Mercadian Masques - a Complete Review (red)

• white
• blue
• black
• red
• green
• artifact
• land
• conclusion

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 4
Strictly a theme card, it's too fragile for serious play at 3 mana for a 1/1.

173 Battle Rampart 2R Creature-Wall C 1/3. T: Target creature gains haste until end of turn. (That creature may attack and T the turn it comes under your control.)

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 4
An expensive wall doesn't fit in a weenie deck and a 1/3 isn't much of a wall anyway. Nice ability though.

174 Battle Squadron 3RR Creature-Ship R */*. Flying. Battle Squadron's power and toughness are each equal to the number of creatures you control.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 3
Probably meant as a finisher, but it's too risky. You'll need it the most when your weenies are dead and then it's useless.

175 Blaster Mage 2R Creature-Spellshaper C 2/2. R, T, Discard a card from your hand: Destroy target wall.

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 3
Might be useful in a red sideboard against opponents that go wall-crazy.

176 Blood Hound 2R Creature-Hound R 1/1. Whenever you're dealt damage, you may put that many +1/+1 counters on Blood Hound. At the end of your turn, remove all +1/+1 counters from Blood Hound.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 2
Again too expensive for a 1/1. Sure it could get big, but an opponent won't attack with one of these in play if he's at less life (unless he can get rid of this thing). And if the opponent doesn't attack, you're stuck with a 1/1.

177 Blood Oath 3R Instant R Name a card type and look at target opponents hand. Blood Oath deals 3 damage to that player for each card of that card type in that players hand. (wordings may be off)

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 3
Interesting, but hard to say how useful it'll be. A good sideboard card against control perhaps.

178 Brawl 3RR Instant R Until end of turn, all creatures gain "T: This creature deals damage equal to its power to target creature"

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 4
Like Shoving Match, this is a fun card, but probably not very useful. 5 mana is a lot for an effect which helps your opponent just as much. Again, fun in multiplayer.

179 Cave Sense 1R Enchant Creature C Enchanted creature gets +1/+1 and has mountainwalk.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 2
It's ok in sealed, but other than that it's just no giant strength. Sure, you can use the mountainwalk against burn, but good luck trying to get a creature enchantment in play without the creature getting burned from underneath it.

180 Cave-In 3RR Sorcery R You may remove a red card in your hand from the game instead of paying Cave-In's mana cost. Cave-In deals 2 damage to each creature and each player.

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 3
Is it really necessary to be able to do a Steam Blast for no mana? Well, I guess it's a good answer to a ritual-priest-priest-weenie-weenie start from your opponent.

181 Cavern Crawler 2R Creature-Insect C 0/3. Mountainwalk. R: Cavern Crawler gets +1/+0 until end of turn.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 3
An earlier spoiler gave it +1/-1 for R. At least this is much better, though still not very good.

182 Ceremonial Guard 2R Creature-Soldier C 3/4. When Ceremonial Guard attacks or blocks, destroy it at end of combat.

==> TOUR: 1 - FUN: 1
A Fog Elemental without flying and with -1/0. And Fog Elemental wasn't exactly popular.

183 Cinder Elemental 3R Creature-Elemental U 2/2. XR, T, Sacrifice Cinder Elemental: Cinder Elemental deals X damage to target creature or player.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 5
I guess it's an effort to get X-burn spells played more outside of combo decks. It's a bit expensive for a 2/2 though, but it's certainly fun, a good use for the new storage lands.

184 Close Quarter 2RR Enchantment U Whenever a creature you control becomes blocked, Close Quarters deals 1 damage to target creature or player.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 1
One in a long, long line of red enchantments designed to discourage blocking or to make it harder. Not much success so far.

185 Crag Saurian RRR Creature-Lizard R 4/4. Whenever Crag Saurian is dealt damage, the controller of the damage's source gains control of Crag Saurian.

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 2
As long as you can burn away blockers, this is a pretty good creature. Except against burn, obviously.

186 Crash 2R Instant C You may sacrifice a mountain instead of paying Crash's mana cost. Destroy target artifact.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 2
This would have been nice against Academy and perhaps Jar, but if you have some mana available to you, there are better options, like Keldon Vandals, Rack and Ruin and Viashino Heretic.

187 Flailing Manticore 3R Creature-Monster R 3/3. Flying, First Strike. 1: Flailing Manticore gets +1/+1 until end of turn. Any player may play this ability. 1: Flailing Manticore gets -1/-1 until end of turn. Any player may play this ability.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 4
A very tricky card. If you play it wrong, it'll be dead before you know it: make you use all your mana to keep it alive during your turn and kill it after my untap phase. Still, this might be a strong card in a land destruction deck. As long as you can keep their land low, this should be a formidable creature.

188 Flailing Ogre 2R Creature-Ogre U 3/3. 1: Flailing Ogre gets +1/+1 until end of turn. Any player may play this ability. 1: Flailing Ogre gets -1/-1 until end of turn. Any player may play this ability.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 4
The lack of flying hurts, but otherwise ditto.

189 Flailing Soldier R Creature-Soldier C 2/2. 1: Flailing Soldier gets +1/+1 until end of turn. Any player may play this ability. 1: Flailing Soldier gets -1/-1 until end of turn. Any player may play this ability.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 5
This one is even harder to keep alive, but you can play it on turn one. That could be ok if and ONLY if you get to start first. Otherwise your soldier will be dead immediately. It'll still die after a few turns, though, so it's pretty weak. I guess it might help against a mana screwed opponent, but those generally don't need any help loosing.

190 Flaming Sword 1R Enchant Creature C You may play Flaming Sword any time you could play instant. Target creature gets +1/+0 and has first strike.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 4
A nice card in straight creature battles, the likes of which are rarely seen in tournaments.

191 Furious Assault 2R Enchantment C Whenever you play a creature spell, Furious Assault deals 1 damage to target player.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 3
Would be more useful if it could target creatures.

192 Gerrard Irregulars 4R Creature-Soldier C 4/2. Trample; haste.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 1
Gerrard's Constipation Troops. Would be ok for 4 mana, but 5 mana is overdoing it.

193 Hammer Mage 1R Creature-Spellshaper U 1/1. XR, T: Discard a card from your hand: Destroy all artifacts with converted mana cost X or less. 1/1

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 3
A good card, but the summoning sickness stops it from being great. I've heard suggestions that this might take the place of Mox Monkey (Gorilla Shaman), but that one doesn't require tapping. And that makes all the difference.

194 Hired Giant 3R Creature-Giant U 4/4. When Hired Giant comes into play, each other player may search his or her library for a land card, put that into play, then shuffle that library.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 3
A solid creature, which probably won't see much play because there are better ones. The drawback is negligible. Sure, you may want to keep this in your hand if the opponent is manascrewed, but you should have no trouble winning without it in that case.

195 Kris Mage R Creature-Spellshaper C 1/1. R, T, Discard a card from your hand: Kris Mage deals 1 damage to target creature or player.

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 2
Without Mogg Fantastic, Fireslinger and Cursed Scroll, burn may resort to this for some reusable board control. I'm not sure how useful it'll turn out to be though, burn doesn't use many lands, so it won't have many spare. Also, the Fanatic is mainly half a shock which doubles as a creature, the Fireslinger's main use is to get in that last point of damage to break down the wall, without needing two cards for it. And well, the Kris Mage ain't no Cursed Scroll. Pretty bad creature, but it could be all red has left.

196 Kyren Glider 1R Creature-Goblin C 1/1. Flying. Kyren Glider cannot block.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 2
Evasion would be nice, but red has too many ground troops, so it needs to burn through the defenders anyway, which makes the flying a bit useless. Still, for just R, I'm sure it would have seen play.

197 Kyren Legate 1R Creature-Goblin U 1/1. If an opponent controls a plains and you control a mountain you may play Kyren Legate without paying its mana cost. Haste. (This creature may attack and T the turn it comes under your control.)

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 1
Same as the others, it's just too wimpy as a hoser and too expensive for the main deck.

198 Kyren Negotiations 2RR Enchantment U Tap an untapped creature you control: Kyren Negotiations deals 1 damage to target player.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 2
A Firewhip for all your creatures, except you can only target players. It's not very useful and there are better 4cc plays for red, like Lightning Dragon.

199 Kyren Sniper 2R Creature-Goblin C 1/1. At the beginning of your upkeep, you may have Kyren sniper deal 1 damage to target player.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 1
I'd rather have Goblin Medics and they were pretty bad already.

200 Lava Runner 1RR Creature-Lizard R 2/2. Haste. Whenever Lava Runner becomes target of a spell or ability, that player sacrifices a land.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 3
This might make it in a land destruction deck, but I doubt it. A 2/2 isn't such a great finisher.

201 Lightning Hounds 2RR Creature-Hound C 3/2. First Strike

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 2
Pretty bland. Red can do better for 4 mana.

202 Lithophage 3RR Creature-Insect R 7/7. At the beginning of your upkeep, sacrifice this card unless you sacrifice a mountain.

==> TOUR: 5 - FUN: 4
That's pretty big for red. The upkeep is manageable, just barely. It looks like a solid red finisher that doesn't quite fit in the mana curve of a typical burn deck.

203 Lunge 2R Instant C Lunge deals 2 damage to target creature and 2 damage to target player.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 2
Shower of Sparks' big brother. Whether this is playable depends on what other good burn spells there are. Only Parch and Arc Lightning spring to mind oh and Shock in sixth. I guess that means this one probably doesn't make it.

204 Magistrate's Veto 2R Enchantment U White creatures and blue creatures can't block.

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 2
Red has plenty of ways to discourage blocking already and few or none of those are played. Limiting it to just two of the five colors makes it even less likely to see any play. On the other hand, maybe this is just what red needs to get through all the protection from red creatures white can field.

205 Mercadia's Downfall 2R Instant U Attacking creatures get +X/+0 until end of turn, where X is the number of non-basic lands defending player controls.

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 1
It's not bad as a sideboard card. Against plenty of decks this'll be better than Trumpet Blast. The question is whether it's worth a slot in the sideboard for the slight extra speed it may give you.

206 Ogre Taskmaster 3R Creature-Ogre U 4/3. Ogre Taskmaster can't block.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 1
Vanilla.

207 Pulverize 4RR Sorcery R You may sacrifice two mountains instead of paying pulverize's casting cost, destroy all artifacts.

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 2
Could see sideboard use against mono-brown.

208 Puppet's Verdict 1RR Instant R Flip a coin. If you win the flip, destroy all creatures with power 2 or less. If you lose the flip, destroy all creatures with power 3 or greater.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 2
I'm usually not a fan of coinflip cards, but this one is ok, because both results can be good. Still, I doubt it's good enough.

209 Robber Fly 2R Creature-Insect U 1/1. Flying. Whenever Robber Fly becomes blocked, defending player discards his or her hand, then draws that many cards.

==> TOUR: 1 - FUN: 3
What's the point of discouraging the blocking of a 1/1 flyer?

210 Rock Badger 4R Creature-Beast U 3/3. Mountainwalk. (This creature is unblockable as long as defending player controls a mountain.)

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 1
Severely overcosted.

211 Seismic Mage 3R Creature-Spellshaper R 1/1. 2R, T, Discard a card from your hand: Destroy target land.

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 3
Expensive, but very strong if he sticks around. It could be a one card lock, but the fragility will probably keep this from being great.

212 Shock Troops 3R Creature-Soldier C 2/2. Sacrifice Shock Troops: Shock Troops deals 2 damage to target creature or player.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 3
Mogg Fanatic's big brother. Nice, but overcosted.

213 Sizzle 2R Sorcery C Sizzle deals 3 damage to each opponent.

==> TOUR: 1 - FUN: 1
Utter crap. Probably meant for multiplayer, but unless you manage to kill everyone with it, it'll just make you a lot of enemies.

214 Squee, Goblin Nabob 2R Creature-Goblin Legend R 1/1. At the beginning of your upkeep, if Squee, Goblin Nabob is in your graveyard, you may return Squee to your hand.

==> TOUR: 5 - FUN: 5
No Goblin deck can do without Squee. He could also be surprisingly good as Masticore Fodder. It looks like he'll join the ranks of the select few cards whose main purpose is not getting cast: Gaea's Blessing, Guerilla Tactics, Mangara's Blessing etc.

215 Stone Rain 2R Sorcery C Destroy target land.

==> TOUR: 5 - FUN: 2
Filler. It's getting irritating that they keep reprinting cards that are in the basic set.

216 Tectonic Break XRR Sorcery R Each player sacrifices X lands.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 2
I can't see any use for this yet, but there might be. In land destruction I'd rather have a Wake of Destruction or Rain of Salt. At least they don't cost you land as well.

217 Territorial Dispute 4RR Enchantment R Players can't play lands. At the beginning of your upkeep, sacrifice Temporal Dispute unless you sacrifice a land.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 3
For 6 mana you get to stall your opponent, who is going to be so devastated that he can't play that seventh land yet. Not. This card is seriously overcosted.

218 Thieves' Auction 4RRR Sorcery R Set aside all permanents. You choose one of these cards and put it into play tapped under your control. Then your opponent chooses one of these cards and put it into play tapped under his or her control. Repeat this process until all cards set aside have been put back into play. (wording not official)

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 5
It's very hard to predict what this will do to the environment, but from the casting cost I'm willing to go out on a limb and say it won't get played. Wonderful card for multiplayer though.

219 Thunderclap 2R Instant C You may sacrifice a mountain instead of paying Thunderclap's mana cost. Thunderclap deals 3 damage to target creature.

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 2
It's no Fireblast, but with the downgrading of burn, I think this has become playable.

220 Tremor R Sorcery C Tremor deals 1 damage to each creature without flying.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 3
Not a bad little card, but 1 damage will only kill a few weenies, usually not all of them, so a control deck has little use for this when it can use Steam Blast or Earthquake. A weenie deck will end up killing its own creatures, so that's no good either.

221 Two-Headed Dragon 4RR Creature-Dragon R 4/4. Flying. 1R: Two-Headed Dragon gets +2/+0 until end of turn. Two-Headed Dragon can't be blocked except by two or more creatures. Two-Headed Dragon may block one additional creature. (All blocking must be legal.)

==> TOUR: 4 - FUN: 5
Lightning Dragon and Covetous Dragon will keep this from being the dragon of choice in tournament decks, but it's still a pretty good card with fitting abilities.

222 Uphill Battle 2R Enchantment U Creatures your opponents play come into play tapped.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 2
Mostly a limited version of Kismet. I can't see this getting used.

223 Volcanic Wind 4RR Sorcery U Volcanic Wind deals X damage divided as you choose among any number of target creatures, where X is the number of creatures in play.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 4
For 6 mana, you don't want a situational card like this. You give your opponent plenty of time to cast Wrath of God, making this an expensive Arc Lightning if that. Another great multiplayer card.

224 War Cadence 2R Enchantment U XR: Creature's can't block this turn unless their controller pays X for each blocking creature.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 3
Another anti-blockers card. Who knows, maybe red will switch to one of these now that its burn is getting more expensive. This one looks like it will cost too much mana for a weenie deck, though.

225 Warmonger 3R Creature-Monger R 3/3. 2: Warmonger deals 1 damage to all creatures and players. This ability may be played by any player.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 4
Pestilence on a stick. And it's not even black. Still, red has cheaper ways of killing creatures and this can easily be killed by the opponent.

226 Warpath 3R Instant R Warpath deals 3 damage to each blocking and blocked creature.

==> TOUR: 1 - FUN: 1
This'll never get played over Trumpet Blast. Nobody is that desperate for one more damage.

227 Wild Jhovall 3R Creature-Cat C 3/3.

==> TOUR: 2 - FUN: 2
Boring.

228 Word of Blasting 1R Instant U Destroy target Wall. That wall cannot regenerate this turn. ~this~ deals to that Wall's controller an amount of damage equal to the Wall's total casting cost.

==> TOUR: 3 - FUN: 4
There's just something primal and raw about blowing up walls. Still, it's a situational card and it remains to be seen whether this will get a spot in the sideboard.