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Duskmourn has ended up being a pretty sweet set. I'll be honest, a bit of the flavor frustrates me because it seems extremely anachronistic for a Magic set, but I guess we live in a post-fantasy Magic reality now? It's a little weird seeing TVs and VHS tapes in a game that often contains things like talking cats and Phyrexians, but here we are.
Minor flavor quibblings aside, the set itself has some really neat designs, and today I'm going to talk about some of the more interesting ones that tickle my fancy - whatever that means.
Those Wacky "Enduring" Creatures
Most of the Enduring creatures seem really cool and have great abilities that persist after their death. Enduring Curiosity, Enduring Innocence, and Enduring Courage seem like the best. I'm not a huge fan of the Green Enduring Vitality, and the Black Enduring Tenacity seems more suited for Commander.
Despite my preference of them, all five of them are reasonably costed threats that need to be killed twice to neutralize their effect, and as enchantments, the second time is going to be more difficult than the first. These not being legendary is interesting, because getting multiple of these into play seems advantageous.
Demonic Counsel
I love a good Demonic Tutor. It's almost always first pickable for me in a Cube Draft. Demonic Counsel is doing a really neat Demonic Tutor Impression, but also a much more narrow Traverse the Ulvenwald impression. Both cards search for a narrow thing, then a much more broad thing. Traverse was great because both functions were very useful. Demonic Counsel requires a bit more building around, but to be literal demonic tutor once your delirium kicks in is pretty impressive. I also added a copy of it to this year's Horror Cube that's available to draft on Magic Online until Friday, October 25th.
Unidentified Hovership
As someone who has had a fascination with UFO culture (UAPs now) since he was a child, seeing two cards in the set based on UFOs and gray aliens (Fear of Abduction) is pretty wild. Unidentified Hovership seems pretty good in terms of White cards in the "cost three mana and remove an opposing creature" category.
This has a lot of similarities with Skyclave Apparition, but a few differences as well. Toughness five or less covers a lot of creatures, while the Apparition can hit any permanent that costs four or less. When the Apparition leaves play, the opponent could get a 0/0 or a 4/4 or anything in between. When the Hovership leaves, they'll always only get a 2/2, but it could be something better, waiting to be flipped up. While you do need to crew the hovership, it only has crew 1, and it also has flying. I think it's a pretty neat card that takes care of probably 90% of the creatures in a given format.
Kaito, Bane of Nightmares
This is a card I was not expecting to shine, but it turns out there are quite a few ninjas in Pioneer. Kaito, Bane of Nightmares has been making waves in the format with multiple decks revolving around the planeswalker showing up. Along with cards like Mockingbird, Moon-Circuit Hacker, Silver-Fur Master, and Thousand-Faced Shadow, Kaito's ability to plus for an emblem turn after turn is actually shockingly strong. He can also draw cards, tap down creatures, and attack on his own! This is a planeswalker that does a lot and ends up having a great, niche application in some formats.
Dissection Tools
This is another card I ended up adding to my Horror Cube. It's not only unsettling, but really feels like a Batterskull without the ability to return it to your hand. For five mana, you get a 4/4 with lifelink, but instead of vigilance, you get deathtouch. That's not the worst tradeoff when this is the only option you have. Additionally, a manifest creature has a lot more upside than a germ. The germ just dies if the equipment is killed, while the manifest survives. You could also just flip it into something larger. The biggest drawback for Dissection Tools is that you have to sacrifice a creature in order to re-equip it to something, which is a bit of an ask. But in a deck that has access to some disposable creatures, it's not the worst.
I've found myself really enjoying Duskmourn as a set. Feel free to share your thoughts with me on social media and let me know what you think or let me know what you might have chosen from the set!
Frank Lepore
