Recently, I kicked off my latest series ranking the mythics from most releases that have featured them since the rarity was introduced. I kicked things off with the first set to include mythic rare cards - Shards of Alara - and today we're talking about the second set of that block: Conflux. Shards of Alara focused largely on, well, the five shards of Alara and how they worked individually - rarely crossing over into one another. With Conflux, we get more of that crossover and a small focus on five-color themes. The set is also a smaller block release, meaning this time there's only 10 mythics. Even though there're fewer overall, there's still a lot of interesting cards in this early mythic set, so let's jump in and start ranking them!

10. Mirror-Sigil Sergeant

Initially, I had this card higher on the list because the ability is just so unique. Then I remembered how, apart from the ability itself, the card is basically French vanilla. To make matters worse, it's an expensive French vanilla creature, costing six mana for a do-nothing that might go wide long term. I love the design, but this is a case of an early mythic that's got the right idea, but feels like a pretty rough execution in practice, especially with 15 years of hindsight.

9. Malfegor

Malfegor has never seemed like a particularly good card to me. It does more than Mirror-Sigil Sergeant, for sure, but that doesn't feel like it's saying much. If anything, this card often feels antithetical to what you want to be doing in Magic. You want to build a hand and expand your strategy. Dumping your hand to force your opponents to sacrifice a bunch of creatures just doesn't feel good, especially when you have to lose it blindly. Even in a Commander game, chances are high your opponents will have plenty of tokens to sacrifice. The card didn't feel great back in the day and it's no better today.

8. Thornling

When Thornling came out, it seemed like a really awesome card. Morphling was at one time considered the best creature Magic had ever seen, and at the time this set would've only been about 10 years since Urza's Saga's release. They tried once a few years prior in Planar Chaos to do something similar with Torchling but that one just never seemed great. Thornling on the other hand felt way better! Unfortunately, it never saw much play - only making a minor impact in Standard - and in most other areas it's just a really big dumb creature with not much going on. As creatures have gotten better in the years since, Thornling's already somewhat mediocre existence was lessened further and further, and is now largely forgotten. A sweet design, but lacking in lasting appeal.

7. Apocalypse Hydra

I'll be the first to admit that I find hydras to be pretty boring (this may come back up in some future mythic rankings as well). They often scale strangely power-wise thanks to their X casting cost and often feel kind of dull. The problem with Apocalypse Hydra is that it feels pretty vanilla with the chance at picking off some small creatures for both mana and making it smaller. It's unlikely you'll get the doubling effect in most games, meaning the power here will be low in most situations. It's also among the first mythics to be downshifted in a reprint set - Modern Masters 2015 in this case - and it's not hard to see why. The card felt cool but middle of the road back in the day, and its appeal has only gone down with time.

6. Conflux

Nowadays, we have plenty of five-color legends, but back when Conflux released, they were fairly scarce. That made this card a difficult card to play in the budding Commander format. Couple that with the difficulty of making five-color decks work in other formats, and you've got a real oddball of a card. Time has been kind to this one, though, and as the years have passed, more decks have come around that can utilize this well, making a curiosity into a veritably potent card in the right deck.

5. Child of Alara

When this was released, it felt like a real head scratcher. Why would you want to blow up everything blindly like this? It's way more difficult to utilize effectively compared to a Wrath of God-style effect after all. The card has prevailed over the years, though, and many players have found cool ways to use it. It still feels lesser among the mythics in this particular set, but it gets some major points for being a card that makes you think about how to make it work effectively.

4. Ethersworn Adjudicator

You know what card rocked back in the day? Mortify.

This basically lets you recast Mortify over and over again - provided you have the mana - and still be able to attack. It's a big hulking body that flies as well. It's quite simple as far as mythics go, but when it comes to casual play, it's hard to argue that this card doesn't rock, and it's the sort of thing players can easily gravitate to.

3. Maelstrom Archangel

Maelstrom Archangel never saw any competitive play, nor will it ever. Its utility is extremely narrow as you can only play it in five color decks, and it's not even a legend. So, why the high placement? Simply put, it's just that cool. It's the card everyone wanted to make work because of the high appeal of getting stuff for free. Plus, five-color cards always have this unique gravitas to them, as do big beatsticks and angels. All in all, it's a truly casual-focused card, but undeniably one of the coolest around.

2. Nicol Bolas, Planeswalker

Seeing this classic big bad return in such epic fashion was honestly breathtaking. Seriously, it was unbelievably cool to see Nicol Bolas back once again, and to see him depicted as such a monstrously huge planeswalker card. The casting cost was huge, but the abilities were - and are - all impactful. Not only is it an iconic card, but it continues to be beloved in Commander decks and in Cubes.

1. Progenitus

Nicol Bolas coming back was amazing, and the card continues to be as iconic as they get. I had a hard time deciding which I wanted at first, because both him and this card rule. I ended up going with Progenitus, though, because of just how unique it feels and felt at the time. We'd honestly never seen anything like it. "Protection from everything" was such a mindblowing line then, and even today it's something you only rarely see. Progenitus remains a huge creature to cheat into play and remains a fan favorite in Commander. Nicol Bolas was like a blast from the past, but Progenitus just felt like something all its own then and still does to this day.

Paige Smith

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