As one of two major new MTG mechanics in Aetherdrift, there’s unsurprisingly a lot of interest in Start your engines! While it does seem rather clunky, this mechanic has a great deal of potential. Depending on your speed, powerful abilities can be unlocked and improved, encouraging you to invest resources.
Unfortunately, while Start your engines! appears to have a lot of potential, MTG players aren’t exactly won over. While we’re only partway through Aetherdrift’s spoiler season, the mechanic seems worryingly slow. Given how fast-paced most MTG formats are nowadays, there’s a real concern that this new mechanic won’t keep up.
Thankfully, there are a handful of low-cost Start your engines! cards that might just get the job done.
Gas Guzzler
The latest, and arguably greatest, Start your engines! spoiler to be unveiled is Gas Guzzler. Costing just one mana, this card is an easy way to start building speed from as early as turn one. If you’re building a deck around speed, a turn one start like this will always be the goal.
Unfortunately, Gas Guzzler enters tapped so there’s no way to increase your speed beyond 1 on the first turn. That is the case in Standard, Modern, and Pioneer, at least, which all lack fast mana like Dark Ritual. While this is a downside, it doesn’t take long for Gas Guzzler to properly get to work.
If this card is left unblocked, you’ll deal six damage and hit Max Speed by turn turn four. From here you’ll be able to sacrifice your other creatures to draw cards, which is always useful. Whether you’ve got excess creatures and vehicles to burn or want to make a chump block more profitable, this ability is far from useless.
Despite this strength, Gas Guzzler will surely need its own deck to be relevant in any format. Whether or not such a deck will be viable currently remains to be seen. What we do know, however, is that Gas Guzzler won’t see Standard play without it. Compared to the likes of Evolved Sleeper and Greedy Freebooter, this card doesn’t do anywhere near enough to keep up.
Given that Gas Guzzler is hardly the most exciting MTG card ever spoiled, it’s no wonder some MTG players have been… distracted. Upon looking at this card, many players remarked on the character’s resemblance to Ben Stiller. This quickly turned into a lot of Zoolander gif-posting, and we can’t deny we see it too.
Nesting Bot
To date, we’ve only seen one other one mana MTG card with Start your engines!, which is Nesting Bot. Hopefully, this won’t be the last one mana Start your engines! card, but we dare not be too optimistic. That said, the ideal scenario is obviously a red card with this mechanic and Haste for maximum speed gain.
For now, Nesting Bot appears to be the best cheap Start your engines! option. Admittedly, this card’s buff from reaching Max Speed is hardly perfect, but it does have the upside of replacing itself. This could make it a fairly decent tool in a white-aligned Start your engines!-focused deck, especially given the importance of getting your speed up early.
Once again, Nesting Bot can’t actually get you to Max Speed very quickly. Since you can’t exactly give it Haste on turn one, it’ll take until turn four at least. While this isn’t very exciting, it seems that’s as fast as we’re going to get in Standard at least.
Outside of a Start your engines! deck, that will likely want every one-mana enabler anyway, Nesting Bot does have a chance in Standard. Specifically, this card may stand a compelling chance in Boros and/or Jeskai Convoke decks. Within these decks, Nesting Bot works wonders with Gleeful Demolition since it’s an artifact.
Within these archetypes, increasing your speed or reaching Max Speed is unlikely to be relevant at all. Even though some useful cards care about Max Speed, Convoke doesn’t really need them. Still, keep an eye on Nesting Bot as it may well see play soon.
A Trio of Tracks
Last, but not least, it’s also worth mentioning the trio of Raceway cards that are coming in Aetherdrift. Each one of these MTG cards is technically a turn-one option to Start your engines! however, they only tap for colorless. Technically, these cards are the fastest way to reach Max Speed. That being said, they equally have the potential to slow down your speed acquisition.
If you want to go fast, any one of the Raceways into Gingerbrute is the way to go. This combo will get you to two speed on turn one, allowing you to reach Max Speed by turn three. While this all seems well and good, it’s a huge investment to make this happen. Investing heavily into this strategy, however, may well slow you down.
Unfortunately, these raceways aren’t exactly easy to play, especially on turn one. For starters, if your deck isn’t colorless, you’ll have to wait until turn two to play anything. Even if you do have other one mana colorless creatures, they won’t be able to attack until turn two.
With this in mind, it seems like running one of the other Start your engines! cards is the correct option. The only time this isn’t the case is if your speed-themed deck is Temur. Even then, however, you may be better served waiting until turn two to make a relevant play.