Kiora, Sovereign of the Deep – Aftermath
Date Reviewed: May 26, 2023
Ratings:
Constructed: 2.0
Casual: 4.0
Limited: N/A
Multiplayer: 3.5
Commander [EDH]: 4.13
Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale. 1 is bad. 3 is average. 5 is great.
Reviews Below:
The creature Kiora seems to be leaning hard into Kiora’s favorite thing: summoning tentacles and supporting tentacles. Admittedly, Serpents lack tentacles, but that’s minor.
The idea of this Kiora seems to be to try and make every big creature a 2-for-1: you get that creature, and you might get a free spell with it. You can’t try some sort of cascading chain with this, but tacking a free spell onto an ostensibly large creature is a worthwhile deal, particularly with how expensive those tribes tend to be. This feels more like a casual, “fun” card, to b fair; Kiroa, Sovereign of the Deep isn’t a terrible body on her own thanks to protection, but she’s going to be the step before you go off, and a potentially necessary one. I do think she’s a solid threat for Commander, with her ability to amass massive value in a single turn, but she does feel a step too slow for more serious settings, not helped by supporting expensive tribes in a roundabout way.
Constructed: 2 (in addition to being expensive, Standard rarely has more than a couple of each of those in the format at a time)
Casual: 4
Limited: N/A (honestly probably a 2)
Multiplayer: 3.5
Commander [EDH]: 4.25
Kiora is an interesting example among the desparked planeswalkers, because her signature abilities work at least as well on a creature card. Maybe even better – after all, the main sea creature ramp commander before was Arixmethes, and it’s good to have choice. And if you wanted to make a deck for these particular creatures, who Kiora has referenced on other of her cards, this is the only pseudo-tribal card for them. On top of all that, she has surprisingly efficient stats and abilities, so you can sometimes just attack with her and win.
I feel like Krakens, Leviathans, Octopuses, and Serpents have enough co-support that they need a batch of some kind. Maybe “sea monsters” – that is the name of a card, though. Or “fathom creatures”? I’ll have to think about this . . .
Constructed: 2
Casual: 4
Limited: N/A
Multiplayer: 3.5
Commander [EDH]: 4
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