When you talk about Return to Ravnica, players often gush about it enthusiastically. When you get to the other sets of the block, however, reception gets a lot more mixed. While we'll talk about the true black sheep next time, I want to focus today on the one that often feels a little under-appreciated: Gatecrash. Many players don't often realize just how many cool cards came out of this set and instead often lament how utterly lopsided the draft format was. Boros and Orzhov being the best things you could do, Gruul was a distant third, and Simic and Dimir were both practically unplayable, leading to a really rough experience for many players.

Despite this, lots of cool and powerful cards came out of the set as well. If you've ever been crushed by a Boros Charm or Skullcrack, for example, you have this set to thank for that. We're going to cover all of the sweet hits and spectacular duds today as we rank all the mythics of this much maligned and often misunderstood set. Ready? Let's dive on in!

15. Aurelia's Fury

We're kicking things off with one heck of a thud. If you're a fan of The Resleevables like I am, you'll know they have an award that's "the Aurelia's Fury award for most overhyped card in the set." If you weren't playing at the time, you might not get just how overhyped this was. We were just coming off of Bonfire of the Damned being a mega hit in Standard and people were expecting this to be the next big mass wipe spell. It presold for around $30 and was THE card everyone was excited for and then...it did nothing and collapsed in price and demand. Turns out it was far too much work to do too little damage and had nowhere near the level of impact Bonfire did, resulting in it becoming a case study in grossly overhyped cards.

14. Gideon, Champion of Justice

The overhype continues with another famously rough card in Gideon, Champion of Justice. The card also presold for around $25-30 in no small part due to how the original Gideon Jura card was such a major piece in control decks of its era. On its own, though, this card doesn't do much of anything. It's really hard to get up to the ultimate if your opponent doesn't have a board full of creatures and if they do, they're probably able to keep Gideon reasonably off of that ultimate on their own. He can turn into a creature still but outside that, he's often not all that useful. He did see a little play, but he's much more famously lambasted for being relatively useless.

13. Deathpact Angel

While neither Aurelia's Fury or Gideon were particularly good cards, they were at least a little bit interesting. The same can't be said for Deathpact Angel, though, which was trying to be a new approach at an Orzhov angel after how popular Angel of Despair was in Guildpact. The end result is a bland dud, but one that was a pretty solid house in Limited despite that.

12. Duskmantle Seer

Much like Aurelia's Fury, Duskmantle Seer is yet another monstrously overhyped card. Unlike Aurelia's Fury, though, this card actually had its uses, making it at least a bit more exciting. Why was it so hyped? From the original Ravnica: City of Guilds set, Dark Confidant was one of the most popular Constructed creatures in the game for a long while, and this seemed like a great way to do that in Commander where you could force players to take really big life swings while you play around it. Ultimately, most players weren't on board with giving other players free card draw, even at the cost of life, and it never took off as well as people wanted it to, but the card still proved extremely memorable in spite of that.

11. Giant Adephage

On some level, Giant Adephage is pretty boring. You just get a big 7/7 "French vanilla" creature, what's the big deal? Well that one huge creature then turns into two, which then turns into four, which then turns into eight, and so on. It may not be the most exciting thing to put onto the board, but once it gets going, it's everything plenty of casual players the world over want to be doing. Best of all it doesn't come with the baggage of similar past Green mythics like Essence of the Wild that showed up around this time.

10. Lord of the Void

For a long time, Lord of the Void was an unwanted bulk mythic rare. It hovered around the $2-4 range for several years before slowly creeping up in price due to increased desirability. After all, who doesn't like permanently removing opponents' access to their spells and getting something out of it for yourself? Turns out many casual players love that, and its demand went up to reflect that with time. Given how long it took to get there and just how undesirable it was in its era, I'm keeping it lower, especially since the top half of this list is filled with some surprising gas.

9. Enter the Infinite

It's somewhat hard to overstate how jaw-dropping this card was when it first showed up. The idea of just getting to draw your whole deck was unbelievable, leading to some unique uses in older formats that could take advantage of it. For a little bit, it showed up in Omnitell lists in Legacy as a way to guarantee that you could land a killing blow by easily casting a free copy of Enter the Infinite off of an Omniscience that was cheated into lay with Show and Tell. These days it's relegated mostly to Commander play, but it had a certain degree of wow factor that captured the attention of players all over at the time of release.

8. Lazav, Dimir Mastermind

Players love a good Clone card. Players love even more when that Clone can turn into a different creature several times. Lazav is a great implementation of this, providing a sweet outlet to turning your opponents' strategies against them while also controlling the game at the same time. Lazav never made much of a splash in Constructed formats, but he was an instant favorite in Commander at the helm of many Dimir lists for years to come, and for good reason.

7. Prime Speaker Zegana

Prime Speaker Zegana was pretty big, and when I say big, I mean the card itself would get huge. Not only would she often enter with tons of counters, but she would then draw you tons of cards. That made her an instant favorite in just about every Commander deck that could play her, though she also had a small stint in Standard as well! Players would put her into play the turn after putting a Thragtusk on the battlefield, creating a 6/6 and drawing a full grip of new cards. After that, you'd cast a Restoration Angel to flicker Zegana and do it all over again. The deck wasn't super popular, but still made a solid showing all the same and helped cement the card as a fan favorite.

6. Hellkite Tyrant

It wasn't long before Commander players everywhere tried getting their hands on Hellkite Tyrant to shut down all their friends piloting artifact-heavy decks. Then players realized they could just pair it with a copy of Mycosynth Lattice and win the game quickly while simultaneously shutting out opponents from being able to do anything. It's the mythic with the highest EDHREC rating and given some of the other cards on this list, that's really saying something.

5. Borborygmos Enraged

"Pithing Needle naming Borborygmos."

The classic tale caused a big change in how naming cards for the likes of Pithing Needle, Phyrexian Revoker, and Sorcerous Spyglass worked where it was treated that the player had named Borborygmos instead of Borborygmos Enraged. While notable for that, it's also notable for the tournament pedigree it brought to the table. Usually it's too costly to play out effectively, but it saw plenty of play in older builds of Goryo's Vengeance in Modern. These days it's sidelined to extremely fringe play and occasional Commander use, but in its moment, the card had a pretty respectable impact on the game as a whole.

4. Master Biomancer

Master Biomancer is the card that everyone knew likely wouldn't make a huge splash in competitive formats, but would instantly be a staple in casual formats. Thanks to the recent blossoming popularity of the Commander format, this became an immediate must-play for many Simic decks. Even today it's far from uncommon to show up in the format, boasting one of the highest EDHREC rankings among mythics in the set. After all, who doesn't love continually putting counters on everything just because?

3. Domri Rade

Nowadays, the original Domri Rade is a forgotten relic that's not really playable anywhere outside of perhaps certain cubes. If you try playing it in Commander, it dies too quickly to get decent value out of, making it rather unexciting. So why is it so high, you may ask? Simply put, the card was an absolutely dominating force during its tenure in Standard. It was so good at the time that it generally commanded a hefty $30 price tag. It may have fallen off completely in the days since, but in its prime, it was everything aggressive and midrange decks alike wanted to be doing.

2. Aurelia, the Warleader

Aurelia's Fury may not be super hot but Aurelia herself is hot fire. This powerful angel saw only minor Constructed play with a modest showing in Standard, but time has been kind to this creature and she's become one of the most popular things you could be doing in Commander with Boros colors. She comes in, attacks immediately, and gives you a second combat phase to go for that big finishing move. If you're an aggro deck with Red and White, you absolutely want this. Six mana is usually far too much for most formats, hence the lack of Constructed utility, but in casual Commander when games can go on for a while? She's an absolute monster.

1. Obzedat, Ghost Council

Old-timers out there might remember a deck once known as Ghost Dad, with the title referring to the original Ghost Council of Orzhova card from Guildpact. The card isn't super stellar today, but at the time it had a rock solid stat line and an ability that was full of synergistic play, even if it only dished out miniscule damage. Flash forward to Gatecrash and we ended up getting a whole new take on Ghost Dad and people couldn't believe how good it was. A 5/5 with no drawback that was incredibly hard to remove that also just happened to drain your opponents over and over after attacking for a quarter of their life total? What a deal! In the years since, Obzedat has fallen out of popularity pretty hard, but there's no denying how in its prime it was one of the absolute best things you could be doing.