These Are Brilliant Magic: The Gathering Cards!

[@TolarianCommunityCollege]

Just go to sponsr.is/bootdev_tolarian and use my code TOLARIAN to get 25% off your first payment for boot.dev.

[@Azeria]

The best thing about Fact or Fiction is that as great a design as it is in 1v1, it gets even better in multiplayer! If you’re the archenemy no opponent will pick in your best interests, but if you’re behind you may end up with a 0 and 5 split if you choose your opponent right. It’s almost like rubber-banding.

[@BananaBanditos]

Cards with rubberbanding potential like "Tempt With Discovery" or "Tempt with Bunnies" in multiplayer formats are great.

[@BananaBanditos]

You know what would be a really cool card design? A saga that flips into a Planeswalker upon completion of the saga. Use the saga as a representation of how that walker acauired their spark.

[@ApplejackOfAllTrades]

I might have to use that idea to design a card for my silly OC lol

[@pigfish99]

Holy crap that's a clever design.

[@ConnorGrummer]

Honestly kind of surprised this hasn't been done with like Tamiyo or somebody like that. Kellan even. Or that it wasn't done in the opposite direction sort of for a walker that got compleated, telling the story of their downfall and then flipping into their Compleated form.

[@arkb0t379]

If the starting loyalty was equal to the chapter count, you wouldn't even have to adjust your counters after flipping!

[@emzetkin1100]

That would, in fact, be really cool

[@BananaBanditos]

Plot Twist. It's just the same list as the "stupidest" but talking about their use in extremely niche and cool situations.

[@mikesaddi]

Swords to Plowshares is pretty simple and brilliant in design in my opinion. Player loses a creature, but since white is all about justice and fairness, it rewards the owner with life gain. Considering it's one mana, that seems very fair

[@emzetkin1100]

Path to Exile is functionally quite similar and you can even politic with it in multiplayer a bit better than Swords

[@Dehtre]

Swords to Plowshares should totally be the card giving basic land instead, based on its name.

[@MartinoMaroso]

I always imagined the creature isn't killed but transformer into a farmers, he would get you food based on his strength, therefore life points.

[@MrVariant]

Yeah 9:24-9:40 was interesting. I di like lightning bolt for 3 damage for 1 mana being evergreen for the inherent power creep. A shame standard nerfs it to 2 when they would break planeswalker like Oko

[@xolotltolox7626]

​@@DehtreThis just tells me you don't understand the name Swords to Plowshares is a Bible verse and a metaphor for Peace You pacify a creature permanently, making it forge its swords to plowshares so now it works the fields as a peaceful profession instead, creating food, thus the life gain

[@SiegeAyy]

I love the way giant growth showcases a ton of what makes magic fun, while also being an incredibly versatile, fun, and simple card. Sometimes you get to use it like lightning bolt to deal the last 3 damage to win the game, sometimes it acts like counterspell, stopping your opponent's bolt from killing your creature, sometimes it lets you blow your opponent out mid-combat. Further, it becomes even more beneficial with certain creature abilities like first & double strike, adding yet another layer to the card. But at its surface, it's a wonderfully easy card to understand. "Creature get big." Absolute home run of a design, not to mention the fact that it has been the lens through which we view all other combat tricks 30+ years later.

[@vincentvega9139]

Knights of Autumn might be the best example of modern etb triggers. 3 modes, each one of them having their place and time, without it ever being broken.

[@luciddre4m]

One of my favorite designs is Browbeat. I run them in a Rakdos multiplayer burn deck and love the difficult choice it presents to opponents, particularly when you have more than one.

[@Triceratopping]

Most of those red "opponent chooses" Odyssey-era cards were pretty bad but I unironically absolutely love Browbeat.

[@IqmasterDaNinja]

My personal take is that Lightning Bolt is probably one of the most brilliant designs due to its simplicity. I think Sam from Rhystic Studies put it best when he argued that, if asked, even non-Magic players would be able to make an educated guess at what the card does. Lightning Bolt is simple, but offers flexibility exactly for that. "Deals 3 damage to any target" is a very short sentence, but offers hidden complexities. When Planeswalkers became a card type in Lorwyn block, Lightning Bolt gained additional hidden rules text, allowing it to target these new cards. Same goes for Battles in March of The Machine. Lightning Bolt is probably one of the most evocative spells, because its simplicity makes it easy to imagine being cast by a powerful wizard smiting their foes. It is, if you'll excuse the pun, grounded. There exists very few cards with as many siblings and derived designs as Lightning Bolt. And i think that makes it brilliant. (Also reprint Lightning Bolt in standard, WoTC, you cowards)

[@ostcubarisusta9543]

I'm not a magic player and I think my favorite design is also Lightning Bolt. It reminds me of book of moon from yugioh which is also a brilliant design imo.

[@emzetkin1100]

Bolt was so good that it created a rule, since 20 mountains and 40 bolts was basically unbeatable

[@ryanhefner2011]

I came here to mentioned lightning bolt too. Standard formats are often described as Bolt or Shock formats depending on which is legal. Prof gets a half a point for mentioning Alpha in general, but I think Lightning Bolt is more impactful to community than any of the other cards in It's do 3 of something cycle. While Ancestral recall is certainly the most powerful, it's only usable in a format so few people can pay to play.

[@eepopgames2741]

This is a brilliant Magic: The Gathering video.

[@TolarianCommunityCollege]

daaaaaw

[@seanbyrne5313]

Many Magic the Gathering players want to know; "What is the most brillant video i can watch on KZbin today." In this comment I will tell you that you've found it.

[@JayoticMTG]

Throes of Chaos is one of my favourite cards of all time. Two simple words: “Cascade, Retrace”. A wonderfully designed card that mixes two old keywords in a beautifully simplistic package.

[@JustABrokenToy]

That's one of my favorites as well! I love a lot of the Modern Horizons designs that combined two mechanics from different sets that synergize with each other, such as Arcbound Slasher (Riot + Modular) or Bannerhide Krushok (Reinforce + Scavenge). I'm surprised they didn't print a card with cycling and scavenge in MH, but maybe MH4?

[@angelojohnson9441]

Glad to see Ambush Viper getting recognition. Might be odd, but great transition to the ad. It was very organic. Listening to the intro it reminds me of how I always hated writing the conclusion paragraph for essays because I didn’t want to sound too repetitive. That is to say this video was very well written and today I noticed it. I guess I am looking at stuff more objectively today. See you next video.

[@MrLynksys1000]

Thanks for all your mtg content Prof! Appreciate what you do for the game.

[@DanMcIntyre-Pengwn]

My favourite card design also hails from way back in Alpha: Dragon Whelp. A cute baby dragon, decently powerful right out of the shell (as far as 90's creature design, anyway), and it can even breathe a little fire. Not too much, though, or it will burn itself up along with its prey. Just delightful to me, even thirty years later.

[@weightlossmed]

just won a game Tuesday by sending my flying, exploding Dragon Whelp to my unsuspecting opponent.

[@syntheticsylvie]

Prof being so positive about Planeswalkers feels like I'm in a different timeline lol

[@cattycats4]

idk how anyone can be positive about a card type that is so badly broken in terms of power, theres basically no removal that leaves the player trying to deal with the pw any kind of advantage its like if you hate mtg as a game and you hate people in general you might enjoy planeswalkers

[@xolotltolox7626]

​@@cattycats4Hero's Downfall literally exists???

[@halanhart]

So happy to see Damn on the list. The card rules and is a whole story on one piece of card board. One of my favorites of all time!

[@Dr_Ki11enger]

I think Zedruu the Greathearted is brilliant design. Similar to your point with Garruk, I think its doubly impressive as well that they hit such a home run within the first batch of commander precons. Zedruu's design perfectly enables a multiplayer exclusive deck archetype in group hug (thats a great way to sell people on the format with your new product btw) while also enabling a strategy thats basically just Trix for clever bastards. She's got a powerful payoff if you do her thing, but never is she a "kill on sight" commander. Her ability is one that, by design, *forces* you to scratch your head and think about your card selection during deckbuilding in a way most other commanders can't. Niche. Rewarding. Fair. Unique. Fun. She's everything a commander in a socially driven format *should* be imo.

[@FlibTheBard]

Risk factor is a very well designed card. Normally giving an opponent a choice is bad but when both of the available choices are very good in the deck that wants to run it and adding jump start onto it turns what would normally be an ok card into a very good one.

[@CodyDockerty]

Okay I'm not the only one thinking Prof tried to mimic his inner Ron Simmons with that DAMN! right?

[@lucyarisato6850]

Was hoping to see this after the negative episode. I’m glad that you’re always willing to see both sides of the spectrum, and I can’t wait to watch this!

[@BananaBanditos]

Was it negative though? Just pointing out bad card design and laughing about it isn't negative. Having dumb cards is half of the fun of Magic.

[@lucyarisato6850]

@ oh, don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed the heck out of it. I guess ‘negative’ isn’t the right word, just used to the ‘worst’ lists getting more views than the ‘best’ lists for some reason

[@LadyLunarSatine]

I feel his metrics would be better if he combined the best and worst vids into one. He keeps complaining about how negativity drives views yet refuses to at least present the bad with the good.

[@BananaBanditos]

@@LadyLunarSatine That's not how it works unfortunately. The more a user uploads, the more visible their videos and channel are. Combining this or the best/worst of the year videos with the companion video reduces Prof's upload count, total views, advertisements served, sponsorship requirements, and just general visibility.

[@menderbug1]

I just love Spore Frog. Name is close to Fog, and I love the story of you out adventuring and when danger approaches you just stomp it and run

[@Bwugwugwug]

Around 14:35, it's inaccurate when the Prof shows several cards with players' likenesses and implies that they were all designed by the players shown on the card. In fact, Wizards stopped doing that before Fervent Champion and I think also Faerie Mastermind were printed, maybe others in that bunch too. There is an old article about it, Wotc's reasons were basically that the players liked it just as much when they didn't design the card / they didn't necessarily want to design a card, and player-created designs didn't always work as well in the set etc.

[@jaykay3784]

Brainstorm is the best card I've come across. It's a must in every blue deck. Easy to understand, cheap in mana and money, it sets you up for the next two turns and, with Sheoldred, you get a little life back.

[@_z3i]

Brainstorm is such a brilliant card, and learning about brainstorm plus shuffling is such a level up move on gameplay skill, especially in formats without easy access to fetchlands.

[@cattycats4]

dont you mean the 2U version Brainsurge that draws 4 cards? thats the only one you can use with sheoldred. btw great card

[@dwelsh226]

“These cards rule! These cards suck. These cards rule! These cards suck.”

[@PieBandit]

I am old enough to get this reference. Well done

[@minecraftchickenmen]

Time to look at the parallel metrics of negative vs positive again.

[@Daemonscharm]

Gift of the Viper has made its way into all of my green decks simply because I use it as creature removal when green doesn't have enough of that on its own, same reason I'd typically play Ambush Viper but that costs 1 mana more which is tough to always leave open for interaction on someone else's turn. Then there's Claim Jumper which answers the question "Does white have ramp?"

[@tangerynetoons7564]

My personal favorite magic card is Path to Exile. It's first of all a fantastic removal spell, exiling any creature for 1 white, but what I really love is the dynamic of giving your opponent an extra land (tapped). If it's still early in the game there's a real thought process of whether it's worth it to get rid of a threat on the board but put your opponent one land ahead of the curve, and it's that interaction that I just love about it. Plus, if you're in a format that uses a lot of non-basics like modern, there's always a chance that your opponent doesn't have any basics to search for, which is an added bonus.

[@toomanyowlz]

I think a very subtle pick for brilliant card design is Feldon of The Third Path. A card that can be understood by people who don’t even play magic, and has so much lore and flavor baked into the card that is reflected in its activated ability. I feel there are so few cards that perfectly mix the feeling of good card design and lore quite as well as Feldon does. And that is some truly powerful art and flavor text. What a gorgeous card.

[@JustABrokenToy]

I like a lot of the Modern Horizons cards that combine mechanics from different sets/eras or look at them in a different way. Arcbound Slasher uses Modular and Riot, which play very well together. Twisted Reflections uses a black entwine cost to potentially allow two blue effects (P/T swapping and power reduction) to become a removal spell. While it's not the most brilliant or useful card, one of my favorite designs is Kaervek's Torch. It is one of the few cards to explicitly reference the stack, and it gives the spell Ward-like protection. As a designer, I love it. Ward or Hexproof don't work on non-permanents, but the idea that there could be a tax involved if you want to redirect, counter, or copy an opponent's spell is really neat.

[@pre-usedphantom7397]

Nascent Metamorph because it adds chaos to a game without being largely disruptive or overtly a waste of time

[@spencerwarren5397]

Prof deserves the title of largest MTG content creator. His videos are always so excellent

[@Shiningfreak98]

Rancor. Everything about it just works together, from the name, to the effect, to the flavor text. Everything green likes to do (except maybe ramp) on a card.

[@PrettyBoyRyan1212]

I think with the references to two iconic magic cards, "damn" should've been named "god damn".

[@chrism824]

I love Tortured Existence, I think it’s a great card that does so much for so little. Pay 1 black mana to cast it, pay another black mana to trade a creature card in your hand for a creature card in your graveyard. Very flavorful, it’s simple in effect and powerful with its results.

[@bmprosser]

Never realized there was another planeswalker (liliana) who has the the hidden “do nothing” mode. I discovered that in Grist the Hunger Tide when you scry your top card and want to keep it, doing nothing is sometimes best. Such great design to leave that as a choice! Grist is incredibly sly commander design as she can be your commander without actually saying it. She also nudges you into kindred insects, which until recently is, well, bad, and I enjoy a deckbuilding challenge. I’ve had a blast making this deck into the commander deck my playgroup knows me for!

[@Noah-yz6li]

Ichor slick! I love that it’s for basically 4 modes! Lots of options for one card

[@SatoruGojo-HonoredOne123]

Thank you professor for helping me get into mtg❤❤❤ I have subscribed and I do not regret this decision

[@Thor8151990]

My favorite card design and favorite card is Stitcher's Supplier. What an absolute gem.

[@firefliesowlcity12]

Shout-out to Prisoner's Dilemma. Translates a game theory thought experiment into a MTG card perfect for Commander's social focus. Bonus points for giving the card flashback which makes it an iterative version of the thought experiment.

[@babygirlvenere]

Not gonna lie, the way Prof talks about Liliana makes me want to hear him tackle some of the coolest little lore bits in Planeswalker history, if any such tidbits exist.

[@Luis_LG93]

This could be a great series showcasing the best MTG has to offer

[@aerynmusick4548]

The ad pivot was masterful.

[@12jacobmar]

Three Bowls of Porridge from WoE is my favorite design. Taking a beloved tale like Goldilocks and using Magic terminology like direct damage (Burn) Tapping a creature (usually associated with Cold or Sleep) and eating food to gain health and heal the soul is just right. ❤

[@cassandracastro2759]

Gingerbrute. It's a cheap artifact creature (which means synergy with several strategies), it can attack at the start of the game for a quick edge, it's functionally unblockeable, and if it's gonna die you can eat it to gain some life. It's all advantages.

[@KageMuramune]

Flood of Recollection is a sorcery that costs 💧💧 and lets the caster put an instant or sorcery from the Graveyard into your hand before exiling itself. I think this is really neat mechanically because it illustrates that normally you should be paying more if you're in blue and trying to get a spell back from the 'yard, but with a wink, WOTC leans closer and says "We'll cut you a deal, just this one time, if you promise not to abuse it." I love cards like that. Not to imply that the card should be in the video, at best I'd classify it as "Honorable Honorable Mention"

[@biuki7215]

bro that sponsor intro slapped hard, such a smooth transition

[@mikelegault9344]

I love the Denethor that you get to set on fire. Super flavour win.

[@SaltySparrow]

Thanks Prof, now I need to watch that trailer again.

[@crselj]

Liliana of the Veil was the first Planeswalker I've ever owned and I still play the card regularly to this day.

[@LordTentai]

My pick for brilliantly designed card also happens to be my personal favorite card: Heartless Summoning! It is an enchantment for 1B that discount all your creatures by 2 mana, but also gives them -1/-1. simple and elegant, incredibly flavorful, while also being an interesting risk/reward proposition. Is it worth spewing out all my big dudes early even though they're smaller? It's very strong in the early rounds, but comes around to bite you in the behind on later turns when you have all the mana you need, but just wish that your creatures weren't that 1/1 smaller. This introduces so much fun deckbuilding too, suddenly 3-drops and upwards are a lot better, X/1 creatures are significantly worse, unless you want them to die, then it's kind of like a free sac engine. God, I could go on and on. I love this card so much.

[@rdxgamer1772]

if theres one consistant peice of brillience in MTG its profs outfits always being on point

[@SaltySparrow]

Urza's saga is such a strong card, but it is very easy to answer. I love any card that provides a toolbox.

[@drewtombleson3995]

Sneak Attack, when this card first came out it was a revolutionary enchantment taking everything that was unplayable do to it high mana cost and putting it back on the board. For the little cost of 1 red u could cheat any creature into play with haste and since it was going to the graveyard anyway why not fling it at someone after attacking!! It was glorious and made for crazy decks that were really fun to play, “yes I would like to play my 13/13 cloudscrapper for 1 red, thank you”

[@vladplasmius2854]

Play Boosters have given rise to a sharp increase in the number of modal spells being made each set, and they've made my JumpStart cube way better.

[@garryame4008]

I'd love more videos like this covering card design

[@Harpoquondrax]

Fact or Fiction is one of my all-time favorite cards, both the artwork and function.

[@tymtrppr3]

The original Innistrad block was amazing. I think this video solidifies what I've been saying for a long time, that the Standard period of Innistrad - Ravnica block was the best version of Standard ever and I wish I could go back in time to revisit how amazing the format was back then because the Innistrad block had some of the best cards of all time. Snapcaster Delver decks vs Golgari Zombies, Thragtusk was everywhere, just the best.. I mean Delver is still played today in the most expensive format, Legacy. Geist of St Traft is insane, Descendant's path, I can go on and on....

[@spazoid311]

Pithing Needle and cards like it are too fun for me. A card that will give you an actual advantage if you can correctly call out what your opponent is up to disabling a combo piece. It's fun adding that extra layer to the mind game. Always loved shutting down decks that relied too much on one gimmick. Or use in commander to check who has removal before playing real heavy hitters.

[@stonealexander8233]

Honestly, I would probably weep for joy if we got a standard reprint of snapcaster. It has to be one of my top 5 favorite cards of all time.

[@minervadetauro7646]

I marked out seeing Phyrexian Arena on the intro. For me it is easily my favorite and lne of the most brilliant cards ever: It iterates perfectly on previos designs by being effectively the "fixed Necropotence" trading life for cards but balancing it by only doing the trade once every turn. It beautifully summarizes a core aspect of the color Black, trading your own life total in exchange of resources. It teaches new players in a simple yet powerful play that cards in hand and resource advantage is much more important than life totals and that your life total can be spent as a resource for a bigger advantage. It has a powerful risk-reward factor that forces you to be more careful and try to use the cards you draw to end the game quickly in order to avoid dying to your own arena, ND it is also a very powerful card without being broken or eating a ban There is a good reason why Phyrexian Arena ended up being chosen as a reprint for Magic Foundations. It is a fundamental, brilliant card that deserves to be in standard for the rest of the decade as a powerful learning tool and a standalone powerhouse. Also that original Apocalypse art of it is Metal AF. I just love that card.

[@minervadetauro7646]

*simple yet powerful WAY. Autocorrect is wild

[@MarioJPC]

There are 2 or 3 Snapcasters at home right now in Standard. And my favorite brilliant card is Scourge of the Wildwoods.

[@sobriquet835]

Personally, I love the simple design of Aetherise. There's definitely more powerful cards, flexible cards out there, but Aetherise for me leads to this interesting cat and mouse game where, if a attacking players suspects an Aetherise is around, they have to decide if they're going to attack, and if they're going to attack how hard they need to commit. And the the defending player with the Aetherise can decide whether or not to play it, or whether to bluff not having it and try to force the opponent to go in harder. And if either player gets the decision wrong, they get punished. But if you get the decision right, you are well rewarded.

[@Dragonsoulification]

You made me the player I am today, I have learned a lot over the years thank prof

[@Thor8151990]

Reminds me of how much and why I dislike planeswalkers. But hey the rest of the list is great! :)

[@w8ting4fri]

The art on Damn is also just so damn good

[@GraemeGunn]

20:43 lol I love it, it's never where he's pointing

[@cptclone9133]

A set of videos about your favorite and most hated commanders would be cool! I need new ideas

[@ThomTheTomatoe]

you have the best ties and fashion. love you prof.

[@codyhanson1344]

This one may be hard to justify from a big picture perspective, as it doesn't have history like "Damn" or "Urza's Saga" as far as I'm aware, but "Pelakka Wurm" has always mechanically stood out to me with my own personal experience. Allow me to elaborate. I came into the game around the release of Core Set 2019, and I built my first personal deck through pulls from packs, which I eventually refined into a fairly competent (for causal play) mono green big stompy midrange deck, which included Pelakka Wurm as just a really good body with a few incidental bonuses. Fast forward a few years or so later, after I've built much more interesting, more focused, and generally just better constructed decks, I went back to Pelakka Wurm for some reason. Idk why but the damn card had been calling to me in the back of my mind ever since I stopped playing with it due to obtaining "better cards" over time. In any case, I read it again and saw its card draw effect upon dying, an ability I don't believe I had seen on another creature at that point. I was thinking to myself "is there a way to exploit this?". I ofc quickly learned of the abundance of revival cards black had, and I was no stranger to playing green and black dual decks. In fact, Golgari was my first 2 color combination I had ever built, so I was quite comfortable going back there. The only question was, how do I get it to die consistently while getting benefitted in doing so? Well that's when I discovered the card "Greater Good", which as I'm sure you're familiar, lets you sacrifice a creature to draw cards, and you can do it as many times per turn as you want. So now I had a general core engine to work with, sacrifice Pelakka Wurm (among other creatures) for card draw, and resurrect with black revival spells. From here I realized not only did I find a way to gain lots of card advantage with Pelakka Wurm, but I also incidentally found a way to proc its life gain ability consistently. This made me think some more. Sure, on its own this will allow me to stay at a high life total, but can I push it to go even further? Turns out I could, as I discovered "Vito, Thorn of the Dusk Rose", allowing me to turn my life gain into my opponent's damage. Perfect. Furthermore, because Vito happens to be a creature, it can also be resurrected from the graveyard, allowing me to bring him back consistently as needed just like Pelakka Wurm. So the core combo now became, sacrifice Pelakka, draw some cards, bring it back, gain some life, burn the opponent. If I do that 3+ times, I automatically win. I also had other cards which made for good bodies as well, which I could also use to help win the game if I couldn't rely on Pelakka combo, but Pelakka Wurm really did prove to be the true star of the deck, being the safest way to down an opponent relatively quickly. While it might not be the greatest deck ever, as far as casual play goes, it is still to this day among my very favorites that I have ever constructed entirely on my own, and it was all centered around wanting to build a deck with Pelakka Wurm. Had the card neither had the on death trigger nor the ETB life gain ability, this entire play pattern, which I thoroughly enjoy, never would have existed in my collection. If it were never a big 7/7 stompy creature, I probably wouldn't have included it in my original deck, and consequently may never have even thought about it as much in the first place. To this day I'm still not sure if there is a card in print quite like Pelakka Wurm, despite it otherwise seeming like a random outdated bulk rare. Idk if you bothered to read all this, I kinda wrote more than I intended, but if you did, just know I really appreciate it! I feel like everyone deserves to go through a titular "Magic The Gathering moment" where they get an idea stemming from a singular card or pair of cards, and end up rewarded for following through with finding ways to make that idea work. Pelakka Wurm happened to be that card for me, which I believe is a testament to its brilliant design.

[@markosvafeas]

I was so sure Sensei's Divining Top would be number 1!

[@danikahicks9896]

Love Damn. And casting it let's you say, "*DAMN!*" when you cast it~♡

[@darkyouyoun]

Liliana is my favorite planeswalker not only the design of the card(s) but also she have the best story among all the others

[@RyuichiShinomori]

I don’t know prof lol. Urza’s saga is completely ridiculous. Idk maybe it’s a sublime design…. But shutting it down doesn’t mean much if they are tossing it out on turn 1. I’m glad Garruk got a honorable mention, I think he’s the most effective and useful commander planeswalker and it is one of the first, so fun.

[@Questioning_Phelddagrif]

I like positive videos like this! It makes me forget about Rakdos Scam! I hope nothing reminds me of that! Especially between minutes 7 and 8, when psyches are most vulnerable to youtube stimuli! 💜💜💜

[@SupahGeck]

Did Thraben Inspecter REALLY need a to be a 1/2 though? I think a 1/1 for one with inspect is totally "Elvish Mystic at one mana" but 1/2 felt really pushed to me in limited. Anyway now to watch the rest of the video, thanks Prof!

[@ObsidianKnight90]

I'd give most brilliant card to either Counterspell or Murder for simplicity, or to Grave Pact for elegance.

[@williamsimkulet7832]

How is Urza's Saga a land?

[@JasonOshinko]

...Because it is? I don't understand the question.

[@codyhanson1344]

It says so right there on the tin

[@elrikstronginthearm9267]

Actually i never thought about that. Mechanically it just is a land but flavour-wise?

[@Oliver-ke5es]

illicit masquerade is one of my fave for swapping a bunch of stuff after a wipe 🎉

[@vengerofthelight]

Imagine calling Lili's ult a FoF variant when Do or Die is RIGHT THERE. XD

[@lukexsc]

This might overstep onto Sprice8Rack's domain, but I'd love to see a list of most flavorful card designs

[@jaredquaglieri3731]

Prof do you have a video on the best and worst alternative win cons?

[@camoyuki]

The only thing that would make Urza's Saga better is if it gets a good run of reprints so it doesn't cost a fortune, lol. I would like to own one so I can play it

[@CyberBuster93]

You left out the perfect cinnamon roll that is Risen Reef 🥺😭😂😄

[@oia]

Two and a half minutes into the video.. I’m waiting for the honourable mention for “Space Beleren” after the ads 😅

[@puncleV]

as senior software engineer i believe that programming ads in non programming channels suck and also that everyone can become a software negineer but usually any course or program wont help you to get the job

[@MrZeyami]

Hard to top Lily for best card. Putting her in the #1 does make me miss when topdecking was part of the game you had to plan for, nowadays games rarely go that long because of how much each card does. My pick would be Knight of the Reliquary. Even though WotC has gone a different direction with the game, the interplay between tutoring powerful utility lands and needing land destruction in the mb or sb is still one of my favorite parts of the game.

[@CyberBuster93]

8:41 Me when that notification hits my phone xD

[@woodbridgebullock429]

Graham was right about Dig Through Time.

[@maruhto3508]

I personally loved "Last stand", originally released in apocalypse. I started playing magic during Invasion as a child and last stand was just soooo interesting! It looked mighty for having all 5 colors and all that text, and it displays beautifully what each color is all about. It was never particularly good, but boy oh boy, this and Draco were reason enough for us to build a wubrg deck.

[@walcodebruyn2135]

Ooh this gonna be really good!

[@vincentmccue7481]

Pelakka Wurm 4GGG Creature - Wurm Trample When ~ enters, gain 7 life. When ~ dies, draw a card. 7/7 and the M10 Titan Cycle. 6/6's for six mana, when they enter and attack, do the thing. Sun Titan, get something back Grave Titan, make some dorks Primeval Titan, rampity ramp ramp Inferno Titan, pew-pew-pew Frost Titan, also ran (I kid, I kid...but its honestly still impressive whenever it gets cast) Doesn't matter where you are on the psychographs...you see one of these and both wolves inside you will nod their heads and go "Hell yeah!"

[@justafanofz]

I might be in the minority, but a brilliant card design for me is Ashiok’s erasure. On a flavor point, I love that you’re going in and “removing” the spell from the memory of your opponent. From a game play perspective, a 4 mana counter spell is a hefty cost, but considering that it bypasses uncounterable spells since it exiles them from the stack, and prevents the opponent from casting cards with the same name, you are effectively “countering” four spells, at a value of 1 mana per spell. If you run a playset, you can lock out up to 12 cards of your opponents deck, which can be devastating depending on the deck build. I know the card is open to removal, but a lot of people don’t run enchantment removal, which is also a teaching opportunity to players on the important of sideboarding/toolboxing.

[@josephskennedy321]

Huh... I use Trait Doctoring in my Orvar deck.... might have to take a second look at it.

[@SpinosaurTamer]

Thoughts on goyf? How close to the top is it

[@Talon18136]

I was always partial to Jace beleren making your opponent get rid of their top 20 cards 😂 some of my best deck building went into it lots of testing to get it right

[@matthewsawczyn6592]

Arcane spells and effects get a ton of flak, but mostly because Wizards didn't keep making them. It's basically its own tribe

[@styfen]

I dunno, that trailer doing Dack dirty is a huge stain on it.

[@3OOM9]

Very Spike and very Melvin. But overall very good choices

[@jeremy3169]

fr i would diieee if they put snappy in standard, it would be soo dope

[@sh41]

Interesting choices. I think fact of fiction would be at the top of the list for me. IMHO Urza's Saga is too unique and complex, it's a very interesting design nevertheless. I think platinum angel would be on my list of elegant design. Easy to destroy, but card text overwriting the most crucial of rules in the most iconic way. I can't think of a better example of the "golden rule"