The Mythic Rare Podcast - Revisiting the Top 5 Cards from Theros

This week on the Mythic Rare Podcast:

- The #FindYourChampion promotion is an awesome initiative

-White Claw should sponsor MTG tournaments

-I was very wrong about my predicted banning's

-Revisiting the top 5 cards from Theros

-And much much more!!

We are about a week into Theros: Beyond Death and the new meta is well underway. Before the release, a very popular topic among content creators was predicting the top 5 cards from the set. This is always a fun article to write, and I saw everything from Whirlwind Denial to Polukranos, Unchained be cited as the number one card from writers across the community. Often times people are way off on these predictions, but you can't blame anyone for putting their theories out there and giving it a shot! Now that the set is released however, I wanted to revisit the top 5 a week after we have all played with the cards. The meta is still very young so this is certainly not a definitive list, and I am looking forward to seeing how this changes moving forward.

5) Gray Merchant of Asphodel (Gary)

Mono Black Devotion was the hot deck for the first few days after release, and there is no denying that Gary makes that deck viable. This card is the primary win con of the deck, and with Nightmare Shepherd and a sacrifice outlet this can get in for 10-15 damage when it comes out pretty easily. In my experience Mono Black Devotion has seen much less play as of late, but with certain respected content creators such as Mogwai stating it could be tier one deck, we will have to see how it evolves as the meta progresses. Regardless, the key card for such a prominent deck certainly deserves a top 5 spot in my opinion.

4) Haktos the Unscarred

Unlike Gary, there really isn't a ton of support for this card in the Boros archetype. Unless someone can find a way to break the card, it may not see a ton of play during Theros. However, I am keeping this in the top 5 because on its face the card is insane. Every time I have played against him he has been a difficult threat to deal with, and with the right supporting cast this card is tough to beat. Assuming Boros gets more support in future sets before rotation, I think we will be seeing a lot of Haktos for the next year or so. Because of the potential for greatness, and because my favorite movie is Troy starring Brad Pitt as Achilles, I am placing him at #4.

3) Setessan Champion

I think a big surprise so far in Theros has been how successful the Selesnya Enchantment decks have been so far. All over twitter and online forums you are seeing people say the deck is not their style of magic, but it has been really good for them and is fun to play. In my opinion, Setessan Champion makes that deck happen. It's basically a 3 mana Edgewall Innkeeper that can also grow in power and will trigger the card draw effect with almost all cards in the deck. In the example below, we see that the deck tops out at 3 mana, so with a ton of card draw you can play a bunch of cards every turn once the deck gets going. I have also seen Setessan Champion start showing up in Bant/Nissa decks, and that extra versatility is enough to place it at #3.

2) Thassa, Deep-Dwelling

One of the main reasons I have this card ranked so high is its versatility. Its seen play in a TON of different strategies. Predominantly though, I would say the card sees the most action in Risen Reef and Agent of Treachery decks. This blink affect allows you to either ramp twice per turn with Risen Reef or steal 2 cards per turn with Agent, and other cards in that deck such as Cavalier of Gales . However, I have also seen Thassa in Mono Blue Devotion, Dimir, Sultai, Bant and even splashed in Mono Black devotion. Any card that makes this much of an impact deserves a top spot in my opinion!

1) Dream Trawler

Ill be the first to admit this a biased pick. I have been playing this card non stop recently and absolutely love it. The card is the win con that Esper has been waiting for since big Teferi rotated out, and just seems like the perfect card to draw in 90% of all scenarios. The life gain potential from this card brings you back in so many games, and since its not a legendary getting two of them on the battlefield is next to impossible to deal with. Of course board wipes are this cards arch nemesis, but against decks not running those you almost always have enough cards in your hand where the discard to give the card hexproof is no big deal. Expect to see a lot of Dream Trawler in competitive magic the coming months, as I am anticipating some version of Esper being a top tier staple this format.

Thanks for checking out this article and hopefully you will check out the podcast above!

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