Limited Use – Born of the Gods

Full spoiler for Born of the Gods is up! I’m going to look at the set, in the way I did with Theros, and talk about some of the cards that will be high picks for me on the day of the prerelease. As with my look at Theros, I’ll be looking at commons and uncommons only, as these form the core of a Limited deck.

Good news is that as Born of the Gods is a smaller set, I won’t need to do multiple articles! Bad news is that Born of the Gods is… erm… not great. Oh sure, there’s some good stuff leaping out at me, but not much; there’s lots of overcosted, underpowered junk. Ah well, let’s see if there’s some diamonds in the rough that can tempt me into attending the prerelease…

 

There’s a whole cycle of these Inspired token-makers, and in my opinion this is probably the best of the lot, as he’s cheap and poops out multiple tokens at a time. He’ll need stuff to help him tap without attacking, as he’s obviously super fragile, but you could get a good little engine going here.

 

 

An unexpected reprint, especially given Fade into Antiquity in Theros! Nothing like giving the big middle finger to a god for two mana. I’m not wild on the gods as is, and this reprint has just made me even more relunctant to crowbar one of those useless mediocre fatties into my Sealed deck.

If I’ve said it once, I’ll say it again; evasion wins Sealed games. Yeah, you may have a massive fatty beatstick, but that means nothing if I can chump him all day. Take away all my flying and give your side of the field flying though? Well, that’s what we call “game over”. Probably my favourite of the Archetypes. On a sidenote, I was incredibly relieved to see that the red Archetype didn’t steal/grant haste.

 

Well, it’s not Gods Willing, but it’s still decent. This will usually be used to create an unblockable attacker, but the untap effect could definitely result in some hilarious surprise blocker moments.

 

Is… is that decent removal? In black? In this block? Well… I wasn’t expecting that. This is just a stronger, more colour-intensive Echoing Decay, but after crap like Sip of Hemlock and Lash of the Whip, I’d take it; the ability to wipe out a bunch of tokens is just icing.

 

More decent black removal!? Where were you four months ago!? So, um… yeah. The scry makes this is a strictly better Infest, and Infest is already a pretty damn good pseudo-sweep. Yeah, definite high priority pick here; a few of these should definitely push you towards some kind of control build.

 

It’s a one-sided Pit Fight! There’s some good fatties in red, so most of the time this will just read “Destroy target creature.”  Even if you have a midrange creature, this will be decent even if it does 3 to 5 damage, which isn’t hard to achieve with the various Minotaurs.

 

Love it, love it, love it! I adore Flame Fusillade and Furystoke Giant, and I adore this! The fact that it’s an instant is just absolute pure sex. Yep, declare blockers, that’s all fine, and then suddenly oh guess what every one of my dudes is a Prodigal Pyromancer, PEW PEW PEW!

Pretty cool, good for pinging off some smaller Inspired dudes and Heroes before they get out of control. I like that the secondary effect hangs around for the whole turn, rather than being dependant on the target immediately dying to the 2 damage. Solid!

 

2/2 haste for three CMC is already on-curve. The ability is a great mana sink, and I really, really want to run this girl with Flamespeaker Adept for super-fun scry-buff times. With cards like this, it’s not a surprise that red continues to remain my favourite colour for this block!

 

Obviously this is at its best in a mono-green build, this can easily be better than Giant Growth, which has always been a solid pump spell. I’m going to be wary of green-heavy decks on prerelease day, for fear of an extra 4-9 damage coming in out of nowhere and messing up combat math. If you win a game by casting this, you’re pretty much obligated to yell “HAIL HYDRA!” at your opponent.

 

Call me weird, but I’m quite fond of this guy. We can argue all day whether or not tribute is a bad mechanic because it gives choice to your opponent, but in my opinion most of the tribute creatures seem fairly decent regardless of the choice. This guy is either a 6/6 for five, which is above curve and makes him a decent – if unexciting – fatty, or he’s a 3/3 that can blow up an important enchantment, planeswalker, or even just a land. That being said, I’ll probably end up disappointed with him if I use him.

 

First of all, DAT FLAVA and DAT ART. For five mana, you’re getting an extra 6 power (at least) on the field and two extra bodies, which is pretty solid. For hilarity, play a second Raised by Wolves on one of the Wolf tokens so that you can attack your opponent with the grandparents as well.

 

 

Another tribute guy who I think is decent; for five, he’s either a 7/7 or a 4/4 and gain 4 life, both of which are really good for Limited.  Hmm, green is looking almost as good as red. If only there was some kind of really good aggressively costed green-red beatstick to really seal the de-

Hey, opponent, your choice; do you want to take an angry horse-man to the face now or later? In a perfect world, I’d open a few of these on the day along with Xenagos and some more awesome green and red stuff, and then after placing first I’d put on my jetpack and fly off so that I’m not late to judge the kiss-fight between Mila Kunis and Scarlet Johansson. But I don’t live in a perfect world, now do I.

And finally a really solid creature in my favourite colour combination, with an ability that’s so simple and yet has so much potential. The Follower of Too-Orangey-For-Crows can trigger Inspired dudes early, double-dip on lands (or anything with a tap ability), give pseudo-vigilance… great stuff, I really like him. I think I would’ve preferred him to be 1/3 instead of 2/2, but beggars can’t be choosers.

Hmm… well, in hindsight, that actually seems to be a fairly decent amount of stuff for Born of the Gods. There’s some really decent rares that I haven’t covered, like Brimaz (who is utterly nucking futs), Spirit of the Labyrinth, Gild (which I love), Satyr Firedancer, Kiora, and Xenagod. White still looks a bit lacklustre, blue is not as good as it was in Theros, black and green seem better, and red is still great. We’ll see how it goes on the day, and what the gods decide to bless me with!

Aaaand I’ve just jinxed it.

– Gareth