Gifts Ungiven

Following the spoiling of the full set list a little while ago, information has been trickling in about cards from Conflux. Some of those are unsourced spoilers, others are early previews from magazines. The official site previews start two weeks from now.

As always, the MTGSalvation spoiler is the canonical place to look for these things.

I'll take a look at some of the current standouts in the extended entry.

With more than another month to go before the first PTQ I'll be attending in the current season, it's good to be mindful of the potential impact of Conflux cards on playable and good decks in Onslaught-Conflux Extended.

Click through to the extended entry for some thoughts on a few interesting cards. My early feeling is that Conflux will help push Burn and Domain Zoo toward success, with a possible role for some new white-splashing control decks as well.

With the MTGSalvation Conflux spoiler just thirteen cards shy of complete (assuming it's mostly correct), it's time to check in again and see if this mid-Alara set is going to cause any significant changes in the current PTQ season.

I have some full notes in the extended entry, but my true standout cards are Path to Exile, Hellspark Elemental, Volcanic Fallout, Worldheart Phoenix, and Might of Alara. I discuss a few others, but these are the ones that I foresee having some real impact. Of these, Path slots into certain control and aggro/control decks. Hellspark Elemental goes into mono-red burn. Volcanic Fallout may go into certain aggro builds. Worldheart Phoenix might be a Gifts finisher. Last, but not at all least, Might of Alara goes into Domain Zoo.

So does this shift the metagame? It might make Domain Zoo a stronger contender, and it might make All-In Red decks much riskier. Perhaps we'll also see some more U/w control again, with Path going in as the super removal card in those decks.

The financial upshot here is that you probably aren't looking to pick up any rares to retain your competitive edge as Conflux spills into the Extended format.

(And, as noted, more commentary in the extended entry.)

They gave Flores the most tournament-worthy preview card of Conflux, and fortunately, it works as it was previously spoiled:

And on that note, freaky baby:

(Whose ability is not triggered if you Path it. So that's one use right there.)

My favorite card art from the Conflux visual spoiler.

I've got that game on my cellphone, too.

As I've said previously, my basic pattern for buying any new set is to start by picking up a full common/uncommon playset as a unit (that's four of each common and uncommon card in the set). This saves me the trouble of trying to guess which commons and uncommons will be useful in, say, the Extended lifespan of the set. It's also more economical over even a moderate time window, especially as some uncommons pick up value. I expect Path to Exile to be that kind of uncommon, for example.

After that core purchase, I then look to pick up rares that I expect to want to use, with an eye especially toward picking up now those rares that will go up in price for much of the foreseeable future. For example, I picked up my Elspeths for 8 bucks each when the set came out; my local store is now offering 20 dollars credit for Elspeth these days.

In our ideal world, all the rares work like that. Well, in my ideal world, anyway. However, some rares are clearly and immediately good. These cards still tend to rise in price over time, so we want to get them sooner rather than later.

Click through to the extended for my purchases...

DeckCheck has a top eight for us from a GP Trial for Hannover, giving us one of our first views of a post-Conflux Extended top eight. I'll link to the decks of interest in the extended, with notes on their standout traits.