General Annual Fun Q: What is your favorite 2024 card?

Velrun

Velrun

@Jason Waddell I'm just joking! :D It's going to be monthly still. Just wanted to see your reaction to the 'annual' change :D

We start up this little fun event again. It'll be once a month. Hopefully I remember to do it on the first day of every month. Today's topic:


What is your favorite card that saw its first release in 2024?
You may mention more than one card. Honorable mentions, completing cycles, you name it.


Sets to choose debut designs from:
Murders at Karlov Manor + Commander + Alchemy
Fallout
Outlaws of Thunder Junction + The Big Score + Commander + Alchemy
Modern Horizons 3 + Commander
Assassin's Creed
Bloomburrow + Commander + Alchemy
Mystery Booster 2
Duskmourn: House of Horror + Commander + Alchemy
Foundations + Jumpstart

What a year. Sometimes I wonder how it would feel to stay in the background and not keep up with released sets only to return to Magic after say 4 years. What an impact the last few years have had on competitive Magic and the power level each format functions under.

For me the clear winner is the whole (10 card) cycle of surveil lands from Ravnica's Karlov Manor. The guilds were ever so sleightly in the background of this set but they were present. These lands have made deck building even more interesting because they are not auto-include in 4+ color decks but they make most games better. We remember this feeling from Theros' scry lands. But now they can be fetched with the original fetch lands (Flooded Strand, Verdant Catacomb). They have so much play to them. You can even utilize the difference between scry and surveil in graveyard decks. Getting to delirium, spell mastery or threshold is easier and you can luck out if you see a bomb in a reanimator deck.

Here's three examples of the 10-card completed cycle


Honorable mention goes to the Modern Horizons 3 spell lands/modal dual faced cards that are very similiar to what had debut in Zendikar Rising. They also make deck building interesting. As always all lands I consider playable across multiple formats I keep a visual spoilers of on CubeCobra as a way for myself to keep track. This makes it easier when building a new Duel Commander deck or whatever to find all attractive lands so I don't have to go through the long journey that is Gatherer/Scryfall search. You can find the link here if you're interested: https://cubecobra.com/cube/list/da3e467c-6e23-4c7c-94c1-4fed03c72da2?view=spoiler

That's it the beginning of 2025. Happy new years riptiders <3


—————-
Past Fun Q
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(15) Favorite Magic card
https://riptidelab.com/forum/thread...is-your-favorite-magic-card.3652/#post-118923

(14) Worst Card to Win With & Best to Lose to
https://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/monthly-fun-q-worst-card-to-win-with-best-to-lose-to.3640/

(13) Favorite Topic On Riptidelab
https://riptidelab.com/forum/thread...r-favorite-thing-or-topic-on-riptidelab.3625/

(12) Least Favorite Place to Live
https://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/monthly-fun-q-what-land-would-you-least-want-to-live-in.3617/

(11) Other Hobbies
https://riptidelab.com/forum/threads/monthly-fun-q-what-is-your-favorite-hobby-besides-magic.3598/
 
ravnic

ravnic

I'll do a count down top 3.



I just finished my alter on this one. I made kind of a skin to have it look less 80' and more like 1800's. BUT mechanically, I am in love with the manifest dread mechanic and this one is probably my favorite design as a Man-o'-War that's a spell and fills the graveyard.



I hated MKM, but this card is so perfect for my cube. It connects multiple green themes in a way that makes you reconsider several picks in the draft. However, I couldn't give a detective with a cringey flavor text the first place, even though the artwork here is cool.



I really like having a third color being able to destroy enchantments, and this elegant design fits my cube's power level perfectly. Bonus points for the sweet showcase version. Just a slam dunk.

I wish the aesthetics of cards weren't downsides for me so often these days.
 
Nanonox

Nanonox

Even though I didn't always like the aesthetics or themes of some sets, there were some really amazing cards for my cube this year. Tough to chose a top 3, let alone a single one.

Top 3



Free sacrifice outlets are dangerous cards. With the right engine, they can let you sequence some crazy turns and even combo off in the right deck. Soultrader's strength is that it trades bodies for mana, just like Phyrexian Altar, but on a respectable 3/3 for 3. It's even better than that tough as the mana is in the form of treasures which adds even more synergy. Being a Zombie is gravy for the Gravecrawler loops. This helps creature combo decks rival with more explosive spell-based combo decks which I love.



Roots ties together a lot of themes in Golgari. And it rewards you with mana and board presence on a 2 mana enchantment. The ability is potent enough that some decks will only care about the Earthcraft ability for tokens, while some decks will care about the leaving the GY trigger. It's not prescriptive and a ton of fun! Gives me big Agatha's Soul Cauldron vibes, my favorite card from last year.



Another comboish card. I might have a type... This is one of the most fun payoffs for filling your GY IMO. Splendid Reclamation is a cool card, but very narrow. Here you get the effect for 4 mana if your 2 drop survives. Oh and it fills the GY! You ramp, but you also get a ton of landfall triggers which can mean anything to more mana, more bodies, more cards or even winning.




The surveil duals are fantastic. Draw smothing + GY enabling on a fetchable dual land is extremely powerful. The fact they ETB tapped means there is a limit to how many you can play, hindering greedy drafters somewhat. Not the most splashy of picks, but definitely a positive for most cubes IMO.

The Apprentice finally adds some Black artifact payoff and it is fantastic. The only reason it isn't on my main list is that I wanted to shoutout the Soultrader more.
 
Onderzeeboot

Onderzeeboot

Ecstatic Orb
Velrun said:
@Jason Waddell I'm just joking! :D It's going to be monthly still. Just wanted to see your reaction to the 'annual' change :D
Click to expand...
I laughed XD No idea what my favorite card was though. Hard to pick between these three. Lively Dirge for the awesome play patterns, Colossal Dreadmask for the playable meme, and Roxanne because she’s a blast to go off with!

 
Velrun

Velrun

Oh boy I should probably also have mentioned that analyst. One of my favorite cards as well. Glad you liked my prank Onde :)
 
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Seeker

Seeker



2024 had some real hits. I was a skeptic on the surveil duals but am now a believer... but this question's not even close for me. Only one card this year where I auto-include it in every deck of its color, because when I draw it I'm always happy to see it. It's like Otawara, Soaring City except better and that is some high praise coming from me. It's not even the kind of auto-include where it's not interesting to draft it, cause "how high do you pick mdfc lands" is an interesting question even if the answer is always some variant of "very".

Honorable mentions:
Stone Drake for making me laugh as hard as I've ever laughed at a fake card
Chthonic Nightmare for being the rare "fixed" card that feels completely different than the original and yet still captures very similar fun vibes
Securitron Squad for the "card I'm always thiiiiis close to including" award of this year and probably next year too and maybe even the one after
 
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