Now that the spoiler season for the Avatar: The Last Airbender MTG set has kicked off in earnest, spoilers are flooding the internet at high speed. There are tons of flavorful fancies for Avatar fans to indulge in, and some surprisingly powerful mana accelerators found in tiny creatures.
Despite the myriad of cards we’ve already seen, Wizards isn’t slowing down, as now there are even more MTG Avatar cards to look at. The most powerful among them threatens to break an Edge of Eternities card that’s already seeing tons of play. Get ready for even more Quantum Riddler than ever, as Airbender Ascension is the perfect complement card.
Airbender Ascension
Of all the spoilers we’ve seen so far, Airbender Ascension looks like one of the best. Combining an incredibly powerful reward with meaningful interaction on entry, Airbender Ascension has everything a deck needs to take over a game without incurring a tempo disadvantage.
Getting four Quest Counters on Airbender’s Ascension isn’t the most difficult thing in the world, especially when combined with token generators that can benefit from Airbender Ascension’s final payoff. Past that, there’s an army of cards with powerful entry effects to Flicker across all kinds of MTG formats.
The synergy this card has with Quantum Riddler and other Warped cards, in particular, is extremely concerning. Not only can you Airbend a Warped Riddler to cast it for cheap, but Airbender Ascension allows you to Flicker it, too. This can either be done to just get extra cards or bypass the Warp cost entirely at the end step.
Even in Commander, Airbender Ascension looks absolutely incredible. There are all kinds of different powerful enters effects that Airbender Ascension can double up on. This card doesn’t even care about tokens entering, meaning you can rack up Quest Counters at the speed of light.
Wan Shi Tong, Librarian
Unlike Commander, Modern does not have a way to easily punish search effects in a one-sided manner, making Wan Shi Tong a massive new card for the format. In addition to profiting off your opponent’s Fetch Lands, Wan Shi Tong also offers a scaling draw effect. This ensures it doesn’t become a bad topdeck later in the game.
There are a ton of decks that can easily adapt Wan Shi Tong as soon as the card is available for competitive play. Goblin Charbelcher Combo, any deck running Psychic Frog, and Simic Ritual will also consider this card in their decklists moving forward.
In Commander, Wan Shi Tong looks like the perfect addition to almost any Blue deck that wants it, all the way up to cEDH. Between tons of tutor effects, from nasty cards like Demonic Tutor to less egregious ramp like Farseek, Wan Shi Tong will draw you a lot of cards in that format, too.
Earth King’s Lieutenant
It looks like Wizards of the Coast is really trying to push Allies as a competitive archetype in Standard. Earth King’s Lieutenant resembles a lot of Typal powerhouses from the past, like Thalia’s Lieutenant, buffing your board of Allies while growing itself as you cast subsequent ones. This card promotes extremely strong starts with existing one-mana Allies like Momo, Friendly Flier, dishing out damage extremely quickly.
While this card wants a few more one-mana Allies in a perfect world, it might be fine without them. Some cards already spoiled in MTG Avatar suggest that there could be potential for a more midrange-y Ally creature deck. Aang, at the Crossroads comes to mind as a curve-topper that does exactly what this theoretical archetype would want. The pieces are coming together, but whether or not it’s good enough is a different question.
Firebending Student
Firebending is a bit hard to use properly in competitive formats, but Firebending Student offers the perfect shell for the mechanic to excel in Prowess decks. Offering something similar to Vivi, Firebending Student grants more mana the bigger it is when it attacks. You can cast additional buff spells with this in combat, scaling your Prowess team to obscene heights.
This card could do work in any number of Standard Red decks, including a Big Red strategy that uses Firebending Student to ramp out powerful instants. I wouldn’t expect this card to see play outside of Standard and Commander, but it certainly has a fighting chance there.
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