Card of the Day - January, 2011 : Daily MTG : Magic: The Gathering

Card of the Day - Monday, January 31, 2011
Priests of Norn – Mirrodin Besieged common. Prior to Mirrodin Besieged, the Phyrexians have never really been thought of as being associated with white mana. But after all, they do represent a highly structured and organized society...

Card of the Day - Friday, January 28, 2011
Dancing Scimitar – Arabian Nights rare. Well before the living weapons of Mirrodin Besieged, there was Dancing Scimitar, a sword animated by magic in Arabian Nights. Its 5 toughness presumably represents how hard it is to kill a sword, not an inordinately strong metal.

Card of the Day - Thursday, January 27, 2011
Poisonbelly Ogre – Guildpact common. The flavor text for Poisonbelly Ogre speculates that it might be of either Simic or Golgari origin. Of the two, Golgari seems more likely, since the Simic guild doesn't involve black mana. Neither guild was in Guildpact, but the Ogre surely isn't Orzhov.

Card of the Day - Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Metalworker – Urza's Destiny rare. Back in the days of 2000-2003, when Metalworker was tearing up tournaments, the deck was sometimes referred to as "mono-brown" because it was all artifacts. That name stopped working when artifacts stopped having brown card borders.

Card of the Day - Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Battle Cry – Ice Age uncommon. Including to Battle Cry, General Jarkeld, the Arctic Fox appears in the flavor text of fifteen cards in Ice Age. He's also shown on General Jarkeld, but he's not saying anything.

Card of the Day - Monday, January 24, 2011
Infected Vermin – Odyssey uncommon. At first, Infected Vermin behaves just like a Pestilence that can kill itself. But if enough things have died, the disease can really take off. It's still going to be tough on the Infected Vermin, though.

Card of the Day - Friday, January 21, 2011
Phyrexian Rager – Apocalypse common. Phyrexian Rager first appeared in Apocalypse, then showed up in Tenth Edition and Duel Decks: Garruk vs. Liliana. And it's also in Mirrodin Besieged! That Horror sure gets around.

Card of the Day - Thursday, January 20, 2011

Mirrodin's Core – Darksteel uncommon. According to the Mirrodin Style Guide, "The interior of Mirrodin is a vast, featureless expanse of silvery, dull metal. The only features of the landscape are the mycosynth, the occasional artifact creature, and Panopticon. The interior is lit by the mana-core sun, which washes everything in intense, pure-white light. The mana core appears as a giant sphere of pure white plasma suspended at the nucleus of the planar sphere."

Card of the Day - Wednesday, January 19, 2011
Arrest – Mercadian Masques common. We're going to skip over the fact that Arrest is in both Mirrodin and Scars of Mirrodin, because we've never noticed its Mercadian Masques flavor text before. Did you know the person being arrested is Orim, Samite Healer? For murder?

Card of the Day - Tuesday, January 18, 2011
Myr Battlesphere – Scars of Mirrodin rare. Statistics show that there are more Myr on Myr Battlesphere than on any five cards put together. The art was provided as a wallpaper here.

Card of the Day - Monday, January 17, 2011
Auriok Siege Sled – Darksteel uncommon. In case you've ever wondered, if you use both of Auriok Siege Sled's abilities on the same creature, that creature won't be able to block the sled that turn.

Card of the Day - Friday, January 14, 2011
Look at Me, I'm R&D – Unhinged rare. Look at Me, I'm R&D is the only card in Magic with no artist credit. It also had no art!

Card of the Day - Thursday, January 13, 2011
Blade of the Sixth Pride – Future Sight common. Future Sight brought the "future-shifted" card frame into Magic, and the future-shifted vanillas had their own textless version. There's room for eight mana symbols there, which ought to be enough for any creature. Well, any vanilla creature. Sorry, Progenitus and B.F.M.!

Card of the Day - Wednesday, January 12, 2011
_____ – Unhinged uncommon. What can you do with a card with no name? Well, not much. But what can you do with a card that can set its own name to anything? Mark Gottlieb covered this question in detail, and the answer is: a lot! Didn't think of Bazaar of Wonders, didja?

Card of the Day - Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Cyclopean Tomb – Masters Edition IV rare. The Alpha version of Cyclopean Tomb was printed without a mana cost. This error was corrected in Beta (it's ), and that was the last nonland card printed without a mana cost ... until Evermind.

Card of the Day - Monday, January 10, 2011
Nameless Race – The Dark rare. Since 2007's Grand Creature Type Update, every creature in Magic has at least one creature type. Except one: Nameless Race, because, well, look at the name!

Card of the Day - Friday, January 07, 2011
Beacon of Creation – Fifth Dawn rare. Three of the Fifth Dawn Beacons were in Tenth Edition, but Beacon of Creation and Beacon of Tomorrows didn't make the cut. Aaron Forsythe explained why a few years ago, but it was basically because they overlapped too much with more interesting options in their colors.

Card of the Day - Thursday, January 06, 2011
Genesis Wave – Scars of Mirrodin rare. Genesis Wave was the key card in David Williams's deck at the 2010 Magic: The Gathering World Championships. For a complete decklist and video deck tech, check out the Daily Deck for December 17, 2010.

Card of the Day - Wednesday, January 05, 2011
First Come, First Served – Unhinged uncommon. In case you're wondering, the Unhinged FAQ says that tokens don't have collector numbers. But that was before tokens started being included in packs, and the modern tokens do have numbers. Well, Unhinged packs actually did have tokens with collector numbers, but back then, they were in the minority.

Card of the Day - Tuesday, January 04, 2011

Scroll of Origins – Saviors of Kamigawa rare. There's a tongue-in-cheek rule of thumb in Magic design that a fair land can be turned into a fair artifact that costs

. For example, Shadowblood Ridge and Rakdos Signet are both fair cards. Scroll of Origins is based on Library of Alexandria, but without the ability to tap for

and with an additional activation cost. The exact text of Library of Alexandria wouldn't be fair on a two-mana artifact, suggesting that Library of Alexandria wasn't a fair land. But we knew that already.

Card of the Day - Monday, January 03, 2011
Pattern of Rebirth – Urza's Destiny rare. There's a fairly complicated combo involving Phyrexian Ghoul, Academy Rector, Pattern of Rebirth, and Saproling Burst, but there's no room to go into it here. It was described back in 2002 by Ben Bleiweiss.

Card of the Day - January, 2011

Monday, January 03, 2011