Magic The Gathering: Theros Beyond Death is here, and it brings with it a whole host of new cards for players to use as they flood the battlefield with aggressive creatures, powerful enchantments, and indestructible gods. From the heavens themselves to the mortal warriors of the plane, this expansion covers a lot of ground.
But some of these cards are more impressive than others. With a focus on mechanics such as enchantments and devotion, there are some standout stars as well as others that don’t hit their marks. Here are the five best (and worst) cards from Theros Beyond Death.
10 Worst: Deathbellow War Cry
The effect of this card is certainly a powerful one - Deathbellow War Cry lets you put four Minotaur creatures directly from your deck onto the battlefield. However, its conditions make it a bit restrictive to play.
First, the card costs a prohibitive eight mana - and it’s a sorcery, which makes it a slower play. On top of that, the Minotaurs must each be different from each other, making it trickier to set this card up properly. With just a bit of bad luck, you wind up missing the card’s entire payoff.
9 Best: The Birth Of Meletis
While not the flashiest new card in the set, The Birth of Meletis is a Saga Enchantment that can easily help set up your first few turns. Its first chapter pulls a Plains card from your deck, and the second chapter gives you a free defender.
The third and final chapter lacks the resounding flair of other Sagas as it just gives you two life, but for just two mana, The Birth of Meletis improves your odds of survival while granting a consistent mana curve. This makes it a remarkably efficient card.
8 Worst: Drag To The Underworld
Drag to the Underworld is a four cost black kill spell, letting you destroy a target creature. It reduces its cost by your devotion to black, but it only reduces the generic mana cost, leaving it at two black mana to play.
This isn’t a bad card, per se - it’s just that there are definitely better choices at your disposal. A conditionally cheap kill spell is maybe not a good as a reliably mid-costed kill spell, especially when several of the more powerful creatures in Theros Beyond Death have indestructible.
7 Best: Bronzehide Lion
Bronzehide Lion is one of those indestructible creatures we just mentioned. As a two cost 3/3, it’s already quite efficient, on top of which it has a two mana ability to gain indestructible. That’s not the last of the Lion’s powers, though.
When it dies, Bronzehide Lion returns as an Aura Enchantment attached to another creature you control. This also transfers its indestructible ability, potentially letting you protect a powerful engine at a relatively cheap cost. All told, this card will definitely see play in Enchantment-themed decks.
6 Worst: Purphoros, Bronze-Blooded
The gods of Theros return in Theros Beyond Death, but not all of them are as impressive as they used to be. Just take Purphoros, Bronze-Blooded - the weakest of the new gods. He has standard god abilities like indestructible and being an enchantment till you hit five red devotion, and he also gives your creatures haste.
His activated ability lets you play a red or artifact creature from your hand without paying for it but has the severe drawback of making you sacrifice it at the end of your turn. This alone makes him an unwieldy card in this set.
5 Best: Nylea, Keen-Eyed
On the flip side, Nylea, Keen-Eyed is potentially the best new god from the set. She has the same god abilities as Purphoros, but also discounts your creature spells by one mana. Her activated ability lets you reveal the top card of your deck and draw it if it’s a creature.
Given that this ability can be activated multiple times, this can lead you to easily have multiple big creatures at your disposal. Those creatures are then all easier to cast, which plays right into green’s typical strategy of having big creatures that trample over your opponents.
4 Worst: Nylea’s Intervention
While Nylea may be a useful card, Nylea’s Intervention is less so. For two green plus X mana, you can either search your deck for X land cards and put them into your hand, or deal twice X damage to every creature with flying.
While these effects do play into green’s archetypes of land draw and flying hatred, it’s a bit of a niche card. The deck thinning can be useful and the pseudo board wipe might save you every once in a while, but don’t count on seeing this card in many main lists.
3 Best: Anax, Hardened In The Forge
Anax, Hardened in the Forge, is an absolute powerhouse for red devotion decks. For just three mana, you get a creature whose power is equal to your devotion to red (of which he contributes two). His second ability grants you Satyr tokens when your creatures die, but that pales in comparison to the potential of his first ability.
Combined with something like Embercleave or other Equipment (or just a whole lot of red devotion), Anax can wreck your opponents single-handed. His power ceiling is extremely high, making him a great pick for aggressive red decks.
2 Worst: Enigmatic Incarnation
Enigmatic Incarnation feels a bit like a gimmick card that may have some niche uses and could pull off some surprise wins, but will largely not see much play. Essentially, it’s an Enchantment version of Prime Speaker Vannifar, only it lets you sacrifice an Enchantment on your end step to pull a creature with a mana cost one greater than it.
It’s difficult to see where this card will fit in. Typically, Enchantment decks are built around playing and having Enchantments, not sacrificing them. This card likely won’t see much play outside of some very specialized, very specific strategies.
1 Best: Gray Merchant Of Asphodel
Finally, our choice for the best card from Theros Beyond Death is Gray Merchant of Asphodel. This card is actually a reprint from the original Theros set, and he has the same ability now as he did then - when he enters the battlefield, you gain life equal to your devotion to black, and your opponents lose that much life.
This card was excellent in the first Theros set due to the huge life total swings he could generate, especially when you play multiple copies as they each add to your devotion. That combined with various cards letting you flicker the Merchant or replay him, and he’s looking to dominate the game once again.
NEXT: Magic: The Gathering: Top 10 Strongest Cards For a Hydra Tribal Commander Deck
