Sets (MH3) Modern Horizons 3 Previews

Marionette Apprentice is an undeniable include. I've gone back and forth between Blood Artist, which is the most powerful card, and Zulaport Cutthroat, which is a Human. Neither have quite been there, because it's the kind of secondary effect that is good but not quite useful on its own to justify picking it up mid-draft.

This does everything:

Triggers on artifacts
Human
More reasonable stats
Creates an artifact creature token, a servo to boot!
+1/+1 counters

All it's missing is being a Wizard. While the lack of life gain is a notable reduction in power, the versatility is more than worth it.

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I've been waiting for this set to drop. The last two Modern Horizons sets were amazing for cube and this one isn't looking any different. It's not just power level, it's the revision of interesting effects that weren't quite up to par. So far I plan to include:

Winter Moon -> Winter Orb was too much, this looks exactly right.
Wight of the Reliquary -> Sacrifice, ramp for midrange and graveyard payoff. It's a zombie, too, and a great fit for Golgari decks.
Flare of Denial -> I needed two counterspells for my cube. I needed a free one to go along with Daze and also an unconditional counter for control decks. However, all the available options had flaws. Force of Will is card disadvantage and uncastable otherwise, Force of Negation doesn't hit creatures and everything else is too demanding or weak. Cancel is reliable enough for control and while sacrificing a non-token creature is a huge limitation, it should be reasonable enough. Strategically interesting, even. I also appreciate that it can be used offensively, which helps both tempo and combo decks.
Flare of Duplication -> I've said this before, but this is the first playable version of this effect. And it's a great one! Copying spells is an interesting ability. At worst, it can copy a bolt to go to the face. At best, it can copy opposing spells or play a key part in combos. I feel it's a staple and people are sleeping on it. There are so many funky plays you can make with this thing, from getting 14 draw triggers from Wheel of Fortune to copying Seething Son for a big play.
Flare of Malice -> The black flare isn't the most interesting, but it seems a good way to slot in a sacrifice effect. I currently run none, if simply because most options don't work in modern environment filled with tokens. Being both free and dodging the chaff seems good enough to try. My hope is that it can work in midrange and control decks. Its price isn't too high to play normally and sacrificing a utility creature seems worth the cost for some tempo.
Warren Soultrader -> I wanted to run another sacrifice outlet, but I never found one as useful as Carrion Feeder or Yawghmoth. Being a 3/3 and not having an activation cost gives me hope. It's a zombie and a wizard, which is fine, though I would have preferred if it were a human wizard instead.

Out of the gate, that's 7 cards that will go in. Currently, I'm dissapointed by 49 cards in my cube, so that's a huge chunk of them that will get fixed with this update. Better than fixed, the effects they'll add are more interesting and varied as well.
 
Love the idea of this card. It feels a bit of a lazy design, since they stapled Frogmite and Myr Enforcer on the same card and didn't even do the effort of finding a new name, but I am sure this will play out very well. Since Affinity is a pretty parasitic archetype, we need more cards like this to be sure to have enough support. I will surely add this to my Modern Masters-inspired Cube, since I am already playing Frogmite, Myr Enforcer, and even Sojourner's Companion (with only three artifact lands in the cube, though).
 
I am absolutely thrilled about some of these cards, but especially the return of Bestow.

For a long time, Bestow, Evoke, and Suspend were my favorite mechanics. Eventually they got sort of blended together into Adventure, which I think is the perfect "cards that are also other cards" mechanic.

But Bestow arrived during a very low ebb for the power level of the game, and I've been very curious about how WotC would implement it in the modern complexity/power landscape.

I can't WAIT to add Triton Wavebreaker to my peasant cube!
 
So far this set is about a lot of cards that come really close to being a good fit for my cube. If Marionette Apprentice or Warren Soultrader where slightly smaller than 2-mana 2/3 or 3-mana 3/3 they would be better fits for my environment. If Triton Wavebreaker was red or even better white, I would slamdunk it. Still looking forward to this.

Also, I feel like we'll get a retro frame treatment for Tireless Provisioner.
 
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Oh hey, it's Eternal Witness but the cards you use to abuse it are completely different!
 
Yeah, that's a sick common. Even with not other ways to put counters on it, it is essentially a Den Protector that just gets permanents - but still, that was a heavily played rare.

Edit: Oh my freaking god it's adapt 2, so it's even better ...
 
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The thing I've always wanted on one of these MDFCS is a land/counterspell combo, and I guess I got what I wanted. The land being able to enter untapped is huge, and the flexibility of the counterspell also being able to bounce permanents helps the Remand-style effect not feel as bad. I definitely like it more than Sea Gate Restoration, which would have been fine as an instant but never felt good to cast.

Not 100% sure about it yet, but consider me more than a little intrigued.

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Also seems practical! I'm super stoked to be getting a full cycle of these!!
 
Flare of Denial -> I needed two counterspells for my cube. I needed a free one to go along with Daze and also an unconditional counter for control decks. However, all the available options had flaws. Force of Will is card disadvantage and uncastable otherwise, Force of Negation doesn't hit creatures and everything else is too demanding or weak. Cancel is reliable enough for control and while sacrificing a non-token creature is a huge limitation, it should be reasonable enough. Strategically interesting, even. I also appreciate that it can be used offensively, which helps both tempo and combo decks.
I don't entirely understand why daze needs a bigger brother, but I expect Flare of Denial to work in pretty narrow contexts. I'd be hard pressed to put it in a control deck unless I can get several Watcher for Tomorrow/Snapcaster Mage style cards, and even in tempo it's not like I want to sacrifice my Brazen Borrower considering my whole gameplan is contingent on using disruption to compliment my pressure. I would personally take Force of Negation over Flare of Denial in most blue configurations I could draft in your cube I think.

Red Flare sounds absurd to me though. I think people have a bit too high expectations of using it proactively, but "sacrifice the target of your removal spell, copy your removal spell for free" sounds like a very strong baseline.
 
There's also this little guy:



If I had a nickel for every green common in MH3 that's OK on its own but goes off if you can repeatedly put +1/+1 counters on them, I'd have two nickels. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it's happened twice.
 
@Brad are you happy? <3
Oh yeah. The power of a Horizons set combined with my exact theme is huge.

Still waiting to see everything before I start the redesign, but there's already a dozen or more auto includes. Quite a few commons are likely, even.

An artifact theme to add more colorless presence seems likely. I think that Clues and Blood could add some much needed card selection for aggressive decks. Haven't seen any more Madness since Emrakul for the Blood tokens, sadly.
 

Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
It goes infinite with so damn many cards, and generates infinite colorless mana on the way:
I was gonna type this, but then I fell asleep XD Really crazy design, especially for a common. Especially because they have been putting “only once a turn” on cards a lot lately, and then leave it out on one of the most combo-rific cards in the set? Wild! Sadistic Glee even is a common, so this is a two-card combo in Pauper…
 
Looks like we might be getting a few more Theros Titans. Can't find a good image but a Boros one with a Lightning Helix ETB just got spoiled which looks strong.
 
I currently don't run either of the titans. Kroxa got squeezed out by Rakdos cards I just like better, and Uro is too good, turning both the draft and games into this:

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Phlage seems really good, and is in an appropriate color pair for this kind of effect in my Cube. I'm not wholly convinced it deserves one of my seven precious Boros slots, but if I were still running Lightning Helix, this seems like a pretty easy swap considering my design goals and meta.
 
I am definitely in the market for a solid Big Boros card and this seems great. The life gain can help stabilize and three damage takes care of a lot of threats. Since White is so bad at filling the GY, you'll probably need to prioritize the cheap interactive spells in White to stack your GY so you can recur it. That, or let Red do a lot of the heavy lifting.
When are we going to get some White GY enabling cards?
 
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Hey, Brad, do you want a 9 drop that puts 19 power on the board and draws you two cards? Seems like a nice little guy.
 
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