Cruel Reality is an expensive but impactful curse. In EA creatures attacking is the primary win condition for most decks, so eating away at them over time can be a good strategy. The main downside is the card being seven mana. Cruel Reality does not have the immediate effect on the board necessary to justify ramping into it, so the most likely home I can see would be some kind of enchantment control deck. Overall the card is too slow and likely not worth running until we get a good way of cheating it out.

Clone is a classic effect that has been redone many times in Magic’s history. We have a few derivations of this card in EA and none of them have seen play yet. I do not expect clones to be usable until there is a combo similar to Gyruda, Doom Of Depths introduced. Not many decks are running around with expensive creatures, so clone has little to no purpose on it’s own.

The Jolly Balloon Man is a bizarre Boros legend that copies creatures as 1/1 flyers with haste. The Man has haste himself so he can do this on the turn he is played. I do not see this card being played fairly, but there is at least one infinite combo revolving around him. The combination of The Jolly Balloon Man , Sewer-veillance Cam , Nurturing Pixie , and a mana creature that taps for at least a blue and a generic (Gyre Engineer among others) creates infinite 2/2 pixies with haste by repeatedly bouncing Sewer Cam to untap both The Jolly Balloon Man on enter and the mana creature on leave. This is a 4 card combo across 4 colors, so I do not expect it to be good in the slightest, but this card has a lot of potential to improve over time if the combo can get 1 card or 1 color smaller.

Cloud Key is a versatile cost reducer that has potential in storm decks and artifact decks alike. Izzet storm could pick up this card as a replacement to goblin electromancer, as it cannot be hit by spot removal and necessitates bringing in artifact removal. Cloud Key does cost more than the cost reducers currently played, but incentivizes the deck to go bigger with more control elements rather than trying to win ASAP before your reducer is removed. Artifact decks already get a similar effect to this with both Glaring Fleshraker and Skittering Precursor , so I do not expect this card to revolutionize that archetype until a color other than red becomes a better fit for the deck.

Lord Skitter, Sewer King is a decent midrange card that has useful utility in exiling cards from your opponents graveyard. Three mana may be too slow for most black based decks, and the aggressively bent tokens do not help this fact. I have experimented with Golgari lists playing mana dorks, but I think the best fit for this card would be in the consuming corruption swamp midrange deck. An army in a can is a reliable threat for a deck with 16+ spot removal spells.

Gigantosaurus is one of if not my favorite Magic card of all time. This placement, and the amount I will play with this card are therefore very biased. Being mono colored in EA is not as big of a downside as it can be in other eternal formats, but green presents some challenges as the “worst” color in the format. A deck with adequate ramp and aggression can use Gigantosaurus alongside Berserk for fast and unexpected kills. Rancor and Aspect of Hydra can grant the deck more consistency when you don’t draw Berserk . The other creatures around it are still in contention, but pump spells and ramp effects are core to Gigantosaurus ’s identity in the EA format.

Raffine, Scheming Seer was a standard all star for years, but may fall to the wayside due to its steep color requirement. I believe Raffine to have a higher ceiling than the cards mentioned previously, due to its synergy with Unearth and Helping Hand effects. A 3 color aggressive/midrange deck is not currently viable in EA, but a deck playing two of those colors and splashing a third could run Raffine with the help of the Unearth effects. Raffine may be the only blue/white card played in those decks, and only 1 splash basic alongside Contaminated Landscape /Obscura Storefront can make the deck’s mana as streamlined as possible. Once the card is in play it has a large effect on the board. Raffine’s trigger happens on attack, not on when Raffine attacks, so it has immediate value when it hits the table. Ward 1 can allow it to survive a turn or two in the early game, potentially growing your threats to outsize the opponent’s board. The color requirement is a steep cost to build around, but the payoff of having Raffine is likely worth the trouble. My starting points are Dimir with Gran-Gran and Hydroponics Architect and Orzhov with Raffine's Informant and Helping Hand , but an Azorius version is also possible with Helping Hand and Recommission .

Doomsday is an iconic combo piece for eternal formats, and has some potential in EA. Doomsday is such a difficult card to play with that I do not think the early data will be indicative of its strength. Dimir is the most likely color combination, but a Rakdos or mono black Doomsday build could be possible as well. I have mapped out the piles for Dimir and the most common one is Thought Scour on top, which mills Laboratory Maniac and Deep Analysis drawing Unearth . Unearth is cast returning Laboratory Maniac , and Deep Analysis draws the remaining card and wins the game. With 7 mana and a Chromatic Star in play you can win in the same turn as you cast Doomsday , but if there is a window, pass the turn piles can be made from turn 2-3 onward. This combo is somewhat compact, so I recommend pairing it alongside many spot removal spells, cantrips, and bigger draw spells like Stock Up /Dig Through Time . The spot removal keeps aggro decks at bay while assembling the mana and the Doomsday . Cards like Fatal Push also enable a possible transformational sideboard plan where you take out the Doomsday combo in favor of Tolarian Terror and Eddymurk Crab with even more removal. Laboratory Maniac being a 2/2 makes it very vulnerable to spot removal, and many one mana spells can take care of it. This makes going for the combo very risky against red decks with burn spells. The combo can still work against counterspells due to the rate of Dispel , but I do not think Doomsday is worth it after sideboarding against a red opponent. Overall the archetype seems promising with many lanes to explore.

Hornet Queen is an instant board presence, filling the sky with deathtouchers. Green ramp decks like Aftermath Analyst combo and Reanimator decks could make use of Hornet Queen to stop their opponents' assault. The Queen can also go on the offensive, representing six damage in the air. She could revolutionise the Aftermath Analyst decks, allowing them to play a slower game with more plans against graveyard hate aside from Breaker of Creation . The powerful aggressive decks of the format include creatures with flying, so Hornet Queen has value for a seven drop in this context.

And lastly my most anticipated card is Dig Through Time . Dig Through Time is an instant speed delve card draw spell, which looks seven cards deep for supreme selection. Treasure Cruise is legal in EA, but does not see much play at the moment. I believe that Dig Through Time will be more usable for blue decks than cruise for its utility at instant speed. The most played blue decks include Tolarian Terror and Eddymurk Crab , which do compete for the graveyard with Dig Through Time , but Izzet Narset / Delver could make use of it for the ability to be held up alongside a counterspell. Those decks do not care as much about how many spells are in their graveyard, and the ever excellent Crackling Drake includes exile. I also believe that a new Dimir control archetype could emerge using four copies of Dig. As long as the deck can fit enough removal spells in the maindeck to beat red decks like Madness it has a viable niche. The ability to take out narrow spells like Fatal Push against Blue Terror could give the deck a solid plan versus the main pillars of the format. The only difficulty would be actually winning the game, and cards like Thieving Aven could fit that role, or playing a few Tolarian Terror yourself. Zac’s Micromancer decklist also could have some purpose to playing Dig, especially considering how often the deck holds up mana on its opponents turn.

We haven't seen a lot of UW fliers lately but this is a big upgrade to Favorable Winds if the mana isn't a big issue.

Pretty solid 1 drop with bounce synergies. Flying and vigilance make it a good thing to buff and the death trigger will help you recover if they can remove it.

If you do want allies this is a good rate. Not sure if the payoffs exist.

Probably the best source of repeated earthbending for the unfair uses. Note that the land returns tapped so even if you trigger this multiple times in a turn you can likely sacrifice it only once, unless you're doing stuff with Zuran Orb.

A pretty interesting rate for self-bounce which also has some use against a reanimated Troll of Khazad-dum. Probably the most maindeckable lesson.

Solid rate for this effect if you're playing some type of green midrange. Best if your permanents can initiate trades with your opponent's cards somehow.

Very interesting effect in black sacrifice presentation which are fairly supported in the format. It needs to survive a turn but if you make one copy your opponent's probably not getting rid of these. Note that you can immediately sacrifice the token to get the surveil and a death trigger.

Totally reasonable 1-of in Starfield Shepherd presentation.

While this can be a fair card I imagine it's most interesting if you have some way of making a huge number of tokens and use Ashnod's Altar to convert them into cards.

This looks like a solid option in green presentation that ramp or just play a longer game. Gets dinged a bit for being a cantrip you don't want to cast on turn 1 if at all possible.

Death trigger makes this inherently a lot worse than Thraben Inspector. I expect I'll prefer Shambling Ghast for this slot but you could run this if you think you'll need more ways to spend mana.

Note that you can put the trigger on the stack multiple times if you can sacrifice multiple clues, which could be a useful way for Cat/Oven to ramp.

The ward alone might make this stronger than Enigma Drake, although you'd want to have some access to lessons if this is in your deck. Not sure if counting other permanents matters much.

Creatures that can come back indefinitely are worth looking at, but 3 mana feels like a lot.

This will definitely cause problems for some presentation out of the sideboard. If you can force them to react to your threats it will do a lot more than if you just pay the upkeep for several returns.

An interesting one. You need a lot of things to line up to make this work:

• A board where you're even or ahead,
• The ability to benefit from both players playing a few lands out,
• Cheap, ideally instant-speed interaction to react if your opponent breaks it by casting several spells

This could help with the Standstill plan. I don't know if it's generally good enough for midrange in a format where the main appeal of green is the ramp.

Not sure this is a viable combo piece unless Channel gets unbanned. I suppose Ashnod's Altar could work and maybe KCI will come to Arena someday.

I've thought in the past I might play Careful Study, though in the presentation you'd play both, this is arguably worse. We don't have High Tide but you can generate mana through Utopia Sprawl, Wolfwillow Haven, or Ancient Tomb for that matter.

Assuming you hit a castable card this does 2 and you could go bigger with Seething Song, free spells, etc. I don't know if this is quite maindeckable in the current meta at least outside of a dedicated cascade deck.

Reasonable sideboard option for mono-red. Better than Meltdown at dealing with Myr Enforcers and more resilient than By Force against counters.

I'm not sure if we're getting these on Arena right away. While they can obviously do a lot to set up combos, fair presentation might consider a package of singletons if the effects can be strong enough to offset the lost card.

I'm not sure if we're getting these on Arena right away. While they can obviously do a lot to set up combos, fair presentation might consider a package of singletons if the effects can be strong enough to offset the lost card.

I'm not sure if we're getting these on Arena right away. While they can obviously do a lot to set up combos, fair presentation might consider a package of singletons if the effects can be strong enough to offset the lost card.

Probably just better than Ponder and Brainstorm in a format where land fetching always costs a mana. We have a density of these effects in the format, but the question is always what do you do with all the selection?

We've had storm payoffs for some time but have struggled to build the mana engines outside of Channel. Along with Dark Ritual there's definitely potential although access to Manamorphose would be ideal. In "fairer" things to do, there used to be an Extended deck called All-In Red that was focused on casting rituals to land a 5 drop creature as early as possible, in a format where people weren't running a lot of interaction to handle just a big creature. I could see something like that with Ancient Tomb working if a turn two... Eomer?? is a big enough threat. Maybe Breaching Dragonstorm.

We've had storm payoffs for some time but have struggled to build the mana engines outside of Channel. Along with Dark Ritual there's definitely potential although access to Manamorphose would be ideal. In "fairer" things to do, there used to be an Extended deck called All-In Red that was focused on casting rituals to land a 5 drop creature as early as possible, in a format where people weren't running a lot of interaction to handle just a big creature. I could see something like that with Ancient Tomb working if a turn two... Eomer?? is a big enough threat. Maybe Breaching Dragonstorm.

Not really aware of anything in the format this enables. The rate is not awful to maindeck this if there's e.g. some artifact/enchantment with counters you'd otherwise have trouble with.

It definitely feels like this should have some application between Land Tax, Aftermath Analyst, maybe lifegain payoffs, and just generally being a 0 mana artifact. Interesting to see where this goes.

Coming to the free removal spells, Fireblast has a long history of removing opponents who are at 4. We've gotten a lot of burn options in the last year or so between Chain Lightning, Boltwave, Galvanic Blast, Burst Lightning, etc. I'm not totally sure which I'd be playing in non-madness red. I do think you want to maximize Amped Raptor so maybe this is a bad enough hit to leave out.

Free is always a cost worth looking at but this just doesn't seem necessary to me. Madness presentation much prefer Lightning Axe and I really don't like how this is almost a sorcery. Perhaps useful for DRC/Violent Urge?

Could be good in certain matchups if you're trying to go something like t2 Baleful Strix t3 Stock Up. 4 life or 4 mana just feels like a huge cost against aggro though.

This is a really wild one to have. Against aggro it will often get 2-3 creatures so it's not really even card disadvantage as it gives you an enormous mana advantage. Very difficult to play around at instant speed. Speaking of Stock Up I'm a little worried UR tempo/control will have too easy a time catching up against an aggro start.r

Lance Says: "this card seems nuts"

Lance Says: "I think that this would be good in a deck that could want 5-8 copies of Lavaspur Boots, like hammer or something else"