Modern Horizons 2 EDH Set Review - White
Serra's Emissary by Nils Hamm
Modern Horizons 2 EDH Set Review: White
The Commander's Herald Modern Horizons 2 EDH set review continues with white!
More Modern Horizons 2 EDH Content
- Modern Horizons 2 Release Date & Information
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- Colorless and Lands
Hi, my name's Michael Celani, and I'm an authority on terrible taste. I purposely submitted this article late to annoy all you WUBRG-order fans out there. Let's see what Modern Horizons: The Squeakquel has in store for us.
Mythics
Serra's Emissary
The last time I saw an angel like this, his name was Abe Vigoda and he was in Good Burger.
For seven mana, you get a behemoth of a flyer that grants not just your creatures, but you personally protection from a specific card type. That distinction is important; it makes you, for instance, unable to be damaged by Craterhoof Behemoth or enchanted by Overwhelming Splendor. The aggressive decks will certainly name creatures to get past blockers while no selling the consequences, but if you care more about your permanents as value pieces, choose instants to dodge Path to Exile.
That's just the baseline, though: if you've built around it, picking sorcery or enchantment is your ticket to one-sided board wipes with Blasphemous Act or even Pestilence. The ceiling on this card is astronomically high, but is it worth its cost? It plays like a trickster Avacyn, Angel of Hope, which it won't replace, but the decks that want this effect are certainly going to put it to good use.
Solitude
Solitude taught me that it's okay that I don't have any friends.
The most apt way to describe this card is that it's the Eternal Witness of Swords to Plowshares. All it does is staple a body to an effect that everybody wants, and suddenly that effect is bonkers. Whether you blink it, bounce it, Blood for Bones it, or Bop It!™, you've got a repeatable removal spell that will frustrate your enemies to no end. You shouldn't evoke it all too often though; one card is a really hefty price to pay in Commander, and it's best left as a last resort.
Rare
Esper Sentinel
You've already seen everyone compare this to Mystic Remora, but I think that's much ado atrout nothing. This isn't remora the same; that card is a much more concentrated burst of draw that ultimately exits on its own whereas Esper Sentinel is better served for the long game. Has-fins aside, this bucket of bolts is a good include in a deck that can pump up his power. If you can't raise the tax, it's going to be difficult to get much use out of him thanks to that "first" clause.
Nykthos Paragon
There's two types of lifegain decks: the Ajani's Pridemate decks and the Cradle of Vitality decks. The first deck type is by far the more common and well supported archetype, so Nykthos Paragon seems destined for the underworld. It's not all Styx and stones just yet, though: the recent Witherbloom Witchraft deck suggests that quality-over-quantity lifegain playstyles are in development. It just needs a few more pieces for this to be worth six mana.
Out of Time
It's difficult to recommend this over a standard exile-strength board wipe like Terminus unless your deck can take advantage of its idiosyncracies or your opponents really rely on their commanders. This is a delaying tactic at best, and it's always rough to have your removal removed. For Out of Time to truly stop the clock, you'll need to build around it, and that's why I'm convinced Wizards wants me to marry Zur the Enchanter.
Incidentally, if you happen to own a Vedalken Mastermind and enough dorks, this would be an infinitely repeatable way to untap all your creatures. You're welcome, Chulane, Teller of Tales players.
Resurgent Belief
Resurgent Belief is great so long as you do anything but suspend it. Ride it on Electrodominance or Sram's Expertise, or play it for free with Fires of Invention and As Foretold, or pitch it to Omnispell Adept, or even cascade into it, but if you announce its presence to the world with the subtlety of Austin Powers blaring Entrance of the Gladiators into a bullhorn you will die.
Sanctifier en-Vec
Meet Jerry.
Jerry is an average man working an average job at an average company. His appearance is average, and so is his livelihood. Every day, after working an average day at his average job, he goes home to his average family and watches television until about nine-o'-clock. If Jerry is feeling adventerous that night, sometimes he will read a book, or go to an average restaurant with his average wife, where they will order an average meal and tip an average amount. Then, after settling into his queen sized bed at ten, he'll get an average amount of sleep and wake up in the morning to do it all over again. This has been Jerry's routine since he was ten years old, and Jerry was at peace.
One day, something happened to Jerry that was not so average.
Jerry's best friend Michael introduced him to a new card game called Magic: the Gathering. Jerry was fascinated by the game. It was unlike anything he had ever seen in his average life. He began riffling the cards in his hands, and in minutes he was hooked. Jerry's favorite deck to play was Chainer, Nightmare Adept. Oh, how he loved to cast spells from the graveyard! It would make him as giddy as a child at an ice cream parlor. "Even if something bad were to happen to me," Jerry thought, "I can just try again. I can never lose!" For once in his life, Jerry felt anything but average.
Jerry's confidence grew. He began experiencing new things, like comedy clubs and skiing and heckling poor people on the side of the road. This made Jerry even happier, and more bold. Even his average family could see something had changed within him. But it wasn't too long before Jerry's confidence turned to vice. He began smoking and drinking marijuana, which was a gateway to other, harder drugs like EverQuest. He began to spend his nights in dangerous places with dangerous people. Within a month's time, Jerry was kidnapping the daughters of congressmen in exchange for military technologies which he would sell on the black market in an effort to destabilize third-world countries for profit. This was not a good thing for Jerry to do; not a good thing for Jerry to do at all.
In an effort to stop the notorious "Jerry Bomb" from inciting anarchy, the government commissioned Wizards of the Coast to print the ultimate counter to Chainer, Nightmare Adept and give it to the one man that could break Jerry. At their weekly card game, Michael slipped Sanctifier en-Vec into his deck and shuffled up. Time seemed to stop when it happened. Surrounded by heavily armed gunmen, mountains of cocaine and sitting on top of a live thermonuclear device, Michael contemplated the card and considered just holding the silver bullet in the chamber. But when he remembered Jerry had stolen three Statue of Liberties in a row, he tapped two plains and slammed the card onto the table with a vengeance so strong it was bulletproof. When Jerry read the card, he suffered a myocardial infarction and died instantly. That night, with a single piece of cardboard, an empire was shattered and the world was saved.
This was a cautionary tale.
Don't be like Jerry.
Search the Premises
Absent any synergy, I doubt Search the Premises will stop your opponents from attacking you. Clues are a rather fair token type, since they still need investment to become card advantage. 2 Modern 2 Horizons does support a bunch of general artifact token synergy, though, which makes the prospect of something like an Amareth, the Lustrous junk deck running this even more terrifying.
Timeless Dragon
If you liked Eternal Dragon, well, here's another one.
Uncommons
Abiding Grace
Constable of the Realm
This is actually absurd, and it's the sleeper white uncommon of the set. Think of how popular Admonition Angel is, then imagine a version of that that works with counters instead. Hell, you can even build your own if you've got a Felidar Retreat lying around.
Healer's Flock
I'm just upset this isn't three Serra Ascendant stapled together.
Prismatic Ending
I don't hate it. The sweet-spot for this is no greater than two mana. Anything higher and you're getting into Generous Gift territory. This does unconditionally exile most tokens for a single white, and it also competently removes a lot of rocks and early game snowballs.
Scour the Desert
This is where you exile something with a ridiculous characteristic-defining ability, like Multani, Maro-Sorcerer, and suddenly you've cast Storm Herd for half the price.
Common
Blacksmith's Skill
This is one of the first white spells to unconditionally provide hexproof and indestructible to any permanent, and it's fantastic if your deck relies on noncreature permanents. It won't replace Mother of Runes, but it will compliment her.
Break Ties
This card is so close to playable, but at three mana I'm running Heliod's Intervention over this because the targeting flexibility and lifegain capabilities outweigh the exile-a-graveyard-card and reinforce effects. This feels like Kaya's Guile missed the mark.
Late to Dinner
If you're running Resurrection, you're running this. I don't know if the Food token will ever be relevant if you're going for a reanimator strategy, though.
Piercing Rays
I want to live in the world where someone forecasts this to tap down their own Emmara, Soul of the Accord to create a token.
Unbounded Potential
Took a really long time to get an instant-speed proliferate in this color, didn't it?
Thank you for reading my Modern Horizons! Part Deux review. Go read the others, now, and careful with those Collector's Boosters.
