The Least Balanced Cycles in Magic: the Gathering

[@traviscochran9253]

Finally Seth recognizes that Shivan Gorge is not only the best land of the cycle, but might be the best land of all time if not for Sorrow's Path.

[@CostaColares]

Rhystic Cave erasure

[@jenniferwilliams9612]

Personally, I only have two Sorrow’s Paths, and I need two more to finish my playset! (Yes I am being serious, and yes there is an explanation)

[@bluedestiny2710]

@@jenniferwilliams9612 donate / harmless offering + Sorrow's? Or Boros Reckoner?

[@durttheelder4035]

Oassis is the best land I can think of

[@williambowen8054]

I also noticed this whoopsie.

[@fiacramccluskey2569]

But have you considered that removing banding is more important than winning?

[@willbill6942]

Banding is OP, thank god tolaria existed, otherwise it would've taken over every format.

[@matthewollar9842]

A right and just question my liege!

[@seandun7083]

It's like Shelkin Brownie, but it hits normal banding and it's on a land therefore making it much better.

[@ConManAU]

Removing banding is so important WotC did it to the entire game many years ago.

[@toolittletoolate]

@@ConManAU Never left Alpha

[@Igor369]

Yeah, I also think Shivan Gorge is the best in the cycle... god damn 1 damage to face for ONLY 3 MANA per turn is so op!

[@pathtracker4944]

4 mana actually, since it's a land

[@Daniel-q9f8p]

All the other cards in the cycle are just enablers, but Shivan Gorge can win the game for you all by yourself. All you need is 4 mana and infinite turns.

[@funkydiscogod]

You'll be happy to know that Mount Doom does pretty much the same thing, and it's on Arena, legal in Historic.

[@pathtracker4944]

@@funkydiscogod it does it better though

[@xSnarfsx]

Hey if you have 20 opponents that's 20 damage.

[@mikotagayuna8494]

Designer: Marketing wants us to add a new cycle for the upcoming set. What flavorful, exciting, new game mechanic do you want me to do for white? Head Designer: Make it suck.

[@OlgaZuccati]

i love when the designer team said "it is healing time!" and proceeded to heal white all over the place.

[@charliesterry4604]

Clarion Ultimatum is playable in Commander though. It reads "search for 5 basic lands and put them onto the battlefield tapped"

[@christopherb501]

Or Persistent Petitioners, or that new ACR white card. Or Rats, if for some reason it's also a black deck.

[@genesis4322]

Issue is it has to target 5 different things so unless you're a 5 color deck with all 5 basics on field I can't see it being good enough.

[@philipmorse-fortier5499]

@@genesis4322 If you have any 5 basic lands in play, that works.

[@ChrisS-rd1dp]

​@@genesis4322 You choose 5 different permanents, but they don't need different names, so you can target multiple copies of the same type of basic

[@Trip_Fontaine]

With Tolaria, I wonder if they thought the idea of making a creature lose banding in the middle of combat was too much of a rules headache?

[@feritperliare2890]

Does he stop being blocked, what about effects reliant on being in a band what about thinking about playing banding seriously and not as an attempt at psychological warfare

[@daftwulli6145]

To be fair WOTC apologized to the island of tolaria by giving it an academy

[@OlgaZuccati]

@@daftwulli6145 and later a community college

[@KeroTheInvincible]

Funny enough, removing banding does nothing if the band is already attacking (you declare the band when declaring attackers)......Not that anybody would be expected to know that. Banding was just too much trouble in general.

[@xenolinguist]

That last (yet first?) cycle breaks an unwritten rule of cycles, being split across rarities. All of them are commons but Ancestral Recall, a rare.

[@SmugLookingBarrel]

I'm pretty sure there's an error at 17:58 and it shows Shivan Gorge as the best and Tolarian Academy as the worst.

[@petermaximoff4598]

That's a feature not a bug

[@letthenonsensebegin]

Lol this comment got me good!

[@NeZCheese]

Thank you Captain Obvious

[@chuckbilly-zg1ob]

This seems to be done in every video and serves a purpose. It generates comments. Objective achieved!

[@ICantThinkOfAFunnyHandle]

​@@chuckbilly-zg1obare people not allowed to make mistakes now?

[@ericyork5696]

I would guess Tolaria’s timing restriction was to avoid confusion about what happens when a card loses banking that is already part of a band and Wizards just chose a really heavy handed way to do it.

[@dracomasters9039]

I wish Healing Salve gave up to three target permanents you control shroud until end of turn. It would protect your creatures and your lands, since land destruction was so prevalent in the early days of magic. It would still be playable today and make people think twice when they go to Wasteland while your opponent has white mana up.

[@KeitaroHirochi]

You'd rather have the card make them indestructible to also dodge the rampant mass LD cards like armageddon, but good idea.

[@DutchBlackMantha]

@@KeitaroHirochiThat would probably make its most common usage as a combo piece with Armageddon.

[@janmelantu7490]

@@DutchBlackMantha oh it definitely would, there’s a whole Pauper Archetype built around indestructible lands and the targeted land destruction spells that replace the “destroyed” land. And in formats where Armageddon is played, Flagstones of Trokair is a staple.

[@IsomerMashups]

"Up to three target permanents you control gain protection from everything until end of turn."

[@xSnarfsx]

I started actually playing magic at a shop in 2010/2011, so bolt was in standard at the time. I remember a guy telling me bolt was part of a cycle with giant growth, which I thought was so cool. I knew both of those cards and had no idea they were even related, so it was sort of funny. He starts telling me the rest of the cycle and then got to white, I legitimately thought he was playing a joke on me. I made him pull it up on his phone and prove he wasn't kidding lol.

[@EvilShade82]

Shivan Gorge should have been something like: "tap: add R for each Mountain you control", or "tap: add R for each sorcery in your graveyard" or something like that. But it seems the devs hated red back in the day.

[@profwoland8942]

Or goblins or dragons

[@DiscardatRandom]

R for each life your opponents lost this turn (basically neheb)

[@justacasualguy13]

​@@profwoland8942that would just make it a tribal based gaeas cradle.

[@Aigis31]

​@@DiscardatRandomcould you imagine a deck that could Double Lightning Bolt, tap Shivan Gorge and cast Lava Axe? Lmao. That's probably why they didn't do a Neheb effect back then

[@DiscardatRandom]

@@Aigis31 I mean I’m stacking it up to tolarian academy and gaes cradle lmao

[@KingBrachion92]

I remember a fun little story the older players who taught me how to play Magic told me about the Alpha cycle. The mana gods came to the five colors and told them they could have an ability based on the number three at instant speed. Red immediately shouted "THREE DAMAGE!" Green was next with "I WANNA GIVE A CREATURE +3/+3!" Blue calmly said, "draw three cards." Black, liking Blue's way of thinking, said "gain three mana." Then the gods said to White, "all we have left is prevent 3 damage or gain 3 life." White said, "gimmie both."

[@skarloey1214]

I like that

[@DimT670]

They could have just gone for "make 3 tokens

[@acornman17]

A good topic for mtggoldfish podcast would be trying to balance these cycles, nerfing the best and buffing the worst, imagining what those cards could've looked like when they got printed.

[@legendarye172]

18:02 Did you intend to swap Tolarian Academy and Shivan Gorge?

[@darkwhiz223]

It was so funny🤣

[@satansamael666]

Editor mustn’t have been paid enough lol.

[@gypsieking3280]

They meant best and worst in terms of balance... Cause Tolarian Academy was not balanced at all.

[@brighamschellinger147]

The alpha Instants are often called "boons" or the boon cycle.

[@Shotgungunshot1]

Karakas being able to bounce opposing Commanders is already very strong. But the other problem is it makes your commander immune to a lot of forms of removal. If someone board wipes you can just send your Commander back to your hand. They try to exile it? Back to hand. They try to darksteel mutation it? Back to hand.

[@Brinta3]

And can Karakas bounce itself when your opponent tries to destroy it?

[@andyspendlove1019]

“Talking endlessly about how good free counterspells are is pretty boring” oof I bet they’ll never have a podcast on the topic, then!

[@raymondgreen9379]

A buddy of mine needed to borrow an intervention pact for an ad nauseum deck, but couldnt remember the name so he asked for "the white force of will" so i brought him scars of the veteran (along with the pacts)

[@rajamicitrenti1374]

An interesting historical note: Back in Alpha (and I believe until the rules rework with 6th Edition), Giant Growth was a 100% save a creature from Lightning Bolt card, as damage from spells and abilities didn't actually get applied until *after* the Queue (or what the proto-Stack was called back then) was completely empty. As such, regardless of whether Giant Growth was cast in response to Lightning Bolt or Lightning Bolt was cast in response to Giant Growth, the buff from Giant Growth would always be applied first.

[@greatdinn8489]

Tolaria is probably upkeep only because they didn't want the headache of figuring out what happens if you remove banding after a band has been formed.

[@guybrushthreepwood362]

A cycle containing Healing Salve and Ancestral Recall will obviously be the most unbalanced

[@ksul0014]

So I was curious and decided to try and do a breakdown of colors by best and worst. I counted Best Blue: 5, Green: 2, Black: 2, Red: 2, White: 1 Worst White: 6, Red: 2, Blue: 2 , Green: 1, Black: 0 Note: I'm ignoring the Atog cycle, since all of them are worst, but one Counting all three colors for the ultimatums Only counting the Force cycle for counters Counting Embercleave and Great Henge as best I also wanted to see what happened if you counted all the free counter spell cycles and ignored the ultimatums. If you do that then: Best Blue: 7, Green: 2, Black: 1, Red: 1, White: 1 Worst White: 5, Red: 4, Blue: 1, Green: 1, Black: 0 Interestingly, Black was never the worst in the cycle, and green only got in through the ultimatum and the free commander cycle.

[@Arcticrose00537220]

Thanks I was just about to do this as well. Interesting overall results ^_^

[@NecroNathancon]

Ah, I remember the fast equips well. This is back when I was freshly learning the game, and my friend insisted that equips can't ever do anything, because their text says to attach, not to equip, so there'd never be a circumstance where an equip was actually equipped. I'm realizing as I look back, he didn't know what he was talking about.

[@jenniferwilliams9612]

18:18 I still have immense nostalgia from when I was a kid, and I got to play 4x Tolarian Academy (with mind over Matter, windfall, Time Spiral, etc.) in Type II (read Standard) at the State Championship! I had a ton of fun with that deck, but I was ill prepared for my opponents Sideboard options against me. I did get to pull off an FTK in Type II (I don’t think that I have ever pulled that off in any other competitive event in my life). To this day, Tolarian Academy is one of my favorite cards ever printed!….

[@MiuanCZ]

A FlameTongue Kavu alongside Tolarian academy?? Thats messed up :D :D

[@jenniferwilliams9612]

@@MiuanCZ I mean…. Yeah…. It was turn 1, so the Kavu just did 4 to itself…🙃

[@DrorSuari]

im sorry but pyrokinesis is a legacy staple. bounty of the hunt saw play in standard. and contagion use to see play in vintage

[@sirshylordy5538]

Contagion sees play in legacy every once in a wild

[@GoldenSandslash15]

I think a really unbalanced cycle that went unmentioned was the basic lands. Island actually lets you cast all of these insane blue cards.

[@Brodysseous]

Only Seth would make a video of him eating this much crow over The Circle of Loyalty. I could hear the dark cloud of his prediction in every word.

[@justfoxx42]

It's no coincidence that almost all the worst cards in these cycles were white. It took a long time for Wizards to get white right.

[@patriciaboggs8882]

I think an interesting thought experiment is to ask: what number would you change each card to in order to make them balanced? You don't change the abilities at all, just the number. So obviously Ancestral Recall is the best and would stay at 3. Now for the rest to be approximately equal: Dark Ritual - 5? Lightning Bolt - 7? Giant Growth - 10? Healing Salve - 100? Maybe 1000?

[@lorpuz4664]

Healling salve should be www for more meme flavor

[@petercollins1122]

Based on what we already have - Ancestral goes to 1 with some other upside - see Ponder, Preordain, Opt, Consider, etc. There's a fine line where too much upside becomes bannable and not enough upside becomes unplayable. Dark Ritual goes to 2 - see cards like Pyretic Ritual. Lightning Bolt goes to 2 with a conditional upside or 3 with an extra requirement - see Play with Fire, Wizard's Lightning, Skewer the Critics, etc. Giant Growth - stays the same to get reprinted but doesn't make competitive play. Probably the most comparable pump spell that gets cast for G and actually used is Scale Up. Healing Salve - 5 definitely isn't enough. People won't pay 2 mana for 10 life. I'm not sure if they'd pay 1 for 10. It either needs to have another upside, or probably be 10+ to be playable.

[@patriciaboggs8882]

You guys are missing the point. These cards aren't getting printed but rather this is about evaluating these different mechanics and their power. Equal numbers (3) don't mean equal power. 3 cards is not equivalent to 3 life, damage or even mana. So what IS equivalent? That is to say 3 cards would be approximately equal in power to 4, 5, or 9 mana? For pump spells and gaining life that number would have to be a lot higher but how much? If it wouldn't see competitive play then it obviously isn't equal! There is almost no deck that wouldn't play ancestral recall if given the chance. At what numbers would these other 4 cards have ended up alongside the power 9 (again, NOT changing the card in any other way)?

[@Randy14512]

I would say HS would never be able to match the power of AR in modern MtG because of how little life total matters in a vacuum vs. card advantage. When you have ways to make an opponent take infinite damage or use alt win cons it doesn't matter how much life they have.

[@ChrisS-rd1dp]

​@@Randy14512 If you had a card for a single white that gained 1000 life, casting it would basically prevent burn decks or creature decks from being able to win. It wouldn't be as widely powerful as AR, but it would be even more powerful in certain matchups

[@thomaspetrucka]

Love how white and red were constantly in the bottom back in the day.

[@bryankopkin6869]

I love these style of videos. Super excited to watch this one!

[@stickofbutter4144]

Fun fact. In the 5th dawn equipment cycle, the worst one, healers headdress, actually does see very slight play in the cPDH format, specifically in certain pure sight marrow brews. Thought it might be bad, it is played!

[@MTGGoldfish]

Interesting! I've never seen anyone play it! Maybe it's better than I thought.

[@dariocampanella7992]

The sad thing about cycles is that only a few have a cycling ability.

[@Jakerunio]

Deflecting swat is actually the best spell in the commander free spell cycle by a lot. Not only is the effect crazy and even better than a normal counterspell in some cases, it is also in red, a color that very rarely gets interaction as potent as that.

[@bizarrum]

Nice video! Only thing I don't agree with is that all the free spells from alliances save the fow are bad. Nowadays yes, but in their time, the contagion was staple on all necro decks (I would say even more played that the FoW), all stompy decks played at least 2 bounty of the hunt, and the pyrokinesis are still played on the sideboard of goblins and other decks. Scars of the veteran were always a hideous card, that's true xD.

[@Psyman2]

Minor Correction: Oath of Ghouls triggers if _YOU_ have more creatures than target opponent in your grave. Not the other way around.

[@MTGGoldfish]

Oh, good call. I misspoke there.

[@CSDragon]

I get that Circle of Loyalty is an mtggoldfish meme, but at least I remembered that card. Does anyone know what the blue member of that cycles does without looking it up? Has anyone _ever_ seen it?

[@andyspendlove1019]

Yeah I think the blue and black cards in the cycle are somehow even worse than Circle of Loyalty. Cauldron of Eternity has anti-synergy with itself! It’s a worse Vat of Rebirth, an uncommon from Phyrexia

[@jozefkeresturi2139]

Yeah and the black one is useless as well

[@amatheuslc]

@@jozefkeresturi2139 It has it's niches. The Grenzo that cheats stuff from the bottom of the library is somewhat popular in EDH and worst case it's a late game 5 mana (and 3 afterwards) + 2 life to reanimate a creature from your gy. It even saw some use in Yuriko legacy decks.

[@amatheuslc]

It's the worst of the cycle but there are a few commanders that use it, mostly if they involve you having a really big hand.

[@jamestarrou3685]

I run an embercleave/circle of loyalty knight deck. It has a lot of other things going for it too, but so far it see pretty good success. Embercleave has won me a lot of games. Circle of loyalty is more situational, but functions as one of many stat boosters that work together to beef up knights.

[@sgjuxta]

Bro, if Idyllic Grange is the WORST example from that Eldraine land cycle, that's pretty wild...because it is by no means an underpowered card haha

[@mattm7798]

Great video! Sarcatog seems the next best where if you have a bunch of artifact tokens I could see it really going off...the rest are just BAD

[@funkydiscogod]

Yes, now that clue/treasure/blood tokens exist, it might be time to reevaluate that card.

[@tatesmith4527]

Could've talk about my boy Pendelhaven, as it had some fun uses !

[@jacobarford2877]

I use Urborg in my Kethis EDH deck

[@collinbeal]

The Seedcore from ONE is like a reverse Pendelhaven, giving a 1/1 creature +2/+1 until end of turn, but it only has that ability if opponent is Corrupted. Really neat card in my Standard mite token deck. It's also a Phyrexian-specific Secluded Courtyard.

[@Anonlyso]

I still wonder what the original design philosophy behind whites "prevent damage" theme. Back even when I stopped at the original Zendikae block they still had cards that made you pay a premium just to gain life, so I really have to wonder beyond sudden combat/anti-burn tricks just hoe much thought was behind preventing damage to anything, and these were printed before planeswalkers so its not like you could stop them from getting sniped

[@KynElwynn]

White is an enemy to red in the color pie, red deals damage, therefore, white gains life.

[@Anonlyso]

@@KynElwynn sure, but green also started getting life gain effects especially when i was starting out. Whats more peculiar is Whites Monopoly in "prevent damage" effects which sounds like pseudo toughness but for creatures. I'm more curious how effective it actually was back when originally designed because obviously black can still just kill spell and it's not nearly as useful as Greens ubiquitous giant growth tricks so idk, that probably lead to it getting phased out (maybe same story with regeneration)

[@KPX01]

i think back in the day rather than balance they put more weight in how the color would act. While bad mechanically healing magic magic is what their aim for white thus the prevent damage is their go to is my guess.

[@barrywade3774]

I used to have great fun running Scars of the Veteran with Veteran Body Guard. It was extra nice to pull as a surprise when an opponent tricked into a big kevek’s tourch to finish with channel or something only to stop 7 with no mana, live and finish them next turn. Contagion saw heavy play too. In my experience the green one saw the least play.

[@erikwiseman1702]

Shivan Gorge has always seemed to me to be either a last minute substitute for a busted version or the best of a raft of even worse ideas for the red land of the cycle. I'm still a bit surprised it doesn't deal 2 damage; but, R&D seemed very cautious with damage dealing lands, in general.

[@kaemonbonet4931]

Imagine the world where shivan gorge added red mana equal to the damage dealt that turn.

[@Nr4747]

I would argue that the Cauldron of Eternity is even worse than the Circle of Loyalty, because the Circle - at least - is quite decent in Knight Tribal decks, the Cauldron actively stymies its activated effect with its Circle of Sun and Moon-esque replacement effect.

[@Awesomesausages]

As someone who regularly plays Cauldron of Eternity in Commander and Brawl: it's not a big deal at all in Reanimator decks that have multiple targets to play with. Card is great with Old Stickfingers (Demon tribal in my case), and perfectly fine in creature-heavy selfmilling strategies, as a constant value engine. The reason I find Cauldron edges out Circle: neither can be resolved particularly early on, but Cauldron can almost always be played when you topdeck it down the line and do its thing. Getting your creatures wiped happens more often than getting the graveyard swept, after all. What I'll give to Circle of Loyalty, however: the recent trend of some 70% of creatures being Legendary does make it better bit by bit :) Cauldron will only get worse over time, realistically speaking.

[@RyanEglitis]

Pact of the Titan is actually used by Belcher decks these days with Recross the Paths. I've certainly seen it more often than the white pact.

[@lukeisstrange1533]

I couldnt even make the Circle of Loyalty work in a Legendary Knight EDH deck and thats propably the best place it could go in. Compare that to the generic value and power Henge and Embercleave provide you see the difference quite clear

[@aaroneisenman6873]

It's ok in a knights deck as it can be a Glorious Anthem fairly easily. The biggest issue is it is legendary so it's basically a dead draw later in the game unless you are running a bunch of legendary Knights and even then it's just ok. It's not an auto 4 of like Embercleave, but does have it's uses as a side board piece against control.

[@lukeisstrange1533]

@@aaroneisenman6873 Its a very small late game anthem effect you have to play a specific creature type to make it mana efficient and control several of those too. The small upside of getting nonlegendary tokens for each legendary cast is so small, its not worth caring. Rather than playing this, I play a impactful card that does stuff by itself. Like the others of this cycle.

[@aaroneisenman6873]

@@lukeisstrange1533 it also can create tokens by paying 4 mana and tapping it, which is inefficient yes, but can be useful

[@adammoravek1785]

Phantatog, Enchanted Evening and Aura Thief is a hilarious combo to do on your opponents, though 😂

[@bryanmckelvey]

Contagion, part of the Alliances pitch spell cycle that included Force of Will, was a main deck 4-of in the winning Worlds Deck of ‘97. Bounty of the Hunt, Pyrokinesis and Force of Will featured in other decks in the top 4. Overall it was a good cycle, but Scars of the Veteran was awful.

[@Oneiroclast]

I wonder if Tolarian Academy being that powerful was a way of making up for Tolaria getting screwed over in the earlier cycle.

[@CDShap]

To be fair, when Legends came out, Legends were mostly overcosted with downsides that were brand new in this set, and R&D had no plans to make more. Banding was a mechanic that saw some play and R&D probably thought would stick around for a while.

[@speedfactor]

I'm a big fan of bringing up Prophecy, featuring both the Avatar and Wind cycles. The black ones of each cycle are playable and the other colors quickly fall off a cliff in useability.

[@Mecal00]

Avatar of Might (green) isn't too bad in commander. But yeah those cycles weren't great

[@TheCommandSphere]

18:00 editing mistake

[@presidentfrog4683]

circle of loyalty is actually really good in Jodah Legends. You get a token with each cascade cast and it's legendary so it triggers Jodah as well. Not too good in much else.

[@grievous606]

What would a "fixed" white and blue card in the Alpha cycle even look like if you tried to stick with the strict pattern of 3's? Would just Scry 3 instead of draw 3 be too weak? Because that seems pretty fair, but sneakily strong for one mana mostly because it's an instant. Or a decent white card might be to put target creature (or maybe just nonland permanent) on top of it's owner's library third from the top. Obviously not super busted or a permanent solution to anything, it could be a decent answer if the game isn't going longer than three more turns.

[@chemicals8582]

True story: Wizards actually realized that Ancestral Recall was way more powerful than the other boons pretty early on (and way more powerful than just about every other MTG card ever printed, for that matter). They did release a 'fixed' version in Ice Age, called Brainstorm, which is still a very strong card. A draw 3, discard 3 instant for U would probably be very good (similar to Faithless Looting, but doesn't have flashback)

[@RPGFanboy14]

I actually own an Alpha healing salve. Bought a blind box off a dude I worked with and it was in the pile. I was very amused by it and still have it to this day.

[@rowerewolf]

I had a casual Ultimatums deck which cast them off Windbrisk Heights. Clarion Ultimatum was actually a decent hit, because it could get another Windbrisk Heights with another ultimatum tucked under it.

[@sir_giggles_8d232]

I have a Jodah the Unifer deck built around legendary Knights (I call it "Knights of the Round") and Circle of loyalty is quite good in it since it's a 6 drop legendary with built in cost reduction making it perfect to continue Jodah's cascading shenanigans, and since every legendary you cast when circle is out nets you a 2/2 vigi knight you'll end up with extra bodies for chump blocking deaththouchers and the like, that being said I agree in comparison to the other cards of that cycle it comes up quite short in the power level.

[@ferdithetank7535]

It's funny when things are other way around, like in case of Commander Legends will cycles, Red and White being best ones.

[@KLUNE]

Great job, I loved the video. Could you please make one about most balanced cycles?

[@akodotain]

Shivan Gorge was actually really good at the time of printing. Mono Red had issues with closing the game after getting their opponents down to low life initially. COP style effects really hosed them, and people main decked disenchant etc to blow up artifacts. Having a 1 ping colourless damage source meant they could finish, and it was safe from most sideboard interaction. Tolarian Academy was OP because it shared colours with an X cost wincon (stroke of genius) so you didn't manaburn yourself out of the game in the process of attempting to go off. Enchantress had a vulnerability that if you tried to vent white mana by repeatedly returning flickering ward, OP could remove the target and leave you facing large burn as most of your spells required green.

[@ildathet]

oath of ghouls work when an opponent has FEWER creatures in his graveyard making it far better than i thought !

[@itsfort2098]

I don't care that Circle of Loyalty is bad. I absolutely loved it when I was playing it in my Mardu knights list when it was standard legal

[@ODIRGO]

Let's make a commander clash but only with worst cicles

[@svenmeling6053]

Oath of Ghouls is fun in a deck with Braids, Cabal Minion; Rotlung Reanimator, graveyard removal, and cheap creatures with death or enters-triggers! :D

[@adammorin2955]

Pact of the titian was used in some decks as the white pact never saw play

[@punkypinko2965]

Sweet overview. Thanks!

[@porgy29]

One interesting cycle that wasn't included (possibly because it isn't obviously intended to be a cycle). The legendary land mega cycle. Starting in Mirage they printed a cycle of legendary lands, one per block ( a set of 3 sets released in a year for newer players) up to Invasion. The best would probably be Volrath's Stronghold, but there are a few others that have seen occasional play. However, the worst is definitely Teferi's Isle, which can tap for UU, but unfortunately it comes into play tapped, and it has Phasing which means that if at the start of your turn it is phased in, it will phase out at the start of your turn. This means that if you play it on turn one the first time you can tap it for mana is turn 3, and then it goes away again on turn 4 (and 6 and so on). The others are Yavimaya Hollow, Keldon Necropolis, and Kor Haven. I think Yavimaya Hollow is probably the next best.

[@doodlealchemist1257]

I'm pretty sure there's an error at 17:58 and it has Seth saying that Tolarian Academy is the best and Shivan Gorge is the worst

[@RyanApplegatePhD]

Some of these are a bit distorted based on the power creep of the game. Shivan gorge might be worse now but when mono red sligh was winning and running cursed scroll as a way to get around COP-red and other red hate, having land/artifact damage was actually pretty important post removal of things like mishra's factory in Type 2 (standard).

[@danielspahn2593]

Would have like to seen the Words of cycle , where you can replace a draw with and effect. But great content as always

[@Qdrew78]

How much circle of loyalty has hurt Seth’s soul. 😂😂

[@nicholasburns1307]

Clarion ultimatum ramp am I missing the nonland part or something

[@Kopekemaster]

Slight (but significant!) correction on Oath of Druids - the player only gets to return a creature to hand if THEY have the most creatures in their graveyard. So it isn't really a group hug-y effect, since any deck that would want the card will almost certainly be able to be the only player to benefit from it. It's odd, because it's kind of the only card of the cycle that works like that (wants YOU to have more of something than an opponent), but that difference makes it a substantially better card IMO. Haven't found a spot for it yet but I got several copies after discovering it.

[@C22772]

i actually use clarion ultimatium in my jodah commander deck because my mana base is almost entirely basics. it can be used to ramp 5 basic lands for 5 mana which is a really good rate

[@STS-qi1qy]

Poor Seth having to relive the Circle of Loyalty pain yet again.

[@kami4242]

Thinking about more recent sets, Invoke Despair is way way more powerful than the other Invokes seen in Kamigawa. So much so that it was banned while the others don't even see play

[@davidhower7095]

I remember Invoke Calamity and Invoke Justice seeing a bit of play. Haven’t seen the other two, though.

[@adammorin2955]

@@davidhower7095 i seen all of them see play but the blue one.

[@thygamerguy]

Im loving these educational magic videos

[@darleygames6806]

What if I clarion ultimatum hare apparent in commander? I think that would be worth it

[@satansamael666]

The Urza’s Saga land cycle is demonstrably busted when even Shivan Gorge is still a CEDH staple in Anje Worldgorger. As unbalanced as the cycle is, it’s not as unbalanced as we think it is.

[@Krossfyre]

Anje isn't that great of a WGD deck anymore though. There's other more popular decks like Kroxa and Evelyn for WGD loops that are much safer. Shivan Gorge or Sunscorched Desert are ways to win with WGD but it's not at all necessary to run them. You're already getting infinite mana, so just dig until you find another wincon from among the madness cards. Instead, just replace Gorge with a coloured mana source, since Anje does need them pretty badly. She's really fast, but she's pretty much a glass cannon.

[@satansamael666]

@@Krossfyre still playable. Not the best but still good. Regardless, it’s still a payoff for the loop if you need redundancies. Good anyway.

[@seandun7083]

I assume with tolaria they wanted to avoid turning off banding after a band had already been declared.

[@Jim4815162342]

There is a lot of missing context in these. Tolaria was a lot stronger when it came out, and Karakas was a lot weaker. Any time you remove an ability from rotation, the chance to remove that ability becomes less appealing. Meanwhile, the power creep of legendary creatures is incredible. And Clarion Ultimatum... OK, I don't play professionally, so deck lists like mine might just not get counted. But a block after the card was released, Bant allies were incredible in standard. A lot of allies triggered when another ally entered, and/or for the number of allies you control. So having five allies enter at the same time meant that you could completely end the game on the ultimatum. Assuming all 5 searched cards were allies and they were the only ones you had, Halimar Excavator let you choose players to mill a total of 100 cards. And it's only gotten stronger since. And in Commander, it's great for landfall decks. It might not be as flexible as some of the others, but it's still a great card.

[@spoopyboi1882]

I agree with you on the fogs being underrated, but i also think a big part of it is commander is a multiplayer format. Fogs shine in 1v1, but their power is downgraded a bit if it becomes 3v1 since fogs only last the turn. Meanwhile phasing out becomes a little stronger in commander

[@JrDriver85]

Summary, White generally gets the shaft when it comes to Cycles. Also, images are flipped in section 2 (Tolarian Academy and Shivan Gorge)

[@EspherMercury]

I love that Karakas is the best land of the Legends cycle and has been for a while, whereas for the longest time it was Pendelhaven lmao. Talk about future card design (and game modes) making a change haha.

[@ToFriskAndSwerve]

I use clarion ultimatum in commander to fetch my basics 😂 usually gets two or three. I run the full ultimatum cycle in Jodah. It's basically a fancy rangers path most times when you cast it for wubrg

[@thenamelessguy2831]

I was about to say, don't you dare disrespect the Magic Mirror, thats my baby.

[@amarauk9687]

Karakas was the box topper I got from a LoTR box, and since then I cringe every time I hear it being mentioned

[@freyamiles3718]

Are uro and kroxa part of a cycle because i never found any others. Also the eidolons from theros are also honeravle mentions as only the black one was any good and only for niche best of one use

[@MTGGoldfish]

I think it's currently an unfinished cycle? I'm not a lore expert, but I believe there are more Titans on Kaldheim, they just haven't gotten cards yet.

[@andynonya1490]

I run Obscuring Haze in my deck specifically because it says "prevent all damage that would he delt this turn by creaturs your opponents control". This means I can prevent effect damage if it comes from a creature.

[@jamiekuryla3940]

Also means you can do some sneaky block shenanigans as well. When they alpha strike you dead with a couple blockers.

[@archaonczech6073]

The lands from Legends were perfectly ballanced when the expansion was printed, Tolaria was actually better than Karakas as the legendary creatures were mostly unplayable, while banding created some strong interactions. The reason why you need to use it during upkeep is to prevent players activate it during combat and made the already complex banding mechanism even more complicated.

[@timw9745]

Legendary creatures from legends were unplayable but people still played them because multi-coloured creatures were new and considered good for no good reason. Fast after that people realised that they were awful tho..

[@markusrows1096]

Hey, never heard of this Crocas card but seems to be nearly identical to Karakas

[@GodzillaFreak]

15:00 Nah nah, pyrokinesis and contagion are both legacy playable as proto fury. They're not great, certainly not anymore, but they were certainly not so bad.

[@camerondomer]

Healing Salve is part of the strictly worse reserve list workaround. Every RL card but with added text: "You receive an emblem that says 'If you play a card named Healing Salve, you lose the game.'"

[@CSDragon]

I can't help but notice a theme in which color gets the best and which gets the worst.

[@AkiVainio]

On Contagion: I guess in the world of Fury, it's kind of unnecessary, but it used to be a Legacy sideboard card and was played quite a bit back in the 90s.

[@chemicals8582]

Yeah, Contagion wasn't bad, and I did see it played in decks before Fury came out.

[@thatlamp]

Clarion Ultimatum DOES work in commander though, but only if you are playing a ton of basics. Note that it doesn't say nonland permanents, meaning you can use it to put 5 basics into play tapped. It's not a busted card by any means, but if you're on a budget, it can definitely do some work and put you far ahead of other players, especially in the mid game after you've already been out-ramping everyone.

[@benbelanger1814]

Clarion Ultimatum in a Hare Apparent deck might be funny.