Dark Ascension

Dark Ascension is coming. The pre-release was this weekend and the full release is later this week. I wrote an article looking forward to Innistrad, so I think I'll do the same here and start a little tradition.

One caveat, though. This article will be short and I'll miss a lot of good cards, but I have a good excuse. I've been working on a top secret project and it's been draining most of my free time and energy. That secret project is also very relevant to Birds of Paradise and you'll learn about soon. Stay tuned!

Now on to Dark Ascension. I'll pick the top few cards in each color that I'm most looking forward to playing with. These aren't necessarily the best cards in the set. For example, Sorin is a good card to give the set a face, but he doesn't make my list because at $50 a copy he won't be making any of my decks. Also, there are a lot cards that look cool and powerful, but just have too much dependency. My card evaluation shortcut is "dependency is bad". This shortcut can sometimes make you miss a good card, but I think it's a pretty good way to do it.

I'll start with black. It seems to catch most of my attention in this set. I think that is appropriate because I believe the tag line of this set or more or less "the monsters win". Zombies are getting some help. First up is the very cool Gravecrawler. Great name, great art, great card. This guy doesn't die. Or at least he doesn't stay dead. This is resilience embodied. As the game goes on he will become less useful: a 3/3 can mostly shut him down, but just remember one important thing with evaluating Gravecrawler. He costs one.

Also add Geralf's Messenger to your (monoblack) zombie deck. If Gravecrawler is resilience embodied then Undying is resilience made into a mechanic. And making your opponent lose two life is a big deal. Especially in these new aggro zombie decks.

One of my favorites cards in the set is Tragic Slip (I think I have a thing for one drops). This card is really good. Creatures die a lot, and when they do, and you have one mana black up (you will when you're holding this), then any targetable creature of your choice is dead. You can even run one of your Gravecrawlers into his Titan to try to set this up. Does he block or no? One black mana up changes how this format will be played. The other thing that makes this card so good is it's far from a dead card when you can't setup the morbid trigger. There are many one toughness creatures that I would gladly spend one mana and a card to get rid of. I think we'll be talking about Tragic Slip for a long time to come.

Combine black with white and play Lingering Souls. Wow! I thought Midnight Haunting was good. Doubling the effectiveness of the spell more than makes up for the downgrade to sorcery speed in most decks. I think this card compares favorably with the mighty Squadron Hawk. Sign me up for white/black.

I like Stormbound Geist for blue. This is a solid attacker at a good price with built in resilience. Tower Geist also looks pretty solid, reminiscent of Sea Gate Oracle, though four mana is a lot more than three.

Faithless Looting is most interesting for red. They officially made the looting mechanic red, and what a good place for it to be. If all you see is card advantage than after casting this twice you end up down one card, but this is not a card advantage card. This is about card quality. Imagine you've beat your opponent down to 5 life but he's starting to stabilize and all you have in your hand is a pair of mountains. You have four in play and don't need any more. You play Faithless Looting and you know you'll throw away those two useless mountains, so it basically becomes Divination for one. It can help you find lands if you need to as well. Don't forget the flashback.

Hellrider reminds me of Hero of Oxid Ridge. Both are excellent four drops to sit atop your aggro curve.

For green, Dawntreader Elk seems pretty good. Kind of like Viridian Emissary which saw a good bit of play, but I think the newcomer might be better because you have more control. Watch out for the Predator Ooze... Kind of ridiculous though a little slow. Hit that thing with a Tragic Slip ASAP. Strangleroot Geist is a strong two drop. I think I'll be dusting off and updating Elder Zenith. Also, if I can can afford it, Vorapede looks like a great five drop. Oh! Don't forget Young Wolf.

There are a bunch of interesting multicolor cards in this set. I generally dislike werewolves, but can't ignore Huntmaster of the Fells. That's just a bomb for four mana. Also note he isn't legendary. The uncommon lords are powerful and also should have an interesting impact on limited play. Check out the captains: Diregraf Captain, Drogskol Captain, Stromkirk Captain, and Immerwolf (a.k.a Wolf Captian). I dare say some of those guys are worth splashing a second color into your tribal deck.

That's it! Thanks for reading.