Scions and Spellecraft is the white blue and black precon from Universes Beyond: Final Fantasy. It features a slew of spellslinging action from the cast of Final Fantasy XIV, the popular online MMORPG game that has been going for just as many years. This deck is a soft control deck that cares about Wizards and casting spells. For this $50 Budget Upgrade guide, I’ll share ten upgrades that will up the deck’s potential.
SCIONS AND SPELLCRAFT PRECON REVIEW
For this review and upgrade guide, we’ll go over the two face Commanders first. Then, we’ll cover the new cards and reprints, before moving onto the upgrades we’d like to make. The final section will include our picks for Game Changers for Bracket 3: Upgraded gameplay, and pricier includes that will serve you well.
Y’SHTOLA, NIGHT’S BLESSED
Y’shtola, Night’s Blessed is a 2/4 Vigilance for four mana. She has a rider to grant you some card draw – on each end step, no less, not just yours – and a triggered ability that pings everyone for 2 when you cast a mana value 3 or greater noncreature spell.
In practice, that means you’re cashing in spells for cards, provided you can keep the volley up. But, you can’t be casting six mana or more for two spells just to draw one card. You’ll need other effects to keep things ticking.
We’ll focus on Y’shtola for this upgrade guide today.
G’RAHA TIA, SCION REBORN
The alternate Commander, G’raha Tia, Scion Reborn, makes chunky tokens whenever you cast a noncreature spell. This means you’re essentially a tokens deck, and you can run all of the support for token creatures – and token doublers – that you’d like. Both are solid options.
MASSIVELY MULTIPURPOSE ORIGINAL ROLE PLAYING GAMEPIECES
There are twenty new cards in this precon, and while we’re covering the best in our Precon Highlights article soon, let’s highlight a few hits from this deck that make it worth checking out.
Emet-Selch of the Third Seat is a really strong engine for casting from the yard. Not only does he give a discount, but he lets you cast cards from your yard – of any card type – when opponents lose life. This is easy to achieve, and makes for a powerful role player.
Estinien Varlineau just keeps growing larger every time you cast a noncreature spell. This is an excellent way to get your card out of Y’Shtola, and you can also draw cards when you hit with Estinien or Dragons, which makes for a kind of Dragons-matters Tymna, the Weaver.
Krile Baldesion works well in this build, returning creatures to your hand from your graveyard. You’ll be able to stock up after a boardwipe, and keep your board populated going forward. UW Reanimator players are going to love this little engine.
Tataru Taru is one of those mono-white cards that Commander players dream about. It immediately makes a treasure while drawing two people a card, and can give treasure going forward. While not broken, it’ll help a lot in this build to keep you casting spells.
Blue Mage’s Cane is a sweet Equipment for decks that care about milling an opponent. You can quite easily end up casting big flashy spells for just (3) mana, which, when you’re also exiling that spell so they can’t get it back, makes for quite a tempo swing.
Eye of Nidhogg is great for keeping opponent’s life totals go down, and really helps Y’shtola in this build as it triggers both of her abilities. I really like the idea of running this in other builds, as the card is just really good.
One of the most talked about cards from Scions and Spellcraft will likely be Observed Stasis. It’s a fantastic combat trick that will net you anywhere from one card to a total hand refill.
REPRINTS? FEWER THAN YOU’D THINK
This precon’s reprints aren’t the most impressive, but that’s largely owing to just how many slots are taken up by brand new cards. Still, the ones included are good enough.
The highlights include Snuff Out with arguably one of the best artworks available; Authority of the Consuls, a card always sneaking up; and Archaeomancer’s Map, a popular “ramp” piece for white decks.
FINAL FANTASY XIV: TEN IN, TEN OUT $50 BUDGET UPGRADE
The deck in general functions slightly below where it needs to be as a more controlling deck, especially as pinging each opponent is going to make you a bunch of enemies.
The upgrades I’ve chosen today up the controlling element with more card draw, more answers, and some surprisingly good synergy pieces.
Cards like High Fae Trickster and Frantic Search speak for themselves: ways to cast spells at instant speed and potentially cast another spell. Sygg is classic card draw that fits into this shell well, while Risky Shortcut fulfills our Commander’s goals splendidly. Talion, the Kindly Lord is a great way to get Y’Shtola to trigger more often.
First up, a card that triggers the Commander, but can also redirect some damage away from you – which will hopefully trigger the other part of Y’Shtola, too. Misleading Signpost can do a lot of work in this build.
Dismember takes precedent here over cheaper removal, as the Phyrexian mana alternative cost can be offset by us gaining some life casting it (much like Snuff Out).
An oldie but goodie here is Slaughter. It’s not ordinarily a card to run over Snuff Out and Lethal Scheme, but in this very specific deck? It can really work well with your Commander, and having this in hand and people knowing it has Buyback is Virtual Card Advantage.
Another one that prioritizes being MV 3 or more, Ophidian Eye beats out Curiosity in this budget upgrade, especially because it has Flash. You can obviously run Curiosity too, but Commander is all about synergy.
Finally, not a noncreature spell, but one of my favorite cards to run in decks that allow it: Portal Manipulator. This thing swings games, and keeps you alive!
The final $50 Budget upgrade deck can be found on Moxfield above, with the Sideboard containing the cards to cut. These cards don’t synergize well with Y’shtola, are expensive to cast, or otherwise underwhelming.
ADDING GAME CHANGERS
If you’re wanting to take the deck up a Bracket, consider the following Game Changer cards.
Panoptic Mirror can let you tuck a great Y’shtola spell underneath it to keep coming back for more turn after turn. Whether removal, card draw, or something more esoteric, you can have a lot of fun with this one.
Fierce Guardianship hits that three mana threshold, and protects our Commander well to keep those triggers coming.
Orcish Bowmasters is obviously a good card, but crucially, it helps us get that damage to face up a bit, enabling our Commander more often.
FURTHER UPGRADES
The first place I’d start is the manabase, as a number of MDFC lands can really help us in our gameplan.
I’d also consider other free spells that are MV 3=<, as they help a lot with consistently triggering our Commander. Deadly Rollick and Submerge are good for that.
Sheoldred, the Apocalypse is perhaps the highest ticket inclusion aligning with our strategy that isn’t a Game Changer, and if you have one, it’s a snap include.
Finally, if your playgroup is fine playing against it, the repeatable discard from Helm of the Ghastlord can be a win condition on its own. It’s such a massive tempo swing that gets ugly fast.
END STEP
We hope this upgrade guide and review has helped you with your Scions and Spellcraft journey. The Final Fantasy precons have some excellent new cards and fun Commanders to build around. What will you do with this Precon?
Kristen is Card Kingdom’s Head Writer and a member of the Commander Format Panel. Formerly a competitive Pokémon TCG grinder, she has been playing Magic since Shadows Over Innistrad, which in her opinion, was a great set to start with. When she’s not taking names with Equipment and Aggro strategies in Commander, she loves to play any form of Limited.