First Look: Secrets of Strixhaven

Strixhaven previews have arrived, and they look quite spicy. I'm more invested in this set release than I have been in years, as I stumbled from the comfort of my desk into a PT invite on Magic Arena.

Let's start with an iconic preview: Ancestral Recall.

Emeritus of Ideation

That's right, we have the chance to literally cast Ancestral Recall in Standard.

Emeritus of Ideation showcases the new ability prepare.

A prepared creature can cast the spell in its textbox. Emeritus of Ideation comes onto the battlefield prepared, so if you have a spare blue mana in play when it enters, you can immediately cast Ancestral. On top of that, we have a five-mana 5/5 flyer with ward 2. We can internalize this as a UUU3 5/5 flying that draws three cards when it enters, essentially. On top of that, it can cast again with some work. Basically, it starts with an Ancestral, and if you can attack, then cast a Delved Treasure Cruise.

Is this card strong enough for Standard? Five-mana cards are few and far between these days in top decks. In most top decks, the most expensive cards we see cost about four mana, and games can end before this card hits the battlefield.

Additionally, there's another broken five-drop in the format that does a similar thing, Quantum Riddler.

Emeritus is the kind of card we'll see in decks initially, but it's too expensive for Standard to have lasting power. As far as competitive play, if it can't make it in Standard, it's unlikely to make it anywhere else.

If Riddler didn't exist, I'd expect this card to see some play. There's also a chance we see both in a deck, especially in a Momo deck of some kind.

Prepare is a sick ability that I absolutely love. I love getting to play a lot of lands in my decks and having ways to spend mana when I draw too many. Prepare should serve that purpose, and in a format like Limited, I expect to want to play more lands than usual because of this ability. 

I'm pessimistic about how often we'll actually get to play Ancestral Recall in Standard, unless of course we mean Accumulate Wisdom.

Mana Sculpt

Mana Sculpt is a Mana Drain callback, and a card I hope to play consistently. It is a Cancel at its floor, and at its ceiling, it can ramp you from three to six mana when you counter their three-drop if you have a Wizard in play. I suspect people will try to make this work, and we'll see more cheap Wizards in decks to facilitate. I think this is a card we'll want to find a home for, rather than make one. It would work insanely well with Emeritus of Ideation. You could use the extra mana to cast the giant 5/5 before your opponent's mana is developed, giving you both an instant Ancestral early in the game and a tough to answer 5/5 while your opponent has so few lands in play.

We'll need to flesh out exactly which cheap Wizards are available and an overall plan A for a deck like that, but it does sound interesting.

This is a self-explanatory card I expect to get tested repeatedly. As more Wizards are printed, the likelihood improves that we see this in Standard and potentially beyond. I like its ceiling, but I wouldn't play a bunch of bad Wizards to make this work without other strong incentives to play only that creature type.

Traumatic Critique

I'm most excited about Traumatic Critique so far. This might be the set's best card when all is said and done. X can equal 0, meaning you can fire this off on turn two as a discard outlet or as card selection. As the game progresses, this only gets stronger. Casting it on turn three, killing a small creature allows you to fight a card advantage battle while also sculpting your hand, and this intensifies as the game goes on.

We used to play Control decks that would chain Sphinx's Revelations to close out games. The same thing can happen with Traumatic Critique, a few of these to the face to end the game, perhaps with a couple of hits from a small creature or two.

Traumatic Critique is incredibly strong. I expect to see it in Standard and eternal formats. This is an X spell that is reasonably efficient at any casting cost.

Studious First-Year

Rampant Growth is back, and it's cuter than ever.

This little bear is an excellent creature that would likely see play if Llanowar Elves wasn't present. It may see play alongside it, especially alongside a card like Gene Pollinator. Gene Pollinator on turn one, into this on turn two, and cast a Rampant Growth. If we need that much ramp, this is a great spot to be in. You could follow up with an Ouroboroid, with this first-year student being another body to get counters from the snake.

This is essentially a Wood Elves where you can split up the mana costs. The downside is that if you blink it, you'll have to cast the spell again. Regardless, this is an excellent creature that will see play in Standard, potentially even in Mono Green Landfall.

What's nice about this card is that once you've cast your Rampant Growth, you no longer need to worry about losing a mana source on future turns when it dies, allowing it to trade with a small creature or just apply a little extra pressure to your opponent.

This is a cool card, and I'm mostly excited about drafting soup decks in Limited with it as the core.

Withering Curse

Withering Curse is an Infest that you can work for to get it to turn into a Damnation. Gaining life isn't difficult; however, this is a time-sensitive card, so you need to have a good amount of life gain for it to be reliable. While there are usually plenty of infest-type cards in Standard these days, the top decks have a lot of small creatures at the moment, making this more intriguing.

Lifelink is a nice way to trigger the infusion on this card, but that indicates you have a creature in play, which will also get picked up. Ideally, something like your lands would trigger this. While the common cycles of gain lands exist, tap lands are not where you want to be these days, so a card like Adventurer's Inn would be more appealing.

While this is a potentially strong card, it's mostly just another infest clone that you'll likely see in sideboards with occasional upside of a Damnation when you're able to combine it with a Requitting Hex or perhaps a food token.

Strixhaven looks incredible so far, and I'm excited for the early access event in a few weeks so I can learn the cards in and out. This set looks to hit all the marks I look for, including nostalgia, sweet buildarounds, and lots of mana sinks for Limited.

I'll be back with a few more cards next week. See you then.