In the spirit of the holiday season, Wizards of the Coast has been surprisingly generous with MTG spoilers recently. While players may have expected things to go quiet until the new year, we’ve instead received a bunch of Marvel Superheroes spoilers and, through the Lorwyn Eclipsed story, a few in-universe cards to whet players’ appetites.
Unfortunately, the Lorwyn Eclipsed story ends today, but before the set vanishes until next January, there’s one more card to look at. Sadly, while this Reanimation spell does look playable in specific strategies, it largely just isn’t that interesting.
Dose of Dawnglow
For five mana, Dose of Dawnglow offers a reanimation effect with a modal downside. While reanimating a creature at instant speed can be quite powerful, especially when reanimating a creature as a blocker, it does come with a significant downside. If you reanimate a card outside of your main phase, you need to Blight 2.
A new mechanic introduced in Lorwyn Eclipsed, Blight asks a player to put a number of -1/-1 counters on a creature they control. Essentially, this means that, if you reanimate a creature at instant speed, you’ll need to give one of your creatures two -1/-1 counters. Because of the way Dose of Dawnglow is worded, you won’t be able to get out of this by having no creatures in play when casting the spell, either, since you can put the counters on the reanimated creature.
This means that, outside of decks that specifically have synergies with -1/-1 counters, you don’t really have a reason to play Dose of Dawnglow over other Standard options. Zuko’s Conviction from Avatar: The Last Airbender, for example, reanimates a creature for the same mana value with no drawbacks. Instead, the card offers an additional upside of a second, cheaper mode. Add on the absurd power of Superior Spider-Man and Bringer of the Last Gift in Standard, and Dose of Dawnglow is strictly outclassed by other options. All of that said, there are some very niche spots where you might want the card.
Synergies with -1/-1 Themes
While Dose of Dawnglow mostly appears to be a Lorwyn Eclipsed Limited card, in some very specific Commander decks, it could be worth giving a try. Dose of Dawnglow specifically synergizes with Blowfly Infestation, thanks to the ability to put -1/-1 counters on your reanimated creature. Nest of Scarabs and Hapatra, Vizier of Poisons offer a similar payoff, creating creature tokens for each -1/-1 counter you put on a creature. That said, neither of these synergies is that great on their own, and would need to be part of a larger -1/-1 counter theme.
Similarly, Dose of Dawnglow can create a weird draw engine when partnered with Dusk Urchins. Dumping a bunch of -1/-1 counters on the Ouphe can turn Dose of Dawnglow’s downside into card draw, especially when you’re reanimating a stronger creature with the card. A similar sort of synergy can be found with Grief Tyrant, turning the reanimation spell into potent removal.
The only Commander that might unconditionally want this card is Volrath, the Shapestealer. The Shapeshifter needs counters on creatures to copy them, which Dose of Dawnglow enables. There are still better options out there, like Persist, but since Commander is a singleton format, there may be room for effects like this.
Sadly, all of these synergies only serve to make an underwhelming card slightly better. If Dose of Dawnglow sees any significant play outside of Limited, it will be due to new -1/-1 counter synergies that emerge in Lorwyn Eclipsed. We already know that one of the upcoming Commander Precons has a -1/-1 counter theme, so lots of support should be on the way. Whether that support will be strong enough to make Dose of Dawnglow viable, however, is a different question altogether.
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