DTK: List of removal

March 24, 2015 Leave a comment

This is a list of all the removal in Dragons of Tarkir, divided into permanent creature removal, temporary creature removal (such as bounce, tap, and falter effects), non-creature removal, and off-battlefield removal (hand, stack, and graveyard). The column labeled T (to the right of the permanent creature removal column) indicates how tough a creature the removal can handle; if there is no number in that column, the removal is independent of the creature’s toughness (it is a destroy effect unless specified otherwise). Conditional removal is indicated after the card name.

Italics indicates that one or more permanents have to remain in play for the effect to continue. Bold indicates a reusable or ongoing effect. Yellow highlight indicates that multiple targets are affected. Red highlight indicates mass removal that you may be able to avoid overextending into. Within each color/rarity, cards are ordered by how tough a creature they can kill, then by converted mana cost.

Unlike the lists of tricks and megamorphs, this list does not try to provide an abbreviated description of the effect, but just references how it affect creatures. Here’s how to interpret those effects:

  • Abbreviations used: A (artifact), attkr (attacker), blkr (blocker), borrow (untap & gain control until end of turn; the permanent gains haste), bounce (return to owner’s hand), bury (destroy & it cannot be regenerated), C (creature), CMC (converted mana cost), counter when used as a verb (counter a spell), dmg (damage), draw X (draw X cards), E (enchantment), ETB (enters the battlefield), flicker (exile, then return to the battlefield), flyer (creature with flying), freeze X (tap X and it doesn’t untap next turn), gain X (gain X life), GY (graveyard), I (instant), L (land), loot X (draw X cards, then discard X cards), lose X (lose X life), mill (put cards from a library into a graveyard), opp (opponent), opp’s X (X controlled by opponent), P (player or power, depending on context), prot (protection), PW (planeswalker), raise (return card from your graveyard to your hand), reanimate (return card from the graveyard to the battlefield), redirect X dmg from A to B (next X dmg that would be dealt to A is dealt to B instead), regen (regenerate), S (sorcery), sac (sacrifice), T (toughness), your X (X you control).
  • Effects (+X/+Y, -X/-Y, hexproof, first strike, prot from a color, etc.) last until end of turn unless specified otherwise.
  • Effects only target creatures unless otherwise specified, e.g., X dmg without any qualifiers means that the effect does X damage to any creature. If the effect also targets players, that won’t be mentioned here.
  • Descriptions sometimes mention other spells to avoid lengthy descriptions, e.g., Silumgar Spell-Eater’s unmorph effect is described as “Mana Leak” to avoid having to write “counter target spell unless its controller pays 3.”

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KTK: List of removal

September 23, 2014 Leave a comment

This is a list of all the removal in Khans of Tarkir, divided into permanent creature removal, temporary creature removal (such as bounce, tap, and falter effects), non-creature removal, and off-battlefield removal (hand, stack, and graveyard). The column labeled T (to the right of the permanent creature removal column) indicates how tough a creature the removal can handle; if there is no number in that column, the removal is independent of the creature’s toughness (the default is destroy, any other effect will be explicitly called out). Conditional removal is indicated after the card name in most cases.

Italics indicates that one or more permanents have to remain in play for the effect to continue. Bold indicates a reusable effect. Yellow highlight indicates that multiple permanents are affected. Red highlight indicates mass removal that you should be careful to not overextend into. Within each color/rarity, cards are ordered by how tough a creature they can kill, then by converted mana cost.

Unlike the lists of tricks and morph creatures, this list does not try to provide an abbreviated description of the effect, but just references how it affect creatures. Here’s how to interpret those effects:

  • Abbreviations used: A (artifact), attkr (attacker), blkr (blocker), bounce (return permanent to owner’s hand), bury (destroy permanent & it cannot be regenerated), C (creature), CMC (converted mana cost), counter when used as a verb (counter a spell), dmg (damage), draw X (draw X cards), E (enchantment), ETB (enters the battlefield), flyer (creature with flying), freeze X (tap X and it doesn’t untap next turn), gain X (gain X life), GY (graveyard), I (instant), L (land), loot X (draw X cards, then discard X cards), lose X (lose X life), opp (opponent), opp’s X (X controlled by opponent), P (player or power, depending on context), prot (protection), PW (planeswalker), raise (return card from your graveyard to your hand), reanimate (return card from the graveyard to the battlefield), redirect X dmg from A to B (next X dmg that would be dealt to A is dealt to B instead), regen (regenerate), S (sorcery), sac (sacrifice), T (toughness), your X (X you control).
  • Effects (+X/+Y, -X/-Y, hexproof, first strike, prot from a color, etc.) last until end of turn unless specified otherwise.
  • Effects only target creatures unless otherwise specified, e.g., X dmg without any qualifiers means that the effect does X damage to any creature. If the effect also targets players, that won’t be mentioned here.
  • Descriptions sometimes mention other cards as a way to describe their effects, e.g., Mardu Charm’s non-battlefield mode is described as Duress, to avoid having to write the full description.

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THS: Maindeck flyer removal

November 22, 2013 Leave a comment

Today, we’ll use the updated card valuations to determine whether it makes sense to maindeck Shredding Winds in Theros. (Arbor Colossus and Bow of Nylea also kill creatures with flying, but those cards are good enough to play on their other merits, so I won’t evaluate them here.)

This spreadsheet lists all the flyers in Theros. Yellow highlight means that a cards can grant flying to another creature (e.g., Cavalry Pegasus); if the text is gray instead of black, it means the card does not have flying itself (e.g., Fleetfeather Sandals). A few things stand out:

  • Shredding Winds can kill all these creatures with the exception of Prognostic Sphinx and Sentry of the Underworld (if they have WB open), a really large Wingsteed Rider, and perhaps a bestow creature enchanting an already large creature.
  • White, blue, and black will have 9, 11, and 4 creatures with flying in an average 8-person draft. Each color is shared on average by about 3 players, so a typical W/U deck will have 7 flyers and Shredding Winds will usually have a target even if you don’t seen a flyer in game 1. Every other color combination will have 5 or fewer flyers, so it doesn’t make sense to side in Shredding Winds unless you see a must-kill flyer.
  • You don’t need flyer removal against red or green since they have almost no flyers. On the artifact side, neither Anvilwrought Raptor nor Fleetfeather Sandals are particularly exciting, and you’re better off siding in artifact removal against them anyway.
  • Nessian Asp is excellent in this format and so it likely to be played by every green deck that has it. It can block and kill all of the creatures listed in the spreadsheet except Abhorrent Overlord (rare) and Ashen Rider (mythic), which are marked with an S in the Must Kill column. In addition, there are 4 other flyers marked with a Y that I consider must kill — Cavalry Pegasus (white common), Wingsteed Rider (white common), Prognostic Sphinx (blue rare), and Shipwreck Singer (U/B uncommon) — each of which will win the game eventually if left untouched. These are flyers you need to be able to kill even if you have multiple Nessian Asps. Both commons in the list are white, so it might make sense to side Shredding Winds in against W/X decks if you have other cards you need to side out, even if you haven’t seen many flyers and they are not W/U.

From the analysis above, I would say it doesn’t make sense to run Shredding Winds maindeck, but it is a great sideboard cards against decks with flyers, and it can be brought in preemptively against W/U decks which tend to have a lot of flyers, and even against other W/X decks which may have fewer flyers since white has a couple of common flyers that can take over or win the game given enough time.

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THS: Commentary on removal

September 23, 2013 Leave a comment

Theros appears to have a normal amount of creature removal, but very little of it is unconditional; most of it cares either about a creature’s toughness or its power. This means that unconditional removal like Sip of Hemlock is likely to be more valuable than it would normally be, even at 6 mana.

While Theros does have cheap creature removal, there’s also a lot of common removal spells that cost 5 or more, so you should probably prioritize the cheaper removal early in the draft as you don’t want to end up with too many of the expensive ones. The cheaper removal spells kill creatures with toughness 1-3, while the more expensive removal spells handle creatures with toughness up to 4 or 5.

Blue pseudo-removal spells like Voyage’s End and Griptide are likely to be more valuable due to the high number of Auras in the set. (There are 15 creature Auras in Theros, if you count Chained to the Rocks, and another 15 enchantment creatures with bestow that be played as either a creature or a creature Aura. Of these, only Chained to the Rocks, Viper’s Kiss, and Ordeal of Purphoros are removal Auras, while the rest are enhancing Auras.)

There is very little reusable removal, so Spear of Heliod, Agent of the Fates, Labyrinth Champion, and Titan of Eternal Fire are likely to be even better than they would normally be.

Be aware that 4 colors have access to mass removal in Theros, although it is all either at rare (Curse of the Swine in blue and Anger of the Gods in red) or at mythic (Elspeth Sun’s Champion in white and Hythonia the Cruel in black).

Theros also has a lot of enchantments (41 vs. 28 in Magic 2014 and 29 in Return to Ravnica), so let’s also look at the enchantment removal available in the set. At common, we have Ray of Dissolution (costing 2W), Fade into Antiquity (2G), and Priest of Iroa (R+3W). At uncommon, we have Artisan’s Sorrow (3G) and Destructive Revelry (RG). And at rare, we have Polis Crusher, although that does cost 2RG to cast, 4RG to make monstrous, and still requires you to do combat damage to your opponent. 1 of the commons and 2 of the uncommons are instants.

Ignoring the rare, a typical 8-person draft will have about 9.5 enchantment removal spells. All the enchantment removal spells require access to either green or white mana, so U/B players won’t have access to any enchantment removal, but players from each of the other 4 color pairs in Theros (R/G, G/U, W/B, and R/W) will. Assuming that there are 1.6 players in each color pair, there will be 6.4 players with access to green or white mana, and each of them will have access to 1.5 enchantment removal spells on average. In practice, the R/G and R/W players will have access to more enchantment removal than the others since they can make use of Destructive Revelry and Priest of Iroa respectively. It is also worth noting that Theros does not have mass removal for enchantments, or even a spell that can destroy multiple enchantments.

There are also a fair number of artifact removal spells in Theros (3 at common and 2 at uncommon), even though there are only 18 artifacts, few of which are scary to face. 3 of them also destroy enchantments, and the remaining 2 are in red (Demolish and Wild Celebrants).

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THS: List of removal spells

September 21, 2013 Leave a comment

This is a list of all the removal in Theros, divided into permanent creature removal, temporary creature removal (such as bounce, tap, and falter effects), non-creature removal, and off-battlefield removal (hand, stack, graveyard). The column labeled T (to the right of the permanent creature removal column) indicates how tough a creature the removal can handle; if there is no number in that column, the removal is independent of the creature’s toughness. Conditional removal is indicated after the spell name in most cases.

This list uses most of the same abbreviations used by the list of instant-speed tricks. Italics indicates that one or more permanents have to remain in play for the effect to continue. Bold indicates reusable removal. Yellow highlight indicates that multiple permanents are affected. Red highlight indicates mass removal that you should be careful to not overextend into.

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M14: Rod of Ruin and Shrivel

August 30, 2013 Leave a comment

I’ve never been quite sure how highly to take Rod of Ruin in M14 drafts. While it is reusable removal, it is also quite expensive. In my post on the B/R sacrifice deck, I’d determined that “27% of the must-kill creatures” and “23% of the flyers” in an average draft have 1 toughness. There is a bit of an overlap here, since both numbers include must-kill flyers, but it means that Rod of Ruin can kill about a quarter of the must-kill/flying creatures your opponent plays. M14 draft decks usually run about 12-16 creatures, so a typical deck will have 3-4 1-toughness creatures. Furthermore, the threat of activation is often sufficient to let you get creatures past blockers or to strand 1-toughness creatures in your opponent’s hand, and it can slowly ping away at your opponent if the board is stalled.

(Note: must-kill differs from my usual evaluation scale of bomb through unplayable. It means the creature can create problematic board states if it remains on the table. A creature like Goblin Shortcutter with a great enters-the-battlefield ability can be very playable but still not must-kill. Other less playable creatures like Striking Sliver and Nightwing Shade are must-kill because you can end up losing the game if you’re not able to deal with them in a timely manner. If your deck is sufficiently aggressive, you may be able to kill your opponent before these creatures become a problem, and so may need less removal. Note also that large flyers are not classified as must-kill unless they also possess problematic abilities, e.g., Archangel of Thune, since they can be gang blocked in theory. In practice, you usually either need a removal spell or a Deadly Recluse.)

I also want to know if Rod of Ruin is more likely to be effective against certain color pairs, so I know whether to side it in/out against certain decks, regardless of what I’ve seen them play so far. Partly, this is because of a recent game I played against a U/R deck. I didn’t see any 1-toughness creatures in game 1, so I reluctantly sided out the Rod of Ruin out for a Naturalize, and then found myself staring down 2 Academy Rectors and a Trained Condor.

Here’s an updated version of the spreadsheet I’d created for that post. This version also computes how many creatures you can expect to see of each type in a typical 8-person draft. It also includes additional columns that sum up the number of must-kill, not must-kill, flyers, non-flyers, and all creatures. Looking at the number of must-kill creatures by color, we see that red has the most by far (6.3) because of Academy Raider, Striking Sliver, Young Pyromancer, and Goblin Diplomat. Each color is typically shared by 3 players, so an average R/X deck will have 2.1 must-kill red creatures with a toughness of 1. That’s not a large number, but it still means you might want to consider keeping Rod of Ruin in against R/X decks, even if you haven’t seen a lot of problematic creatures. Red also has the highest total number of creatures with 1-toughness in an average 8-person draft (14.7), followed by black (11.1), white (9.9), blue (7.9), and green (6.0).

Shrivel also kills 1-toughness creatures, but on both sides of the table. Consequently, it ends up going very late and often languishes in sideboards. However, I think it is actually a reasonable sideboard against R/X decks, and especially against U/R tempo decks since it kills Goblin Shortcutter, Coral Merfolk, and Trained Condor. Shrivel is also a reasonable card to side in against Young Pyromancer or Sporemound, since it can kill the tokens they produce. However, you need to ensure that your deck doesn’t have too many 1-toughness creatures yourself, or that you delay playing some of them if you haven’t yet cast the Shrivel.

Why are we not also talking about Barrage of Expendables, Thorncaster Sliver, Festering Newt, and Wring Flesh, even though they also kill 1-toughness creatuers? I already talked about Barrage of Expendables previously, and part of the benefit of the card is that it lets you sacrifice creatures, not just that it does a point of damage. Thorncaster Sliver is usually surrounded by other Slivers and so will usually do more than 1 point of damage. Festering Newt trades with 2/2’s. And Wring Flesh is an excellent combat trick that I’ve heard compared to Giant Growth; while it can’t save a creature from Shock or do the last 3 points of damage to an opponent, instead it sometimes kill a 1-toughness creature.

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M14: Plummet vs. Windstorm

August 23, 2013 Leave a comment

When drafting green decks, I’ve faced the choice of drafting either Plummet or Windstorm from the same pack, or having both in my draft pool but not knowing whether either is worthy of maindecking. Another choice I’ve faced is deciding which one to side in against an opponent who has one or more flyers in their deck. Let’s see if we can figure out the right choices in these scenarios.

If you’re running green as a main color, Deadly Recluse and Giant Spider are great ways to deal with flyers. They can also defend quite well against non-flyers, and sometimes even get to attack. Deadly Spider is easier to kill than Giant Spider, so our analysis will look at 3 different categories of flyers:

  • must-kill non-defender flyers (see the spreadsheet from my post on creature evaluations)
  • flyers with power >= 4 (or deathtouch) and toughness >= 3, since they can kill Giant Spider without dying in the process
  • all non-defender flyers

There are only 5 must-kill flyers in M14: 1 common, 1 uncommon, 1 rare, and 2 mythic. An average draft will have 0.57 of these flyers per player, all in white, blue, and black. Must-kill means that you can’t reliably block or gang block the creature with flyers/spiders to neutralize it, or that it has a static ability that makes it dangerous even if it’s not in combat, which is why Nightwing Shade, Air Servant, and Galerider Sliver fall into this category, along with the more obvious inclusion of Archangel of Thune and Windreader Sphinx.

There are 6 flyers with power >= 4 (or deathtouch) and toughness >= 3: 2 uncommons (only Serra Angel and Sengir Vampire, since we’ve already counted Air Servant above), 2 rares (Jace’s Mindseeker and Shivan Dragon), and 2 mythics (Shadowborn Demon and Scourge of Valkas). An average draft will have 0.45 of these flyers per player, primarily in black. Note that although Shivan Dragon and Scourge of Valkas can attack for a lot of damage, I don’t consider them must-kill since firebreathing doesn’t pump toughness, so they can still be blocked and killed by multiple opposing flyers/spiders.

Adding these numbers tells us that the average draft will only have about 1 flyer per player that falls into either of these 2 categories, so you probably don’t want to run either Plummet or Windstorm in your maindeck. Obviously, there are exceptions to this. For instance, if you have Diabolic Tutor or Ring of Three Wishes in your deck, you could run a singleton Plummet or Windstorm as a silver bullet. If you have a U/G control deck with limited creature removal, you’re more likely to face a bomb flyer that you can’t handle, so Plummet or Windstorm might have a place in that deck, especially if you can regrow it using Archaeomancer. And if you have an otherwise really strong monogreen or G/R deck that lacks flying defense, you might run Plummet and/or Windstorm maindeck to shore up that weakness and as insurance against your opponent having a flying bomb.

Finally, let’s look at all non-defender flyers in M14. All of them are playable, except perhaps Dragon Hatchling. Let’s exclude those creatures and then look at the number of flyers we would expect a player in those colors to have in an 8-person draft, assuming there are 3 drafters in each color. (This analysis is more useful here than looking at the average number of these flyers per drafter.)

  • White: 3 common, 1 uncommon, 1 rare, 1 mythic -> 8.9 at the table, or 3.0 per white drafter
  • Blue: 4 commons, 2 uncommons, 2 rares, 1 mythic -> 12.9 at the table, or 4.3 per blue drafter
  • Black: 2 commons, 1 uncommon, 1 rare, 1 mythic -> 6.6 at the table, or 2.2 per black drafter
  • Red: 1 uncommon, 2 rares, 1 mythic -> 2.2 at the table, or 0.7 per black drafter

From this analysis, we can see that only U/X decks are likely to have more than 1 flyer on the table at a time, and so are the only ones against which you’d rather bring in Windstorm. There are only 2 rare and 2 mythic flyers with toughness >= 5 (I’m including Nightmare but not Nightwing Shade here), so Windstorm will usually be able to take down all your opponent’s flyers. (And sometime they’ll play a Galerider Sliver and you’ll knock out most of their side :)) Of course, if your deck also has flyers, you may still prefer Plummet, even when playing against a U/W or U/B deck.

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M14: Commentary on removal

July 15, 2013 Leave a comment

White, Blue, and Black all have removal spells at common and uncommon that don’t care about a creature’s toughness:

  • White: Pacifism; Celestial Flare; Banisher Priest; (Master of Diversion)
  • Blue: Claustrophobia; (Time Ebb; Disperse; Frost Breath)
  • Black: Liturgy of Blood; Doom Blade

Of the common/uncommon removal spells that can only kill creatures with a certain toughness, 5 kill 1-toughness creatures, 3 kill 2-toughness creatures, 2 kill 3-toughness creatures, and 1 kills 4-toughness creatures. So creatures with 5+ toughness are safe against R/G decks unless they have multiple removal spells, Act of Treason + Barrage of Expendables, Hunt the Weak + a sufficiently large creature, or Plummet against a flyer.

There are 4 mass removal spells: Planar Cleansing; Shrivel; Windstorm; and Rachet Bomb.  The only spell that kills multiple creatures without being mass removal is Flames of the Firebrand.  And the only reusable removal spells at common/uncommon are Blightcaster, Barrage of Expendables (sort of), and Rod of Ruin.

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M14: List of removal spells

July 12, 2013 Leave a comment

Magic 2014 Removal

This is a list of all the removal in the set, divided into permanent creature removal, temporary creature removal (such as bounce, tap, and falter effects), non-creature removal, and not on battlefield removal (hand, stack, graveyard). The column labeled T (to the right of the permanent creature removal column) indicates how tough a creature the removal can handle; if there is no number in that column, the removal is independent of the creature’s toughness. Conditional removal is indicated after the spell name in most cases.

This list uses most of the same abbreviations used by the list of instant-speed tricks. Italics indicates that the spell is a creature that has to remain in play for the effect to occur. Bold indicates reusable removal or removal that can kill multiple permanents. Highlight cells indicate mass removal that you should be careful to not overextend into.

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