OSSR: Magic: the Gathering : Ravnica: City of Guilds

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Mistborn
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Post by Mistborn »

Whelp let's keep this show rolling

Black
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Ravnica has some problems with Urban Decay
Black is probably second to White in terms of pieces that don't necessarily come together. Black kills things, discards things, brings things back from the grave, and sometimes draws cards in exchange for life. Ocasionally that stuff come together in some kind of midragey attrition deck but more often you just wanted to splash black to kill their guys.
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So mono back got a bunch of targeted removal which of course where high picks in draft. Last Gasp was the stand out winner going into basically every black deck. Disembowel, Ribbons of the Night, and Brainspoil were all fringe constructed playable. Darkblast saw a lot of sideboard play in old extended.

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We've talked about Bob before one of the best creatures ever printed still sees play today in eternal formats. In standard he powered Dimir Tempo, Orzov Aggro, and later Rakdos Aggro. He didn't show up in every deck with black in it though. Control rarely played him as the life loss was very relevent.
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Blacks draft creatures were reasonable cards. Stinkweed Imp opviously has seen a lot of play if not as a 1/2 deathoucher. Turnkey and House Guard are a little behind today's curve but Ravnica Draft was a slow enough format that Transmuting for Turnkey on turn 3 so you could get him back on turn 4 was a respectable line of play if your opponent didn't lead off with a turn 2 bear
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Blacks discard in Ravnica isn't quite the high efficiency duress and mind rot type cards that serve as the standard these days but as is a common theme in this set review they got there somehow. Strands of undeath being an aura was relevant for Ghost Dad decks and their Tallowisp based shenanigans. Nightmare void on the other hand was a sideboard card against combo and to a lesser extent control.
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Vigor Mortis is a 4 mana reanimation spell with upside 4 mana is about the bar so standard playable reanimates and this was a format with a lot of creatures you'd enjoy reanimating. Necromanic Thirst on the other hand was and interesting draft card. It definitely embodied the high risk high reward paradigm that auras traditionally have. Empty the catacombs was another card that wanted the be part of some weird combo deck that didn't get there.
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Speaking of Weird build arounds here's some more weird build arounds that didn't get there. (Well in standard at least, Sins of the Past saw some play in Extended Minds Desire) These cards are the type that are interesting even if they don't end up being good. They point people to an entirely different way of playing magic.
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