Friday’s MagicCon: Atlanta preview panel had no shortage of new MTG spoilers. We saw a ton of cards from January’s Lorwyn Eclipsed, as well as a batch of brand-new, mechanically-unique Secret Lair cards. Amid all of this excitement, one sneaky spoiler managed to slip through the nets. Curiously revealed via the Lorwyn Eclipsed card image gallery, Deceit looks like a seriously interesting MTG Elemental.
This essentially confirms that Emptiness from the main preview batch is part of a wider cycle. It also looks like a very solid card in its own right, with applications in one of the best decks in current Standard. While Deceit is a bit of a step down from similar designs we’ve seen in the past power level-wise, this may well be the right move for Magic, given how troublesome cards like Vivi have proven to be.
Deceit MTG
- Mana Value: 4 U/B U/B
- Type: Creature – Elemental Incarnation
- Rarity: Mythic Rare
- Card Text: When this creature enters, if UU was spent to cast it, return up to one other target nonland permanent to its owner’s hand.
When this creature enters, if BB was spent to cast it, target opponent reveals their hand. You choose a nonland card from it. That player discards that card.
Evoke U/B U/B- Stats: 5/5
There’s an awful lot to unpack with Deceit, even for a modern MTG card. Ultimately, this is a modal spell with three different modes, depending on the type and amount of mana you have available.
Most of the time, you’ll likely be casting Deceit for its two-mana Evoke cost. If you put two blue mana into it, the card becomes a much clunkier Into the Flood Maw. We’ve seen how powerful getting any nonland card out of the way can be in recent Standard, so this is a very solid effect. Even for two mana, it’s a pretty good deal.
If you put two black mana in instead, it becomes a bit of a ‘Thoughtseize at home.’ You don’t need to pay life, but you do need to pay one more black mana. Two-mana discard effects like this haven’t traditionally seen a lot of play, even in Standard. Often, having to wait means the card you need to deal with is out of your opponent’s hand by the time you can cast it. The extra flexibility here does add a lot of value, mind you.
If you opt to pay Deceit’s full six-mana cost, you’ll likely be able to get both of these effects on top of a 5/5 body. The way the abilities are ordered means you’ll be able to bounce an annoying permanent and then force your opponent to discard it in one fell swoop. Six is a lot, of course, but the fact that it effectively comes stapled to two separate two-mana spells softens the blow a lot.
A Shoo-In For Standard?
Deceit has a lot of potential across a number of MTG formats. The most likely candidate, for now, is actually Standard. We’re very likely to see some Vivi Cauldron bans come November, which will clear the way for Dimir Midrange to make a comeback. If it does, Deceit is an ideal addition to the deck.
Both of the two mana modes are great in Dimir Midrange, the blue one especially. Bouncing opposing creatures can get your team through for safe attacks, which in turn can generate card advantage via Enduring Curiosity and Preacher of the Schism. You can also reset the counters from the likes of Proft’s Eidetic Memory, if that manages to dodge a ban in November.
The discard mode is a bit of a long shot, but it could still end up doing some work. There are a number of Control decks, including Azorius and Four-Color, sitting just behind Dimir in the current rankings. The discard mode can help strip board wipes from their hand ahead of time, or you can hit key threats like Overlord of the Mistmoors instead. Wizards may not be able to slow down Standard enough to make these matchups really important, but it’s a nice option regardless.
Dimir Midrange aside, Deceit also has applications alongside Up the Beanstalk. Using either Evoke mode will net you a card, which is a nice way to keep up tempo. Beanstalk isn’t really seeing any play in Standard right now, but the introduction of some powerful new enablers like this could lead to a renaissance for the card. Heck, we could even see the Golgari Self-Mill decks that showed up sporadically in the past make a comeback. Triggering Beanstalk while also putting a body in the ‘yard is a great combo, after all.
A Balanced Diet
- Mana Value: 4 W/B W/B
- Type: Creature – Elemental Incarnation
- Rarity: Mythic Rare
- Card Text: When this creature enters, if WW was spent to cast it, return target creature card with mana value 3 or less from your graveyard to the battlefield.
When this creature enters, if BB was spent to cast it, put three -1/-1 counters on up to one target creature.
Evoke W/B W/B- Stats: 3/5
Potential playability aside, Deceit is an interesting MTG card for other reasons. Its existence, alongside Emptiness, implies that we’re getting a full cycle of new Evoke Elementals in Lorwyn Eclipsed. You’d expect these to match the colors of the five Shocklands we’re getting in the set. So far, however, it seems that the opposite is true. We’re likely getting Evoke Elementals in Simic, Boros, and Gruul, alongside the Dimir and Orzhov ones we’ve already seen. Alternatively, this could be a full 10-card cycle, but that’s a lot of mythic slots, so it seems unlikely.
In any case, these new Evoke Elementals are a notable improvement over what we’ve seen in the past. The Modern Horizons 2 Evoke Elementals were notoriously overpowered. Two of them, Grief and Fury, eventually got banned in Modern. The problems with these cards were twofold. First of all, they could be cast for free, which is always a huge Magic red flag. Second, their important abilities triggered on entry, which allowed for abuse via blink and reanimate effects.
With this new cycle, Wizards has addressed both of these problems. Deceit’s abilities, like those of Emptiness, only trigger on cast. This means the blink/reanimate tricks that were possible with cards like those aren’t possible here. You’ll also always need to pay at least two mana for these, so ridiculous early value turns are out. While some may be disappointed at such a reduction in power level, especially for mythics, I think it’s a great step forward. Power creep in Magic is a real issue, and more balanced designs like this go a long way towards addressing it.
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