Marvel Super Heroes Set Review for Legacy Brewers

Another month, another Magic: The Gathering set to parse through...

Marvel Super Heroes Mechanics

Power-up: Similar to Exhaust, though this mechanic will see much less play. It’s far too overcosted.
Teamwork X: Kicker, but using creatures’ power to pay. If there is a card with Teamwork that sees Legacy play, it will be easy to activate.

Commander Set

Falcon and Redwing have a lot going for them in Initiative decks with the magical mana cost of . They're evasive, so they can regain the Initiative if you lose it. They create flying tokens on combat damage to a player, which can help protect the Initiative.

Falcon and Redwing also have a lot against them: Being Legendary isn’t great versus opposing Karakases), they're blocked by Tamiyo, Inquisitive Student — one of the most ubiquitous creatures in the format — and is a Marvel card, which should leave a bad taste in your mouth.

I wouldn’t be surprised to see this on the other side of the table.

I’d like to Thwart my opponent’s play, then rebound Invisible Force Field and cast Armageddon. This might happen at Friday Night Magic (FNM), but I doubt you’ll see it at the top tables.

If you squint, you can see a Jacked Rabbit. The upside compared to the Jacked Rabbit is the ability to create tokens immediately. It creates the creatures it needs to crew it and has evasion. I don’t know where this goes ( Stompy?), but it seems like an ok top end.

Another piece of equipment for Death & Taxes to try. Will it be better than Kaldra Compleat, Meteor Sword, Pre-War Formalwear, or anything else? It does pitch to Solitude. Even Trailblazer’s Torch has seen sideboard play.

With the amount of Legends printed, these “Legend Rule” cards might be useful at some point. Maybe there’s a Stompy deck that could have fun with this.

Turn One: Ancient Tomb, Chrome Mox/Lotus Petal, Council of Reeds → copy Council of Reeds.
Turn Two: Land, Stock Up/The One Ring → copy both Council of Reeds
Turn Three:…copy the four Council of Reeds

mana at Sorcery speed might be too slow to get two spells back, but playing two of these in your control deck could be infuriating for the opponent once they get going.

This likely won’t beat out Mystic Sanctuary, but I wouldn’t knock you for trying it. It also has the ability to bounce something if your graveyard gets nuked, but that’s rarely what you’ll want to do with Fantastic Elasticity.

Lockjaw, Slobbering Teleporter and Phelia, Exuberent Shepherd, best buds. Generally speaking, you don’t want to play spells before combat, but to play with dogs, you could do worse. I doubt this sees play.

Living Laser can deal a surprising amount of damage quickly. With just Faithless Looting and Reanimate, you’re attacking for 12. Should Hollow One decks be considered again with this in mind?

Another option is as an Artist’s Talent finisher. Either Reanimate Living Laser after discarding or use spirits and rituals to cast it from your hand if your graveyard is too fragile.

I’m 99.9% sure this won’t see play. Dragon Man is, however, one of a handful of cards that can return to the battlefield from your graveyard without any hoops to jump through. Lorien Revealed and Force of Will make this a 5/5 flyer for that can keep coming back. Sadly, that hasn't been good enough for a long time.

”Alright, I managed to finish my playset of Force of Wills thanks to Secrets of Strixhaven, but I still don’t have any duals…” Lucky for you, this guy prefers Hallowed Fountain over Tundra!

Namor, Atlantean King seems flexible in the archetypes you could play him in:

He could be the top end of a go-wide aggro deck.
He makes his own army, so he could be a control/mid-range finisher.
He’s a Merfolk that makes Merfolk, though Merfolk likely won’t want him.

Namor, Atlantean King's biggest downside is costing in a Daze/Wasteland format, but Barrowgoyf sees plenty of play at . Luckily, he’s for Force of Will and for Solitude.

Namor, Atlantean King's second ability plays great with the nickel and diming your life total from Force of Will, fetches, and shocks (perhaps Daze to re-play the shocks), as well as the life you give your opponents with Swords to Plowshares and Solitude.

Namor, Atlantean King is near the top of my list of cards to test from this set. I guess I need to put these Tundras away and buy some Hallowed Fountains.

Two mana, 2/3, Lifelink, draw a card, and pump the team on attack. That’s a lot for one card to do. It won't break anything, but Shuri, the Black Panther can certainly apply a lot of pressure.

The downsides are costing , not generally an artifact deck color combination, dies to Lightning Bolt, gets bounced by Karakas, and has to attack with a bunch of artifacts in play to get any value. I suppose you could Pithing Needle the Karakas, and Mox Opal makes the and/or . Maybe someone will make this a thing.

I’ve seen a lot of chatter around this card in Vintage, but honestly, it seems easy to turn on in Legacy, too.

Turn One: Underground Sea, Dark Ritual, The Fantasticar, Lotus Petal, Thoughtseize attack for 16.
Turn One: Ancient Tomb, Grim Monolith, Voltaic Key, The Fantasticar, Candelabra of Tawnos → attack for 16.
Turn One: Once Upon a Time, City of Traitors, pitch Simian Spirit Guide, The Fantasticar, Lotus Petal, Lightning Bolt → put your opponent to one.

The Fantasticar has to be on the battlefield before the fourth spell is cast to do the thing, but even if you don’t do the thing immediately, it's still a 4/4 flyer threatening to become four 4/4 flyers. We’ll have to see where this card shines the brightest, since it will certainly see play in Legacy.

Jumpstart Set

The first thing that came to mind when I read Amazing Spider-Girl was the Initiative. Flying and vigilance help protect the precious Initiative, web-sling lets you re-cast Initiative creatures, and “Human” means Cavern of Souls, which cast either or Initiative creature can cast her, too.

Once you get to the last room of the Undercity, she's potentially an 8/7 flying, vigilance, temporarily hexproof threat. I wouldn’t go overboard on this, but two in the 75 might be decent.

Black Panther, Most Dangerous is another potential Stompy card. He’s the least likely to see play, but the punisher effect makes blocking him kind of annoying. Power-up is just flavor text.

Mysterio’s Mirage looks like a Cori-Steel Cutter, sort of… It requires more intentional deck building, but it may be easier to trigger if you do. There’s a lack of haste, but 3/3s are temporarily bigger than 1/1s with prowess, and is more useful than . Enchantment hate is less common than artifact hate.

Cori-Steel Cutter is better, but this doesn’t go in Delver shells. If you want to build an army and do a lot of looting/rummaging, this seems like a decent option.

Daredevil, Fearless Fighter has really piqued my interest. The simple answer for where this goes is Moon Stompy. Take a minute to think of other cards this works with, outside of Ancient Tomb:

Tarnished Citadel bolts both players
Punisher enchantments like Pyrostatic Pillar, Roiling Vortex, Sulfuric Vortex, and Eidolon of the Great Revel punish them whenever you get punished.
Flame Rift deals eight for .
Questionable creatures like Flesh Reaver and Goldnight Castigator start to look pretty sweet.
Madcap Experiment into Platinum Angel can one-shot your opponent.
Wheel of Misfortune is always misfortunate for your opponent.

All that and I haven’t even touched on his second wall of text. On attack, Daredevil, Fearless Fighter essentially draws a card and domes both players for the mana value of that card.

This is a sweet card that won’t make the top tables but will stay at the top of my mind.

Standard Set

Just hum Gregory Isaacs’ Night Nurse to yourself whenever you open this in Draft, then pass it to the left.

If Samwise the Stouthearted can see play, so can this. The differences are Lifelink, the permanent returning doesn’t need to have been on the battlefield, and no temptation from the Ring. That second bit may open up some play patterns Samwise the Stouthearted can’t replicate.

Ironheart, Clever Champion is a cost-reduced cost reducer. Improvise is far inferior to Affinity, but we can’t get everything (yet). These artifact decks can produce a lot of tokens thanks to Pinnacle Emissary. Is there a place for this in 8-cast style decks? Currently, it doesn’t look like it.

Ironheart, Clever Champion might open up a Karn, the Great Creator into Mycosynth Lattice{ line, but I doubt that’s better than their current configurations/plans, which don’t need Ironheart.

Check out ForceOfPhil’s article for a more in-depth look at {Loki, God of Mischief. This is a far cry from Nadu, Winged Wisdom but can still draw a lot of cards if left unchecked. Being Legendary might actually be an upside, since 1 toughness and is pretty fragile. I’m sure this will be tested, but I doubt it will stick around.

So they tried to fix Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer. It costs more and doesn’t create a Treasure token, so that’s a step in the right direction. In exchange, she has Menace, the ability to grow, and the guarantee of hitting a nonland card (all the lands before the nonland remain exiled). This is another card worth testing in Tempo.

Elektra, Daughter of the Hand in multiples represents repeatable removal. It only hits targets on the smaller side, and unlike Ninjutsu, Sneak is casting the spell, so it’s counterable. Although there are quite a few creatures that see play at 3 or less power, I doubt you’ll see this. and is a lot for a removal spell, especially when you’re using it to take out creatures that mostly cost or mana.

Hex Magic can draw a lot of cards. This might be great in Storm decks. I haven’t played Storm, so that’s all I’ve got to say about that.

I’m always looking for a reason to play Power Conduit. Jessica Jones, Private Eye seems like a great reason to do so.

Tap Jessica Jones, Private Eye to exile two cards, use Power Conduit to turn that stun counter into a +1/+1 counter. Next turn, tap Jessica Jones, Private Eye to exile three cards off the top and so on. This could be a pretty neat engine for an FNM brew.

Absorbing Man can copy Dark Depths. The issue there is that Dark Depths and Absorbing Man have to be in play before the first main phase of the turn. So this likely isn’t happening until turn five, and then you have to wait another turn cycle before you can attack for 20.

Another interesting option with Absorbing Man is copying Sagas*. He’ll retain the lore counter from the first Saga he copies, so the next Saga he copies will start on two lore counters. Copying Urza’s Saga can permanently give him the ability to tap to create constructs, and that’s after he attacks with vigilance.

I’ll have to do a Scryfall deep dive to find some really fun things to do with him. This could be the conduit for a fun and weird deck.

*Note: While copying sagas would be a sweet idea, the timing of when some lore counters are added at the beginning of the first main phase is not compatible with Absorbing Man's ability.

Giving your opponent a card so you can draw six-plus seems worth it. The rest of Armor Wars is just gravy. is a lot of mana, but in a deck playing Moxen and Lotus Petals, it doesn’t seem so far-fetched.

The final effect (if the game isn’t over yet) can easily hit your opponent for 6 or 7 with all the Affinity creatures and Kappa Cannoneers in these artifact decks.

Vision Quest may be worth it if you enjoy Phyrexian Dreadnought. End step, Dress Down into Vision Quest for Phyrexian Dreadnought seems like a decent sequence. If there’s a late game that includes or more, give that ‘nought +4/+4 or more and haste.

I’m sure there are other things to find with this, but, ya know, 12/12, which will be 13/13 to out-muscle opposing Phyrexian Dreadnoughts).