One week ago, Wizards of the Coast revealed a handful of spoilers for the upcoming Lorwyn Eclipsed set. While we don’t know a ton about what the set has to offer yet, seeing throwbacks to old designs, including “fixed” Evoke Elementals, is really cool.
Many of the cards revealed thus far, especially Jean Emmanuel Depraz’s World Championship winner’s card, have received a lot of hype early on. However, we feel one particular rare spoiler may be flying under the radar. Despite not being super flashy, with the right supporting cast, there’s a lot of potential for this three-drop. We hope that this card will help some specific strategies that have fallen out of favor rise from the ashes once more.
Mutable Explorer in Golgari Midrange
This time around, we’re highlighting Mutable Explorer. Mutable Explorer is a simple design. There have been a lot of other iterations of small three-mana creatures that ramp you that never rose above the bar to see Standard play. So, what makes Mutable Explorer different?
Well, the biggest factor to keep in mind is that rather than just netting you a basic land, you get a land that can become a creature on command. This provides extra mid to late game power, and once you add on the fact that both Mutable Explorer and Mutavault are all creature types, you have an abusable threat.
Right away, the synergy between Mutable Explorer and Unholy Annex/Ritual Chamber makes this card extremely appealing. If you’ve played Pioneer, you know how well Mutavault and Unholy Annex pair together. Having access to a Demon amongst your lands with a cheap activation cost that’s immune to sorcery speed removal is a huge deal.
The fact that Mutavault isn’t Standard legal is a big part of the reason why Demon decks aren’t highly represented. Cards like Demon Wall, while strong with Unholy Annex, aren’t good enough on their own. They’re also vulnerable to traditional removal spells when necessary.
Mutable Explorer, by contrast, is a totally fine playable that adds two Demons to the board at once. Even the 1/1 Changeling becomes a must-kill monster alongside Unholy Annex. Plus, the extra land from Mutable Explorer sets you up perfectly to unlock Ritual Chamber and put your opponent on the backfoot.
Up to this point, Golgari midrange has been overshadowed by its Dimir midrange counterpart. The power of Enduring Curiosity and Kaito, Bane of Nightmares made it tough to justify playing Golgari. With the release of Lorwyn Eclipsed, being able to curve Llanowar Elves into Mutable Explorer into Unholy Annex or Ritual Chamber is a strong line of play that could help resurrect the archetype (the arrival of Overgrown Tomb to Standard helps the cause.)
Hope for Typal Decks
The other archetype style that gets a nice boost with Lorwyn Eclipsed is the typal deck. MTG Foundations brought a handful of strong Elves to Standard. The issue is that the surrounding sets haven’t held up their end of the bargain.
Mutable Explorer is a step in the right direction for these strategies. For Elves, there’s already a big incentive to play Llanowar Elves as an elite mana dork. Imperious Perfect and Elvish Archdruid are solid “Lord” effects, too.
Mutable Explorer functions as two cards in one that both benefit from your Lords. Mutavault won’t be exposed to board wipes, which are a major weakness for typal decks. The ramp element also makes it easier to land cards like Vivien Reid that can singlehandedly dominate grindy games.
In the case of Merfolk, there is a variety of decent creatures in Standard that have the creature type, including Mindspring Merfolk from Aetherdrift and Cenote Scout from The Lost Caverns of Ixalan. Mutable Explorer alone likely won’t be enough to save Merfolk (especially given the recent loss of Vodalian Hexcatcher to rotation). Still, our return to Lorwyn is sure to come with other strong Merfolk that collectively may give the archetype a chance to perform.
Mutable Explorer is a classic example of a card that’s worth more than the sum of its parts. Hopefully it and the rest of the cards in Lorwyn Eclipsed can help bring a shakeup to a Standard format that desperately needs it.
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