‘Ello ladles and jellyspoons! With the first week of M20 spoilers on the books, I’ve decided to break down my Top 5 picks from Week 1.
*DISCLAIMER*
These are my personal picks i.e. these aren’t necessarily the “best cards” from the set, just a few cards that tickle my fancy for one reason or another. I write from mostly a Modern player’s perspective so if I didn’t mention Yarok, the Desecrated, don’t think that I didn’t see it or that I don’t want do silly Panharmonicon things with it in Commander. I just needed to keep my list short and sweet like a chocolate dipped midget.
In no particular order:
[scryimg] Scheming Symmetry [/scryimg]
Scheming Symmetry. I’m super excited for this card and I have high hopes for it. Obviously Commander players are celebrating in the streets for the new one mana tutor that doesn’t cost 50-60$ like Vampiric Tutor does (even if it does give one of your opponents a tutor). In Modern, I could see it finding a home in Mill (super dirty to cast with an Archive Trap in hand) and in Lantern Control. The fact that it puts the tutored card on top of library instead of in hand plays to Lantern’s advantage because they get to look at it and decide if their opponent gets to keep it. The card was almost tailor made for Lantern as it allows the deck to cut down on the number of main deck answers and bring in more 1-of silver bullets. In general, the card has a mini Fact or Fiction effect in that you can play mind games with your opponent games 2 and 3. Psych them out by tutoring up an all new creature combo from your transformer sideboard after they bring in their artifact/enchantment hate.
[scryimg] Lotus Field [/scryimg]
Lotus Field. As soon as I saw the word ‘Lotus’ I already knew we had a broken card on our hands. People have already been talking about how Blood Sun breaks it and you know Amulet Titan is going to exploit it. Lord Windgrace is a happy camper and I’m sure some degenerate Eggs shenanigans will come of it as well. The card just has too much potential that I had to mention it.
[scryimg] Elvish Relaimer [/scryimg]
Elvish Reclaimer. Why didn’t we get this in Modern Horizons??? I don’t think it will break Standard so it doesn’t make difference… Anyways, I feel like if there is going to be a Modern Lands deck this guy was the piece that we were waiting for to make it possible. Essentially Crop Rotation stapled to a 1/2 one-drop with the relevant Elf creature type to boot! I’ve seen people dabble with weird Primeval Titan/Lands-esque brews before but I think the Reclaimer will get us closer to a real Lands deck in Modern.
[scryimg] Rotting Regisaur [/scryimg]
Rotting Regisaur. Oh baby! A three mana 7/6 beat stick?!? It’s like a glorious dump truck mixed with a freight train. Sign me up! Yeah sure, it has a drawback but it can be played to your advantage if built around properly (pitch a Lingering Souls to it or use it to enable Madness, Delirium, or Hellbent…). And yeah sure, it doesn’t have evasion but so doesn’t Tarmogoyf and people still play the crap out of ol’ Goyf. It costing three mana can almost be seen as an upside when it comes to removal because it requires Revolt in order to Fatal Push it. It takes two Bolts to kill it which is six less damage you take to face vs. Burn. It still ‘dies’ to Path but so does everything that doesn’t have Hexproof. The sheer fact that it’s a 7/x also makes it considerably better than if it was a 6/x because it represents a three turn clock instead of a four turn clock. The drawback doesn’t require the deck to be built around it. Had the card read, “At the beginning of your upkeep, sacrifice a creature.” that would require a steady flow of dudes in order to continue sending this big boy into the red zone. As is, you get an unconditional 7/6 beat stick for three mana no matter what the board state is. You have just driven into Pound Town, USA and this dino is the mayor.
[scryimg] Goblin Ringleader:m20 [/scryimg]
And lastly, Goblin Ringleader. I like this card mostly for reasons similar to Elvish Reclaimer in that they both (I feel) will make new Modern decks possible that hadn’t existed before or were missing pieces for. As I mentioned in one of my previous articles, Modern Horizons gave us Matron but Ringleader was the missing piece of the puzzle for Modern Goblins to mimic Legacy Goblin and become a thing.
Welp, those are my Top 5 picks from Week 1. I don’t know about you but I love spoiler season because I get all the spicy/flashy Commander bombs and the occasional Modern playable gem during the week and on the final Friday we get all the commons (Pauper players favorite day!). Stay tuned for next week when we get all 280 cards dropped on us.
And as always, if you’re in the market for some snazzy new sleeves be sure to cruise on over to the shop and use my discount code MADMAGIC for 15% off on your next purchase.
