Welcome back to the Friday Card Review! This week, I wanted to talk about a card from the latest Spider-Man set. Even though this set just released, I feel like we’ve already launched into Llorwyn and right over the Avatar set. To be honest, I haven’t found a ton of Avatar cards to be excited about, which is what drove me to look through the Spider-Man set page on EDHREC.
I wasn’t expecting much. The prerelease for Spider-Man was pretty lackluster and, especially because I was sick last week, I’ve avoided playing on Arena because Spider-Man cards are Standard legal. I just wasn’t ready to look at them. But as I went through, I found some stand-outs I wanted to share with you.
Cheering Crowd is an interesting piece of Group Hug that we don’t see often in Gruul. For Commander deckbuilding I think this card pairs well with Meria, Scholar of Antiquity or Svella, Ice Shaper, both of whom can take advantage of a huge burst in colorless mana.
For Standard, my thoughts immediately went to Jund Big Mana. With Doubling Season, Innkeeper’s Talent, and Exsanguinate all Standard Legal, I could see some very silly interactions happening.
Jackal is one of the few Commanders from the Spider-Man set that simultaneously feels very “solved” while allowing for a lot of in-game variance. We’ve been doing Simic cloning and counters for a long time, but smart players will have to navigate both deckbuilding and mulligans carefully in order to maximize Jackal’s abilities enough to win. You’ll want enough cards at the early ends of CMC that are also worth cloning.
I don’t think I could talk about this set without mentioning Spider-Woman, Stunning Savior. Allowing people to have this effect as an Azorius commander with flying will be the downfall of many local hasty metas.
Symbiote Spider-Man is perfect for the current era of Sultai in MTG. Cards that trigger off of cards leaving the graveyard are plentiful after Tarkir: Dragonstorm and Symbiote Spider-Man allows you to continue setting up more of those triggers while providing wonderful card selection.
Of the cards that I think will sell years from now, I think Strength of Will is a card you should grab while it’s cheap. We have seen cards like Tamiyo’s Blessing rise in price consistently over time. Strength of Will isn’t as good as Tamiyo’s Blessing because the latter has the flexibility of protecting any permanent, but Strength of Will can give your Commander some huge counter-attack potential, especially if it has trample.
Those are some of the best cards I have seen, but feel free to send your favorites to [email protected] if you want to see me talk about them.