Another summer, another new core set. I generally look forward to drafting the new core set every year, even if they are more or less the same each time. Wizards has actually been doing a decent job of making core sets draftable, and while they’re not as interesting as expert-level sets, they’re still fun for a few weeks. I tend to grow bored of Draft formats pretty quickly, and the current one has nearly run its course. It’s fair to say I’ve had something of a love–hate relationship with Return to Ravnica block Limited. Never before has my win rate on Magic Online varied so wildly. I lost my bankroll in triple-RTR and built it back up with triple-GRC, and I’m basically just treading water in full-block. Shoving all ten guilds together makes for a challenging Draft format, so going back to core set will be a refreshing change. Besides, I still have my Full Ravnica Cube if I have a hankering for some multi-colored goodness.

I’m going to evaluate this from a Limited perspective, so I’m mostly going to be talking about the commons and uncommons. Before I go to a prerelease, I’ll generally scan through the spoiler looking for a few things in particular. I’m guessing most of you already do this, but it’s important that you don’t just passively read the cards. You should be asking yourself how the cards interact with each other and observe general trends. For example, the big thing with this core set is Slivers, so I’m going to want to know how far the theme is being pushed. How many Slivers do I need to have before Hive Stirrings becomes really good? What instant-speed removal or tricks are there than can possibly mess with my attack? Answering these sorts of questions can leave you better prepared for when you open your six packs this weekend.

It’s important to be able to gauge both the relative and absolute usefulness of a card. Take a card like Doom Blade. In absolute terms, it’s a premium removal spell. It unconditionally kills most creatures at a cheap cost and is even splashable. Unless it’s a crazy format in which black is much better than every other color, it’s easy to rate a card like this. Now take a card like Mark of the Vampire. Granting +2/+2 and lifelink is a big deal, but figuring out how good the card is takes a bit more work. In a world where the only removal is damage-based, I’d feel safe main-decking this card if I also have high-toughness creatures. In a different world that has both Unsummon and Aether Adept, Mark of the Vampire becomes a liability. M14 is somewhere in the middle, but I tend to err on the side of caution when it comes to Auras.

I’ll comment on what I feel are the standout commons in each color and give my general impressions on what to look for when you’re battling this weekend.

White

Celestial Flare is an interesting card that’s going to make for some really weird attacks and blocks. I can see myself attacking with Kraken Hatchling a lot if that’s a card that comes back. To avoid being blown out, you should be attacking or blocking with an extra creature whenever possible. I usually don’t like Diabolic Edict effects that much in Limited, but constraining the choice to attack or blocking creatures combined with the cheap cost makes this a pretty good card. Unlike something like Divine Verdict, you can still develop your board while leaving up . Combined with Master of Diversion, white decks are very good at controlling the attack phase. Dawnstrike Paladin is also a fine defensive creature, so white decks don’t necessarily have to be aggressive. You also have Angelic Wall if you really need something to block early, but that’s never a card I’m happy to play.

White seems to pair with red and green the best and with black the worst. In fact, I would avoid playing W/B like the plague since a lot of the good white cards are , and the good black cards require you to play a lot of Swamps.

Blue

So far, I’m not impressed by blue. The creatures all kind of suck, and it’s not as though the spells are amazing either. Trained Condor is pretty sweet, though, and I’m always happy to play cards like Nephalia Seakite. Archaeomancer is another card I’m probably going to be casting a lot of in the near future. Where blue really shines is in its uncommons. Both Air and Water Servant are premium creatures (well, Air Servant is just a bit better), but the card that has me excited is Warden of Evos Isle. Playing out a cheaper flyer and leaving up mana for instants is just what blue decks want to be doing. Opportunity is another great card, but I have a feeling that many people, including me, will overrate it. Drawing four cards is a big game, but it comes at a hefty cost. The Draft format might end up being too fast for it, although I would never cut it from a Sealed deck.

I’m a little sad there isn’t a Control Magic variant at uncommon, but it’s probably for the best. Mind Control is just overpowered at uncommon. I thought Switcheroo was fine, but Domestication at rare? Ugh. As for color combinations, blue goes well with red and white. Red cards like Goblin Shortcutter work well for pushing Scroll Thief through, and red seems to have the best assortment of spells to rebuy with Archaeomancer. W/U flyers is almost always a thing even if white’s common flyers aren’t all that exciting.

Black

Black isn’t a color that plays well with others. There are a bunch of cards in the set for which you’re going to want to play as many Swamps as possible. Quag Sickness is the most important one, and it turns into Vindicate when you have more than thirteen or fourteen Swamps in your deck. It’s still a fine card when it’s giving a creature -2/-2, but it’s not as though you can splash it. M11 was the last time we saw this card and its best friend Corrupt, and I can tell you from experience that when the mono-black deck comes together, it’s nigh-unbeatable. I was the only mono-black drafter in the Top 8 of a Grand Prix Trial, and I managed to pick up five Quag Sicknesses and one or two Corrupts. My deck had fifteen Swamps, so Quag Sickness was the literal Vindicate. I won the trial very easily despite my opponent in the finals playing three Obstinate Baloths (one from a Clone) in a single game. Let me tell you: You haven’t lived until you’ve played Corrupt for 11.

This isn’t to say that you have to play mono-black, and even so, it’s more for Draft than Sealed. For decks without an absurd number of Swamps, Liturgy of Blood gets the job done. Paying 5 mana is a lot, but I never met a Brainspoil I didn’t like. B/R sacrifice is a real deck as well, as black offers a few decent sacrifice outlets at common, the best of which is Blood Bairn. Other important creatures at common are Child of Night, long a pet card of mine, Deathgaze Cockatrice, and Undead Minotaur. That last one might seem like an odd card to highlight, but a there seems to be a lot of 2/2s, so a 3-mana 2/3 really shines.

I mentioned that black pairs with red very well because of Act of Treason, but it’s fine with any nonwhite color. For the prerelease, the main draws to being in black are Liturgy of Blood and Doom Blade.

Red

While reading this, it seems that red is the Guile’s Theme of colors. Well, yes and no. Red does have some decent synergies with other colors, but its own card quality is quite shallow. Chandra's Outrage is the best common, and after that are Shock, Goblin Shortcutter, Blur Sliver, and Marauding Maulhorn in no particular order. In a R/G deck, I’d value the Maulhorn and Blur Sliver a bit higher. These cards are fine on their own, but they all need a little help to do anything. Most of the other cards that red has to offer at common are just filler. Red does have some really good uncommons, though, with Flames of the Firebrand being the best one. Battle Sliver is a really good reason to jam the maximum number of Slivers in your deck as well. Young Pyromancer is exciting as well, particularly in a U/R deck with Archaeomancers.

I think the best color to pair red with is green despite everything I said above. You have access to most of the best Slivers, and Marauding Maulhorn goes from being decent to being insane with Advocate of the Beast. As I said before, B/R is also a good combination.

Green

Well, any sort of Overrun-like effect is gone, and with it is any chance of me drafting green. Well, that’s not entirely true. My hatred for playing green in core-set Limited is legendary, but I don’t allow that to get in the way of me playing a good deck. Green was actually decent in the last core set, but few forms of evasion or pushing damage through means I’m not going to be sleeving Forests very often. It’s not all bad news, though. Predatory Sliver is a probably the most important common Sliver to have, though I suspect it’s going to be Timberpack Wolf a majority of the time. Rumbling Baloth is freaking huge, and if you can play it early off an Elvish Mystic, your opponent will be hard-pressed to deal with it right away. Speaking of which—really? They couldn’t just reprint Llanowar Elves?

I would actually put Llanoware Elves Elvish Mystic as the top common since it’s that important. Rumbling Baloth is a close second, and the rest of green’s creatures are good filler. Green is actually a good color for Sealed for this reason—you’ll rarely want for enough playable creatures if green is one of your colors.

Have fun at the prerelease, and I’ll see you guys again next week.

Take care,

Nassim Ketita

arcticninja on Magic Online

http://www.youtube.com/nketita