It is that time again (or perhaps it never ended), and that time is preview season. Phyrexia: All Will be One is on the horizon, which means it’s time we identify the highlight cards in the set for Modern.  This time around I thought I’d try something different and highlight the best card of each color instead of just the ... Read More...

While the full extent of Elesh Norn’s plans have yet to be previewed, Phyrexia: All Will Be One looks primed to give Standard a huge shot in the arm (don’t ask what kind). As always when Phyrexia is involved, most of the new cards are pushing the absolute limits of game balance while also breaking new mechanical ground in various ... Read More...

In Phyrexia: All Will Be One, we have a cycle of one-mana artifacts with activated abilities that can draw you a card called Skullbombs. This builds on a similar cycle from Scars of Mirrodin called Spellbombs, which were themselves a sequel to the original Spellbombs from Mirrodin block. It’s not often we see cycles full reiterated this many times, but ... Read More...

Phyrexia: All Will Be One preview season is well underway, and there are many exciting, new Commanders. I’m the most hyped for Karumonix, the Rat King, who is a great commander for rats-matter decks.  While giving Toxic 1 to your rats is really cool, I’m actually more excited about his enter the battlefield ability, which can draw you a ton ... Read More...

Devoid is a characteristic defining ability that can appear on any card type, and simply makes the card colorless regardless of its mana cost. And that’s entirely it. There’s a couple of notes, but they’re pretty quick; And that’s it. Devoid was not terribly popular, as it seemed like an odd choice to devote a full set mechanic slot to. ... Read More...

The Commander format has one really fundamental problem: it’s explosive. And it’s only getting worse as time ticks on. I don’t just mean that the community discourse is liable to blow up at the slightest provocation (although, true). I mean that multiplayer Magic, especially with the card pool and ruleset present in this format, naturally trends toward explosive play patterns ... Read More...

The weekend of Jan. 13 brought us the most competitive Modern tournaments than we’ve seen in a long time. SCG Con New Jersey had both $20,000 and $5,000 tournaments while the LMS Open Qualifier took place in Trieste and the NRG Champs closed things out. Naturally, each high level Modern tournament offers worthwhile results to parse through.  Modern is in ... Read More...