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Pojo's Magic The Gathering
Card of the Day

Daily Since November 2001!

Trading Post
Image from Wizards.com

Trading Post
- M2013

Reviewed September 13, 2012

Constructed: 3.75
Casual: 3.90
Limited: 3.20
Multiplayer: 3.20

Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale
1 being the worst.  3 ... average.  
5 is the highest rating

Click here to see all of our 
Card of the Day Reviews 

BMoor

Trading Post

It's a fun card to read and think about-- it's neat the way all four of its abilities chain into each other. Activating all four in a row (over four turns) would leave you up 3 life and possibly have improved what's in your hand, but it takes four untappings of the Post to do that. If I had four turns, I certainly hope the Post isn't the most impressive thing I'm doing. And if I had a way to repeatedly untap an artifact, Trading Post is on Page 306 of the list of artifact combos I'd use with a repeatable untap effect, right after Pest Generator + Krark-Clan Ironworks + Dragon Appeasement.

So it's not quite a one-card combo, but could it be a combo piece in four different decks? It has four activated abilities. The first one is a decent discard outlet if you're playing Madness decks, Hellbent, or some kind of graveyard recursion. The second one makes a Goat token for 1 life, which is fair I suppose, but hardly impressive. The third one just screams to be put in a Sharuum Commander deck, or could be used to bounce a pair of Solemn Simulacrums back and forth for all the land fetching and card drawing you could want-- if you have time and mana to recast each Simulacrum. And the fourth? Well, if your artifact is about to be Shattered, why not sack it for a card? At the worst, the Trading Post can be a cantrip if you're desperate and need to dig.

I don't know if there's any deck that really needs Trading Post, but I doubt there's a deck that can't find a use for it. With four abilities, it's quite possible that on any given turn, you'll have a use for it. Just as the name suggests, it lets you trade whatever you've got a surplus of-- cards in hand, creatures, artifacts, or life-- for something else. It'd be good to have in a stalemate, and it can really open up some options for you.

Constructed- 3.75
Casual- 4
Limited- 2.5
Multiplayer- 4


David Fanany

Player since 1995


Trading Post
 
As the latest in the "lots of slightly different abilities" line of cards, Trading Post definitely rewards those who take the time to analyze it. I admit that I tend to sort of drift off when I read some of the longer synergy or combo cards - my early decks had cards like War Mammoth and Scathe Zombies, if we go back far enough - but Trading Post jumped out at me as one of the most interesting. It almost reminds me of the Stations from Fifth Dawn, where the abilities lead in a "circle" and take over the game, except on one card rather than four. That means that you can devote pretty much all of the rest of your deck to things that support or protect it, which is a very good thing for combo players.
 
Constructed: 3/5
Casual: 4/5
Limited: 3/5
Multiplayer: 3/5

Paul

Welcome back readers todays card of the day is Trading Post an amazing engine card that has seen some play in standard formats in combination with artifacts. In standard this card has seen some play in black control shells combined with artifacts such as Ichor Wellspring and ilk to grind out incremental advantage, the sheer amount of things one can do with Trading Post and how they build on top of one another makes it a great but sometimes slow source of advantage. In modern I can foresee this card seeing fringe play as it allows some artifact shenanigans and in legacy and vintage I feel its too slow to have a profound impact. In casual and multiplayer this card provides a multitude of effects that are beneficial to provide a solid defense and a way to reuse and repurpose resources. Trading Post is an engine card and provides some sweet incremental advantage. In limited its  solid and if you can draft around the engine quality it may prove to be a solid card. Overall a card with constructed and casual applications and who doesent love goat tokens?
 
Constructed: 3.0
Casual: 3.5
Limited: 3.0
Multiplayer”3.0

Michael "Maikeruu" Pierno

Today's card of the day is Trading Post which is a four mana artifact with four effects which each include a cost of one mana and tapping to activate in addition to loss of something.  The first is discard a card to gain four life which should rarely be used outside of wanting a specific card in the graveyard or a few situations where burn, evasive, or Trample damage will only not win the game if you have four more life.  The second effect is probably going to be used the most as it is pay one life for a 0/1 token which can of course block a big attacker or be sacrificed for other effects.  The third effect of sacrificing a creature to return an artifact to hand can be very useful in an artifact heavy design or one that has a sacrifice engine in place.  The last is good when used on tokens or in response to removal, but can also be combined with expended charge counters or other reduced effectiveness choices.  Overall this is a very versatile card that can see play in numerous deck types, though it isn't extremely powerful in any one regard the number of options it offers means it almost always has something it can do.
 
For Limited the main benefit will be creating tokens barring a decent artifact pool for the third and fourth effects, but just that one effect alone makes this a first pick and the potential for other uses is just icing on the cake.  The token generation can shut down an opponent's primary offense and without one can swiftly make a wall of blockers should they be needed.  If needed the first effect can provide a safety buffer for summoning more tokens.  As an artifact this is an easy inclusion in any Sealed build as well and there really is no downside to using this in any Limited deck.
 
Constructed: 4.0
Casual: 4.0
Limited: 4.5
Multiplayer: 4.0

John
Shultis
Phoenix
Gaming

     Welcome to the Pojo.com card of the day section. Today we are looking at Trading Post from M13. Trading Post is a rare artifact that costs four generic mana. Trading Post has four abilities. Pay one generic mana, tap, discard a card: Gain 4 life. pay one generic mana, tap, pay 1 life: put a 0/1 white Goat creature token onto the battlefield. Pay one generic mana, tap, sacrifice a creature: Return target artifact card from your graveyard to your hand. Pay one generic mana, tap, sacrifice an artifact: draw a card.

     This card so totally reminds me of the cycle of Stations from Mirrodin, only this time they are all in one. Crazy good card when utilized properly. There are so many ways of breaking this card, most of them in older formats. Because of the way combos are so easily broken, I won't go into details.

     Even in its Standard form, it can still be a useful card. In a token based deck, the sacrifce a creature could help get back a decent artifact you may have lost. The discard for 4 life is also nice, since flashback is a decent way to go.

     This card is a lot of fun, and I have seen it used many interesting ways.
 
Limited: 3/5
Constructed: 4/5
Casual: 4/5
Multiplayer: 2/5


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