Blade Cycle

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Hello again - I am freshly returned to civilisation from the barren tundras of northern Ontario and am more than excited to be able to get internet access again . . . (I think I was having web withdrawals).

Today, I'll yatter about a random Alara Reborn cycle. A simple cycle (or horizontal cycle), usually just called a cycle, often consisting of five cards within a set, one in each color (or shard as in the Shards of Alara block). I wanted to post some summaries of cycles within the Alara Reborn and there happens to several nice ones to choose from ; Allied-colored equipments, Blades, Borderposts, Dual-Landcyclers, Hybrid-cyclers, Sojourners, etc. Today I will hit up the 'Blade Cycle'.

Our contestants for the blade cycle are Bant Sureblade, Esper Stormblade, Grixis Grimblade, Jund Hackblade, and Naya Hushblade. Each of these are common 2/1 creatures have a converted mana cost of two with one hybrid mana and one other mana colour. The colour represents which shard they represent as shown below . . .

Bant : {G/U}W
Esper : {W/B}U
Grixis : {U/R}B
Jund : {B/G}R
Naya : {R/W}G

Each creature in this blade cylce has the text "As long as you control another multicolored permanent, (creature name) gets +1/+1 and has [ability word]".

Bant : First Strike
Esper : Flying
Grixis : Deathtouch
Jund : Haste
Naya : Shroud

The best two in this cycle appear to be Jund Hackblade and Naya Hushblade, since the haste and shroud abilities tend to give the most grief to your opponent, especially when dropped at turn 2 or 3. The player should not get too attached to these critters due to the ease of removal given a toughness of just 2 but should rather think of these as being able to potentially disrupt the early game or getting in early hits . . . these are expendible.

The Alara Reborn borderposts will work quite nicely with the new Alara blade cycle. These multi-colour artifacts could be dropped as early as turn one to provide you with the cowbell required for your particular blade - example -

Turn One - Play land, Firewild Borderpost
Turn Two - Play land, Jund Hackblade

Jund Hackblade is now the fully enhanced 3/2 hasty little monster that you want him to be.

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Something altogether different now . . .

I will be checking out the relative worth of Alara Reborn Singles Prices. Below are the approximate price of cards which have not seen too much change in the last week or so.

1) Maelstrom Pulse ($18)
2) Jenara, Asura of War ($12)
3) Meddling Mage ($12)
4) Lord of Extinction ($10)
5) Sen Triplets ($10)
6) Dauntless Escort ($7)
7) Thought Hemorrhage ($7)
8) Uril, the Miststalker ($6)
9) Spellbreaker Behemoth ($4)
10) Sphinx of the Steel Wind ($4)