My Dominaria Highlights

Ok slowly opening the second booster box didn’t last long. All the boosters inside mysteriously burst open yesterday. I wish I knew how it happened.

I have surprised myself and actually got the first booster boxes contents scanned into the Decked app along with the foils and legendary creatures from the second.

With all this new injection of cards I have that ongoing problem of are the new cards good enough to go into the relevant deck? And if so which ones do they replace? That second question will be answered another day. At the moment I’m looking at the cards through the lens of would this card be good in one of my Commander decks. One or two cards have sparked ideas for brawl decks. Others have given me an idea for standard/modern decks (but not sure I’ll act on those for the time being).

I’m very happy with my pulls, I got 95% (a rough estimate) of the cards I was after either as singles or multiple copies. Plus one or two pleasant surprises that I wasn’t aware of mainly due to me not bothering much with the majority of spoilers.

Not sure if I’ll play Arcane Flight but I do like the art on the card. I’m not surprised it’s one of the ultra pro playmats for this set. I find the art whimsical with the expression on the cats face.

So what were the highlights of my pulls?

I’m glad I’m not playing Tron lands at the moment, Damping Sphere shuts them down. Which would slow my Angel deck down completely. I’m thinking this might find a home in my planned Death and Taxes Commander deck. Final Parting was a nice surprise and definitely is a nice tutor for a Commander deck, get the card you want and set up some graveyard shenanigans.

Gaea’s Blessing was on my list, with mill a thing with my students meta both in their modern decks and Commander this is a nice addition to fight against it. Gilded Lotus is it good enough for modern and standard? I think the 5 CMC is a bit expensive. But Brawl/Commander I’m liking the look of it. Grand Warlord Radha was a pleasant surprise, maybe not good enough to be the new commander of my Elf Tribal deck, but as a Brawl Commander?

Hallar, the Firefletcher was another surprise, definitely a Brawl Commander. Kicker isn’t a thing in my Elf Tribal deck so it wouldn’t break into that. Jhoira, Weatherlight Captain was on my list so happy to get her. As was Karn, Scion of Urza.

I really want the promo for Llanowar Elves. But if I’m building a standard deck I think I’d be going green with that Llanowar Elves/ Steel Leaf Champion combo. I’m not sure the other elves are strong enough to go full elf tribal both in Brawl or standard. Lyra Dawnbringer was high on my list and straight into my list of angel includes for my in progress Angel Commander deck. Marwyn, the Nurterer was in a Planeswalker deck and a nice surprise. I’d like to try and fit it into my Elf tribal deck.

Mishra’s Self Replicator is screaming out to be abused in some infinite loop way. Mox Amber not sure I’d ever use it, but it does seem to be expensive at the moment. Muldrotha, the Gravetide was a nice surprise and will be interesting to build decks around. Graveyard shenanigans is always frustrating to play against, and this could be a way to cheat out some expensive cards. Remember Final Parting?

More graveyard shenanigans with another pleasant discovery Primeval’s Glorious Rebirth. I think having some graveyard hate in decks will be a necessity, luckily there is some out there. A rat deck of some kind is back on the books, ’nuff said. I was just thinking white needs some more cards like Seal Away.

There were 2 angels I wanted from this set and I got both. Shalai, Voice of Plenty has made the team for my planned Angel Commander deck. Blue has some really nice big monsters of the deep. They may not be that playable in most formats. But hey that OMG moment when an another player sees them hit the battlefield, worth it. Slimefoot was on my hit list. I had it in my mind to do a saproling/fungus tribal deck of some kind, and this is the commander I wanted for it.

I don’t know what I was expecting from the sagas. But Song of Freyalise with a lot of creatures out, say like elves or saprolings this could be insane. I bet Squee, the Immortal will end up being a very very annoying card. Wish I’d got more Steel Leaf Champions than I did.

These next 3 were unexpected and have potential I think.

Oh look another board wipe for white with Urza’s Ruinous Blast, just what they needed. Ok probably not that great with this big influx of legendary cards in standard and Brawl. But other formats it might be more impactful. Token decks won’t like it for sure. Oh look a dragon for my dragon tribal deck. And with the Ur-Dragon as the commander a turn 3 drop! I can see Warcry Phoenix maybe making it into a Brawl deck. But as a 4 CMC 2/2 it looks a bit weak against Glorybringer and Rekindling Phoenix.