FOOTLIGHT FIEND DEATHTOUCH FULL

Grief Factor: 9/10.Ĭaptive Audience: No deck really ramped into black and/or red payoffs, as they were largely the opposite colors of ramp. Even as planeswalker destruction is becoming more frequently attached to creature destruction, it remains a big deal to have both so efficiently paired. In fact, if not for the stricter color requirement, Bedevil would almost outclass Putrefy entirely - give or take residual regeneration concerns that don't affect Standard anyway. Grief Factor: 6/10.īedevil: The major Rakdos removal spell of this era ranked right there with its two direct forerunners, Putrefy and Mortify.

The versatility brought about by the hybrid mana cost and the general hunger for cheap removal made it into a minor success. So at the end of the day, all the text on this card amounted for the most part to a two-mana instant that kills one creature with toughness lower than 4. On the other hand, the quite expensive Bedazzle half would rarely be cast at all. The Bedeck half presented the double use of boosting the damage output of one of your attackers or, more commonly, removing one of the opponent's creatures, with its conditional three-toughness clause finding significant targets in the majority of the games. Ravnica Allegiance Rakdos Lossesīedeck // Bedazzle: As expected, Rakdos offered a good number of removal pieces. And who knows, maybe we'll find out the card's going away right when it would have mattered.

FOOTLIGHT FIEND DEATHTOUCH FULL

But the it was born here in Ravnica Allegiance and existed in Standard for almost two full years. The card's a formidable hatebear that was designed to turn off, among other things, Urzatron, delve, cascade, Moxen, and Force of Will. Lavinia, Azorius Renegade: Well, Lavinia wasn't meant for Standard, that much is sure. Finally, High Alert's non-synergistic activation was briefly exploited before the companion nerf kicked in, when its interaction with Zirda, the Dawnwaker and Faeburrow Elder would shape an infinite mana engine - not on par with the kind of combos that caused Zirda to be banned in Legacy, but powerful enough to generate some buzz. In a similar way, it was also one of the enablers of the 'defender matters' strategy, a second-rate build that lost all steam once Arcades, the Strategist rotated out last fall. The first made it into a payoff for toughness-heavy aggro lists running Huatli, the Sun's Heart in conjunction with big-butt one-drops like Yoked Ox and Merfolk Secretkeeper. High Alert actually had three separate applications, one for each of its abilities. High Alert: Most Azorius cards seem to have been the extremely specialized focus of individual gimmicks. But it became a part of some juicy combos, chiefly working alongside Narset, to negate the symmetry of the draw, and Smothering Tithe, producing your own massive Treasure trove to use in combination with Tezzeret, Master of the Bridge, or just for mana. Grief Factor: 6/10.Įmergency Powers: This cycle's resident fair Timetwister was too pricey to be played straighit t. It was easier to set up than the Disinformation Campaign deck, but more or less gravitated around the same intermediate territory, even while building a solid following of aficionados for itself. Grief Factor: 3/10.ĭovin's Acuity: A control list with Acuity as its centerpiece emerged along the way, without ever rising to top-tier glory. Grief Factor: 8/10.ĭovin, Grand Arbiter: Another card with very narrow applications, mostly used to create more Thopters for the flier archetype helmed by Sephara, Sky's Blade. To every deck that could access its colors, the Deputy was also an answer to the Zombie hordes of Field of the Dead and similar token infestations. And it did, with many creature-based builds like Hero and Vannifar enjoying the removal option, even with the return clause making it somewhat ephemeral. Grief Factor: 2/10.ĭeputy of Detention: The printing of a Detention Sphere on legs was undoubtedly bound to leave a mark on the format. Grief Factor: 7/10.ĭepose // Deploy: Flier decks occasionally found some use for the two little Thopters-cum-lifegain from the Deploy side.

After all, when starting on the play, you get a chance to absorb Teferi himself. Esper Control and later Azorius Control embraced Absorb with open arms, even in a world plagued by the Teferi dystopia. The former, a classic counterspell that originated in Invasion, was more relevant in the metagame, since control decks want to buy time and survive the assaults of aggro more than they want to deal random damage. Absorb: This Standard cycle contained the mirrored pair of Absorb and Ionize.

Footlight fiend deathtouch