A Sorcery speed Sift isn’t a terrible card, though if this is a format where you really need to add more meaningfully to the board, it might be a little bit too clunky. The things this transforms into also isn’t amazing, but if you double a removal spell with it, it will certainly feel pretty good.

Jin-Gitaxias

Transforming this in Limited isn’t going to be super easy, but that’s okay – a 5-mana 5/5 with Ward 2 that draws you extra cards is still really great, and on the off chance you do manage to flip it into a Saga, well – you’re just going to win the game on the spot. The extra cards Jin-Gitaxias helps you draw can help you get there, but generally in Limited if you’re holding on to that many cards, you’re going to fall way behind.

Meeting of Minds

This is an Instant, which is kind of a big deal – in many situations it can be a better version of Divination, and in a format with a spell deck that is good at convoking, this seems like exactly what the doctor ordered. You probably don’t want too many of them, as they can get awkward in multiples. But I think the first copy is something you want.

Moment of Truth

This is a nice upgrade on Anticipate, since now you get to put something in your graveyard. It still isn’t amazing, but if you’re a deck interested in spells or the graveyard, it will be something you play

Negate

In most formats, this is something that should stay in your sideboard, because there just aren’t enough targets. This format does have a new non-creature card type in Battle, and I think that’s enough for this to be a little more playable, though it is probably still better as a sideboard card.

Oculus Whelp

A 4-mana 3/2 Flyer is a little below rate these days, but if this is replacing itself when it dies it does get significantly better. Oftentimes the problem with casting something that costs 4+ mana and has 2 or less toughness is that your opponent can get an easy tempo advantage when they point a one or two mana removal spell at it, but this hedges against that a little when you have a transformed permanent around, since getting the 2-for-1 makes that feel a little less awful. Still, even in the Blue-Green deck you won’t always be able to get this going, and the baseline just isn’t very good.

Omen Hawker

This format does have a decent number of activated abilities, between Incubate and creatures who can transform for some amount of mana. Accelerating those things is definitely nice, but it still feels like this might be a little too narrow, even in this format.

Oracle of Tragedy

The loot ETB will be useful the most often, but it doesn’t hurt to have the other option. Either way, this isn’t much more than filler.

Order of the Mirror

A two mana 2/1 is below rate these days, but this can transform the turn after you play it, and a 3/3 with this ability does tend to stay relevant for most of the game.

Preening Champion

This helps you do Convoke stuff in addition to having the Knight creature type, and it is just a really good rate in general. This is one of Blue’s best Commons.

Protocol Knight

The baseline here is a little bit below rate, but a creature that comes down and stuns something usually plays quite well in Limited, since you add to the board and really downgrade your opponent’s board. If you’re in Blue-White setting this up so it does that is going to feel great. It will feel well above rate when you can pull that off. I I think the gap in how good this is wide enough that I’m going to give it a build around grade.

Rona, Herald of Invasion

Even if you have no ways to untap her in your deck, the front side is an upgraded Merfolk Looter, and that’s a pretty darn good card. Looting is a great way to drastically improve your card quality, especially when you do it over time. Once transformed, she gets a much more relevant body, and her ability does make it a pain for your opponent to interact with her in any way. The bummer will come when your opponent doesn’t have a whole lot going on in their hand, but the threat of that ability is very real even when they only have one card

Saiba Cryptomancer

Been awhile since they gave us a creature at a lower rarity that just straight up has Hexproof, and I’m not sure how I feel about it! Obviously, this can lend hexproof to another creature temporarily, but because this always has Hexproof this might just be a case where you’d rather take the two mana ½ Hexproof since your opponent won’t be dealing with it that well. This is a spicy place to put +1/+1 counters and Auras, and there are going to be some games determined by someone just sticking an Aura on this in the early game and going to town.

See Double

Making a token copy of any creature at Instant speed is really great, and copying spells can be powerful too. If you ever get to do both, this will feel truly insane.

Skyclave Aerialist

I’m already sold on a two mana 2/1 Flyer, so the fact this can transform into a more durable creature that nets you a card is amazing upside.

Stasis Field

This type of removal never feels great. This is mostly because it allows your opponent to hold on to at least some value from their creature. Sure, the best it can do most of the time is chump block, and that may not sound like much, but that makes this a lot worse than it might look.

Temporal Cleansing

A Sorcery that always did this for four mana would probably be a 1.5. It is definitely removal, but very clunky, and the fact it can’t be a more permanent answer for many creatures is definitely a problem.

Thunderhead Squadron

Even if you only tap one creature to help you cast this, you’re getting a passable deal. If you can cast this for significantly less, it will feel even better.

Tidal Terror

This 6-mana 5/6 plays well with all the token stuff going on in Blue/white, as it can sometimes be unblockable. Islandcycling is a great thing to have, as it allows you to throw this away in the early game so that you hit your land drop, and if you play it late, it isn’t a bad threat to have.

Transcendent Message

This will be a little easier to cast than it looks. Normally quadruple Blue can be really scary in a two-color Limited deck, but as long as you have some Blue creatures, you can pay for some of those Blue mana symbols. This still looks quite mana intensive, and it of course doesn’t impact the board, but the upside of granting extreme card advantage is intriguing.

Wicked Slumber

As usual, the best way to use this sort of thing is to tap your opponent’s stuff during their turn so that you get two attacks where those creatures are out of commission. This can often win you the game on its own, and the fact you can convoke this means casting it will be extra easy. Its also nice that you can choose a couple of different ways to use this. It always taps two creatures, but you can put one stun counter on each creature, or two on one creature if that’s better.

Xerex Strobe-Knight

This has an excellent baseline as a Vigilance Wind Drake, and you’ll be able to spit a token out with it often enough for this to deliver some impressive value.

Zephyr Singer

This looks great. It has a nice baseline as a 4-mana ¾ with Flying and Vigilance, and the upside of sometimes costing less mana and giving flying to things is pretty amazing. It also means it will often leave value behind on the board even if it is killed right away.

Zhalfirin Shapecraft

This is a nice trick, not too different from Suit Up, a Blue trick that performed really well in the past. It probably isn’t quite as good – that cost one more mana but made the creature a 4/5, and that was a size that could win combat with almost everything, where as a 4/3 can sometimes be a little too small to survive combat – and that’s what you really want here to get a sweet 2-for-1. Still, it is relatively cheap, can create 2-for-1s, and plays well with +1/+1 counters which this set certainly has.

Aetherblade Agent

A two mana 1/1 with deathtouch is a little bit below rate, but it does trade for anything, and the creature this can become late is a big problem for your opponent.

Archpriest of Shadows

Without Backup, this card would still be good. It demands to be blocked or you get a ton of value, and because it has death touch those blocks are going to be hard to set up effectively. So, adding Backup is a huge deal, as it can give you both of those abilities on something that can attack right away. This gets especially good if you use it on an evasive creature. If you get only one creature back, you’re going to feel great – any more than that, and you’re just going to win.

Ayara, Widow of the Realm

Just the frontside is a really strong card. Giving up creatures or artifacts to drain the opponent’s life is a great way to close out a game. There will be situations where you can’t take full advantage of that ability, but the baseline is still a three mana 3/3 – and the card still has some other upside! If you’re in a spot where the ability on the front isn’t doing anything, you can simply transform Ayara, and she can help you do some damage by bringing back creatures or artifacts.

Bladed Battle-Fan

+1/+0 and indestructible isn’t a terrible trick-like effect, because it saves a creature in combat while helping them punch up, and it saves the creature from most removal too. Any time a card can do both of those they end up seeing play. The Equipment itself definitely isn’t exciting after the turn you cast it, and that does make it awkward in some situations, but the threat this presents as a trick is nice, and its flexible too.

Blightreaper Thallid

You get a 2/2 upfront, and then on the next turn you have the option of making this a 3/3 and getting a 1/1. That’s a pretty nice thing to have around if you don’t have anything to do with three mana, and at some point you’re certainly going to have the time to transform this. It isn’t the most massive upgrade ever, but you do end up getting two Saprolings and a 3/3 in the long run.

Bloated Processor

Notably, this is a free sacrifice ability, and those always play quite impressively. It makes it a real pain to ever know what’s going to happen when this is on the battlefield. Now, it does restrict the effect to only Phyrexians, but if you’re in Black-White that will be most of your creatures. It can gobble up the plentiful incubator tokens too, although they do need to be transformed. But yeah, even if you have 0 other Phyrexians in your deck, we’re talking about a three mana 3/2 that leaves a body behind, which is already great.

Breach the Multiverse

7 mana to reanimate the best things in your graveyard and your opponent’s isn’t bad. Because it mills ten cards, you are reasonably likely to get back at least 7 mana worth of value, and the card selection you get should be powerful. One kind of cool thing about this is that if the game is late enough that both players are low on cards, you can also cast this to mill your opponent out, and they will draw before you do! This is expensive for sure, but it does feel like it will be able to pull you ahead from behind in most situations.

Collective Nightmare

This is a great deal whichever way you cast it. Without Convoke this would be good. With it, its great.

Compleated Huntmaster

You can sort of look at this as paying 3 mana, sacrificing something, and getting a 3/3 – that wouldn’t be a bad deal, and this is better because you can pay for the Incubator on a separate turn. This doesn’t have the worst stats for a card with this strong of an ability, either. Cards like this really make it feel like the sacrifice deck in this format is going to have some legs

Consuming Aetherborn

Giving a counter and lifelink until end of turn to something on ETB isn’t too bad, but a 4-mana 3/3 with Lifelink is not a good deal. It sort of feels like both options are a little overcosted here.

Corrupted Conviction

If you have expendable creatures, this is pretty good – and it always has the mode of allowing you to use it after you block or your creature is targeted with removal. If you’re only using it in those situations it definitely gets worse and more narrow, though – ideally, you consistently have bodies around you can always sacrifice and feel good about it, which gives this more room to shine.

Deadly Derision

We’ve seen this card at Sorcery speed before, and it was pretty good. As an Instant, it gets significantly better! This is easily premium removal, and pretty much a lock to be one of Black’s best Commons, if not the best.

Dreg Recycler

Life drain does a great job of helping you stay alive while also pressuring your opponent, and it even has passable stats.

Etched Familiar

Trading this off and draining 2 life from your opponent is going to feel like a good deal all the time, and it isn’t terrible sacrifice fodder either.

Etched Host Doombringer

This is an interesting design. Obviously the stats are bad, but even if this could only drain 2 life on ETB it would probably be playable, so having this Battle upside is pretty nice. If you can use this to defeat a battle and transform it, its going to feel pretty close to a 2-for-1 – and the fact you can also use it to subtract counters from your battles or add counters to your opponents battles is pretty sweet. If you can use this to defeat a battle on ETB, it is going to feel pretty close to a 2-for-1

Failed Conversion

This isn’t a terrible rate - against most creatures it will be a 5-mana spell that kills the creature and then you Surveil 2. It also isn’t premium, though, as a 5-mana sorcery speed removal spell should probably be able to kill more stuff!

Final Flourish

This is a nice removal spell. The base card is probably a C, but the kicker upside here is massive. As we’ve seen, Black has good sacrifice outlets and lots of other good reasons to sacrifice creatures, so this card will be right at home in that type of deck. That said, this will probably only be capable of -2/-2 a little too often to be an amazing removal spell.

Flitting Guerrilla

Wind Drakes aren’t what they used to be, and this ability is something you’ll only use a small percentage of the time.

Gift of Compleation

You can sort of look at this as a 4-mana 3/3 with this Surveil effect. Obviously, it is better than that, because you can pay in installments and the Surveil effect sticks around even if the creature goes down

Glistening Deluge

This card annoys me. Mostly because it ends up being even more narrow than the other cards in this cycle. This is because it has a symmetrical effect, which means if you’re playing Black-White or Black-Green you really don’t want to play this or even side it in. If you’re in one of the other three Black decks, it is a nice sideboard card that might sometimes be a one-sided wrath, but the base effect does seem underpowered enough that it should still start in your sideboard

Gloomfang Mauler

When you actually cast this thing, it has a big impact on the board – either coming down as a monstrous 7/7 with Menace, or coming down as a 5/5 that gives something else two counters as well as Menace until end of turn. This gives it the ability to immediately impact the board when it comes down, while still sporting a sizable and problematic body. The downside here is that you just don’t always get 7 mana in Limited, but this makes sure that isn’t too much of a problem for you, since you can just pitch it to search up a Swamp if that’s what you need to do

Grafted Butcher

There are lots of Phyrexians in this set, including all the Incubate tokens, so a Phyrexian lord is already fairly well positioned! Offering +1/+1 and one turn of menace to your Phyrexians is going to have a big impact on a lot of boards, and the Butcher doesn’t stay dead either!

Hoarding Broodlord

This looks really good. Getting it down to six isn’t a big ask, and once you’re doing that you’re getting a super efficient flying threat that also searches up your best card and lets you cast that card with Convoke. If the Broodlord dies, you still have access to the card too!

Ichor Drinker

This one drop brings a lot of value. A one mana 1/1 with Lifelink isn’t amazing, but in a format with +1/+1 counters around, among other ways to augment your creatures, it will probably play a little better than it looks. Additionally, if you mill this thing in your Blue-Black deck, or it ends up in your graveyard in any other way, it does deliver some real value in the format of the incubate token. One drops lately have pretty much all overperformed, and I think this is another one that will. It is really cheap and does stuff that all the decks in the format can take advantage of.

Ichor Shade

Its nice that this looks at both graveyard, as sometimes when we see this sort of effect it only checks yours. This will gain a counter on a significant number of turns, especially if you’re a Sacrifice deck. It does have a pretty bad baseline, but I you can definitely hold this and then play it in second main phase after something dies, and it will quickly become a ¾, and things can go crazy from there.

Invasion of Eldraine

Overcosted Mind Rot is not a good starting point. It will feel nice if you play it early and you get that 2-for-1, but not adding to the board is definitely a problem, as is how bad this is as a top deck in many situations. It does synergize with itself though, because once transformed it punishes the opponent for having too few cards in hand. Still, I don’t see the front side delivering enough value, or assisting enough in transforming it, that I see this as being something great. Obviously, if you always got the creature and the effect for 4 mana it would be nuts, but I have some doubts that can be accomplished.

Invasion of Fiora

A six mana modal Wrath is pretty nice, especially because you’ll be able to choose an option that works the best for you. It can get awkward of course in a deck that is interested in curving out and winning quickly, but a card like this can reshape the game in a way few other cards can. Now, it is likely to be harder to transform this than some of the other Battles, because if you just nuked the board, it isn’t likely you can do 4 damage really easily. There might be the occasional situation where you can blow up your opponents only blockers and hold on to your legendary creature who can attack it right away, but I wouldn’t count on that lining up perfectly.

Invasion of Innistrad

The Battle here is a great removal spell, and the fact it has Flash also works really well with how Battles work. Your opponent doesn’t know it is coming, so you’re likely to produce a situation where they aren’t prepared to defend it. That, plus removal that kills basically anything, means that attacking this and transforming it in one or two turns is very doable. In other words, this is going to feel like a 4-mana removal spell that also makes two 2/2 tokens on your next turn, and that’s just crazy.

Invasion of Ulgrotha

5 mana to do 3 to anything and gain 3 is already playable, so like most of the Battles this has a decent enough baseline. Keep in mind this can even hit other battles! If you transform this, you end up a fairly imposing creature, though on some boards she won’t exactly feel insane.

Merciless Repurposing

6 mana is a lot, even for removal – mostly because you end up paying more than your opponent did for their creature a lot of the time, and that tempo hit can be rough. However, this is an Instant, and it gives you something that will eventually be a creature. If you have 8 mana lying around, this will feel like an 8-mana 3/3 that exiles something on ETB, and the fact you can spread it out in two installments is nice.

Mirrodin Avenged

This is a functional reprint of You Are Already Dead, which we saw in Kamigawa: Neon Dynasty. That card was kind of underwhelming. When it worked, you got a pretty sweet 2-for-1. It can’t really be an amazing card though, because there aren’t enough situations where you can do damage to something without already having to give up a card. If you can do that, this gets a lot better.

Nezumi Freewheeler

A 4-mana 3/3 Menace isn’t amazing, but this can also give you a bit of graveyard value. Getting cards in the opponent’s graveyard has some upside to it in Black in this format too. This can also transform the turn after you play it into a very exciting creature that can take advantage of the graveyard quite effectively.

Nezumi Informant

Adding to the board and taking an opposing card is pretty sweet. This isn’t exactly Virus Beetle though, which is probably the best version of these we’ve ever seen. That particular card happened to be an Artifact in a format where that mattered, and it was also in a format with lots of Ninjas so it was easier to abuse the ETB. In this format this does provide some decent sacrifice fodder, since it gives you a 1-for-1 up front, but it does have diminishing returns the longer that games go on.

Phyrexian Gargantua

This is a nice reprint. It is basically two Phyrexian Ragers! It has the potential be a three-for-one, and the trade off is playing something below-rate that also hurts you a little bit. Still, the first copy of this seems like a solid inclusion.

Pile On

This is an amazon removal spell. 4 mana to destroy a creature or planeswalker and surveil 2 is already premium, so the fact you can Convoke this – meaning sometimes you can cast it even when you’re tapped out – makes the card amazing.

Render Inert

You can use this to “defeat” a battle, which is probably the strongest thing you can do with it – and you can also use it to get rid of an incubator token in most cases, and there are a variety of other random uses in the format too. The fact it replaces itself is nice, but I still feel like this is probably too narrow to make the cut very often.

Scorn-Blade Berserker

This is either a one mana ½ with this ability, or a one mana 0/1 that puts a counter somewhere and gives the ability to something else for a turn. Neither of those seems…amazing. Generally you don’t want to sacrifice a creature you just put a counter on, so that part of the ability is a bit awkward. I think the idea is to put that counter on something and then sacrifice the Berserker though – in which case this is sort of a two mana sorcery that puts a counter on something and draws you a card, and that’s a playable card! It has far more flexibility than that too.

Sheoldred

This has great base stats, and while her ETB isn’t great in the later stages of the game, it certainly subtracts from your opponent’s board in some way or another. Like with the rest of these, transforming this isn’t exactly easy, but by the late game it is pretty likely you’ll be able to turn her into a Saga, and you may get it done even earlier if you’re playing Blue-Black -- and once this is a Saga, it is going to be pretty hard for you to lose.

Tenured Oilcaster

A 4-mana 2/4 Menace isn’t too bad, so if you add in the fact it mills you and pays you off for milling is pretty nice. The times when this is a 5/4 menace for 4 will feel pretty nice!

Traumatic Revelation

Hitting creatures and battles means you can hit most nonlands in your opponent’s deck, and if you wiff you sort of end up with a Hill Giant. While that’s not awesome, the main problem with discard spells is how weak they are when you get them late or you wiff, and the consolation prize is enough here for this to be a 1.5. Basically you get the upside discard spells offer with very minimal downside.

Unseal the Necropolis

Black usually gets a nice common that returns creatures from your graveyard to your hand, and this looks like a really good version of that to me. Milling three for both players gets your pretty close to meeting the “reverse threshold” type requirements that several cards have, and it also increases your chance of being able to get back two creatures. It is also an Instant which isn’t something we often see. This means you can use this on the end of your opponent’s turn, and then cast something you get back on your turn which is nice. You don’t usually want more than one of these, because they are so bad in the early game – but honestly, the first copy of this card looks like a must-have for most Black decks, and especially Black-Blue.

Vanquish the Weak

This can sometimes trade up, but more often than not you break even on mana or worse when you cast this – for me, that keeps it from being a premium-level removal spell – instead it is merely solid.

Akki Scrapchomper

I’d generally rather be able to sacrifice creatures than lands, since there are so many good expendable ones out there. Sure, if you have too many lands this provides flood insurance, but it is a pretty mediocre card early and not even that good in the late game.

Beamtown Beatstick

+1/+0 and Menace isn’t a terrible boost for the casting and equip cost here, and the fact it gives you treasure will also mean it will be a little easier to move around than it might look at first. Seems like a solid inclusion for Red aggro decks.

Bloodfeather Phoenix

This is a nice aggressive two drop, and it has the upside of coming back from the graveyard. Triggering that upside isn’t necessarily going to be that easy, though. First, you need to target damaging spells at players and battles, and while you’ll do that, you’ll certainly find yourself wanting to remove creatures with them more often. Basically, you can get this back, but it won’t be automatic, or even close to it.

Burning Sun's Fury

As a trick, this isn’t especially good. +2/+0 might help a creature take down something bigger, but you still end up losing your creature in most situations, and obviously to take advantage of Haste you have to cast it in your main phase. This is really cheap, and with Convoke in the picture it will be even easier to cast than it looks at first – but I think the card’s main uses will be for sending in one of your new creatures and/or finishing the opponent off, and those uses are a little too narrow. It can definitely help you do a ton of damage out of nowhere.

Chandra, Hope's Beacon

If you can manage to play Chandra, use her +2 and cast a cheap spell with that mana, you’re already going to be really far ahead. If you can’t do that, her -X will often do enough to really weaken your opponent’s board, and if you just get to the next turn and manage to use her +1, there’s a very good chance you’ll blow the game open with whatever spell you hit. She’s definitely a bomb.

City on Fire

This costs a lot of mana, but Convoke helps soften the blow. Problem is, for this to really be at its best, you kind of need to be able to take advantage of it immediately. Normally, tripling your damage would be something that makes your board far better at attacking and blocking and that would be enough, but because you’re going to need to tap several creatures for this most of the time, you’re also decreasing your chances of being able to effectively take advantage of this right away. And in that case, it ends up being a pretty clunky Enchantment that probably takes a turn to deliver on its return. Of course, if you are able to untap with this in play, your opponent is going to be in a world of hurt – assuming you have a developed board. Basically, this is going to be truly awful sometimes.

Coming In Hot

This is a decent trick that we’ve seen before. +1/+0 and First Strike is enough to help a lot of creatures kill an opposing creature and survive combat, the Scry is some nice additional upside. It IS a trick that is only useful in combat, which certainly hurts its stock a bit, but its fine.

Etali, Primal Conqueror

This costs a whopping 7 mana, but it definitely delivers. Even if it never transforms, this is a 7-mana 7/7 trampler that lets you cast two spells for free. That sets you up for an amazing 3-for-1, and means that evne if Etali doesn’t manage to survive to smash in for 7 on the next turn, you’re going to have gotten two cards out of it. Obviously, if it transforms it gets scarier as an attacker, since it can end the game in a single swing.

Fearless Skald

So, this is either a 5-mana 4/3 with Double Strike, or a 5-mana 3/2 that puts a counter on something else and gives it double strike for a turn. Both modes can be pretty nice, though I think I would be more inclined to put the counter somewhere else, since even at three toughness this dies quite easily, and if you put all of your eggs in one basket the tempo might hurt! This is going to create a major threat the turn it comes down, and it is a pretty nice threat on its own.

Furnace Gremlin

A two mana ½ that can pump its power for two mana isn’t always great, mostly because just to trade with other two drops you end up having to pay some extra mana. However, the Gremlin here gets around that downside, at least partially! Because if you do pump it to trade with a 2/2 or something, you end up getting an Incubator token with two counters on it. No matter how this thing goes down, it ends up leaving something behind, and even attacking into it will be a real problem for your opponent sometimes.

Furnace Host Charger

A 6-mana 5/5 Haster is definitely medium, but it is definitely relevant on most board states, and if you draw it early and would rather have a land drop, it has you covered.

Furnace Reins

A Threaten effect seems particularly interesting in this set, because getting a blocker out of the way and sending it at your opponent for a single turn is going to be more meaningful in a world where you can attack Battles. I think this does make this type of effect better, but the best place for this card will still be a deck that can also sacrifice the creature you can steal. The format does have a ton of cheap sacrifice outlets, especially in Black – and in the Black-Red deck this will be amazing. It has the upside these all have – that it can produce lethal out of nowhere – but in a Black-Red sacrifice deck you can use it earlier in the game and sacrifice the thing you steal, meaning you can use this a lot more often and a lot more effectively.

Hangar Scrounger

This is either a three mana 3/2 that rummages when it taps, or a three mana 2/1 that puts a counter somewhere else that lets you rummage when it taps that turn. That’s certainly fine, but I’m also not blown away by either option.

Harried Artisan

A three mana ⅔ Haste isn’t terrible, and this can transform into a ¾ flyer for a relatively cheap cost. Obviously, in terms of efficiency it isn’t amazing, but it is a nice mana sink to have around.

Into the Fire

Both of these modes are good in the right situation. If your opponent has lots of small stuff, or some battles that you haven’t quite transformed, the first option can have a massive impact on the board. Then, if you are in a situation where you can’t get any value out of the first mode, you can reload your hand a bit.

Invasion of Kaldheim

This has a really neat design that does a rummage-type thing but combines it with impulsive draw, and it has the potential to give you a lot of extra cards, but this also has some real potential to be very awkward in Limited. If you are paying 4 mana for this thing doesn’t impact the board immediately, you really need to be getting at least a few cards you can use, but you’re not guaranteed to have enough cards in your hand to actually make that happen. Once it transforms it does become a pretty insane Enchantment, but this seems clunky and awkward overall.

Invasion of Karsus

This looks really good. Doing 3 damage to everything has a good chance of impacting the board, and if you know this is coming, you can find a way to make it so it doesn’t effect you too severely. If you manage to transform this, it becomes a very problematic creature too. Sometimes, you’ll have a situation where you wipe away an opponent’s blockers and just attack right away to transform the Invasion.

Invasion of Mercadia

This is basically Tormenting Voice with a bunch of upside, and that certainly seems solid. Once transformed, you get a creature that is pretty insane, as churning out elementals, buffing your board and giving it haste is amazing.

Invasion of Regatha

Doing some direct damage with this is pretty nice, and it will feel really good when you can also pick off a small creature and/or defeat a Battle. As with most of these, the creature when you transform this is pretty amazing.

Invasion of Tarkir

Most of the time in Limited the front side of this will do 2 damage to any target. That is a reasonable, if unexciting removal spell – but it impacts the board most of the time. There will be some occasions where you actually do more damage than that too, because there are a few dragons in the set, including a Blue one at Common and a Red one at Uncommon. Once transformed it provides you with a Dragon that can quickly end the game

Karsus Depthguard

Just one +1/+1 counter allows this to start rumbling, and those aren’t exactly hard to come by in Red, and a 3-mana 4/3 Defender isn’t a terrible fail case.

Khenra Spellspear

I would already play a two mana 2/2 with Prowess and nothing else and be pretty happy with it. That card is probably a 3.0. So, adding Trample and the ability to transform into an even more imposing creature to the mix makes this absolutely incredible. It can even transform the turn after you play it, which is great. The double prowess on the transformed size is going to be a real beating, and the fact that Ward makes it harder to kill is great too.

Lithomantic Barrage

I think you can play this in your main deck and have it perform reasonably well. There are enough X/1s that it can target in typical decks, and against Blue/White it is utterly absurd. What it does to Blue or White creatures will make it feel like a 4.0 and against everyone else it is going to feel like a 1.0 – but I think that makes this a 1.5 overall, if you have enough playables it is probably still better to start in your sideboard.

Marauding Dreadship

So in the end, you pay 5 mana for a 2/2 and a 4/1 Vehicle with Haste and Crew 2. That’s not….the worst thing ever, but it doesn’t seem like you’re doing a great job either. The Vehicle can simply be blocked by a token or something, and Crew 2 is kind of high for a 1 toughness vehicle. It can definitely come down and do some surprise damage, but the fact that you have to tap something significant to crew it makes that a lot less appealing.

Mirran Banesplitter

The fact this Equips for free the first time is nice, and definitely has the ability to make just about anything into a much better attacker. With Flash, you may even find a way to trade a smaller creature for something larger. The fact it costs three to Equip thereafter is rough.

Nahiri's Warcrafting

Three mana to do 5 to a creature, planeswalker or battle is already easily premium removal, and the extra upside here is amazing. Sometimes its a bummer to use a 5 damage spell on something with lower toughness, but this makes sure you get back some big value. Even if you only reveal one card, its going to feel pretty good! Now, unlike a lot of these effects we’ve seen lately this one does require you to play that card before the end of your current turn – so you have a fairly narrow window, so sometimes you may reveal something that you can’t cast with the mana you have left. However, you can play lands off of it, which is nice – and if you do more than one excess damage you get card selection that can allow you to reveal something you can play.

Onakke Javelineer

A 5-mana 5/4 Reach is probably a 2.0 at best, but this activated ability means business. Using it to hurt javelins at your opponent’s dome can be a very real threat, and the fact thise can allow you to defeat battles without having to attack – and it can defeat them at instant speed – is great.

Pyretic Prankster

A two mana 2/1 is below rate these days, but this can transform into a 3/2 that virtually always forces a 2-for-1, and it can transform pretty quickly.

Ral's Reinforcements

Going wide and Convoke are two of Red’s big themes in the set, so this seems to do exactly what you want to be doing in Red.

Ramosian Greatsword

This is a stats boost that makes basically any creature into a threat, and the fact you can Convoke this helps soften the blow that this costs so much mana. The Equip cost itself is super reasonable for the boost after you get it into play, too!

Rampaging Raptor

A 4-mana 4/4 with Trample and Haste is a pretty easy 4.0, so the fact this can buff its power and threaten to go after battles even when it does damage to your opponent is awesome. One of the awkward things about battles is that sometimes you’d rather damage your opponent than transform a battle, and the Raptor makes it so you don’t have to choose. And yes, it can go after planeswalkers too, but that won’t come up nearly as often.

Redcap Heelslasher

A 4-mana ¾ with First Strike performs reasonably well, and having the ability to offer +1/+1 and temporary first strike to something already in play will usually mean that creature can attack far more effectively that turn.

Scrappy Bruiser

This can definitely make something else – or itself – into a much better attacker, but I actually don’t love that it makes you return the thing you target to your hand. Sometimes you’ll get some sweet value as a result of that, like if you return something with Backup, but the tempo you lose is a big deal.

Searing Barb

Three mana for 2 damage at Sorcery speed isn’t very good, but you can sort of look at this as a 5-mana 2/2 that does 2 damage to something. Which…well, still isn’t that good. Still, it does have 2-for-1 potential and can hit battles.

Shatter the Source

This looks pretty nice. 6 mana for 6 damage at Instant speed is usually a 2.0, and with Convoke you’re going to be able to cast this in many more situations than you would normally be able to. Sometimes you can blow up a problem Artifact with this too.

Shivan Branch-Burner

You probably need to paying 5 or less actual mana for this to really feel like you’re getting there. Luckily, that’s quite doable! And getting this down even easier than that isn’t impossible either.

Stoke the Flames

Even without Convoke, this would be great. But sometimes you will be able to cast this without any mana up, or at least for a lot less than 4 mana, and that upside is crazy, especially because it can hit any target. This is premium removal and then some.

Thrashing Frontliner

Attacking as a 3/3 trampler when it goes after battles is pretty impressive for the cost, and the baseline isn’t too bad either, especially with Backup having a significant presence in Red.

Trailblazing Historian

We’ve seen several one mana 1/1s with Haste that can tap and give things Haste, and they tend to work out reasonably well. Making this cost one more mana, but also giving it two more toughness, is a reasonable trade off, and Haste can play particularly well in a world of Battles.

Urabrask

A 4-mana 4/4 with First Strike is great, and the fact this pings your opponent and gives you some mana just for casting instants and sorceries is awesome. Transforming Urabrask is something of a challenge, though. You can stockpile some instants and sorceries for sure, and the extra mana he gives you does make it easier for you to fire off three in the same turn, but you rarely find yourself in a position where you can just hold on to a bunch of spells in your hand to make this work. You can do it sometimes for sure, but most of the time you just can’t pull it off in Limited. Luckily, even if he never transforms, Urabrask is very powerful. If he does transform he becomes downright insane, as Chapter I likely decimates your opponents board, Chapter II is more of a throwaway, but then chapter III lets you cast a few spells. Hard to go all the way up to a bomb grade here, though, since transforming him will happen a very low percentage of the time.

Volcanic Spite

This is a great removal spell. Two mana for 3 damage is premium even at Sorcery speed, and this is an Instant that also gives you a bit of card selection. The ability to hit more than just creatures is great upside too.

Voldaren Thrillseeker

This is either a 3-mana 3/3 with this ability, or a three mana 1/1 that offers +2/+2 and this ability to something else. Either way, you’re likely to be very happy here. Two counters is a big deal that alters a lot of boards, and adding this Fling effect to the mix is great.

War-Trained Slasher

A 4-mana 4/3 with Menace is probably a 2.0, so the fact this swings with eight power when it goes after battle is pretty awesome. It really puts your opponent in a horrible spot on a lot of boards, and they are likely to get 2-for-1’d at best.

Wrenn's Resolve

This is Reckless Impulse with a different name, and that was a quality draw spell in Innistrad: Crimson Vow. You’re almost always going to be able to play both cards that you hit with this before the end of your next turn, and this ends up being a two mana draw two most of the time.

Ancient Imperiosaur

If you cast this for six and only tap one creature, you’re talking about a 6-mana 8/8 with Trample and Ward 2, and sometimes it will be even larger! You do of course have to weigh the cost of tapping things down, but oftentimes by the time you want to play this you’ll have creatures to tap that won’t really feel like a big cost. Ward 2 also makes it more of a pain for your opponent to deal with it.

Arachnoid Adaptation

One mana for +2/+2 always has me a little bit interested, since it offers a big enough boost for a creature to win a significant number of combats, and It comes at a very low cost. The tempo you get when you use this kind of trick can be amazing! The creature even gets pseudo-vigilance. You can also use this defensively of course, and that’s the only way that Reach will be useful, but you should really only do that in an emergency. It is always dangerous to use a trick on your opponents turn, since during combat they probably have lots of mana untapped. In the end, this seems solid for aggressive Green decks, though I don’t think it will always make the cut.

Atraxa's Fall

One thing to keep in mind is that destroying a battle doesn’t let you cast it transformed. A battle has to be “defeated” for that to happen, and the only way to make that happen is to remove the counters on it one way or another. This simply puts in the graveyard. In other words, you want to use this on a battle you are defending. This targets a whole bunch of stuff, but I’m still pretty skeptical it will find something useful to do on a regular basis, so I’m starting it in the sideboard.

Blighted Burgeoning

If you play this on an untapped land, you can immediately transform the Incubator, and that’s nice – it means you can actually add something to the board when you play this, and the problem with most cards like this is they don’t do that. This also does a pretty good job of fixing and ramping your mana.

Bonded Herdbeast

A 5-mana 4/5 is a 2.0 at the very best, but this one transforms into a pretty scary 7/5 with Menace, something that is going to be a problem on most boards.

Chomping Kavu

This is either a 4-mana 4/4 that can’t be blocked by small stuff, or a 4-mana 3/3 that gives something else a counter and makes it harder to block for a turn. I think both of those modes are going to feel like a pretty good investment.

Converter Beast

You can look at this as a 6-mana 0/1 that makes a 5/5. That’s an acceptable rate, and this has the usual upside Incubator tokens have – you have the option of paying for it in installments. The downside here is the times where you can’t get that 5/5 really quickly, you’re playing a 0/1 for a 4 which will feel like you are barely adding to the board.

Copper Host Crusher

This is a big hard-to-kill monster, but it also costs 8 mana which simply isn’t an amount of mana you get to very consistently in Limited.

Cosmic Hunger

We have seen this card before, only without the battle part, and it is always premium removal for Green because it can deal with things so efficiently. You always run the risk of getting 2-for-1’d when you cast it if you aren’t careful, but because this is an Instant, finding a spot where your opponent can’t respond is relatively easy.

Crystal Carapace

As an Aura, this isn’t the most efficient thing ever, but it wouldn’t be completely unplayable either. +3/+3 is a big upgrade, and Ward 2 allows you to really decrease the chance your opponent can interact in some way before you get some value out of attacking with a creature this is attached to. If you find yourself in a situation where you just can’t risk playing this or playing it doesn’t make a difference, or you’re mana screwed, you can just Cycle it away. That Cycle part is what really makes this borderline playable card into something solid.

Deeproot Wayfinder

This has nice stats, and if it ever hits your opponent it is going to generate some significant value. It even has the potential to ramp you if you can get a land in your graveyard – something Surveil helps you do. It definitely has diminishing returns the longer the game goes on and the less able it is to get in for some damage.

Doomskar Warrior

On its own, this can be a 4-mana 5/4 Trampler with this ability that will just end up drawing you a card most of the time. That’s a great card, and you have the upside of putting the counter somewhere else to give that creature trample and the same ability for a turn. Both options sound good to me.

Fertilid's Favor

This is an Instant speed way to both ramp your mana and buff a creature. In other words, it can be part combat trick part ramp spell. Ramp spells can be a dangerous proposition in Limited because they usually don’t add to the board at all, but this one does. It doesn’t search up the basic land as efficiently as something like Rampant Growth, but this is better in Limited in a lot of ways, because it is a much better late-game top deck and even has a bit of 2-for-1 potential. I think having both of these effects on a single Instant is enough to make this a quality card.

Glistening Dawn

This ultimately gives you two bodies, and generally they are going to be of a fairly significant size. The downside here is that casting this and not transforming at least one of them in the same turn is going to feel pretty brutal in many situations, as not adding to the board at all when you spend that much mana can be a pretty serious liability. Still, even in that bad situation, if you are able to untap you’ll usually be in decent shape, and if you can transform one when you cast this you’re usually still getting a nice deal.

Gnottvold Hermit

A 4-mana 4/4 is a pretty solid rate, and this can transform into a creature that can drastically upgrade another attacker every time it gets in there.

Herbology Instructor

A two mana ⅓ that gains 3 on ETB is usually a 2.5, so the fact this has late game upside that turns it into a 3/3 that will kill something is pretty nice.

Invasion of Ikoria

So you’re basically never going to feel like you’re getting a great deal with the front side of this, since you’ll always be overpaying by two – but it does mean that this adds to the board right away. In doing so, you also increase your chances of successfully defeating this Siege and getting Zilortha, who is likely to kill your opponent unless they remove it. You can also pay 0 for X if you ever find yourself in a situation where you’re going to be able to attack and defeat this thing in a single turn.

Invasion of Ixalan

This delivers some impressive value for the cost. You are maybe very slightly overpaying for the front side, but it is always going to draw you a card, and if you get this down early you have a pretty good chance of transforming it into the Regisaur.

Invasion of Muraganda

A 5-mana fight spell that gives you a +1/+1 counter isn’t bad, and it also means this is another Battle that increases your chances of being able to attack right away. With 6 defense it might take some time, but the creature you eventually get is pretty nice! Mostly you will lose it to buff your stuff, but the upside of sometimes taking away opposing abilities is definitely nice.

Invasion of Shandalar

This is going to do an incredible job of restocking your hand in the later stages of the game, and it has relatively low defense. The bad news is you don’t really want to cast this in situations where you aren’t getting the full value out of your graveyard, and that certainly isn’t guaranteed. Additionally, even with the fact you returned permanents to your hand, once this is Leyline Surge it isn’t really that impressive in your typical game of Limited. We’ve seen that countless times with this sort of effect, it just underperforms because the average power level of your permanents isn’t usually that high. Still, the Battle side is the kind of thing that helps you win a longer game.

Invasion of Zendikar

Lately, a 4-mana card that gets you two lands from your graveyard has been too clunky to work effectively in Limited. However, unlike most cards that do that, this does have the potential to add meaningfully to the board. If you can play this and flip it in the near future, getting that 4/4 body will make a big deal. That said, you won’t always be able to get that done consistently in Limited.

Iridescent Blademaster

This is a bear that can buff itself when you have some extra mana lying around. We’ve seen many cards like this in recent years, and most of them haven’t been especially impressive. You just don’t find yourself with a bunch of mana lying around until the later stages of the game, so this is often irrelevant between about turn 2 and turn 10, and that’s a problem.

Kami of Whispered Hopes

This being a three mana 1/1 is a big liability. It dies to basically everything, and the tempo hit can be rough. That said, it does come with some strong abilities! Giving things extra counters and ramping mana is great, and if you are putting counters on it, it will get quite large and produce lots of mana.

Overgrown Pest

Early, the fact this hits a land will feel pretty good. In the later game you won’t really want a land, and if you don’t have enough double-faced cards it will feel especially bad. There aren’t any DFCs at Common either, so actually getting a critical mass where this hits consistently is a challenge.

Ozolith, the Shattered Spire

This format has a ton of +1/+1 counters in it, so this is going to be giving you a ton of extra value – especially because it can put counters on things all on its own! It also cycles, so if you’re in a situation where you can’t do much with this, it is nice that you can throw it away and try again.

Placid Rottentail

A 1/1 with Vigilance isn’t really setting the world on fire, but it does make it a nice spot to put +1/+1 counters, and once it goes down it can provide you with some counters all on its own.

Polukranos Reborn

Triple Green can be challenging in Limited, but you get a nicely above-rate creature that can transform into a Wurmcoil Engine-like Hydra, and that’s pretty neat. Even if you don’t play this on curve, and way until turn 6 or something, it is still going to be a big problem for your opponent. The mana cost does hold it back and prevent it from straight up bomb status, but because you can still get a ton of value out of it late, this still looks like a really good card to me.

Portent Tracker

This is an ugly stat-line, but between ramping your mana and messing with Battles, this seems like it has some pretty real utility. Some mana dorks are all but useless late, but because this can do things with Battles, that’s less likely.

Ravenous Sailback

A 5-mana ¾ with Haste is…not exactly good – it is probably a 1.0 at best. If your opponent has a target for the other mode this can do some work. Problem is there will be enough boards where this is just an inefficient creature with no good targets.

Sandstalker Moloch

A three mana 4/2 with Flash is something you’ll pretty much always play, so the fact that this will be a straight up 2-for-1 against some opponents is amazing. If this always drew you a card it would be a 4.0. In Limited, the chances you run into someone playing one of these colors is pretty significant, too. Basically, this will feel amazing against the right opponent and solid against everyone else.

Seed of Hope

Green isn’t that into milling in this format, otherwise this would be a little more interesting. As is, it has a fairly small effect, and since it is restricted only to the two cards you mill, you’re just going to wiff sometimes or get something very underwhelming.

Serpent-Blade Assailant

A three mana 3/2 with Deathtouch is passable, as is giving the counter and deathtouch to something else. It will often allow a creature to be a much more problematic attacker. Also works well with the fight and bight spells Green always has.

Storm the Seedcore

Granting a big stats boost to a few creatures, and giving all creatures Vigilance and Trample seems like a nice deal. This lets you really upgrade your board without sacrificing the ability to block on the following turn, and that can really help turn a race around. As usual, this type of card has the downside of being very mediocre if you don’t have a well-developed board, but even then the fail case isn’t the worst.

Streetwise Negotiator

If you put the counter on the Negotiator, you basically have a two mana 3/3 – something that I’m happy to play, so the additional upside is awesome.

Tandem Takedown

An Instant speed effect that has your creature damage an opponent’s creature is usually a very nice card and this simultaneously gets around two downsides this kind of card often has. First, because you get to use two of your creatures, you will be able to take down even very large creatures with two smaller ones. Second, because it uses two creatures, you can set it up so that you don’t get 2-for-1’d if your opponent can interact in response. Add in the fact that this can also damage battles and you have an amazing removal spell that is quite easily premium.

Tangled Skyline

This looks like a nice card for helping higher-curve Green decks stabilize against aggro. It is effectively a 7-mana 5/5 with Reach that gains you 5 on ETB, except it is a little better because you don’t have to pay all that mana in the same turn. Giving Phyrexians Reach isn’t exactly the most impressive upside, I think the best part of this card is just that it gives you a beefy body and gains you some life, though Reach does mean you can stabilize against flying creatures too.

Timberland Ancient

A 6-mana 6/5 with Reach and Trample is right around a 2.0 these days, but don’t underestimate Forestcycling! Unlike your other 6 drops, you can throw this one away if you draw it early and grab a land drop you desperately need, and when it comes time to cast it, it isn’t usually a creature your opponent can just ignore.

Tribute to the World Tree

Triple Green can be a bit challenging in Limited, but if you can cast this, it gives you a ton of value, either making your creatures far better or helping you rip through your library. It is true that it doesn’t add to the board immediately, but it is cheap enough and has enough upside that I think it is worth the downside. If this were 2 generic and a Green, I think I would have a hard time not giving it at least a 4.5 – but we do have to factor in the challenge presented by the mana value, especially because you want to get a card like this down pretty early to take full advantage, and outside of mono-Green that’s going to be a challenge.

Vengeant Earth

We see this type of card every now and then, and usually its unplayable. Animating a land or incubator for a single turn usually isn’t worth doing, but this one does make things a little interesting, since it forces something to block it. This can allow this to feel like a super situational, roundabout way to remove an opposing creature. You can also animate a land and block it as a surprise, but this is usually a dangerous proposition. So yeah, It still feels like this is still far too situational to be worth using, though.

Vorinclex

This gives you a way above rate body and a couple of Forests, which is enough for this to be a great card. Transforming this is costly, but the fact it grabs you those Forests does make it a little easier for you to make that happen.

War Historian

A 3-mana 3/3 with Reach is a C these days, and when it attacks a battle your opponent is going to be in a world of hurt, since you just have a free attack any time you do it.

Wary Thespian

Two mana for a 3/1 and a couple of Surveil triggers seems like a solid deal. That is some very nice card selection to come attached to a creature that is already close to playable based on its statline.

Wildwood Escort

I like this. It is a built-in 2-for-1, and the first copy of this is going to be something you virtually always want in Green.

Wrenn and Realmbreaker

This is a powerful three mana planeswalker. Fixing your mana can be really nice, and the +1 does a decent job of protecting Wrenn. Because the land has Vigilance, you can also use it to attack and then use it for mana. The -2 is maybe a little less exciting, but it will generally draw you a card, and the -7 is likely to win you the game. This is going to be hard to beat on turn three, and while it has diminishing returns the longer the game goes on, it is still going to be quite powerful.

Baral and Kari Zev

This has great base stats, and the fact you get to either cast something for free or get a Ragavan token is great! Oftentimes you won’t be able to take advantage of the free spell, so it is a big deal that they give you something else in those situations. The token is legendary and all, so getting more than one isn’t going to happen, but it can probably also swing at your opponent for free most turns.

Borborygmos and Fblthp

This has a powerful ETB and attack trigger. Shocking something with it while getting some nice card selection is very doable and will make this generate a ton of value if it remains in play. At worst it draws you a card every time it ETBs or attacks, and that’s already really good. The activated ability does give them the potential to avoid removal though, even if you won’t usually draw them again for a few turns.

Botanical Brawler

As it often it is, Green/White is about +1/+1 counters. So, a two mana 2/2 trampler that gains counters no matter where you put them on your board is really nice.

Djeru and Hazoret

By the later stages of the game, and often the turn you cast it, this will have Vigilance and Haste, which is awesome. The attack trigger has a reasonable chance at hitting something too, partly because of the “Multiverse Legends” bonus sheet, which guarantees every pack has at least one legendary creature in it. There aren’t actually that many legendary creatures in the main set at lower rarities, but I think the bonus sheet is enough for you to hit something with this about half the time, and that’s plenty. The times when you cast this with Haste and get a free legendary creature it will feel truly absurd! However, we also have to account for the times where it doesn’t have the keywords and/or it wiffs on a legendary creature, in which case it is less likely to deliver the value you’re looking for.

Drana and Linvala

A 4-mana ¾ with Flying and Vigilance is great, although double-White does make it more challenging to cast this super consistently on turn 4. Luckily it has way more upside than that though – shutting off opposing activated abilities and stealing those abilities is sweet, though more often than not it won’t actually do something.

Elvish Vatkeeper

A three mana 3/3 that makes an Incubator is sweet – if you have five mana available you can just do it all, and pay 5 for a 3/3 and a 2/2, which is a nice deal! The other ability is fairly expensive, but if you have the mana to sink into it, it certainly makes your Incubator a lot scarier.

Errant and Giada

This has a great base rate, and getting information about the top of your library is nice upside to add to it. While you aren’t ultra likely to have a ton of cards with Flash in your deck, you are likely to have some Flyers, and if you cast even one thing off the top of your library this will feel amazing, and give you a sweet 2-for-1.

Ghalta and Mavren

This is a little tough to cast because of Double-Green Double-White, but it is absurd if you can! It has way above rate stats, and then also just generates a bunch of creature tokens. It does not give you any value immediately, and the most powerful cards generally give you something even if the card eats removal – and that isn’t going to happen here. But if you untap with this in play, your opponent is probably losing. If you’re behind at all, making those life link tokens will still allow you to attack, and if you’re ahead, makign another huge dino probably ends the game.

Glissa, Herald of Predation

Like past Glissas, this one looks amazing. Her trigger happens at combat, so you are going to get some value out of her right away, and all three options are sweet. If you’ve already got a nice board, giving all of your Phyrexians First Strike and Deathtouch will make it impossible for your opponent to block effectively – if you’ve already got some incubator tokens that you need to transform, she can do that – and if you need to build out your board, she can give you incubator tokens. Because she gives you real value right away and snowballs from there

Halo Forager

UB is a mill deck in this format – interested both in self-mill and milling the opponent and getting value out of it, so that does mean having cards in your graveyard for this is pretty likely. A three mana 3/1 flyer is already passable, and the fact that you can cast an instant or Sorcery from either graveyard is a pretty big deal. You won’t always have the mana to do that, and the graveyard’s won’t always be stocked even in Blue-Black, but even just getting a one mana spell out of it is going to feel amazing, and it sort of scales the longer the game goes.

Hidetsugu and Kairi

A 5-mana 5/4 Flyer is a huge problem for your opponent – but this also basically casts Brainstorm up front, giving you serious value. And the death trigger can sometimes be quite potent too, especially if you set up your deck using the ETB trigger.

Inga and Esika

This 4-mana 4/4 comes with substantial upside! Giving your board vigilance and the ability to tap for mana is pretty awesome, and you’re also going to be able to draw cards with it sometimes.

Invasion of Alara

So the battle side gives you a 2-for-1 on its own and if you ever transform it, it is pretty impossible for you to lose! However, casting this is hard in Limited, and transforming it isn’t a walk in the park either with its 7 defense.

Invasion of Amonkhet

We’ve already seen some of the non-battle signpost Uncommons, but every color pair has an uncommon Battle too! As we’ve seen, Blue-Black is interested in getting things in the graveyard, and the fact you draw while your opponent discards is some really nice value, and it really isn’t that far off of the three mana you’re paying, so the fact you might get a 4/4 later in the game is pretty nice.

Invasion of Azgol

A two mana Edict is usually playable, though they do drop off the longer the game goes on. If you play this early, though, it will often kill your opponent’s only creature, making it a lot easier for you to attack this battle and transform it into a creature that will get scarier all game long. Basically all of these two mana Battles are interesting, because you pay so little up front

Invasion of Ergamon

Two mana to make a treasure and loot isn’t the most amazing thing, and I’m a little less into all the Battles that don’t actually help you attack the Battle inherently. Now, this can sort of help in that regard by giving you more mana to cast creatures and helping you find more things that attack, but it is still a little too indirect to be great. Still, once you can transform this it becomes amazing, finding you another Battle or a land while having a very relevant body

Invasion of Kaladesh

While a two mana 1/1 Flyer isn’t the best deal, it does mean this Battle gives you an evasive creature that can help you transform this into a solid Vehicle. It will at least be a ¼ Flyer with Crew 1, and that’s not too bad – and sometimes it will be a much bigger problem than that.

Invasion of Kylem

The base effect on this card generally isn’t worth the four mana it asks you for. However, because this also comes into play and has to be defended, it synergizes quite well with itself. +2/+0 and Vigilance on two creatures will allow you to attack this fairly effectively right away on many boards. In other words, there will definitely be turns where this costs 4-mana to give +2/+0, vigilance, and haste to two creatures, and then you also get those two really powerful 3/2 tokens on the same turn. Yeah, that’s an insane card. Now, we do have to take into account the situations where this doesn’t do much, and the fact this doesn’t do something permanent to the board does mean sometimes this will do stone nothing.

Invasion of Lorwyn

The front side of this is a removal spell that will kill almost everything, and when it transforms it is a creature that is all but guaranteed to be the biggest thing on the field. Six mana is a lot, but the fact this is removal is great, since it also means you’ve got a good chance to attack the Battle right away.

Invasion of Moag

The Invasion will often significantly upgrade your board – which in turn means you can go after this Battle right away in lots of situations, and don’t forget that GW is into +1/+1 counters, so there is definitely some extra value to be had! The creature you get after you do that is going to continue to offer a nice upgrade to your board every turn.

Invasion of New Capenna

I don’t love that this does stone nothing on turn two a lot of the time. It would be nice to set this up on turn two and get a little something, which is what a lot of the cheap Battles do – but this one is far more situational. That said, the thing that it can do is certainly powerful, especially if you have some expendable bodies around, which isn’t a huge ask if you’re in Black-White, since that’s the color pair the most interested in Incubating. This also means that the Equipment you ultimately get can do a pretty nice job of enhancing your board.

Invasion of New Phyrexia

If you are paying 2 or more for this you’re getting a great deal upfront, even without discussing its ability to transform. The synergy here is awesome too, because all of those bodies should make it easier for you to attack this Battle and get Teferi. He’s not the most amazing planeswalker for being this difficult to get, but he’s still pretty great! His -2 buffs all of your tokens and makes them harder to kill, his +1 can help you find stuff, and his -3 can allow you to really mess with your opponent’s board – especially if you still have those knights around. I think this is a bomb.

Invasion of Pyrulea

Two mana for a Scry 3 that is likely to draw you a card isn’t a terrible rate, and while this doesn’t directly help you add to the board, it is a passable rate. If you find yourself in a situation where you can attack the Invasion, you’re going to get yourself a very impressive creature too, especially because UG is the color pair the most interested in transformed creatures, so there’s lots of synergy there.

Invasion of Tolvada

This lets you get back a permanent for 5 mana. That isn’t always going to feel like its worth it, but any of these Battles that led you add to the battlefield seem like they will be fairly nice, because it means you are increasing your chances of being able to attack it. And if you flip this, it becomes pretty insane – effectively spitting out a 2/1 with Flying and Lifelink every single turn.

Invasion of Xerex

I like this one. It bounces something, upping your chances of successfully attacking and transforming this quickly, and you get a pretty powerful creature when you can make that happen.

Joyful Stormsculptor

A 5-mana ⅔ that makes two 1/1s is pretty nice, and that’s especially true when the UR archetype is about Convoke! The fact this damages Battles and players is some nice additional value that can make a real difference. The question will be whether or not there are enough Convoke spells in the format to support this, but I would guess it will work out.

Kogla and Yidaro

This is very strong. It either comes down and kill something, or comes down and smashes in for 7, and it even has the upside of being Naturalize earlier in the game, which helps offset how awkward this can be in your opening hand sometimes. It is a little challenging to cast, but I think it gets into the lower bomb range.

Kroxa and Kunoros

A 6-mana 6/6 with these three keywords is already great, and this has the ability to reanimate stuff. Now, it does come with an effect that actually makes it a little tricky to reanimate sometimes, because it exiles five cards. This means you have to leave a creature behind after exiling 5 cards, and unless you have a loaded graveyard, that can be really tricky in Limited. You also aren’t really going to manage to reanimate something every time it attacks for the same reason. Still, even without the reanimate effect this is good, and I think by the time you play it you’ll probably find yourself able to reanimate something often enough for this to be a bomb.

Marshal of Zhalfir

This is a very nice Knight lord, and at two mana it will often do a nice job of immediately upgrading your board. The tap effect is a nice thing to have around too, especially when it only costs two mana.

Mirror-Shield Hoplite

Red/White is a Backup Aggro deck, so doubling Backup abilities is massively powerful, especially when attached to a creature with solid stats

Mutagen Connoisseur

Blue-Green is all about transforming things. This plays well with Incubator and Battles, as well as all the creatures that can transform for Phyrexian mana. Even with just 1 power, this is going to feel like a fairly powerful card, and it can get a lot sillier than that.

Omnath, Locus of All

Obviously, casting this isn’t a cake walk – but its ability to store mana and draw you an extra card every turn is awesome. You won’t be able to get the multicolored mana part of the card draw to trigger very often, but that’s fine – an extra card every turn is enough to overwhelm your opponent, especially because you also get a reasonable body and you can store a bunch of mana, even if it does turn Black. This is hard enough to cast that I don’t feel super comfortable giving it a straight up bomb grade to start the format, though obviously if it turns out that it is easier to have really great mana in the format, its value goes up.

Quintorius, Loremaster

This will often feel like a 5-mana ⅗ with Vigilance that puts a 3/2 into play, and that’s amazing! There may be times where he doesn’t have something to exile, but most of the time by the time you play him getting that first 3/2 should be doable, though you do need to have a decent number of spells in your deck to make it happen. You can even get those things back if you decide to sacrifice Spirits, and sometimes that might even let you cheat something into play.

Rampaging Geoderm

This can target itself, so it does attack as a 4-mana 4/4 Trample and Haste if you want it to. It also doesn’t have to be attacking for this trigger to happen – as long as you attack with at least one thing, the Geoderm’s ability will go off. Red-Green is the color pair the most interested in battles too, so you have other incentives to attack them – and getting a permanent +1/+1 is a pretty massive upgrade! Of course, haste and trample are themselves great for attacking battles.

Rankle and Torbran

The only thing that holds this card back at all is how mana intensive it is. Double mana in two different colors can be difficult with the bad mana bases we have in Limited, but that’s okay because no matter when you play this it will have a nice impact. Its first two options are entirely symmetrical, but its the third option that seems the most interesting. It won’t increase the damage Rankle and Torbran do, but because this has First Strike, it will hit your opponent first – so if you have anything else getting through for damage, it will do significantly more. That option just won’t really be symmetrical – though it is perhaps the most situational of the three. I think the Edict effect will be nice on a lot of boards too, and treasure might be what you choose the least often.

Sculpted Perfection

BW is a Phyrexia Tribal deck, with special focus on the Incubator tokens. Most creatures in Black and White are Phyrexians in the set, so this ends up feeling like an anthem a decent chunk of the time – and one that brings a creature along for the ride, even if that creature is kind of inefficient

Stormclaw Rager

This is a powerful sacrifice outlet, even limited to Sorcery speed only! You get a card back, so it is hard not to get nice value out of this, especially if you’re sacrificing something really expendable. There’s also a cheap Threaten effect in the format that is going to combo absurdly with this, but in general, there’s plenty to sacrifice to this, making it another great signpost

Thalia and The Gitrog Monster

These keywords make this hard to block. The extra land effect is usually not very impressive in Limited, but when you can drop a land after playing this it will feel nice, especially because you can give up that land later to draw a card! Making your opponent’s creatures enter tapped means it will be easier for you to push damage through, and the nonbasic land upside will come up some too

Yargle and Multani

This is a massive vanilla creature. Obviously 18 power is enormous, but it can also be chump blocked all day or taken down by a couple of 3 power creatures. If you have ways to give this evasion it will become quite the threat. However, we’ve seen that big vanilla creatures haven’t been that impressive in the past, even if this is the biggest one yet.

Zimone and Dina

Draining 2 life when you draw extra cards is nice. It quickly creates a massive difference in life totals between you and your own., and this comes with a built-in way to do it. Even without sacrificing creatures, your deck is likely to have a few ways to trigger them, and even just doing it once is going to feel quite good.

Zurgo and Ojutai

This looks great. A 5-mana 4/4 with Flying and Haste is already amazing, and this comes with great upside that was offered by the other Ojutai. You get great card selection and you get to draw a card, and the fact it has Hexproof means it is likely to give you that value most of the time when you cast it, and Flying and Haste do a great job of making sure that happens.

Flywheel Racer

This is a reasonably efficient vehicle, and the fact it fixes and ramps is nice too, even if you do have to Crew it.

Halo Hopper

A three mana 3/2 is pretty bad, but the convoke upside here certainly makes this playable, though I’m still not very impressed.

Kitesail

This offers a reasonable boost for how much it takes to Equip. Adding Flying to creatures is a nice upgrade.

Phyrexian Archivist

This is a reprint, and it wasn’t very good last time. This format does have a self-mill deck, and that means this can theoretically keep you from milling out in the extreme late game, but it isn’t particularly efficient and is far too situational.

Realmbreaker, the Invasion Tree

This is one of those really cool cards that has applications in other formats, but really wasn’t designed for Limited. Sure, you can use the ability to mill your opponent and ramp, but I think its too slow and clunky at doing it. As usual, you should probably be adding to the board in a more meaningful way, and paying 5 total mana to cast this and then mill probably isn’t where you want to be. Obviously, the second activated ability is all but useless in Limited!

Skittering Surveyor

This does a great job of fixing your mana, and makes for an expendable body to sacrifice in Black-Red.

Sword of Once and Future

This offers a great boost right away, and protection from two colors is impactful on lots of boards. Surveiling is great card selection, and you may even find yourself able to surveil a spell into your graveyard for the other half of the ability. You may also just happen to have a spell in your graveyard anyway too! Getting in with this once is likely to deliver a big advantage, and it can just keep moving to other creatures until it makes your opponent dead.

Urn of Godfire

This is horrible at fixing your mana and is a wildly inefficient removal spell. You might run it if you’re desperate for removal, but if that’s where you’re at things really didn’t go well in the draft.

Bloodfell Caves

These always enter tapped, but producing two different colors and gaining a life is always nice value. If you’re in their two colors or trying to splash something, you’re going to be happy playing these.

Blossoming Sands

These always enter tapped, but producing two different colors and gaining a life is always nice value. If you’re in their two colors or trying to splash something, you’re going to be happy playing these.

Dismal Backwater

These always enter tapped, but producing two different colors and gaining a life is always nice value. If you’re in their two colors or trying to splash something, you’re going to be happy playing these.

Jungle Hollow

These always enter tapped, but producing two different colors and gaining a life is always nice value. If you’re in their two colors or trying to splash something, you’re going to be happy playing these.

Rugged Highlands

These always enter tapped, but producing two different colors and gaining a life is always nice value. If you’re in their two colors or trying to splash something, you’re going to be happy playing these.

Scoured Barrens

These always enter tapped, but producing two different colors and gaining a life is always nice value. If you’re in their two colors or trying to splash something, you’re going to be happy playing these.

Swiftwater Cliffs

These always enter tapped, but producing two different colors and gaining a life is always nice value. If you’re in their two colors or trying to splash something, you’re going to be happy playing these.

Thornwood Falls

These always enter tapped, but producing two different colors and gaining a life is always nice value. If you’re in their two colors or trying to splash something, you’re going to be happy playing these.

Tranquil Cove

These always enter tapped, but producing two different colors and gaining a life is always nice value. If you’re in their two colors or trying to splash something, you’re going to be happy playing these.

Wind-Scarred Crag

These always enter tapped, but producing two different colors and gaining a life is always nice value. If you’re in their two colors or trying to splash something, you’re going to be happy playing these.

Plains

Island

Swamp

Mountain

Forest

Coppercoat Vanguard

The set doesn’t have an enormous number of humans at lower rarities, but this works pretty well in the UW Knight deck, since most of the best cards for the deck happen to be humans. Even if you just have around 5, this is certainly worth playing.

Deification

There aren’t enough Planeswalkers in the set for this to work out. Heck, even if you are lucky enough to get one, this still isn’t worth playing just to make that one card in your deck better.

Harnessed Snubhorn

This has reasonable defensive stats, but this set doesn’t have so many artifacts and enchantments that you’re always going to be able to do something when it hits your opponent. Furthermore, it isn’t exactly so large that your opponent can’t do something about it when you do have something you can bring back.

Metropolis Reformer

A three mana ⅔ with Flying and Vigilance is already pretty nice, and that’s good — because the other two effects this has aren’t exactly amazing. Hexproof will come up on rare occasions, and this is likely to gain you a few life some of the time too.

Spark Rupture

In Limited, this will be a three mana cantrip 99% of the time, and that just isn’t enough to move the needle. You’ll never have or run into enough planeswalkers to make this worth it.

Tazri, Stalwart Survivor

This starts out with a reasonable stat-line, and there are enough activated abilities in this set that you can get some pretty good mileage out of tapping your creatures to make mana for them. It works well with Incubators, the double-faced Phyrexians, and more. Obviously, you can also use those creatures to activate Tazri’s own ability, but the set doesn’t have so many activated abilities that I love the sound of that. You’re going to wiff sometimes, and getting one card for that big of an investment isn’t going to feel great.

Filter Out

There aren’t enough noncreature nonlands for this to be worthwhile. Sure, you can maybe rebuy a Battle, or get rid of some incubators that haven’t transformed, but that’s too narrow.

Tolarian Contempt

This is a little slow, but it effectively allows you to remove one of your opponents creatures every turn, and the turn you play it, it does actually impact the board by time ebbing one of them. There will be times where your opponent’s board isn’t that concerned about this, and sometimes it will be too slow – but it also has the ability to turn the game around for you.

Training Grounds

Even in this set, there aren’t enough activated abilities for this to be worth it. Sure, incubators transform for free and stuff, but you’re not going to have enough of them in Blue to justify this, especially because all this does is reduce the cost of those abilities. That just isn’t worth a card.

Vesuvan Drifter

A three mana 2/4 Flyer is a great place to start, and the upside is pretty real. Even just having information about the top card of your library is nice, but sometimes this will be a Flying copy of a fairly formidable creature.

Ayara's Oathsworn

If you play this on turn two and your opponent can’t kill it, they’re probably going to lose. Menace is hard to stop in the early game, especially when the creature just keeps on growing. Things will snowball out of control in a hurry, and you’ll probably have won the game even before you get to tutor something. It does get less impressive the longer the game goes on, but a Menace creature is also at least something of a problem.

Blot Out

This will usually allow you to remove your opponent’s best creature, though sometimes you’ll only be able to get rid of something less important than that.

Death-Rattle Oni

The idea here is that you can chump block some stuff, and then flash this in for cheap and kill the things that your creatures chump blocked. When that lines up it will feel pretty great, but there are going to be times where you just can’t make that happen, or the game isn’t in the kind of state where that really works out. You can of course also use it after you attack and set up some nice situations, but overall this feels like a card that will either feel awful, or like the best card in your deck. It is too situational to be anything special.

Markov Baron

There aren’t a ton of vampires in this set, but there are a couple of pretty good Common ones in Black, so this will actually buff stuff a decent chunk of the time. On top of that, even if you don’t have Vampires, this seems like a passable card thanks to the Madness, Convoke, and Lifelink upside.

Urborg Scavengers

This is pretty tough to line up correctly. If there is a well-stocked graveyard around, you might find yourself capable of giving it a keyword ability. The problem is, you kind of have to do that, because otherwise this not the most imposing creature. If you play this before there are creatures in the graveyard it will feel particularly horrible, and by the later stages of the game, even if it can gain keyword abilities, it will matter less because your opponent will have better creatures.

Arni Metalbrow

These effects are never as good as they look in Limited. When you can cheat a creature into play with Arni’s effect it will feel pretty busted, but you’d be surprised how often you either don’t have the mana or the creature card to actually take advantage of it. The upside is massive, but there will be many games where this is effectively a three mana 3/3.

Kolaghan Warmonger

There are very few dragons in this set, especially at lower rarities. So, this will typically just be a three mana 3/2 with Haste. That’s not a terrible card, but not something that always makes the cut either.

Plargg and Nassari

This basically draws you an extra card every turn. Your opponent can make sure you get the worst card of the two, but you’re always going to get one spell that you can cast for free, and that’s hugely beneficial. The only downside is you have to wait a turn for this to get going.

Reckless Handling

Tutors tend to be pretty bad in Limited, since the average power level of the cards you can search up is fairly low, especially when it is restricted to a card type that isn’t that plentiful in the set. This does at least always do 2 to your opponent, so it isn’t entirely meaningless when you don’t have something good to grab, but its pretty close

Animist's Might

This is a nice removal spell for Green, and will feel especially nuts when you have a legendary to target. There are enough legendaries in the set, partly as a result of Multiverse Legends, that you will actually cast this for one mana sometimes

Leyline Immersion

This is expensive, risky, and incredibly narrow. That’s a bad combination in Limited. This won’t do anything most of the time, and even when you do put it on a legendary creature, you won’t have something to do with the mana a huge chunk of the time.

Nissa, Resurgent Animist

So she’s basically a bigger Lotus Cobra, something that is pretty nice in terms of fixing and ramping your mana. Triggering this twice in a turn is doable, but not a walk in the park either. If you can pull that off, that’s when Nissa will feel her strongest, since she will start drawing you creatures. You don’t even need that many Elves or Elementals for that effect to be great, since it effectively just grabs you one from your deck.

Open the Way

So, this is basically Explosive Vegetation, or Invasion of Zendikar. Only, you don’t have as much control over the lands you get. Ramp is definitely a thing in this format if you have the right bombs, but this is a pretty clunky way of doing it.

Tranquil Frillback

This three mana 3/3 comes with some pretty nice ETB options. Early it is a reasonably efficient creature, and the later the game gets, the more likely you’ll be able to both pay the mana for the effects and make use of them. Even just gaining 4 and blowing up an Incubator is going to feel good for five mana, and exiling graveyards has some meaning in this format too.

Undercity Upheaval

This has a very high ceiling, but it asks too much for Limited. You need to have a well-built board with lots of creatures and a graveyard stocked with creatures, and that’s some really awkward tension.

Calix, Guided by Fate

A three mana 2/2 that puts a +1/+1 counter somewhere is a pretty solid card, and if you have some more Enchantments around Calix can really get crazy, especially because his ability to copy Enchantments will also trigger constellation. This set isn’t the most Enchantment-heavy one ever, or he would be a bomb – as is, he’s merely very good.

Campus Renovation

This has the potential to deliver a 4-for-1, and that’s certainly intriguing – but you are far from guaranteed to have an Enchantment and Artifact in your graveyard, especially in Red-White in this format. You will very rarely get a full 4-for-1 here, and most of the time it will probably just be an expensive sorcery-speed 2-for-1, which is pretty bad.

Cosmic Rebirth

Reanimating a small thing at Instant speed and gaining three life is pretty good. Just putting the creature in your hand is less impressive, but still a passable effect. The trick is having stuff in your graveyard, but it feels like the first copy of this will be a nice thing to have in most Limited decks.

Danitha, New Benalia's Light

So, neither Auras nor Equipment are such a big feature of this format for Danitha to really go off, but she does start with a bunch of great keywords, and that means she is a great place to put the format’s plethora of +1/+1 counters, and when you do have Auras or Equipment to get back from the graveyard she will feel truly absurd.

Feast of the Victorious Dead

So this does stone nothing on turns where nothing dies. That’s…really bad. Sure, sometimes you will be able to get a ton of counters and gain a ton of life, and that has the potential to off-set the fact that this is a do-nothing so often. Also, you can play it in your second main phase so that your opponent doesn’t know you’re going to get the bonus, but this type of card always underperforms. You have far less control over making things die than you think.

Gold-Forged Thopteryx

A two mana ⅓ with Flying and Lifelink is a pretty impressive card to have, especially if you can augment it in some way. Giving Ward 2 to your legendary permanents will actually come up too

Jirina, Dauntless General

Most of the time, exiling a graveyard isn’t that impressive in this format. There also aren’t so many humans at lower rarities that her ability to make them indestructible and hexproof is consistently useful either.

Jolrael, Voice of Zhalfir

Animating a land into a flying creature every turn is nice, and even if you’re only able to make it a 1/1, it will be able to get in and draw you a card often enough for this creature to be a massive problem for your opponent.

The Kenriths' Royal Funeral

This set has more legendary creatures than normal, but this asks a lot of you. You’re going to need to have a legendary creature in your graveyard or this basically doesn’t do anything, and that’s not easy set up. Black can mill itself some, so it isn’t impossible, but even in this format consistently having something for this to exile is tough. That said, if you do have a legendary with mana value 3 or more in your graveyard, this looks to be a pretty good card, largely because of the ETB effect. If your deck has 4+ legendaries that fit the bill, and enough self-mill, this is probably playable. Otherwise? Not so much

Kiora, Sovereign of the Deep

There aren’t enough creatures with these types for her to do her thing very often. You may end up with 1-2, and when you cast one of them that will feel pretty nuts! But mostly? She’s a 5-mana ⅘ with Vigilance and Ward 3. Which is fine, but not much else.

Nahiri, Forged in Fury

There is an Equipment sub-theme in RW decks in the format, especially if you get some of the multiverse legends in those colors, but the floor here is pretty ugly. If you can’t lower her cost her stat-line is bad, and even then if you can’t trigger her attack trigger, she’s still not going to feel great. She’s definitely a buildaround that isn’t worth playing if you have 2 or fewer equipment, but she becomes more interesting if you have 4 or more.

Nahiri's Resolve

This stats boost alone isn’t really worth how much the card costs, so the question is how much mileage you can get out of the end step trigger. At worst, it does give your creatures pseudo-vigilance, and at best you can use it to rebuy ETB abilities. There are enough of those in the set for that to actually matter, but not so many that this will consistently be all that impressive.

Narset, Enlightened Exile

This is a bomb. Prowess to your whole board is already pretty insane, so the fact that she can help you trigger prowess with her attack trigger is nuts. She won’t always be able to cast a spell with that effect, but she’ll be able to do it often enough.

Nashi, Moon's Legacy

When you cast rats or legendaries from your graveyard this will feel great, and that isn’t impossible, especially because the set has more legendaries than normal, and Blue-Black has lots of self-mill effects. A three mana ¾ with Menace and Ward 1 isn’t bad either

Niv-Mizzet, Supreme

This is castable in this format for sure, it has hexproof from most removal in the set and is a huge flyer, so that’s a great place to be. Unfortunately his ability to give two-color spells jump-start is pretty close to irrelevant in the set, but the rest of the card is enough for this to be great

Ob Nixilis, Captive Kingpin

There are a few ways to make your opponent lose exactly one life - most notably Dreg Cycler and Invasion of Azgol - but that isn’t really enough for Ob’s ability to trigger very consistently. But hey, he starts out as a 4-mana 4/3 with Flying and Trample, and will on occasion do something pretty powerful.

Pia Nalaar, Consul of Revival

There is only one card at Common or Uncommon that triggers Pia’s ability (Wrenn’s Resolve), so most of the time she’s just a two mana ⅔. That’s not especially meaningful after turn two

Rebuild the City

Making three 3/3s with Menace and Vigilance is quite good for six mana, so the fact that this ramps you too is a nice cherry on top

Rocco, Street Chef

Giving your opponent an extra card isn’t amazing, and they do get a chance to use the card first. However, the fact you get some value back when they do play that card, and then you also get your own extra card every turn plus that bonus effect is pretty great

Samut, Vizier of Naktamun

If Samut can come down and hit the opponent right away, you’re going to feel pretty great. If you play it on turn three, you have a pretty reasonable shot at pulling that off too since not many things can effectively take it down in combat that early. It does get worse the longer the game goes, but it does work well with other cards that have Haste.

Sarkhan, Soul Aflame

There really aren’t enough Dragons in this set for Sarkhan to become a copy of consistently. He’s mostly just got semi-passable stats and might give you some very rare upside.

Sigarda, Font of Blessings

A 4-mana 4/3 with Flying is a great starting point, and there are certainly enough Humans and Angels in the set for you to actually cast one off of the top of your library sometimes. Hexproof to the rest of your board is always nice, but oftentimes this will be your best permanent anyway, so it doesn’t change what your opponent does a whole lot.

Tyvar the Bellicose

On his own, Tyvar is a 4-mana 5/4 with deathtouch when it attacks. That’s a passable card, and this format does have some other elves around that he can give deathtouch. On the other hand, there aren’t very many creature cards that produce mana in the format, so that part of the card is going to be a little more elusive.

Karn, Legacy Reforged

At worst, Karn is a 5-mana 5/5. That’s a passable stat-line, and if you have some other Artifact stuff going on, he can potentially become bigger and give you some “powerstone” mana. Unfortunately, this format doesn’t really have very many expensive Artifacts you’re actually interested in playing, so his upside is a bit limited.

Drannith Ruins

This is a pretty nice utility land. It hurts your mana of course, but being able to pay a two mana kicker to put two counters on most creatures you cast is pretty massive upside.

Anafenza, Kin-Tree Spirit

You don’t have complete control over where the counter goes, but it doesn’t really matter – adding “Put a +1/+1 counter somewhere” to every one of your nontoken creatures is a major upgrade, and that makes this a two drop that can really make things get out of hand.

Daxos, Blessed by the Sun

On its own, Daxos is a 2/2, and it will often have higher toughness than that – plus all the incidental life gain is nice. That said, this format doesn’t have a life gain deck in it – nor does it really have an Enchantment deck, nor does it have very many other cards that care about Devotion. So, it doesn’t do

Elesh Norn, Grand Cenobite

7 mana is a lot, but obviously Elesh Norn has an absolutely massive impact on the board right away, often wiping away several opposing creatures and allowing your board to attack far more effectively. She often simply wins the game the turn she comes down.

Kenrith, the Returned King

Even if you can’t use all of Kenrith’s abilities, he ends up being a 5-mana 5/5 that will have access to at least a couple of these, and that’s plenty for him to be good since every single ability he brings to the table is pretty impactful.

Kwende, Pride of Femeref

A 4-mana 2/2 with Double Strike isn’t a complete disaster, and this does upgrade a few other cards. Unfortunately, there aren’t very many First Strikers in this set.

Sram, Senior Edificer

This set doesn’t have an overwhelming umber of cards with these types – there are 7 Auras, 3 vehicles, and 8 Equipment – and a lot less of all of those if we only talk about Commons and Uncommons. That said, there’s definitely enough around for Sram to draw you a card sometimes, and he has a fine baseline.

Thalia, Guardian of Thraben

Thalia’s always a nice card because of her bae stats Her tax effect is symmetrical, but you’re the one playing Thalia, so you have control over when you cast her – if you really need to cast some noncreature spells just don’t play her, and she’s even better if you don’t have a ton of noncreature spells in your deck.

Baral, Chief of Compliance

Decreasing the cost of spells is nice, and there are a couple of playable counterspells in the set.

Emry, Lurker of the Loch

This set isn’t artifact heavy enough for Emry to work that well. She does mill you, which Blue/Black can get some value out of, but the absence of a critical mass of good Artifacts makes her pretty bad overall.

Inga Rune-Eyes

You’re mostly just paying for a 4-mana 3/3 with Scry 3. Luckily that’s a passable rate. You will be able to trigger her other ability on occasion, but don’t count on it.

Jin-Gitaxias, Core Augur

10 mana just isn’t accessible enough in Limited for Jin-Gitaxias to ever come down. There is a bit of reanimation and some other ways to cheat things into play, and if you can make that happen he gets pretty insane, but it isn’t a big enough feature in the format for him to be remotely playable.

Tetsuko Umezawa, Fugitive

At worst, Testuko is a an unblockable 1/3, and most Blue decks will have a few other creatures who can benefit.

Ayara, First of Locthwain

Triple Black is a challenge in Limited, but Ayara does a good job of paying you off if you go mono or mostly-black, as making most of your creatures drain 1 life on ETB is great, as is cashing them in for a card. She will be pretty nice even if you can’t play her until later because of her mana.

Horobi, Death's Wail

A 4-mana 4/4 flyer is a pretty nice rate, the rest of this card’s text has its pros and cons. It turns basically everything that targets into a removal spell, and that may benefit your opponent more than it benefits you! It is fairly hard to control how things will go there. Obviously, you can build around it to some extent, but you still can’t count on your opponent being capable of targeting anything.

Seizan, Perverter of Truth

This effect is symmetrical, and your opponent gets to take advantage of those new cards first. Now, they do also lose life first, but that doesn’t really make up for things here. I don’t like giving my opponent the cards that might let them just remove Seizan before I get to take advantage of them.

Sheoldred, Whispering One

Sheoldred’s great. You play her and pass the turn, and your opponent immediately loses something, and then if you get to your upkeep you reanimate something. If you get to take advantage of that turn cycle even once, it is going to be hard for you to lose, and most of the time your opponent won’t be able to deal with it before they at least lose a creature.

Skithiryx, the Blight Dragon

A 5-mana 4/4 Flyer is still a nice baseline, and this throws in a whole lot of extra value, including the ability to end the game with Poison. Regeneration and Haste are great things to have too – it makes it very hard to deal with this.

Tymaret, Chosen from Death

Hating on graveyards has some real value in this format, especially against Blue/Black decks, and Theros is basically always going to have a decent stat-line and bring some incidental life gain along for the ride.

Yargle, Glutton of Urborg

If you want a big vanilla creature, Yargle does the job. But…you really shouldn’t want that. The low toughness makes him a real liability.

Captain Lannery Storm

The turn this comes down this is a three mana 2/2 with Haste that makes a treasure when it attacks, and can threate to be a 3/2. If she’s allowed to attack more than once the value she brings in terms of treasure is really good. She does have diminishing returns the longer the game goes on, though, especially because this isn’t exactly a treasure-heavy format.

Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer

Ragavan is obviously insane in basically all constructed formats, but in a non-cube Limited format like this one, he is merely quite good. If you play him early he will be giving you a whole bunch of value since you’re going to effectively draw cards and ramp and fix your mana – and Dash means you can sneak it in sometimes. However, the board does quickly become populated enough that Ragavan just ends up being a one mana 2/1 by the mid to late game – which is fine, but nothing special.

Squee, the Immortal

Squee just doesn’t’ stay dead! The ability to continually return from the graveyard or exile means you can just keep trading this off if you’re on defense, or just keep on sending it in if you’re on offense. It also works well with the Sacrifice stuff in the set. It is still just a 2/1, but that recursion is nice.

Urabrask the Hidden

A 5-mana 4/4 with Haste is decent, and the upside of Haste to everything is pretty real on subsequent turns – and if your opponent’s stuff has to enter tapped, your things with Haste are even more likely to be able to get in there for damage.

Valduk, Keeper of the Flame

I don’t think every Red deck will automatically have the things it needs for this to spit out a Spark elemental every turn, and its pretty bad when you’re not doing that.

Zada, Hedron Grinder

Zada is really sweet if you are a deck that uses combat tricks and goes wide because using a combat trick on every one of your creatures look insane, and that does look like something many Red decks will do in the format. That said, the base level thing you get here is a Hill Giant, and this is probably another one that needs a build around.

Fynn, the Fangbearer

Even if you have 0 other death touch creatures in your deck, Fynn being a one mana 1/3 with Deathtouch is already acceptable, there are also a few other deathtouchers at lower rarities in the set, including two Commons. That said, you probably shouldn’t really count on poisoning someone out with this, especially because the larger set doesn’t have much in the way of poison.

Goreclaw, Terror of Qal Sisma

On its own, Goreclaw attacks as a 5/4 trampler, and if you have some other beefy creatures around it gets even better. You’ll often have those big creatures in Green too.

Renata, Called to the Hunt

Renata giving your creatures a +1/+1 counter when they enter is great, especially because this set has +1/+1 counter synergy, and sometimes Renate will also have pretty high power.

Vorinclex, Voice of Hunger

Like we saw with Jin-Gitaxias, 8 mana just isn’t something you can count on getting, and Vorinclex’s abilities honestly aren’t even that great by the late game in Limited. You don’t have anything to spend all that mana on most of the time, and making your opponent’s mana worse doesn’t matter a whole lot either.

Yedora, Grave Gardener

This is a 5-mana 5/5 that lets you get some value out of dead creatures, and sometimes it can even ramp you.

Aegar, the Freezing Flame

This was a powerhouse in Kaldheim Limited, pretty much an Uncommon bomb -- but that set had a heavy spell theme and Giant tribal all over the place. Blue-Red only has spells as a sub-theme this time around, and the set only has two Giants in it – and one of them is Mythic. Mostly in this format, we’re talking about a three mana 3/3 that draws you a card when you do excess damage with a spell.

Arixmethes, Slumbering Isle

This is effectively a 4-mana mana rock when you play it at first, and it does do a decent job of accelerating your mana – but that’s all it would be for awhile. You have to cast five spells to turn it into what is basically a vanilla 12/12. This is is a horrendous top-deck, and if you do play it on turn four, transforming it quickly is unlikely. Basically, its never good.

Atraxa, Praetors' Voice

Mana isn’t amazing in this format, but if you’re partly Green you have access to some fixing, there are also common dual lands, and Skittering Surveyer is in the format! Point here is that casting this is possible, but difficult. If you can cast it she’s pretty insane, proliferate does some serious work in this format between all the +1/+1 counters and Battles. You can make battles you are defending even harder to defeat, for example – in addition to getting a creature with a bunch of amazing keywords that can simply win the game by attacking. Her mana requirements keep her out of the straight up “bomb” range, so if mana ends up being better than I expect, she’ll easily be a bomb.

Atris, Oracle of Half-Truths

This is going to at least give you a 2-for-1, load your graveyard, and give you a 3/2 Menace. That’s a great deal.

Aurelia, the Warleader

Thanks to having both Flying and Haste, this is likely to be able to attack successfully the turn it comes down, and then give you an extra combat phase immediately, and even if that just means you attack with her again, you’re going to feel pretty good. Most of the time, it will mean you can attack with other things an additional time too!

Brudiclad, Telchor Engineer

A 6-mana 4/4 that spits out a 2/1 with Haste every turn is a strong card, and this offers some additional token upside. If you play it in your first main phase, you get that 2/1 the turn you play it, so even if Brudiclad goes down, you have some value left over – and if its left in play it becomes a major problem. This works really well with Incubators too, because they have base power 0/0, so if you have them all become 2/1s they will become significantly larger.

Dina, Soul Steeper

Life gain is not a huge theme in the format, which really limits how good Dina can be. There is incidental life gain around that she certainly takes advantage of, and her ability to buff herself can be useful sometimes too.

Ezuri, Claw of Progress

If you have small creatures, Ezuri starts to do some pretty great stuff, as even just getting one +1/+1 counter a turn is pretty awesome, and you can end up with far more. It does take some work to really get it going of course, since it is just a Hill Giant at first, but I think decks will have enough creatures to give you experience counters.

Firesong and Sunspeaker

This gets nice with damaging spells, and there are of course many of those in Red – and even one in White in this set. Gaining life off of all of that is pretty powerful.

Firja, Judge of Valor

This has decent base stats, and it will net you cards sometimes. It even loads your graveyard if you’re interested in that.

Grimgrin, Corpse-Born

Entering tapped is a big problem, but there is plenty of sacrifice fodder in the format that lets this untap, and it is a free sacrifice effect which is always very threatening – and the fact it can destroy something when it attacks is really nice. This can really go wild if the board is set up correctly for it, but it does take some work.

Gyruda, Doom of Depths

Trying to meet the companion requirement here is definitely worth I, buteven if you end up not meeting the Companion requirement, Gyruda is still a bomb, because it is a 6-mana 6/6 that virtually always reanimate something on ETB.

Imoti, Celebrant of Bounty

A 5-mana 3/1 isn’t good, but this has Cascade – so you’re also going to get something else, and even if it is just a one mana spell you’re getting a decent deal – if you hit something that costs 4 it will feel pretty insane. Granting Cascade to your expensive stuff is a nice thing to have around too, and if you can follow this by casting a six drop on the next turn its pretty hard for you to lose.

Jegantha, the Wellspring

Sometimes in Limited you just end up with a deck that meets this requirement when you aren’t even trying. Typically, you end up making 2 or 3 different picks to play Jegantha as your companion, and that cost is definitely worth effectively having this available to you in your opening hand every single game, even if you have to pay three generic to put it into your hand. The card itself has a nice body and can even help you with mana little bit

Judith, the Scourge Diva

This is going to be great in this format. Black/Red looks like a strong sacrifice deck, so adding a ping every time one of your things dies is great. She does stay nontoken, so she doesn’t let you go crazy with Incubators, but she still has a massive amount of upside – and the fact she buffs all your stuff right away is great too. Going to combat when Judith is in play is going to give your opponent nightmares. She even counts herself, so it is hard for your opponent to ever escape without something getting pinged.

Juri, Master of the Revue

Again, sacrifice decks in this format look legit, so this is an incredibly nice payoff for that deck. Even if it never grows, the fail case is a two mana 1/1 that pings something when it dies. That isn’t great, but that’s the fail case, and this becomes more and more of a problem as the game goes on.

Kaheera, the Orphanguard

You’re not meeting this requirement, and you just won’t have that many creatures that Kaheera buffs.

Keruga, the Macrosage

Making this your Companion is going to be a challenge, especially if the format is one where you need to add to the board by turn two, and it probably is. The good news? Keruga is great in your main deck. Even if it just draws you one card on ETB you’ll be very happy, and it can often draw you multiple cards

Kroxa, Titan of Death's Hunger

Playing this on turn two is pretty decent. If it was just a Sorcery that did that it would probably be a 1.5 -- However, if it ever Escapes the graveyard, it is a complete and utter beating, since the effect keeps triggering and eventually is a real problem for your opponent. Black has lots of ways to mill itself in the format too, so I think getting Kroxa to come back once is fairly doable – it does still take some pretty real work, though.

Lathiel, the Bounteous Dawn

This can gain life all on its own, but it is also small enough that it isn’t really going to survive gaining you that life. You need some other incidental life gain around to really take advantage. There’s enough life gain in Green/White for this work out fairly well.

Lurrus of the Dream-Den

Lurris is another companion where it is kind of tough to make it your Companion. However, doing so can be pretty nuts! Keep in mind it only looks at permanents, so you can still run lots of expensive instants and sorceries. If you do meet the Companion requirement it means Lurrus will be able to get basically all nonland permanents out of your graveyard, and that value is just absurd, especially because it is a three mana 3/2 with Lifelink. Ideally, you play Lurrus and then you play something out of your graveyard, and you’re already way ahead. I don’t recommend forcing this as a Companion in all situations, but you can definitely have a solid deck that can play Lurrus, and if you end up with Lurrus in your deck you’re still in great shape.

Lutri, the Spellchaser

Lutri is the easiest of these to make your Companion. Most of the time in Limited you end up with a singleton deck, so you don’t even have to try very hard. Lutri isn’t quite as powerful as some of his fellow companions, but being the easiest to make your companion certainly matters. And it isn’t like he’s a slouch either, a three mana 3/2 with Flash that copies one of your spells is definitely powerful.

Niv-Mizzet Reborn

The mana here is tough, and there aren’t really enough cards in this set that Niv-Mizzet can even hit and put in your hand. Your typical deck will probably have like two cards he can draw for you, so he isn’t even always going to be able to draw you a card.

Obosh, the Preypiercer

On its own, Obosh is effectively a 5-mana 6/5 – and it also effectively buffs the power of all of your other odd-numbered creatures. You can see why doing the Companion requirement can be quite powerful, because it means literally every creature in your deck will do double damage, and you know you have the opportunity to get Obosh every single game. It is definitely a challenge to meet the requirement though, as not having two drops can be sketchy. He’s great in your main deck too, though!

Radha, Coalition Warlord

Radha isn’t going to be as good in this format as she was in Dominaria United. That format was well set up for you to get multiple land types in play. This one’s not. So she is mostly a Hill Giant that offers +2/+2 when she attacks.

Raff, Weatherlight Stalwart

This was powerful last time we saw it, and it will be here too. Blue/White isn’t as into spells this time around, but you will have spells and this gives you the option to draw extra cards off of them, while also having a powerful mass pump effect that really alters the game when you get there.

Reyav, Master Smith

There’s a decent amount of Auras and Equipment in the set, but not so many that this is going to be super easy to trigger.

Rona, Sheoldred's Faithful

Adding some incidental life loss to your spells can be nice, and Blue/Black in this format mills itself enough that her recursive ability matters too.

Shanna, Sisay's Legacy

In most cases, she scales as the game goes on, and the fact she can’t be targeted by abilities comes up sometimes too.

Taigam, Ojutai Master

If you can make a single spell rebound with this, it will feel pretty great, as it turns every spell into a 2-for-1 at the very worst. You won’t always be able to attack with Taigam and have the monk survive, because its just a ¾, and that does limit its usefulness.

Teysa Karlov

There are enough creature tokens in the format that Vintage definitely matters, and there are certainly death triggers in the format.

Umori, the Collector

This can be a little challenging to make into a Companion. In Limited you basically need to have all creatures for it to work, but this is one where I don’t really recommend going the companion route. Like the others, this is great in your main deck, since it is a 4-mana 4/5 with upside.

Yarok, the Desecrated

ETB abilities are plentiful enough in this set for Yarok to do the same kind of silly stuff he usually does, and a 5-mana 3/5 with deathtouch and lifelink is high quality to begin with.

Yorion, Sky Nomad

Yorion is fairly easy to make your Companion, especially these days, because the average power level of cards is so much higher. There really aren’t that many cards that are straight up unplayable, so going up to a 60-card deck in Limited to make Yorion your Companion can really be worth it. You end up with a big, efficient flyer that can also give you some pretty serious ETB power. Its great when it isn’t your companion, too.

Zirda, the Dawnwaker

Sadly, it is impossible for Zirda to be your Companion in Limited. You just can’t meet this requirement. A three mana 3/3 that reduces the cost of activated abilities and can make things unable to block is a nice card, though.