Constructed Average Rating:
3
Limited Average Rating: 3
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale
1 being the worst. 3 ... average.
5 is the highest rating.
DRY 1337
Today we
review Slash and Burn. It’s a card that comes with
the potential to cause devastation but the reason
why it gets little play is because of its limited
playability. You’re not always guaranteed to have
the perfect circumstances before using this card.
Slash and Burn
Cost: 4
Civilization: Dakness/Fire
Type: Spell
Rules Text:
· (This spell is put into your mana zone tapped.)
· Whenever any of your opponent's creatures is
destroyed this turn, your opponent chooses a card in
his mana zone and puts it into his graveyard. Then
he chooses one of his shields and puts it into his
graveyard.
Slash and Burn is one of those cards that reviewers
like me typically try to stay away from. The reason
is because these cards have promising effects but
under any normal circumstances they are useless.
Slash and Burn, for instance, asks that you destroy
at least one of your opponent’s creatures before you
can use the effect. If you cast the spell and end up
destroying nothing then you just threw a card away.
However when the timing is right, you’ll be able
wreak havoc on your opponent’s shields and mana.
So what’s the best way to set off the effect? It
would be easiest to destroy your opponent’s
creatures by using the effect of a spell or a
creature. The more creatures you destroy the better,
so we need to be creative. The problem is that this
spell costs 4 mana to begin with so that will pretty
much limit what you can do. For instance, a card
like Burst Shot, which costs 6 mana, would require
that you have 10 mana to start out with (4 + 6). We
start to see how much of a nuisance this becomes. We
can be really creative and use a spell like Intense
Evil to destroy Stallob, the Lifesquasher and the
rest of our field, which will result in card draw
and shield/mana destruction. Just remember that
Slash and Burn is still pretty good when you only
kill one creature because it sets your opponent
behind by one mana and it removes 1 shield. It’s
still somewhat of a good deal.
Even though it would seem more difficult to
guarantee a kill during the battle phase, it could
still prove to be a more effective strategy for
using Slash and Burn. The best way to abuse it is by
tapping Deklowaz, the Terminator and wiping out all
creatures with power 3000 or less. You can also
develop creative methods, such as casting slime veil
on the previous turn then attacking your opponent’s
creatures while they’re tapped. The light
civilization could also prove useful because of all
of the cheap tapping effects. Either way you have to
create the right conditions in order to use this
card.
The Good: You have the potential to eliminate your
opponent’s shields and mana.
The Bad: The card is conditional and very difficult
to use.
The Ugly: Topdeck this card and it’ll pretty much
become mana.
Constructed Rating: 3/5 – If it works then it’s a
beautiful thing. However once your opponent catches
on it’s not the best card to be using. At least if
you kill one creature you get something good out of
it.
Limited Rating: 3/5 – In limited you’ll only be
using this if you can kill just 1 creature, which
still isn’t bad. The card isn’t good but it’s also
not the worst thing.
Please feel free to post your comments, questions,
and/or objections on the Message Board and I’ll be
more than happy to respond. Happy dueling!
