One of the best new cards in Dominaria United is actually an old one. It’s the return of Liliana Vess, the dark lady from Magic: The Gathering. A healer turned necromancer who wears a cursed veil, makes deals with demons and looks like she knows all the lyrics of Nemesis from Shriekback (opens in new tab)Liliana Vess is so goth she shits on bats. I mean, her name is an anagram of “a villain” for God’s sake.
Liliana has appeared in various guises on various Magic cards over the years, most recently cameo appearance in the college-themed Strixhaven set as a professor of death magic. The Innistrad set introduced a particularly memorable incarnation of her in 2011, and it’s this that Dominaria United is reprinting: Liliana of the Veil, a planeswalker that makes players sacrifice creatures in-game and discard cards from their hand. She takes away a subpoena you played and then decreases the chances of you being able to replace it. Which is just mean.
In 2011, there weren’t many ways to counter Liliana of the Veil. Now there are more options, like Pioneer-sized Loxodon Smiter (a big elephant that jumps straight onto the battlefield for free if you need to throw it), and Tenacious Underdog in Standard (which bounces back out of your graveyard like it’s a trampoline), but Liliana is still a solid choice today.
She has been reprinted in the Dominaria United set to match the overall retro theme. As part of a celebration of Magic’s 30th anniversary, it returns to the original plane of the setting and is packed with legendary figures. In fact, opening a Collector booster pack makes it very unlikely that you’ll get a valuable card from the 1994 Legends expansion, as some of these old cards have been tucked into it, such as Willy Wonka’s golden tickets after being discovered in Forgotten suitcases in a closed warehouse.
It’s not as powerful a theme as the sets based on twisted fairy tales, urban fantasy, cyberpunk Japan, or whatever if Harry Potter wasn’t so bad, but in my mind the actual theme of Dominaria United is “let’s make black cards that damn rule”.
Check out Sheoldred of the Apocalypse, a 4/5 Legendary that gives you two lives when you draw a card, and takes two lives from opponents when they draw. Evolved Sleeper starts out as a one-mana throwaway and gets stronger the more mana you pump into it, staying relevant in later turns, and different cards work with your graveyard in fun ways. Urborg Repossession lets you bring creatures back to life, and Writhing Necromass is a 5/5 bomb with deathtouch that costs one point less for each creature in your graveyard.
I won a few games at a Jumpstart event this week by playing Writhing Necromass early, the cost has come down thanks to the pile of kills I built up in the early turns – although I’ve survived up to that point to get a to give it a different color thanks to the white half of my deck. I don’t think it’s just about black. Dominaria United gives white a lot of cards with enlist, and a killer Defender called Wingmantle Chaplain I’ve already dealt with a card game built in Arena. It summons a 1/1 bird for every other Defender you have or play, so my opponent stringed together Shield-Wall Sentinels – Defenders that allow you to search your deck for another Defender to put in your hand when you play them – and each used to find another, while growing their bird army at the same time.
Meanwhile, red gets a boost when you’re big on goblins – which of course you should be – thanks to Rundvelt Hordemaster, who gives +1/+1 to other gobbos and a chance to play another goblin when one dies, and Squee , Dubious Monarch, who creates free goblins when attacked. Red also gets Phoenix Chick, one of the many flying creatures in Dominaria United – in all colors, not just white who usually gets the lion’s share – who is in a hurry and can return from the graveyard with +1/+1. Arguably the main perk of the Phoenix Chick is how cute it is, which made me feel really guilty when I cut it off by casting Cut Down in a face-to-face game.
Green’s best new cards seem to be the ones that go well with other suits thanks to the Domain keyword, which gives increasing bonuses based on how many different types of land you have. Herd Migration gives you a 3/3 beast for each land type, Nishoba Brawler has a power equal to the number of different land types, and Sunbathing Rootwalla (which looks like a frill-necked lizard (opens in new tab) and I hope it goes like this) can spend four mana to temporarily get +1/+1 per country type.
As for blue, nobody cares because it’s full of annoying counters and interrupts and only played by cowards and reprobate (don’t mind the multiple copies of Negate and the new Ertai Resurrected in my deck). Blue can indeed make interesting use of the new Kicker keyword, which adds effects for extra mana costs. Timed Interference, which gives a creature -1 strength, can be kicked to force the weakened creature extra to block, while Protect the Negotiators counters a spell, unless the caster pays extra mana for each creature you control, and can be kicked to you a 1/1 soldier first, increasing the cost the other player has to pay. Classic blue card shenanigans, but I respect it.
Early in the life of a new set, sometimes mono-color decks rise to the top as players slowly expand their collections and unlock the best combos and counters. For example, Sheoldred, the Apocalypse, a sort of Cenobitic centipede woman with a million legs, can be taken off the board with a simple citizen’s arrest. (If you’re having trouble imagining what that would look like, the excellent Twitter account MTG taste judge drawings (opens in new tab) did the heavy lifting.)
There’s a lot of potential for things to be shaken up once someone discovers a ridiculous interaction with some of the new cards like Serra Paragon (a white angel that lets you play land or spells that cost 3 or less from your graveyard), or Silverback Elder (a green monkey shaman who lets you choose between destroying an artifact/enchantment, playing a land if it has one in the top five cards in your library, or getting 4 lives each time you play another being summons).
Right now it is time for mono-black to reign, a dark lord on a dark throne. Enjoy this moment while it lasts, swamp dwellers and wizards of death. They’re coming soon enough for your Sisters of Mercy collection on vinyl.
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