Since its debut back in 1998’s Stronghold, Fling has been a constant presence in Magic: The Gathering. Whether it’s pushing for a win by cashing in a big creature, or serving as sneaky spot removal, the card has found homes in all manner of decks and formats. We’ve seen plenty of variants on the effect over the years but Self-Destruct, a new card revealed for MTG Final Fantasy earlier today, may well be the best of the bunch.
This card tweaks the fundamental idea of a Fling effect in a very powerful way, opening up all sorts of lines of play. It also synergizes perfectly with some of the best cards in Standard right now, which puts it in a good position right out of the gate. As we saw earlier this year with Stock Up, uncommons are more than capable of being standout cards from a set. With Self-Destruct, lightning may just have struck twice in that regard.
Self-Destruct From MTG Final Fantasy
- Mana Value: 1R
- Rarity: Uncommon
- Type: Instant
- Card Text: Target creature you control deals X damage to any other target and X damage to itself, where X is its power.
While Self-Destruct is certainly reminiscent of Fling effects past, this MTG Final Fantasy card has a number of features that set it apart. Firstly, and most importantly, it doesn’t actually ask you to sacrifice the creature you want to use it with. The creature deals damage to itself equal to its power, yes, but that doesn’t guarantee the creature dies.
Any creature with greater toughness than power will survive the Self-Destruct process. Much as this is a flavor fail, it makes the card a lot more playable. The same is also true if the creature has Indestructible, or happens to be sporting a shield counter. It’s not hard to engineer a situation like this, and if you do the card essentially becomes a fight spell that can also target players and planeswalkers.
On top of this, Self-Destruct is notable for letting the creature it targets deal the damage rather than dealing it itself like Fling. This lets you leverage keywords like Deathtouch and Lifelink very nicely indeed. Flinging a 1/1 Deathtouch is a terrible play, but having one Self-Destruct can take out the biggest threat on the board. Likewise, Using it on a Lifelink creature will get you twice X life: once for the damage to itself, and once for the damage to the target.
Finally, the fact that the creature Self-Destruct targets actually sees it resolving is a big deal in current Standard. Between Valiant and Prowess, there are many situations where this is far, far superior to Fling.
Sizzling Standard Synergies
Fling isn’t legal in Standard right now, so having access to a more powerful variant is great news for red Aggro decks. We’ve seen players run Callous Sell-Sword for the Burn Together half in the past, but the lack of instant speed on that makes it a worse option overall. Self-Destruct has a real opportunity to step in and establish itself in Standard for this reason.
It helps that the card is pretty much tailor-made to work with Screaming Nemesis. It gives you an easy way to activate its “turn off your opponent’s lifegain” ability, since the creature targeted damages itself. This play also lets you push six damage to your opponent’s face, which is no joke in Mono-Red. The fact that you can do this at instant speed can even help you dodge pesky Sheltered by Ghosts or Go for the Throat that could otherwise stop Nemesis from popping off.
Beyond this, the card also works really well with the Mono-Red Mice package. Whether it’s Heartfire Hero or Emberheart Challenger, you can push the power of your Mice a lot with this card, then convert it into immediate damage. Hero is particularly good here, since it gives you the damage again when it dies from Self-Destruct’s effect. Given that these cards tend to go in the same deck as Nemesis, I think there’s a good chance the card is tested in the list at least.
If that doesn’t work out, Izzet Prowess may be where Self-Destruct ends up. It’s a nice way to get your Prowess triggers going, and it pairs nicely with Monstrous Rage to enable some explosive bursts out of nowhere. Self-Destruct also plays perfectly with Vivi Ornithier, also from MTG Final Fantasy, since it’s essentially a Prowess creature with a bigger toughness than power.
Galuf’s Final Act
- Mana Value: 1G
- Rarity: Uncommon
- Type: Instant
- Card Text: Until end of turn, target creature gets +1/+0 and gains “When this creature dies, put a number of +1/+1 counters equal to its power on up to one target creature.”
For a bit more Self-Destruct synergy, look no further than Galuf’s Final Act, another MTG Final Fantasy card revealed today. This was actually unveiled alongside Self-Destruct, since both depict key scenes from Final Fantasy V. Both also play very nicely together, it turns out.
Galuf’s Final Act does two things. It serves as a (very) minor combat trick, and a way to convert a creature’s power into +1/+1 counters on another creature if the first one dies. This is a huge flavor win for those who’ve played Final Fantasy V, but it’s also a sneaky-powerful combat trick. If you have a way to destroy or sacrifice a creature at instant speed, you can use this to massively buff an unblocked creature and push through for the win.
Self-Destruct, conveniently enough, gives you a way to do just that. It even adds more damage on top, making it very possible to engineer turn four wins if you can cast the two back-to-back. Aggro decks in Standard have moved away from Gruul in favor of Mono-Red or Izzet recently, but Gruul Prowess does still exist. With the addition of this card, it could well carve out a bigger niche for itself post-Final Fantasy.
Both of these cards are also absolutely hilarious with Jumbo Cactuar. Putting 10,000 +1/+1 counters on a creature, or just dealing 10,000 damage to your opponent, is pretty much guaranteed to win the game. Players are already talking about how good these interactions will be in Limited. Standard is a bit more of a long shot, but you can certainly count on Commander players trying both of these out.
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