The five best cards from Throne of Eldraine, Black
Oh man, is this set spicy.
While the first week of spoilers, the preview week, left everyone wanting more, the last two weeks have unveiled some absolute behemoths of cards for Magic’s upcoming expansion, Throne of Eldraine. With the set now fully revealed, each color is looking at several exciting upgrades, and the adaptations on existing decks will be made accordingly, leaving the window open for an exciting standard format, with the possibility of cards seeing play in some eternal formats as well.
(The order of the color I talk about is the order of how strong I think each color is, starting with the color I think got the weakest support. The order of the cards themselves is relatively arbitrary. This is the fourth of a several part series, going through each color and the multi-color cards as well.)
Black
So this is a bit of a weird one. When I was evaluating all of the colors, Black to me initially felt like one of the strongest colors in the set, and while I think it is, I don’t think it’s the best color. It’s easy, as I learned, to get roped into the power level of the top end cards, which is the highest top end of all of the colors so hard.
In the end though, Black’s top level was second only to Green in terms of the pure power level of cards. There were only actually ten cards, which is the second lowest number so far, I considered for the top contenders, and I honestly only really feel strongly about four of them. Honorable mentions here include Cauldron Familiar, which has a lot of combo potential and even in just a fair Aristocrats shell, the card functions pretty well as sacrifice fodder, Wishclaw Talisman, which also has some crazy combo potential, Ayara, First of Locthwain, which if there’s anything Black wants to do, it’s sacrifice their own dudes for pay off, Witch’s Cottage, which is the second strongest of the common land cycle behind Blue’s, and Cauldron of Eternity, which is one of the more build around of the legendary artifacts, but powerful in the right shell nonetheless.
5. Blacklance Paragon
Direfleet Poisoner was an intriguing Pirate from Ixalan that saw fringe play even recently in an adapted Sultai Flash deck as an efficient kill spell in combat. Paragon is a nearly objectively better Poisoner.
On his own, he kills something and gains you three life from flashing him in favorably to block, as he is able to target himself, giving him the deathtouch and lifelink. He will die to any creature, which wasn’t the case with Direfleet Poisoner, but he has the life gain benefit, which isn’t totally insignificant.
There’s also the better curve to talk about of Fervent Champion into this, which is incredible because Champion will live through whatever combat because it has first strike, in conjunction with the deathtouch. While this trick works with any creature with first strike, Rakdos Knights is something that seems like it’ll be pretty popular and that seems like a very strong curve out.
He doesn’t need to go in the Knight deck though, as he is just a decent threat on his own without having to block. It can trade up with three toughness creatures, though he is worse than Poisoner in the sense that Poisoner always has Deathtouch, meaning he can trade even after he enters.
Still though, in an aggro shell, this card seems very strong, and can help deal with some of those Midrange creatures which leaves a body behind. He also doesn’t say “Attacking Knight,” so his trick works on the defensive side as well. This is the weakest card of the five I’ll talk about here, but I’m pretty high on this and would look forward to jamming it in any aggressive black deck.
4. Witch’s Vengeance
Black board wipes in standard right now consist of Ritual of Soot, Cry of the Carnarium, and Finale of Eternity, which isn’t a true board wipe. Witch’s Vengeance is a very welcome edition.
While it isn’t a true sweeper, it is an absolute beating to tribal decks, of which we will see a lot of. It can hit Elementals, Knights, Goblins, the shell of whatever Vampire deck scrap together because Sorin, Imperious Bloodlord is so pushed, and whatever other tribal support Standard gets in the next two years. It’s also incidentally good at hitting any renegade Field of the Dead zombies laying around.
This isn’t technically a one sided board wipe, but it certainly can be. If you’re not playing Elementals, have a board full of X/3s, and your opponent is Risen Reef-ing it up, you can wipe them away with no fear of losing your non-Elementals to your own sweeper. That is a pretty good deal, and this, like Cry of the Carnarium, hits Leafkin Druid too.
I think this card is actually main deckable. At it’s worst, it can kill one thing. If your opponent has one random Vampire, Knight, Faerie, or whatever, in a cluttered board, three mana to pick off one creature isn’t ideal, but that’s pretty much it’s floor, which isn’t nothing. It’s something you can’t say about Ritual of Soot, in that you can make an effort to protect your own board.
Black sweepers have been pretty inconsistent in Standard lately, all of them having downsides or restrictions, and while this is still very restrictive, the ability in a Black creature deck to one-sidedly clear the board of Nissa lands is absolutely no joke and I’m sure this card will pop up several times during it’s Standard tenure.
3. Castle Locthwain
Of the entire rare land cycle, I believe this is the best one, though the White and Green ones are both very good too. Having a card draw engine on a land is something that is pretty invaluable, even if it is just one card for essentially five mana. People played Arch of Orazca, and that was essentially six mana to use.
This is a land that taps for Black, and can help you a little bit out of a top deck. Admittedly, you probably don’t want to use it when you already have 4–5 cards in your hand, as you’re going to be taking a large chunk out of your own health pool (not that Black is opposed to that) but this works better as an emergency option when your top decking, which is some really fine utility on a land.
As I’ve said throughout this series, having any kind of utility on a land is very strong, especially when it draws you a card without using an actual spell in your deck. I don’t think you want this land as a four of, but as a solid two of in a Black deck, this puts you in a good spot to help you get out of top deck mode, work through a flood a little quicker, or just get to your last combo piece or finisher.
2. Rankle, Master of Pranks
On the surface, this card kind of just looks like a pile of text with some random, symmetrical abilities. But this card looks promising and honestly, punishing. Getting to do all three of the abilities is just insane. Let’s go through each ability one by one.
- Each player discards a card. Okay, this card isn’t Liliana of the Veil. I know that. But, it comes out a turn later, and effectively does the same thing as her plus. Again, that is a bad comparison, but at the same time, it’s not a bad comparison. Do I think it’s as good? No. Not at all. I’m not crazy. But the ability is comparable. I know people don’t run her just for the plus one, but people won’t run Rankle just for his first ability.
- Each player sacrifices a creature. Wait…are we sure this isn’t Liliana of the Veil? The first two abilities effectively do the same thing, albeit this makes you sacrifice a creature as well. You most likely wouldn’t do this if Rankle is your only creature, unless you really hated the one creature your opponent had out, but sacrificing a mana dork, or a sacrifice outlet creature while your opponent has their one bomb out seems pretty strong to me.
- Each player draws a card and loses a life. Symmetrical draw here is interesting. From what I can understand, you can’t choose the order of the modes, so you can’t make your opponent draw a card then immediately discard it if they’re top decking. I may be wrong about that, but that’s my interpretation of it is that those abilities resolve in the order their printed. If I’m wrong about that, tell me so I can sulk in shame about not knowing the rules of this game. Anyway, this little guy does generate some card advantage for you and does replace himself the turn he comes down (probably) as he does have haste. It’s just a matter of if you want your opponent to draw a card too, which I think in most cases is probably fine, considering they’re also taking three to the face with it.
Rankle is really interesting. I actually have a deck shell that he slots into quite well and it may or may not be Jund Midrange. I’m excited to see how he performs in there, and I’m sure there are more unfair decks he slots into better.
- Murderous Rider/Swift End
When I saw this spoiled, I was blown away. I believe this is the best card in the set. Hands down. Yes, there are some great cards in Green which I’ll get to. Yes Bonecrusher Giant exists. Rankle is really good, Emry may break Eternal formats, but from a Standard perspective, this card is pretty dumb.
Let’s get this out of the way. I am not excited about a three mana 2/3 with lifelink, no matter how good of types it has. I’m not here for that. That’s the icing on a really sweet cake.
I’m here for the Hero’s Downfall. That’s what it is, is Hero’s Downfall. Which was a standard staple when it came out, peaking at around a $15 clip. That’s what I’m looking at in Murderous Rider, about a $15 post-release clip. Vraska’s Contempt, which albeit exiles, making it arguably better, peaked at around $20 at it’s height and with that rotating, Rider takes the spot so nicely.
It effectively draws you a card, and that card is a 2/3 with Lifelink you just get for playing a card you were absolutely going to play anyway. Some of the Adventure cards are two kind of bad cards glued together to make it playable. This is a slam dunk staple on one end, making the Rider part almost irrelevant.
Seriously, what deck doesn’t want this? This is going to be a staple in control decks, midrange decks, hell, even aggro decks probably play it. It’s cheap enough and can keep applying pressure.
The ability to, at instant speed, kill any creature or Planeswalker is insane for three mana, and the two life loss is pretty negligible, especially because Murderous Rider gets you the life back if it attacks or blocks. Absolutely insane. The closest thing we have is Bedevil and there’s an extra little Red blip on there (though it does hit artifacts), while this is only mono colored.
I have Black elevated so highly probably mainly because of how much I love this card. It’s so good. This will be a premium removal spell in Standard for two years. I know it. I’m confident.
I am so confident this will be a Standard staple for it’s entire life that if it’s not a 3–4 of staple in nearly every Black deck for it’s entire tenure, I will buy a playset and eat them. I know this card is awesome and I’m so excited to play it.
Want to tell me how wrong I am? Comment on the article or find me on twitter at @adolce95 if you want to discuss.
